Write to Rank: 2023

Red Belt: Eccentric Lunacy

The blood was sickly sweet on Gretel's candy cane blades. Two front guards fell to the ground, their licorice armor pierced by her weapon. Her tight black leather armor comforted her while she moved past the bread gates into the castle courtyard. The air stung with sweet aromas. Gretel was grateful for her mask as the smells had made her sick since she and Hansel started this work six years ago.

Candy Castle of Candy Land was everything she'd imagined: gumdrop grass, massive ice cream cone shaped pillars, walls of cake, and each building topped in heaps of cotton candy. Gretel stood in the middle of the courtyard with sugar spun candy roses rising to her knees. There were at least a hundred roses for nobility and the king to gawk at. Gretel would have considered them beautiful if they'd been anywhere else, but here the obvious display of classism made her blood boil.

She had one goal: to make as much noise as possible.

Her brother would complete his role, and she would do the same. Glancing around, she wondered why the guards hadn't come yet. Her brother would know; he was always far more into politics and the inner workings of humanity than she. But it was no matter, she would make them come.

Gretel strode froward, ignoring the candy Blox. She lifted a boot, stepping onto a rose. A satisfying crunch sounded while the fragile sugar crumbed into dozens of pieces. A lock of blonde hair untucked itself from her hood, flying in front of her blue eyes.

She swung out her blades, and the sound of two more roses breaking left her giddy. Her boisterous laugh echoed through the courtyard while she destroyed rose after rose. Sugar glistened around her, spraying onto the ground.

Footsteps neared, and she smiled. Finally, someone's paying attention.

She faced six more guards suited in licorice. She sharpened her candy cane daggers with one another, holding her position.

Bring it.

~ ~ ~

"My lord," Hansel said, hinging at the hip.

The dining room was a cacophony of voices. King Kandy sat at the head of the table with Queen Frostine at the other end. The queen's long blue hair stretched to the floor while her white and blue gown bellowed around her. Between them, their sixteen children stuffed their large cheeks full of delicacies he and Gretel only dreamed of. Lord Licorice, dressed in his black and red armor, loomed in the corner next to the queen, their affair far from a secret.

"What is it, boy?" Kandy's fingers burrowed into a slab of meat. He took a large bite, juices spraying into his pink beard and mustache. He was plumper than any man Hansel had ever met, though the thick candy armor did him no favors.

"Would his majesty like to step out?" Hansel asked, keeping his bowed position. He was pushing Kandy's temper, but if he could get the king to follow through, Gretel wouldn't have to fight anymore. Any pain he could save his sister would be worth it.

His cheek stung when the king backhanded him. "Insolent brat. You know better than to interrupt my dinner. Perhaps you need another lesson tonight."

Hansel's body tensed. The scars were still fresh from two nights ago.

"That's what I thought." Kandy grinned, the expression the same as when he forced Hansel to unclothe before leaving him to bleed on the cold stone floor. "If you have news, you can announce it, otherwise be quiet and only seen when I want you."

He stepped back behind the king. Did he chance telling the room that there was an intruder or did he chance the spotters telling Kandy first? For the past four months, Hansel had hinted to the king that he had foresight or some magical ability. He couldn't say it directly or he'd be punished by the law against magic. But if he hinted, the king would grow curious—as he had—and the more curious he became, the more vulnerable he was.