Ever After High: Forbidden

Forbidden

The night was calm. The air was still.

Tonight was a beautiful night.

Duchess laid there on the dew tainted grass. She was looking up into the night sky.

On a night as clear as this one, you could see everything. Even the second star on the left was out tonight; but she wasn't focused on that.

She only had eyes for one star.

The brightest star in the sky, the first one she saw that night.

As she lay on the soft patch of grass, she could not tear her gaze away. It was the one thing that drew the most attention, the one that stuck out the most. Every student made a wish on the wishing star. Perhaps for love, money, or just a happily ever after.

Not Duchess.

She stopped making wishes to the wishing star a long time ago.

Now, the only thing the star meant to her was some memories.

She still remembered them.

The small details were fuzzy; she couldn't remember how old she was with the first memory. Was she three? Was she four? Maybe she was five? She didn't know, all that she did know was that she was at an age where she didn't understand the world. She didn't understand just how cruel reality was. That night should have been her first sign.

She was just a small child, and just like many children during such nights she had nightmares. The routine of a nightmare would have been the same, she would wake up during the night and cry from the fear of the images that she had to bear witness created from her very own mind, then her parents would come rushing to calm their crying baby girl – this night did not go the routine.

"Ma...ma..."a young Duchess sat in bed, trying to speak out between sobs, "ma...ma..." she cried out for help again and again – but no hero came to her rescue. This should have been her first hint about the real world. The young girl sobbed silently to herself, waiting for someone to come sooth her.

But no one came to her room.

The shock of fear was beginning to disappear, her heartrate started to go back to normal. The lucid state of her started to disappear, her vision started to clear. She finally was able to notice that she was no longer in the nightmare world, but that she was in fact in her bedroom; albeit alone.

"Mama?" Duchess called out.

But no one came.

For a child, the darkness was a scary thing. Even a young Duchess couldn't just go back to sleep after the event that had just taken place. She made her move.

Crawling out of the bed, she grabbed her little stuffed frog that she had always slept with and made her way to the door to her bedroom. She opened the door. She could hear some noise from down the hallway.

The hallway was quiet. Unlike most children of her status, Duchess didn't live in any extravagant house or anything of the like. It was just a simple log cabin, fit for three: a child and her two parents. That was the essentials this family needed. Duchess made her way to her parent's bedroom.

Though the halls were not long or big; to a child's, the night made everything seem scary. To a small child that had only just awoken from a nightmare, the shadows themselves would cause her to remember her horrific time earlier.

Duchess squeezed the stuffed frog tighter in her arms; squeezing it closer and closer to her heart – hoping that if she held it close enough, it would protect her. If she kept going, the shadows weren't going to reach her. Once she made it through the dark tunnel she was going to find her happy place.