The One They Call Dark One

1) Dancing With The Darkness

"Mother? My corset! It's too tight on me!" Princess Emma cried, as the maids tightened her corset even further. Her mother rushed into the room, sendings he maids off elsewhere down the halls of the castle. "Oh, I'm sorry sweetie. We're just all so excited about your big day! Today's the day you are to find a suitor! Isn't that great Emma?" He mother jumped up and down, to energetic to contain her happiness.

Emma groaned, brushing her hair through her hands, "Mother, I told you. Today is my big day, and it is I who chooses when I may have a suitor. I want to marry out of love, not by force. I want to be just like you and father!" She moped, her mother embracing her into a deep hug. "Oh, honey, I know. I know, but we can't doddle! The Dark Kingdom has been too quite for decades, and we must be prepared-"

"-before they try to kill us. I know, I know, I know. Mother, if the Dark One hasn't been in business with our kingdom for years, why must we worry? For all we know, he could be an ally in years to come." Emma suggested, her mother roughly placing her finger over her daughter's lips for silence. "Emma Swan we do not dare to speak of a creature like that with such kindness, and you know that! He is in the shadows, and it shall stay that way. We cannot interfere with his duties, nor will he with ours. As long as you don't summon him, we're safe."

Emma crossed her arms in a moment of rage as she stomped towards her bed, falling face first into her soft pale pick sheets. "I just don't understand mother...why do we fear what we don't understand? We feared fire for centuries back in the day, but now we grew to love it's warmth. Can't that be the same with the Dark One?" Her mother sighed, her arms let loose still holding the tiara, "Some things are just meant to be feared my dearest Emma. And the Dark One being one of them."

"Here, you must've go around dancing with decent men without a decent tiara." He mother smiled, placing the golden tiara atop of her head. Emma smiled in return, placing a gentle hand over her mother's arm, "I apologize mother. I will try to see a man for tonight." Her mother smiled with a single tear falling from her eye as hope filled her heart.

Turning back her mother left, leaving her daughter alone in her bedroom tower once again. She laid back down onto her bed, gripping the sheets as her angry was all in her head, "The Dark One...hm, how bad can he be? He's just an immortal and very powerful dark arts' wizard. What could be wrong with that?" She pondered for the next three minutes about the Dark One, until her bedroom door was swung open by her eleven year old brother Neal.

"Emma! Father wants you in the war room- um, what're you doing lying bed wearing that?" He asked, pointing at my dress I was meant to wear at the ball tonight. I sat up, laughing, "No worries Neal, I'll be fine. Go play with the guards or in the garden, will you?" Neal giggled like the child he was, and ran down the corridors, overhearing him laughing with one of the guards. "He's such a baby..."

She walked down the empty halls of her castle, barely noticing the paintings on her wall for she has starred at them for years on end. Her heels hitting the tiled floor with ever step she took, the sound echoing through the halls. She made her way towards her father's studies, pushing open the grand doors towards the war room. A circular table of stone in the centre of the room, taking my spot beside her father.

The round table was of the seven dwarves, Granny, my father and herself. Her mother, sadly was too busy planning the ball to attend. "As you may know, my daughter's ball is tonight. Which one of you know any royals throughout the realms that'd be perfect for my daughter?" Her father asked throughout the group. She punched his arm, even if it was played with armour, "Father! I am not to wed anyone unless it's out of love! Arranged marriages aren't for me!"

"Oh, alright fine. At least dance with a few please?" Her father asked, to where Emma nodded with an displeased sigh. She stood from her chair, and said, "If this ball is just for me to get a suitor, then I'm not going." She huffed, walking out of the room and slammed the door heading to her quarters.