Hell Hath No Fury Like the Devil's Daughter Scorned [NaNoWriMo 2013]

Chapter 2: Travel

Dedicated to AubreyEatsHearts - love her works The Replacement Girlfriend and Late Summer Rain (cost me so much tears), hope she returns to Wattpad soon! I'm just one of her many fans who miss her :(

“So, how are we supposed to leave Hell?” Oria asked, looking at me.

We were standing at the harbor, facing the water. As usual, the harbor was filled with denizens of Hell milling around, though not all were seeking to leave. Some were there simply because they had nothing better to do. After all, when you’re supposed to spend eternity in Hell, even your favorite pastime gets boring after a while, right?

“I mean,” Oria continued, “even if nobody recognizes us so far, someone on the boat might recognize us and we’ll be in trouble before we even leave. The Master will place us under constant surveillance and there’s no way we’ll ever be able to leave again, until-”

I clamped my hand onto Oria’s mouth, stopping her from saying anything more. I did not want to hear what she had to say. Oria thrashed around, trying to get my hand away from her face. Shaking my head, I let my hand drop back to my side.

“What was that for!” Oria practically exploded, glaring at me. To use one of the humans’ phrases, if looks could kill, I would have been burned by fire many times over. That is, if she even gets the chance to kill me. I’m Lucifer’s daughter, for crying out loud! I’m so well-trained that my trainers regret teaching me 500 different ways of killing an enemy with fire because I’ll practise on them - with less lethal blows, of course. And I have nothing to do with having at least 14 different trainers every year, I swear!

“You know what it was for! Don’t you dare mention it to me again!” I fired back, giving her a glare of my own.

Oria folded her arms and looked away, though she still wore an expression of annoyance. “Alright,” she muttered reluctantly, still displeased with the way I’d treated her.

I didn’t reply, averting my gaze. I knew she didn’t mean to say what she had almost said. Oria’s tactlessness was known throughout the entire palace, but I knew she had no malicious intent. In a place where everyone only did anything if it benefited them, Oria was practically an angel. However, Oria was certainly no fool; those that tried to make use of her, well, let’s just say they never dared to do it again. Many had sported mysterious bruises and injuries after Oria found out about their intents, which they well deserved.

Knowing this, I wondered if Oria would have done more if I wasn’t the princess. Given Oria’s headstrong personality, she would have continued to argue with me if only to prove her point. Yet as far as I can remember, she had always let me win most, if not all, of our arguments. When I was younger I was happy to win our arguments, but as I grew older I started to resent Oria’s acquiescence because of my position. Even though I had told her on multiple occasions to treat me as equals, Oria never listened to me. I sighed, hoping that I could get her to change her attitude towards me with this little ‘trip’.

Just then, a bell rang. “All aboard!” called someone, which I knew was an imitation of what human sailors did.

“Let’s go,” I said in a clipped tone, although I was upset at her bowing to me as the princess than the topic she had almost broached. Oria nodded to show that she heard me, then gathered our belongings, all the while never meeting my eyes.

I took two sweets from my pocket and handed one to Oria. “Put this in your mouth. It will change your appearance temporarily, which should last us for the boat trip,” I instructed.

Oria took it and examined it curiously, never having seen it before. Of course she hadn’t; it was created during one of my ‘experiments’, although it was a serendipitous discovery since it wasn’t what I had intended to make. I never thought it would come into use at a time like this either, but now I was just grateful that I had these to make my escape.

“Only for the boat ride? But what about the rest of the time? If you retained your human appearance, then we’ll be discovered quickly,” Oria pointed out, putting aside her feelings towards me for the time being.

Oria brought up a good point that I hadn’t thought about until now. I had no response to that, but years of princess training kicked in - I instantly put on a calm face, merely saying, “We’ll deal with that later.”

“You don’t have to pretend, Princess. I know you don’t know what to do. We’ll think of something later,” Oria said softly, then proceeded towards the ship with our bags in hand. I stared after her. Darn! She really knew me well…

I caught up to Oria just as she passed two coins to the demon behind the counter, who flashed us a smile and waved us through. Catching a glimpse of the nametag on his uniform, I had to stifle a giggle. Of course he had to be named Charon, didn’t he?

As we reached the ship’s deck, Oria put down our bags, giving me an opportunity to look around. The ship was in worse shape than I expected. The metal railings were rusty and the sides of the ship was covered in algae and whatnot. I let out a squeak unintentionally when I saw what looked like a hellrat scurrying across the deck. Gross! Didn’t the crew or whoever maintained the ship knew how unhygienic it was to have these vile creatures running around? Who knew where they had gone before coming onboard the ship?!

Oria nudged me, not very softly. I looked up and saw that some demons were looking at me. My face flushed with embarrassment and I hid my face with my hands. “Oria, are they still looking?” I asked, my voice slightly muffled.

“No, they are not,” Oria said, wonder in her voice.

Dropping my hands, I saw that everyone had returned to what they were doing before my very unladylike squeal. Thank goodness, I thought. Looking at Oria, she had a stupendous look on her face. “Oria, what’s with that look?”

“It’s just… They really don’t recognize us, Princess!”

She was right. Nobody paid any attention to us, unaware of our true identities. “Looks like the sweets worked, then,” I said, smiling, “though with our hideous looks I’ll be surprised if anyone did recognize us!”

The sweets changed our appearances and instead of looking human-like as was our original appearances, we now resembled two of the many ogres living in Hell, and very unlike our usual selves. Truthfully, I was grimacing at our current appearances. I mean, hell-o, I’ve been pretty my entire life! If it wasn’t necessary, there’s no way I’ll ever look like a monster, even on that day where humans dressed up in costumes. I was glad that only Oria was around to witness my ugly appearance; I wouldn’t ever live it down if Akaden saw me like this.

At the thought of Akaden, my shoulders sagged. I hated the fact that I couldn’t say goodbye to him before we left since he wasn’t in Hell at that moment, but even if he was, I wouldn’t do it either. As much as I adored him, he was one of Father’s most trusted subordinates, and would surely find a way to stop me from leaving. I just hoped Father wouldn’t send him after me to make me return…

“Shall we settle down somewhere, Princess?” Oria’s voice brought me out of my thoughts, as usual. I nodded and followed her until she found a place away from the other passengers, and we settled down, waiting till we reached our destination. I wonder how Earth will look like? I mused.

~~~

A/N: Chapter 2 is up! Don't worry, our little princess' love interest is going to make his appearance in the next chapter. What do you think of Kelafiel? And yes, I do know that Charon is the boatman who ferrys souls, but I decided to change it a bit here. Vomment if you like this chapter!