The Dark Princess

Milo

I'll admit, I was a little stunned by Booke's powers. First she bursts the lock on my door with a thought, then later she holds it closed against my strength (and I am strong; believe me) with only her willpower. I only beat her in either duel because I'd had practice (and plenty of it), and she hadn't. At twelve years old, I had already bested hundreds of . . . things. Don't get me wrong, I had fought real people, but my mom (you'll remember she's an evil sorceress) had mostly sent me out to defeat monstrous leaders of various armies. The people who weren't criminals wouldn't know this, but the "Dark Princess" was gathering every foul or magical creature in the entire realm of Lithingdell to create the ultimate unbeatable army. Not a single kingdom in the whole realm would be able to stay anti-magic when she was done with them. Unfortunately, she kept sending me to do her dirty work. Example A: kidnapping Brooke the only person other that Her Majesty that was a full witch . . . as far as we knew, anyway.

Well, back to what happened when Brooke thought she could beat me and got creamed. Twice.

When she passed out, I just stood there for a moment, enjoying the minute-long moment of . . . happy. (By the way, my theory is that everyone has magic, but refuses to use it, and that's good for them, because if you use magic once . . . well, there's no such thing as using magic just once, because there's this minute-long elation that happens when you use it. The moment of ridiculous happiness is immediately addicting, and eventually magic becomes your whole life. It's like the saying "live by the sword, die by the sword", except with magic instead of swords.)

I had just started forward to drag her behind the bed when she suddenly sat up, smiling sleepily, eyes still closed. "Milo," she said, "I thought thiss day would come. That'ss why I ssent her the dream, you know." That's when her eyes opened, but they weren't her eyes, they were a misty grey . . . completely, whites and everything. I stumbeled back in surprise and (I admit) fright. Yes, lots of fright. Not-Brooke laughed, and I noticed for the first time that her voice was more like the hissing of a snake. "Yesss, Milo, I know your name, I know everything. For you sssee, I am the original Prophecy Ssspirit. I have even spoken to your mother onccce or twiccce." I was completely freaked out by now, and with the whole prophecy thing, and the grey eyes, and the hissing voice, I had every reason to be. "I'm here, however, for you," the freaky prophecy spirit said through Brooke. "You ssee, I have told your mottther a not-sso-little ssssecret, and in ssso doing, I have put your and Brooke'sss livesss in danger."

She waved her hand, and some mist floated through the window to make a kind of screen. Scenes appeared in it, Brooke and I were on a battlefield, standing back to back. There were battles raging on all around us, and I recognized a couple of the monsters as members of my mother's army. We were disintegrating monsters left and right, one after another, but there were just so many more. Then a man appeared through the crowd, and Brooke ran to him, leaving me to fight on my own. She got to the man just as a throwing knife punctured his abdomen. There wasn't any sound in the misty screen, but it was clear that Brooke was devastated. A magical shield appeared around them as Brooke knealt by him, and I realized it was me who was protecting them. The man died right in front of her, and her eyes filled with anger. She took the knife that had killed the man and stood, angrily swirling her hand in the air. A portal appeared, and she threw the knife through it with all her might. Just then the shield started to flicker, drawing my attention to myself in the mist. The portal had been diverted at the last second, no doubt by my mother, to me. The knife had come sailing through and had hit me in the chest. The wound was fatal. I looked back to Brooke, who was turning to come back to fight  by my side, and saw the horror on her face when she saw the knife. I saw her open her mouth to wail, and she fell to her knees, sobbing. Then another portal opened behind her, and my evil mother stepped through, a sword in her hand, and swung at Brooke's neck. The image shattered an instant before it hit it's mark.

During this whole thing I wanted to look away, but I couldn't. Some kind of magic was holding me there, forcing me to watch the gruesome scene unfold. And when it was done, I stumbled back, horrified. "Yesss," the she-demon possessing Brooke's body said, "Terrible, isn't it?"

(A.N.) I know, I know, it's a really short chapter, but it just felt right to end it there. (for the record, I'm just typing this, not writing it down except for sometimes I have nothing better to do, and that's when I write it down)