The Dark Princess

Mary

In the dream, I was my father the day he died, but the dream was wrong. In the dream, he didn't die. Instead, as the evil Sasha started to deliver her death blow, she stopped herself, her sword inches from the king's neck. Her head tilted like she was listening to something, but I couldn't hear anything. Then she moved her sword so the hilt was facing the king's head and slammed it down, knocking him out.

I should tell you something here. I am the princess, Mary, and I will be telling every other chapter of the story. Anyway, back to the dream. Sasha's eyes flashed, like I'd come to know meant that a person was using magic, and the king levitated. Then she ran back to her horse, the king magically following her, and hopped on it. My father fell into the black chariot just as the sorceress started galloping away. Then, for just a second, the image changed. Instead of Sasha riding the black stallion, there was a dark-haired boy, and instead of my father in the chariot, there was Brooke, hands and feet tied and mouth gagged, eyes streaming tears as she was driven away. That was when the dream ended, and I woke up to Brooke screaming.

***

 It took me hours to get her to calm down enough to stop screaming, and even then she couldn't tell me what the dream was about for a while.

Her breathing was shaky as she stuttered out, "Pap-pa . . . h-he died . . . j-just died . . . we couldn't-we couldn't help him. He d-d-died p-protecting me."

That's all she could say for a while, she was sobbing so hard. I started crying too. Brooke's Papa wasn't really her dad, but he might as well have been. Ruden had been one of the few soldiers who survived the war against Sasha's armies. He'd been on his way home when he passed the flooded village where Brooke had been born. It had turned into one of the four large ponds of northeast Colland. Ruden had to walk around the flooded town to get home, and on his way around the west bank, he heard the scream-like crying of a baby. He immediately ran toward the sound, and when he got there, what he saw nearly made him pass out. Of course, the baby in question was Brooke, but it wasn't the actuall baby that scared this former soldier, it was the fact that she was "flickering". This is what we call it when a Halfsie constantly switches from their normal human form to a fireborn, dewdrop, mudslide, etc. and back again. The wonderful man understood immediately. The town had flooded, nobody had made it out except for those who could breathe underwater. This child was only half dewdrop, so she had probably lost a parent, maybe both, due to the recent war between the fireborn and dewdrop people. In the end, Ruden left a note, held there by a rock.

People of this forsaken town, I found a young child

laying on the banks of this sad new pond, if any

survivors are missing a newborn babe, my name

is Ruden, and I live in the town of Din that lies at

the edge of this very Kingdom.

 He then went home with the young Brooke, every day hoping in vain that her family would come looking for her.

So you can see why Brooke then spent all day quietly weeping as she did her chores. The three days after the dream, she wasn't weeping, but she never said a word to anyone. She was depressed, and I wasn't sure why. The only explanation was that she thought the dream might be real. I started going really easy on her unless something absolutely had to be done. That was before she got sick. When she got sick, I had my suspicions that the dream might be causing the coughing and bloodshot eyes, but I wasn't sure how. I begged her to take at least one day off, but she just went on with whatever chore she was doing like she'd never heard me. One day, she started talking again, but only in small words. I still took it easy on her, but there were things that really needed to be done, and she was the only person to do them. Eventually, I had to send her out into the forest at the edge of the town surrounding us to pick up some herbs for the physician. When she didn't come back, I went out looking for her. What I saw sent off all kinds of alarms in my head. 

Before I even got down the front stairs of the castle, I could see explosions of green light and blackness. The green light seemed to be getting less frequent, while the blackness stayed the same. I ran; I'd seen Brooke's magic in action, and there was always a green swirl when she used it. I was almost to the forest when the explosions both stopped. About three seconds later, another explosion of blackness hit, bigger than all the others. The blackness seemed to suck all the light out of the air, making it momentarily dark as night in all the Seventh Kingdom. The sound could be heard all the way to the First Kingdom, I'm sure. Then Quiet.

I finally arrived at the battle scene. A small, dark-haired boy was leaning against a tree, and he looked ready to pass out. Brooke lay on the ground, unconscious, surrounded by blackness. I tried to go to her, but apparrently the boy wasn't as weak as he looked. He stood up straight and pionted his finger at me. Darkness surged from his fingertip and flooded over me. I couldn't see, but this lasted only a few seconds. When I could see again, I saw that the boy had passed out. I looked at Brooke hopefully, but she was still unconscious. I also noticed a basket next to her full of greens. Well, I thought, a little unstable, at least we have something to heal them with when I get them back to the castle.