It was dark in this strange new place. But it was calm. That was odd.
The stars were high above her, shining some light but not enough. There was no moon. The sky seemed perfect without it.
There was some sort of liquid substance beneath her, black and inky.
She was walking, ripples on the water appearing where she set foot. She didn't know what she was walking towards or why, but she didn't want to stay in one place, in case something might start chasing her.
As she walked, the horizon stayed the same. The only way she could tell she was moving and not staying still was because the stars were moving. She could identify the constellations, there was the Stone Guardian, a vague figure of square forms made of stars, and the Lake of Spears, a circular lake with various stars stretching out from it like spears. And there were many more, some she had never seen before and some she only read about.
But as she walked along, walking for neither too long nor for too short, she saw a figure in the far distance.
She stopped walking, carefully observing the figure. It was small. Hunched over as if it were in pain. It... it looked like a child.
Adara took a few steps towards it, and as if it moved closer to her, she reached the child without even taking three steps.
She could not see the child. It was there, right in front of her, but she could not tell if the child's hair was blonde or brown, if its skin was pale or if its eyes were green. She could not see.
But what she could see was that the child was bleeding. Bleeding from various cuts on its arms and legs, a long cut along its chest and a rather nasty cut along its face, another reaching down from its eye down to its jaw.
Adara thought the child was awfully lucky it did not get blinded by the wound so close to its eye, and that it was still alive after so many wounds. It must have had a will to live.
She stood above the child, but the child did not look up. It continued looking with its head down. So she sat down, right in front of the child. She opened her mouth, feeling odd that she was using it for something other than screaming.
"What's wrong?" she asked, a second later.
The child did not respond immediately. "You can't escape us," the child mumbled.
Adara frowned. Despite the child mumbling and not being able to hear the words it spoke, she understood what it said. "What do you mean?"
The child looked up, and she could see it now. Its eyes were black like the darkest coal, filled with hateful desperation. Its skin was light enough to pass for a Southerner's, a sun pendant smeared with blood dangling from its neck. "You are trying to get rid of us. You can't do that."
Adara, pulling herself away from the child, realised who she was looking at with shock. It was... her. She was looking at herself, in her white nightgown splattered with blood, on the night she disappeared. "What—."
The child stood up, towering over her despite its short stature. "You need us. You can't get rid of us so fast! Just because somebody in your 'best friend's' body says so! It isn't that easy!"
Now the child was even taller. Hair a luminous golden blonde in an intricate hairstyle. A face so pale and sharp that she thought she would cut herself. A dress so beautiful and extravagant, with lavish silk and satin making it look noble. And those dignified eyes, a bright green, peering down at her with an expression just as hateful. "You need us," this new figure spoke, sometimes bleeding from scars, sometimes too short. "To stop you from making such idiotic mistakes in the future."
The figure crossed her hands in a familiar way, one hip to the side in bitchiness. "Next thing you know, you might go around wearing dresses. You look so ghastly in them! A tight dress— you'll be called a WHORE!" The figure screamed that last part, making Adara scramble away.
She didn't like screaming. She didn't like this figure screaming. She hated when this figure screamed, and she screamed often. She had often gone on tirades that Adara would look horrible in a dress, especially tight ones. And now this figure taking her appearance was repeating it.
The figure changed again, back to the child from before. The child that looked like her. "You can't get rid of us! It isn't that easy! You need us!"
Adara was struggiIing to respond. She didn't like this. She would have rather she was getting chased. "I don't— I don't need you. You aren't a part of me—."
The child seethed, its eyes a bright green, its bloodied dress now lavish. "Of course we are! Without us, what would you be?"
"Adara Thornwin," she whispered, soft as ever. "Without you, I am Adara Thornwin."
The child's eyes widened, its eyes back to that dark black. It screamed though Adara did not hear the words, it tried to claw at her face, trying to claw at her eyes. But the child did not reach her. Because the child started slowly melting into the inky floor, the lake all around them.
It trashed around, sometimes tall and blonde, sometimes short and bleeding. Sometimes both, sometimes neither. But the ink swallowed it whole anyway.
Adara stared at it with unkind eyes. The form of her younger self. She might have tried to clutch the child on another day, she might never have said those words. But she was Adara Thornwin. And she did not need her past.
It was quiet. The serenity of this moonless space was restored when the figure disappeared.
But then she started sinking, the inky substance taking her with it. She did not melt into it like the figure had, she simply sank. She stayed still as if she were in a trance, even when the cold substance reached over her stomach, creeping up to her chest.
She kept staring at the place where the child had melted. Aware of the inky substance swallowing her as well, but then not. But then she was neck deep and she awoke from her still state.
She tried thrashing as the child had did, but when she tried to scream the inky substance forced its way into her mouth, making her gag. Not soon after, she was fully submerged. And the dream ended.
She fell and fell, the falling never-ending, until she hit the hard floor— if it could even be called that— with a painful thud.
She looked up, into this familiar realm where she could never quite comprehend what was around her. It was cold, on this floor. Last time she was here she had been carried, she had never been on the floor.
She looked around, panic seeping into her. Some of them were already starting to awake, she needed to move fast. There was nothing in sight to help her get out of this realm that was in between reality and dreams, a realm that blurred the harsh lines until they merged.
She made a split-second decision, to punch the ground. It worked, though her knuckles started bleeding. Where she punched the pristine floor, made of something that was not quite glass, she left a dent, pieces of the floor coming loose.
She picked up a particularly sharp piece, and stabbed herself in her heart.
She awoke with a painful breath. She must have hit her lungs as well, she was having trouble breathing. And her knuckles hurt. When she checked them, they were only slightly scratched.
She tried to sit upright to get a book, she was done with sleeping. But she heard a noise to her side, and saw a half-alseep Cale, his eyes fluttering.
"Go to sleep," Cale mumbled, a tugging hand on her nightgown.
Adara laid back into the bed. She didn't want to disturb Cale. So she stared at the pristine ceiling until a dreamless sleep overcame her.
In the morning in another room, stood a blonde individual. He was in a room of great regality. He hated it.
He hated the big doors, the royal crest carved into them expertly. He hated the paintings of previous Royal Members whose office this once was. He hated the dark polished wood and he hated the ornate molding and gold gilded accents. He hated the impressive chandelier hanging from the ceiling.
He hated the colour scheme as well, all dark wood and gold. He hated the artefacts in the room, on shelves and in display cases, every artefact holding historical or cultural significance. He hated that he knew what the artefacts were, what historical or cultural meaning they had. He hated the carpets, the carpets that muffled the footsteps of people he was too tired to hear come in.
He hated the chair, a pitiful imitation of the throne he was destined to sit on. He hated the embroidered royal insignia on the chair. He hated every royal insignia, the ones on the door handles, on the frames of the paintings, on the ornate moulding and gold gilded accents, the chandelier, on the walls, on the shelves and every display case, every carpet— even the curtains had that damn royal insignia.
And here he was, sitting in a room he hates, sitting at the only thing he didn't hate in this room. The desk. He had a big desk, the colours dark wood and gold— of course— but it was big. And messy. Strewn with papers, scrolls, and quill pens, all in the same boring colour, it was a big mess. It was the only thing that was his. That felt like his, in this big room he hated.
The Crown Prince currently had a visitor. His aunt, the only tie he still had to his mother.
"From the maids, I have heard that the first time they came in to check on the Young Master and Mistress they were both asleep," Tasha reported. "But the second, Young Mistress Adara was awake and reading a book."
"Which book?" Crown Prince Alberu asked before she could continue.
Tasha made a face. "It was not specified. I'll tell the maids to check next time." She hesitated. "You said you wanted all the information right?"
Alberu nodded.
Tasha shrugged. "Well, more than one of the maids— three to be specific—," she added when she saw Alberu open his mouth, "swooned about how pretty Adara looked when she smiled and waved at them."
Alberu tried to keep in a chuckle.
"The next three times they went in only Young Mistress Adara was awake," Tasha continued. "Which fits in with the knowledge we observed that Young Master Cale sleeps late. The fourth time, he was awake and they had breakfast soon after. They particularly ate a lot of the steak and cherry tomatoes," she informed. "After their servant— Hans, I believe I heard him introduce himself as— came in to give them clothes for the day, Young Mistress Adara tried to get out of her room."
"Why?" Alberu asked.
"Well," Tasha started, "the second she stepped out of the room, one of our maids intercepted her. Young Mistress Adara apparently wanted to go to the library, but the maid countered by offering to go for her and get the book she wanted. Upon hearing that, Young Mistress Adara declined and retreated back into her room. She hasn't tried to get out since."
Alberu shook his head. "Don't be so obvious next time, she's smart, I'm sure the reason she hasn't tried to get out of the room since is because she realised we are monitoring her. Maybe she's realised that the maids repeatedly coming into the room in the mornings are to monitor them as well instead of just checking to see if they're awake to have breakfast."
Tasha nodded. "We'll be more careful next time." Tasha hesitated again. "You said you wanted the rumours as well, right?"
Alberu frowned slightly. "Yes?"
Tasha sighed. "When the maids came in for the first time, they were sleeping in the same bed. Rumours are circulating between the servants and cooks that they are courting, or at least fornicating."
Alberu sighed as well. He had promised he would tell them about any rumours about them. How should he tell them about this rumour? But then he remembered what he had said. Any rumours about them and the current situation. Oh. Of course, this rumour has nothing to do with what the citizens are now calling the Plaza Terror Incident, so I have no requirement to tell them about it. He redirected his gaze to Tasha. "Were they wearing any clothes?"
Tasha nodded. "They were fully dressed in the nightclothing they received from their servant."
"Was there any indication that they were fornicating except for the fact they slept in the same bed?" he asked again.
She shook her head. "Nothing. But the fact that they are sleeping in the same bed could indicate they have a closer relationship than we thought they had."
"I don't care if they've had sex or not, it is not important," he admitted. "But what is important is if they do have a closer relationship than we believe— than is commonly believed."
"I think they are courting in secret," Tasha revealed.
"I do not," Alberu disagreed, not getting the image of how Adara smiled at Cale when she sat on his bed, wishing him a good sleep the night before, in that nightgown of hers, with her collarbones and scars on show. He could not get the image of how pretty she looked out of his head. No. I do not think they are courting.
Tasha pulled a chair and sat on it, knowing this discussion might take long. "Why not?"
"Back when they were both 16, two years ago," Alberu began, "both the Thornwin and Henituse Families submitted a request seeking the Crown's blessing for the marriage of their eldest children."
Tasha's eyes widened. In all her years of gathering information and rumours on the Young Mistress Adara of the Thornwin Family, she had never heard of this.
"But that request was withdrawn," he continued, "because the two eldest children in question did not want to marry."
Tasha frowned at the story. "But that doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things. What if they didn't want to marry then but do now?"
Alberu shook his head. "I already thought of that. If they didn't want to marry then, but do now, there would be no problem with it from anybody. Their parents already wat them to marry, the Crown would have no problem, there is no reason they should not put in a request for our blessing if they did want to marry."
Tasha frowned even further. "There are many reasons they would not want to officially ask the Crown to marry. We know Young Master Cale does not want to be Successor. We know Young Mistress Adara does want to be Successor. But because Young Mistress Adara's position of Successor is not official, or even guaranteed, Young Master Cale would not be marrying the future Countess of the Thornwin Family, but Young Mistress Adara would be marrying the Trash of the Henituse Family. Therefore, her wanting to be Successor might be considered forfeit, as if she had given up on the position and was intending to 'settle down'."
Alberu was silent for a few moments. "I never thought of that."
Tasha continued. "Also, 16 is awfully young to marry, even by human standards, and despite them both being wealthy and having no need to wait for a stable income, they might want to experience unmarried life before jumping ahead to marrying. So they might be courting, not as official as marrying, in secret."
She got up from her seat. "And, these are only two reasons I can see. There could be— most likely are— many more reasons why they would not want to marry."
Alberu nodded slowly. "I didn't think of that at all. Thank you, Imo¹, I'll need to think about this a bit more. Maybe I can find more reasons."
[¹]: 'Imo' pronounced (ee-mo), is what you would call your maternal aunt in Korean— according to the research I did. If it is incorrect, please inform me and I'll change it to what it ought to be. For the life of me, I could not remember what Alberu called his aunt, Tasha (though it most definitely was not 'imo'). Similarly, if someone remembers what Alberu did call his aunt, please tell me and I'll change it.
Tasha nodded, walking out of the room.
But Alberu stayed in it, mulling over the revelations he's had. He remembers hearing about Adara's reappearance in society. The Crown had not been invited to the lavish Banquet Countess Louise had organised, they were not needed there. What did it matter to the Crown who was the Successor to the Thornwin Family?
It mattered a lot, but none of the Nobles thought that far ahead.
But who it most certainly did not matter to, was the rest of the Nobles in the other Regions. Why would the South-West care about who a Count in the North-East had as Successor? They had no reason to care.
But Countess Louise always struck Alberu as a lavish but meticulous person. Someone who wouldn't mind spending a lot of money to reach a goal. But in that situation 4 years ago, it seemed downright profligate. There was absolutely no need to invite all of them except to flaunt her family's wealth and her son.
And Alberu had felt proud and intrigued by the Missing Daughter of the Thornwin Household who had made the whole Banquet blow up in her face. A daughter no longer missing. She truly had picked the right moment to reappear.
And then the Nobles were talking of nothing but said Daughter of the Thornwin Household on end. And now that he thinks about it, it seemed they never really stopped talking about her. She would always be the topic of gossip, until the end of time.
And as the rumours grew and grew, that they even reached his ears without him necessarily seeking them, he began to get interested.
He wanted to know who this Adara Thornwin was. What she was doing and why. Why she had gone missing— because everyone stopped saying she had been kidnapped—, why she chose to reappear when she did, and where those beautiful scars came from.
For four years, Alberu has been searching the continent for every single rumour about her. Every bit of information he could get he searched for.
He heard she was pretty, he heard she screamed like a banshee, he heard she was rude, he heard she laughed like a Black Mage, he heard she threw bottles, he heard she bewitched like a necromancer, he heard she acted like a bastard and he heard she looked like a Dark Elf.
He knew everything that was said of her. And he wanted to meet her in person, this enigmatic daughter. The Formerly Missing Daughter of the Thornwin Household.
But, now, after finally meeting her, he was not disappointed. He could not tell anything about her. All he could see on her face were things she let him see. She was as enigmatic as the various contradicting rumours about her.
She herself was contradicting. She was blunt, seemingly bored with the flowery words, but then said some sugar-coated words of her own, catching him off guard. She was sly and calculating, a glint in her eye that seemed to be scheming at all moments, and then she smiled at you with all sweetness in the world.
He was not disappointed at all.
He only hoped, that with her staying at the Palace for a couple days, he might find out more about her.
In her own room, Adara was sitting on the bed she and Cale now share, reading the book she found of a retelling of a famous myth from the Ancient Times, another one about a guardian of boulders, when a mage came in with a communication device.
The mage was a shy one, probably an assistant of another mage. Adara kept her mannerisms kind when she listened to the mage speak. Her father, apparently, was waiting on the other end of the communication device.
She took the communication device with a frown on her face. Even Cale from next to her, who was reading a fantasy book while eating fruit, looked at the communication device suspiciously. The mage exited the room quietly, not making a single noise on the hard floor.
His face was on the device, with his dark brown hair and his green eyes. They stared at each other for a moment. Expecting the other to speak. Though, of course, he didn't quite stare, he stared at a vague point on her nose.
Adara stayed silent. She might have started the conversation on another day, but she did not today. She didn't want to today. Because he called her, he should start the conversation.
"Greetings, Adara," her Father, Count Devon Thornwin, said after a few more seconds of silence.
"Good afternoon, Father," she responded.
Her Father was quiet again as if he was hoping she would continue talking so she could carry the conversation. "I... uh, heard about what happened from Count Henituse."
Adara remained silent.
Her Father struggled to continue. "And, uhm, I trust you are not hurt?"
She shook her head. "I am hurt. They have the best doctors treating me. My stomach hurts and so do my limbs and sometimes I can't breathe properly." It was all a lie, but she wanted to make this as hard on her Father as possible.
Her Father gulped. "Oh. I hope you get better soon."
"Thank you, Father."
"Yes, yes." He avoided her eye even more obviously now. "I, uh, heard that they have not yet found out who the terrorists were."
"They did not," Adara affirmed.
He swallowed when she offered no further conversation. "Did you... sleep well?" he asked hesitantly.
She shook her head. "I slept horribly. I cannot sleep without seeing the horrifying image of that mage, nor the suicide bombers that I almost didn't save."
His voice wavered as he tried to respond. "I am sorry to hear that."
More awkwardness ensued. Adara was on the point of hanging up.
But then her Father opened his mouth. "You look like your mother."
Adara's eyes flared. "Bullshit," she said in a heartbeat, anger creeping into her voice. "You never knew what she truly looked like."
Her Father frowned at her harsh words. "Adara," he started, "that's not fair. I know I've been distant—."
And for a second there. She genuinely believed he would apologise for all his years of emotional distance. For all the pain and neglect he's put her through. For not bothering to even look at her. For not being there.
"—but if your mother hadn't left—."
And now Adara got annoyed. "Don't you dare blame all of this on her!" she snapped. "You have been as absent from my life as she has. And she didn't fucking leave! You banished her."
She couldn't believe she thought he would ever apologise. How dumb was she?
"Well, at least I never made you feel like I didn't love you!" he said back— not quite screaming, but not calmly either.
Adara paused at that argument. Her mask crumbled. It made Count Devon take a step back. He had never seen her so vulnerable. "Do you not remember?" she asked, her voice void of any emotion.
"What?" he said, getting defensive. "Remember what? I have always loved you."
"No. No, you didn't," she argued back, her voice still flat. "Not ever. Not now, not then. You didn't say anything. You never looked at me and when you finally did... I'm sure you don't remember. But I still do. When I came into your office, at 8 years old, begging you to read the letter my mother wrote, you looked at me like you had forgotten I existed. When I brought up the letter— when I brought my mother— you started yelling and screaming and throwing things. I was scared. I thought you were going to hit me.
"When you stopped, I told you that I loved you. I was still scared, but some stupid part of me must have thought it would have calmed you down," she admitted. "And maybe that same part of me wanted to make sure my Father loved me, like the fathers in the books who loved their daughters unconditionally.
"But what I expected to happen didn't happen. I think it made you angrier. Because you responded by saying that you didn't love me." She watched as he frowned, trying to remember when this ever happened. "I ran out of the room, tears flying everywhere, and I locked myself in my room. I didn't open it, not when the servants came to serve me dinner, not when the butler came the morning thereafter to coax me into eating breakfast. I told myself I would only open it when you came to knock at the door. You never did."
His expression still had not changed, he was still frowning, his face twisted in deep thought, trying to remember. It hurt her that he did not remember, but she should have figured.
"A week later," she continued, "you invited me to eat lunch with you. I was in the middle of a lecture— I still remember what it was about, it was about the Breck Kingdom's Royal Family. We had just finished going over our Royal Family so we moved on to the next. I remember admiring Crown Princess Rosalyn, I remember wanting to be like her, and possibly meet her in the future. She was only 4 years older than me but I thought she was the coolest person ever. I wanted to learn more about her."
She didn't want to continue talking, but the words were tumbling out of her mouth and she didn't have the energy to hang up on him. "But when your butler came, announcing you would like to have lunch with me, I never wanted to skip a lesson so fast. And I did. I dropped everything that I had planned that day. My schedule was completely free. But when I came, in the best dress I had with my hair done neatly, you acted like last week never happened.
"You didn't say anything about it, you couldn't even look me in the eyes. And before you even finished eating you left because your schedule was full. You had errands to run and people to meet. I cried again. I went back to my room, gathering my books about Crown Princess Rosalyn and locked myself in there again."
Her Father finally looked up into her eyes. Making eye contact with what felt like the first time. "So, yes," she said. "You did make me feel like you didn't love me. For all of my life."
And then he hung up.
And Adara had the urge to throw the communication device across the room.