The Lucielle Box - 2 : The Infamous Dungeon !

CHAPTER 1

The sudden brightness made her face squirm and eyes crinkle in response. A hand reached into the box, grabbed her by her hair and pulled her onto the ground. A flurry of laughter rose overhead. With her face pressed onto the stone-cold floor, reality began seeping in her foggy brain. Her vision cleared up and she spotted two pairs of leather boots in immediate sight.

“Not a fighter, eh?” one of the men said.

She felt a hand on her foot, grasping, as it dragged her across the floor and manhandled her onto a wooden chair.

“Change them ropes to thicker ones,” another man said.

“Let me look at that face first…kekekekeke.”

A finger and a thumb urged her face up by her chin and forced her look at the men surrounding her. There were four of them, leering in her face, exhaling odours which felt better to anonymously read off the pages of a book than experience in one’s breath. Their faces were scarred by time and war, darkened by the sun and an assumable abhorrence towards water. Thick bushy hair left no pore unmarked on their faces, in hopes of asserting dominance probably. Their beefy builds left no room for a violent retaliation unless she wished her head to be smashed open, in one blow, and end the nightmare before it would begin.

“She a gud one, I tell ye.”

The strange man’s hands grabbed her by the shoulders.

The girl sucked in a breath from that pungent, murky, damp, air.

“Show ‘em heaven, lass, eh.”

“Mee too, mee too!”

As soon as the man neared her face with puckered lips hidden amidst the bushy mouth of his, the girl began coughing. Violently. Her neck jerked forward but her spit reached flung forward, reaching left, right and centre; she coughed and coughed, distancing the men from her sickly, writhing body.

The dungeon was large, dark and cold, encased by a stone floor and stone walls, lit up by fire torches and lanterns. The men backed up into a corner, eyeing their captive with much disgust as her body contoured into different angles with no breaks in the cough-fest.

“Is she dyin’?”

“Last storm before the final calm?”

Third of them wiped his spit splattered face by his sleeve.

“Or is she acting?”

The fourth man scowled forward and charged his hand for a resounding slap but the momentum of his bulky hand reaching her face was slower than the spout of blood exiting her mouth and making him recoil in defense.

Too late though, for his open mouth and bushy face were now covered in blood. Certainly not a new sight but surely a sudden one for all of them.

“Argh! You disgusting country lass!!” the man scowled.

“Boss!”

“Bossman!”

“Sire!”

His three underlings ran up to his side, armed with their sleeves to instantly wipe clean their superior’s face. Though, their loyalty lasted only until they heard the words being hoarsely let out:

“I … h-have…tub-tuberculosis, ARCKHAHKKKHKHKHAAKHAM KHA KHA KHA, co-con-con-ARKHAKHAKHAKHAKHA-contagious.”

Heaven, Earth and everything in between knew the woes of a long-term slow death exceeded that of being shot by a bullet. So, in respect for their future, all the men hastily retreated to – what one could easily assume – clean themselves up.

The girl spat the last of blood in her mouth and fell back into the chair with an audible sigh of relief. Her tongue dangled out to let it remain open for some cold air to seep in and caress the open gash inside her mouth. She had bitten on her left cheek to make the violent coughs look more convincing but heaven knew it hurt like hell.

‘Well, I survived that thanks to watching so many dramas…but for how long?’ she thought as she looked around the dungeon. Behind her was a prison cell against which stood the box she was brought in. On the farther right was an empty wooden table pressed against the wall and directly opposite to it was a suit of armour.

An idea struck in her head as she dropped onto her knees, from the chair, and seethed as a sharp jolt of pain shot through her legs. The ground was rough and sharp against her knees but she was in no situation of whining about the ill upkeep of a castle dungeon – even though her opinion should have been highly valuable as a prisoner.

The girl crawled and managed to reach the suit of armour at the expense of her kneecaps and threw herself onto the metal, sideways, making it crash to the floor with a resounding THUD! It broke its shape as the head rolled off one direction and the arms in another.

She cringed at sheer loudness of her actions and could only hope no one heard. Amidst the dismantled parts, she spotted the armour’s sword laying near the prison cell. She crawled her way to it, gasping in delight as the slightly unsheathed blade, at the rear, glistened under the torchlights. She pressed the sheath under her foot and struggled to pull the sword out by its hilt. Though, as she stretched her body to pull harder, the sheath slid inside the prison cell emanating a loud drag while the hilt remained in her hand.

Praying to the plot gods, she began attempting to cut open the ropes on her hands.

“Ah, a dungeon escape?”

The sudden words jolted her in the direction of the voice. She spotted a blurred presence in the prison, dragging the sheath as he walked forward, from the depths of the cell, into the light.

Her hands began moving faster on the blade.

His eyes caught the glow of the torchlight as stood beyond the bars, looking down on her with much fascination. The buttons on his coat jacket glistened crimson and it was giveaway enough for her to know that he wasn’t an ordinary prisoner.

He seemed to have spotted the fast hand movement behind her back and could not help but snicker the words, “The Isdarien Dungeon is infamous for being an inescapable labyrinth, don’t you know?”

“I know,” she replied, monotonous, tongue poking out the side of her mouth to let the cold air soothe her burning gash.

“How…?” he frowned.

“Did you not say it is infamous?” she scoffed.

“I was being enigmatic,” he scoffed back, “Of course no one knows.”

She frowned.

“Well, now I know,” she shrugged.

“So, don’t you consider your ardent efforts at escaping to be futile?” he asked, eyes narrowed and neck craning to try and get a good view of her awkwardly rubbing the fraying rope to the sword’s blade.

“I don’t,” she replied, nonchalant.

“Damn, are you a regular?”

“What are you in for?”

A charming laugh resonated off the dungeon walls, intriguing enough for her to look up, momentarily. Curly dark hair covered his forehead but did not hide the genuine crinkle of his sharp eyes.

“I disrespected the big old man,” he replied, a boxy smile encasing his mouth.

“Pfffft, God?” she sputtered and looked away, afraid he’d catch her staring (though, in her current circumstances, there was much else she should have prioritised on her ‘scares-me-right-now’ list.)

“No,” he scoffed, “Grandpa.”

“What’d you do?” she asked, unknown to the fact that a smile was sneaking its way onto her lips.

“I laughed at his thirteenth wedding,” his reply was hushed like a conspiracy.

The rope tore apart and the sword jingled against the floor, once again.

“A punishable offence,” she uttered hoarsely as a realisation set in.

He is a prince.

With her hands free, she rotated her shoulders and wrists to feel the new-found-ease in her limbs. Her brain pondered over the princes’ lore in the book but all she could recall was how each died at the hands of Leonora.

“I am not a regular,” she answered as she picked up the sword and wedged it in between the ropes of her feet, “I was abducted.”

There was a moment of silence as the slow drag of the sword blade tried to penetrate into the thick rope of her feet.

“So…how do you know about the dungeon?” he asked, audibly confused.

“I know about a lot of things,” she shrugged in reply.

“Oh!” he neared the bars and grabbed one each in hand as he asked, “Do you know something about me?”

As she looked up, she found a wide pair of blazing eyes staring back into hers. An upturned smile graced her lips, out of sheer fascination, and she replied, “Well, what I know about us is that if I die here today, then,” she leaned closer to the prison bars and crouched down to be in his line of sight, “An upcoming war will wipe out the entire Royal family in five years.”

She held up hand, wiggling the five fingers, in his face.

Maybe it was because he was crouched, away from the torchlight, but his face darkened.

She picked up the sword to repeat her chore when her breath hitched.

Distant thuds of footsteps made her hand movements hasty and imprecise.

“Someone’s coming,” the prisoner said.

“I can hear it,” she struggled to move the sword faster but as the footsteps closed in, her heart thundered harder in her ears. Sweat overtook her hands as she tried to grasp the sword by the hilt to make it work faster but a sudden coagulation in her throat compelled her to begin cough. ‘Ah! How did I forget…Runa was a genuinely terminally sick person…’ she thought.

Footsteps closed in, the wooden door was pulled open, she continued coughing violently until blood oozed from her throat and splattered all over the pink dress she was wearing. Her vision darkened as she felt a hand jerk her head by her hair.

Then, darkness consumed her into a pool of her own expulsion.

The Lucielle Box - 1: Waking Up In My Favorite Dark Romance Novel !

 

 PROLOUGE

 

THUD.

 

NEIGH.

 

THUMP.

 

Her head banged on wood, insinuating a jolt of pain that drove her out of slumber. The subtle to-and-fro of the carriage that once cradled her body now became an incessant gesture of alarm. The fog in her mind hindered the comprehension of words being passed around yet her ears did not cease to gather.

 

“Leonora’s lass, she is.”

“Caught her straight off the Square, we did.”

“Dun’t know what got her!!”

“Kekekekekeke.”

 

A sharp pain stung through her back as the carriage overcame a stone in its way. Her body fidgeted to find a more comfortable position, when – her eyes shot open! Her perspective was darkened by the lack of light, but that was the least bothersome thing in that moment. For when she rolled her shoulders, she felt two unfamiliar weights bent at a painful angle. When the woman turned her neck to look back, to her absolute surprise, she spotted a pair of hands tied behind her back by their – her – wrists.

‘I have hands…?’

Panic surged through her veins as she realised the compactness of her surroundings. She tried getting up only to realise that her feet were bound together, around the ankles, with yet another rope. Her parched throat threatened to let out a scream but was hindered by a sudden round of laughter.

 

“That skimpy bandit would’ve no choice but to surrender ‘erself now!”

 

“How dare a pesky woman like her threaten the Crown?!”

 

“As soon as we reach the castle, let’s teach this lass a lesson. For the daughter of a Bandit Queen, she sure is quite a looker.”

 

Chills ran down the girl’s spine as her feet gave up and she fell back, onto the cold hardwood of the box. Questions overwhelmed her mind for the last thing she remembered was sitting by the window, staring into the sunset. The year was 2024, the wind was polluted, her body had no hands but at least she was a free individual – who would want to kidnap a disabled orphan? And what did they mean by the Crown and the Bandi--!!

 

Her eyes widened as a hazy memory of a name pierced through her common sense. Leonora. Bandit Queen.

 

Her lips broke into a mirthless grin.

 

Daughter of a Bandit Queen.

 

Her forehead bunched into a frown without hindering the toothy grimace. Her newly found hands grew cold and clammier behind her back as exasperation of the situation dawned on her. Somehow, call it fate’s folly or destiny’s greater ambition at giving the Gods a good laugh – but she, Isadora Bailey, had transmigrated into a fantasy book she had loved ever since she was fifteen.

The Lucielle Box.

 

“Holy fucks.”

 

The plot was simple, yet complex, depending on the age one pursued it.

The story followed a Bandit Queen named Leonora Russet, in the land of Isdaren, who plundered the rich to provide for the poor. She was a brave and kind woman with a sickly daughter and in order to save her only family’s life, she was searching for the Lucielle Box. An object deemed to be hidden somewhere in the Royal Castle with magical properties of rejuvenation. It protected and immortalised the royal family and was Leonora’s only hope to keep her child alive. Though, after time and time again of begging the King to show mercy on her dying daughter and heeding no positive results – Leonora resorted to accumulate power, steal, bring the people on her side and protest against the crown.

The carriage halted and a gust of nauseatingly fresh air entered into her captive box through the small holes on top. The chattering men dragged the box down a slope, mounted it over a trolley and began dragging it towards doom.

Bandit Leonora was wildly successful in her pursuits and even after having the greatest bounty on her head, she remained uncaptured for a decade. That was until the Third Prince’s cavalry were able to capture Leonora’s daughter. They planned to use her as leverage to make the Bandit Queen surrender and puppeteer for the Crown but some low-level soldiers could not resist the temptation of a captive woman at hand and decided to violate her.

The box almost dropped off the trolley while the men were hoisting it up a staircase. A flurry of curses resounded against the cold hard walls of the stone dungeon. A musky damp scent prevailed in the atmosphere, making the trapped girl’s throat itch.

“Could’ve jus bot the lass, but no! Haf’ta bring a goshdarn box all the way ‘cross!”

Leonora’s daughter dies while trying to protect herself. The Third Prince’s plans fail and he shoves the reason of his failure on one of his brothers. Though Leonora was a woman, she was a concerned mother first and avenges she does her daughter’s blood by slaying a Prince…but it does nothing to fill the gaping void of her heart. In five years, Lenora storms the castle, slaughters the royal family, takes over the Lucielle Box and uses it to make a deal with the devil. In return of her child’s life, Leonora unleashes darkness onto the world and plunges it into chaos. She forgets all regard for mankind and wreaks havoc until the Hero slays her at the end of the book.

It was a sad story, yet one brimming with great mystery and adventure. A tale where the sadness was worth the journey undertaken – but that was a fifteen-year-old emo Isadora’s perspective. Twenty-two-year-old Isadora, stuck in a box that was now being pried open, hated the concept of valour stemming from sacrifice.

Especially when she was the sacrifice.

She was Runa Donn Russet.

The daughter who was about to die.

All the paths lead to you — 1: Met a Grandpa and with an agenda!

The wall clock flashed 9:00 P.M. The dim lighting poorly reflected off a nametag reading: Larissa J. 

As the isolated office neared closing time, Larissa stretched out her hands while she stood in front of the air conditioner, in a desperate attempt to absorb as much as air as she could before the flap would shut close. 

A contended smile was wrapped over her thin lips, eyes closed to cue pretenses of standing in the middle of a rainforest rather than the city center, clad in a blue and gray cleaning lady uniform with a mop leaning against her chest. 

She inhaled the cool wind like a woman starved, feasting over the last clean gust until it was too late. The swing flap of the air conditioner swung close and with dejected shoulders, Larissa too stepped away. 

She grabbed the mop again and began sliding it against the marble flooring. Her hands moved fast while her eyes kept glancing at the clocking. 

'In twenty minutes, the office would heat up like a portal to hell,' her brain reminded. Her bushy brows banded in determination as worked her way through the wide expanse of an entire office and the adjoining hallway. 

Her head bopped to a popular song, body swaying to-and-fro with the mop as she lost herself to the beat while mopping. So, it was consider her surprise only human when she opened her eyes and spotted an old man standing on the end of the hallway. Under dim lights. Clad in all black. Awaiting her like an angel of death.

Larissa let out a startled scream and let go of the mop. It fell with a loud thud, eliciting a similar response from the man. With one hand, he seemingly clutched his chest and gasped, with the other, he pointed an accusatory finger at Larissa.

"You— you!!"

"I—I, uh, I am sorry!" Larissa immediately bent into a ninety degree bow. "Are you okay? I didn't mean to startle you!" She called out and walked towards the man. 

"I'm good, you're good," the old man replied with a gruff voice. 

"Let me fetch you some water, come sit," Larissa said as she grabbed the old man by his arm and led him inside the office. "Do you work here?" She asked as she seated him on one of the cubicle chairs and speed-walked towards the pantry.

"I suppose I do," the man replied with a nonchalant shrug. "Put a slice of lemon in my water dear, it elevates the taste," he called out to Larissa shuffling inside the pantry. "Do you work here as well?" He asked, while Larissa replied affirmative to both.

"I just part-time, you know, I'm a college student so this is one of the many jobs I do," Larissa clarified as she jogged out with a glass of water and a singular slice of lemon in hand. "I didn't know how you'd want it...eh, should I just put it in? Wedge it to the brim? Squeeze it?" She asked, side-eying the lemon slice. 

"Just put it in," the man sighed.

Larissa did. He thanked her and took a sip of the refreshing drink. Larissa looked up at the clock and panicked. The heat was already beginning to consume the closed space and in a matter of moments the walls would start emanating all the heat they consumed.

"Do you work for security? The office closed an hour ago, there's no other reason a person like you would be here." Larissa asked as she fetched her mop from the hallway. 

The old man replied something but it was muffled owing to the distance between them. Larissa picked up the mop from the end of the hallway and ran back to the office. 

"Don't you want to go back home? To the familiar warmth of your wife, a table filled with food and everything nice?" Larissa asked as she walked back inside.

"I don't anyone to go back to," the man shrugged. 

"Oh— I, uh, I am sorry! Again!" Larissa bent into another apologetic bow. 

"No, no, I mean, my wife is angry at me...for something, yes," the man confessed. 

Larissa let out a giggle. "Bring her some flowers and apologise. I'm sure she's working her best," Larissa advised with a smile. 

Even under the dim light, the old man exuded an otherworldly glow through his wrinkled skin, beady eyes and crisp black suit. His lips were pushed up in a smile as he followed Larissa's movements with his crinkled eyes. 

"Don't you want to go home? It's quite late for a young girl like you," he pointed out. 

"Oh don't mind me!" Larissa waved a hand in his face, "You know how it is like to earn money, don't you? I have a sick aunt at home. She's a teacher. She leaves me copies to correct each day and sometimes I make the report cards as well. She has a lot of allergies — not a sickness for a poor soul, am I right?" Larissa snorted.

"Mhm, my wife is mad at me because our grandson is in love with a wrong person and I'm not doing anything about it," the old man revealed.

"Oh?" Larissa's dark eyes twinkled and her head perked up, "Is it a man?" 

"No," the old man replied promptly.

"Then what? Is it a child? A convict? A prostitute?" 

"You're making her sound like a saint now," the man sighed.

"I don't understand," Larissa confessed.

"Fancy a drink?" The man asked.

Larissa made a face and took two steps backward, "Grandpa, the best I can do is help you sit in a bus." 

The man let out a laugh and Larissa did not understand what in her words was so amusing. Heat had begun emanating off the walls and boiling the floor up. Larissa could feel it in the clogged air and her sweaty armpits.

"What's your major, in college, that is?" The old man asked.

"I cannot tell you that, for privacy concerns," Larissa replied. "We should get going though, this place is going to boil soon."

"Oh? You can turn on the air conditioning if you want to," the man pointed at the the remote place beside the air conditioner, drilled with a stand on the wall. 

"Oh-ho ho! How can I? A mere cleaning lady? Ha! You're so funny! They're going to have me killed and hang me at the community center to make an example out of how people like me should stay in their lane!" Larissa bellowed in between exasperated dry laughs. 

"You've got a vivid imagination," the old man scoffed, "Do you fancy easy money?" His words immediately stilled Larissa.

"Who doesn't?" She scoffed back.

"How far would you go for it?" 

Larissa crossed her arms over her chest and threw a deepened frown at the old man. "I didn't imagine you to be sleazy, wow, there's no place for kindness in this society anymore," she scoffed, throwing disgusted glances at him.

"What! No! What even— How could you!" The man struggled for words and stood up in his defence. Larissa considered it as him making a move and took three steps back. 

"I'm telling you, I will hit you!" She exclaimed, welding the map as a lance. 

"Oh please," the man rolled his eyes, "I love my wife very much, thank you, but what I was suggesting is— would you fancy a wedding to my grandson?"

"A'ight, too much out time for me today, I'm going home, old man, who even are you?!" Larissa scoffed and walked into the hallway to complete the cleaning and leave as soon as possible. 'Surely, if not senile, he must be a human trafficker,' Larissa concluded, very wisely, in her head and made a mental note to report him first thing tomorrow morning. 

"I understand it sounds ridiculous —" the man started as soon as he stepped out of the office, "But my wife is just so mad at me and I cannot think of any other way to get out of this. Surely, if I get him to fall in love with another person, surely he would leave that girl and marry a decent one. I am willing to pay as much as you desire. I am quite well off, you see—"

"I think you need medication!" Larissa cut him off with a shout from the end of the hallway. 

"Opportunities like these never knock twice! How does 50 million dollars sound to you?" The old man shouted back from the other end of the hallway.

"Like the price of my organs that you're gonna illegally harvest!" Larissa shouted back, clearly alarmed, she threw the mop in the janitor's closet and beelined towards the stairway exit. 

"No— hear me out! He's a very dashing young man! His name is Nikolai and he likes dar—"

"Hello? 110? This is an emergency! At Hurain Corp, yes, there is an old who might be trafficking girls, yes he is coming after me, please help— oh my—"

"— Here me out lady, this is actually a great deal, looking at you, you're absolutely his type—"

"—Can you hear that?! He keeps forcing me to marry his grandson?! Yes please —Help!" 

Suddenly, the stairway exit door burst open and Larissa screamed with all her might. 

A flash of light made Larissa look away. They were in the Police Station, bustling with cops and operators handling finncky civilians and criminals. The man flashed light into Larissa's left eye. Again, she looked away.

"You don' seem blind, you quite al'ight, lass then why can't you recognise the big boss o' your workplace? Hurain Kairos? The founder and maker of Hurain Corp? Whatchu some kinda Patrick Star?" Her assigned cop chided as he looked at Hurain and Larissa, simultaneously, giving an apologetic look to one and a pointed look to another. 

"I am sorry..." Larissa sighed, properly slouched in the chair with her shoulders slumped, head bent and back curved into a shameful C. 

"My husband was treating you with kindness and here you are calling the cops on him," an old woman tsked. She stood behind Hurain's chair with a hand on either of his shoulder. Her persona exuded the same otherworldly glow that her husband possessed. Her curly silver hair, sharp blue eyes and unblemished wrinkled skin qualified her as the richest woman in the entirety of the nation. 

"I am sorry ma'am," Larissa slouched further than humanly possible, "Please do not sue me," she all but begged. 

"They gon' do what they like. You can't jus' offend the Kairos' yaknow," the cop snorted, excitedly exchanging glances between the duo. 

"We won't press charges, of course, as long as you co-operate with us," the old man, Hurain Kairos, said ever so kindly.

His soothing tone instinctively urged Larissa to glare at him through a side-eye. "You should have started with your name, old man," she grumbled, unapologetically. 

"It's all the same, all the same," Hurain let out a hearty laugh and patted Larissa's slouched back. "How about we discuss this in the presence of my beloved — or do you wish to be sued instead?" 

Larissa spotted an evil glint in his eye and groaned internally. What she wished was to go home, not be wedded off on the whims of an old rich couple. Surely — it must trespass some of her fundamental rights. Right?! 

Nonetheless, Larissa willed herself to get up and launch into a flurry of apologetic bows for wasting a government official's time and closely followed the old rich couple out of the prison.

The old woman glanced at Larissa twice before patting a hand on her shoulder. "Go home for now, let Arnold take you. We will continue this in the morning. Know that we are only trying to do the best for everyone, okay?" She smiled at Larissa. A dimple birthed on each cheek and her lips pursed into absence while she smiled.

Her touch was warm against Larissa's cold shoulder.

She wished she had grandparents...or parents... Larissa sighed as she walked inside the small one bedroom apartment and locked the door behind her. Aunt Nora was sleeping on the sofa with her glasses still on. Her nose was puffed and red, clearly indicating that her allergies flared up again. A pile of books was placed by the foot of a sofa and a red pen gently swayed (owing to the tall standing fan placed behind the sofa) on top of them. 

The table in front was laden with covered dishes and more notebooks. To the right, by the window, laid a mattress with a folded sheet on top of it. Larissa smiled gratefully.

She took off her shoes at the small shoe cabinet behind the door and tip-toed her way to the bathroom on the left. She washed her face and took her phone out to google the name of the man for whom her life was being ruined.

Her bangs were standing up and as soon as the face of the man popped in the image results, all of Larissa's body hair sprang up.

What awful fate she had.

What fucking awfully hilarious and random fate she had to have for Nikolai Rudbrek Kairos to be the same man she detested with more passion than her hopes to drop dead. 

Blood Bride — 2

The moon hung low in the sky, big and round, giving an illusion of close proximity to those who dared to reach out for its touch. Dyed crimson, it haloed the head of the fabled man whose name had sealed her fate with death. 

"Hasty to die, aren't we?"

His cold touch against her warm body seared her sense of speech. Dark hair strands fell over his cataclysmic grey eyes peering into hers. Elowen's gaze meandered to avoid contact and instead ended up skimming over his prominent collarbones and chiseled cold chest. As soon as she registered his semi-nudity, her eyes pressed close.

"H-haste makes waste," she stuttered, "I don't want to die w-wastefully." Elowen hated her tongue for not rolling as planned. To think she was more eloquent in front of the King and Queen now felt like a far fetched dream.

"How productive of you," the man couldn't help the snicker that escaped his lips as he helped her back to the ground and sped backwards to put some distance between them.

Elowen's hammering heart and flushed body found much solace as the cold rooftop air embraced the emptiness he left behind. 

"We mustn't delay the ritual. It might not seem so but we have eyes and ears around us," the man informed, his voice oddly deep and calming to Elowen's flustered senses.

"Wouldn't expect otherwise," she said with a firm nod then patted her palms against her thighs, awkwardly, "But...I don't really know how to go about it." 

The man, with his hands on his belt buckle, stilled upon the revelation. "Oh? Oh, Astrid, makes sense. I missed your arrival so she skipped the guiding, understandably so," he whispered to himself.

The stars surrounding the crimson moon had begun to twinkle a red glare onto the pond. The man infront cleared his throat, almost human-like, to gain attention.

"I am Prince Valen Sythar, the heir to Valoria," the man introduced himself with a curt bow and a hand over his heart, "And as per ritual," he said as he walked towards her, "A human princess, also known as the Centennial Blood Bride," he held out a hand and urged, with his eyes, for her to do the same, "That is you, Princess Elowen Calyx, has consented to be sacrificed at the Blood Moon's altar for peace and safety of Eidryn. Am I correct?" 

'Consented was hardly accurate. Destined? Too fancy. Fated? Too flowery. Thrusted upon? Yeah, that sounds about right.' Elowen thought, though these tangents hardly mattered on the topic. So, she held out her right hand as he did and said, "Yes, I consent."

Valen took her hand in his and turned them to face the pond. He rested the back of her hand over two of his fingers and pressed his thumb in the centre of her palm. "It might hurt a little, hold onto me if you're scared," he said as the clean cut nail of his thumb suddenly began growing sharper and longer against the skin of her palm.

Elowen clenched her teeth and shook her head upon his offer. Maybe if he had a shirt on, the thought would have been more in consideration because Elowen would rather bleed in pain than grab his bare arms and embarasses herself just moments before her death. 

The nail pressed deeper into her palm and drew blood. Elowen withdrew a slight gasp as Valen instructed, "Close your fist." She closed her fingers around his thumb and he held her hand as a stream of blood bled into the pond, creating new ripples of fate. 

Valen chanted something under his breath, a language Elowen couldn't decipher, and as soon as he let go of her hand Elowen's wound was healed. He did not have to heal her but the small gesture felt like a gust of kindness in a desert of cruelty.

"Able bodied and a consenting will are necessary for the ritual," Valen clarified just as small whispers of smile threatened the corners of Elowen's lips.

"Oh-" she uttered, dumbly. 

"Now we will have to soak in the pond until the scarlet moon wanes, as you must know, it is to stabilize the yin and yang of Eidryn." 

'Hence the stripping,' Elowen thought as she nodded her head in understanding. Suddenly, her eyes widened at the implication of her own thoughts. 'STRIPPING?!' Her head swatted to Valen and surely, he was unbuckling his pants with no concern whatsoever. Flustered, Elowen flipped her head away. 

"A-ah, do I, of course, right? Have to partake in this?" 

A gust of wind brushed past her and in the blink of a moment, Valen was in the scarlet tinted pond, soaking with his bare chest out for depraved sight. He ran a wet had through his dark locks and shrugged, "It is what is necessary." 

Eidryn was a land of many a species living together in a forced pact of harmony brought out of mutual loss. The Mortal Empire, Imania, consisted of the Fae Continent Sylvaris, the great waterfolk ridge called Aquor's Spine, Lykorra Peninsula of the Shapeshifters and the landlocked human kingdom of Calythia. 

As the weakest of the Mortal Empire's quadrant, it was Calythia who was destined to sacrifice a princess, at the end of every century, in order to be at peace with Dark Realm of Nocverra. Failing to do so would end in upheaval of the Nexus, and quite possibly the end of the world.

"Heh," Elowen scoffed and briefly considered the hygiene issues of bathing in a pond with her blood but the rushing thought of her eventual death subsided the concerns. She looked down at her shirt and flared pants, sighed heavily, then proceeded to unbutton the collar of her shirt. 

For a sacred and centennial ritual, her hosts were pretty lax with the planning. The least they could have offered her were a small sette to keep clothes on and a bathrobe to wear after. Was it too much of a consideration? Then again, her thoughts were with the Valoria Vampires as context.

The glaring scarlet eyes of the second prince invaded her memory. 

Elowen did not bother to undo her pants and entered the water. She rested her back against the pond's edge with only her face out for sight. The water was lukewarm and comforting around her heightened senses; Elowen could have almost enjoyed it if not for Prince Valen, at hand. 

"What's next?" She asked.

He coughed to clear his throat before answering, "We wait for the waning." 

"Ah..." Elowen nodded. The silence gnawed at her soul, "Sounds a bit boring, does it not?" 

"I don't know, it's my first time trying," Valen shrugged, a hint of amusement in his tone.

Elowen's sight was stuck at the darkened skies but from her forced peripheral vision she witnessed Valen resting his elbows on the pond's edge while he threw his head back to stretch. The young princess gulped as water trickled down his prominent adam's apple on a leisurely pace.

"I liked your carriage," Valen commented after a minute or a century, Elowen wasn't sure. 

"Hu-" she almost gulped the bloody water, "Ah, thank you, I engineered it," Elowen strung together a sentence before embarassing herself, "How, I mean, where did you see it though?" 

"While working, through a window," the Prince shrugged, "How did you calibrate human inventions with fae artefacts though? It is quite brilliant." He referred to the elongated pentagonal stone hovering on top of her carriage and powering it.

"Heh, this and that," Elowen smiled, "I liked getting into new stuff ever since I was a kid. It is because I—"

Horror dawned on Elowen as she pursued her lips. She had almost uttered it out and put all of Mortal Empire at stake. Involuntarily, her hands reached the back of her waist, concealed underneath the high waistband of the pants, and her fingers felt for the familiar bump on it. 

"You must have been an important asset to Calythia," Valen whispered under his breath. 

"Heh," Elowen said awkwardly, "No, no, I was just selfish in my pursuits. No body knows, of course," Elowen nodded. Any and all of her intrests were merely a liability to Calythia's treasury.

"The blood ritual takes place over the span of a week. You shall be sacrificed seven days from now...is there something you want to do before that? Anything you regret or expect?"

Elowen flipped her head to look at him. His words were barely above a whisper, his eyes were hooded and his head was titled just enough for his hair to curtain his face from her partial nudity.

"A-are you, no, I mean, why do you ask?" Elowen gulped, for sure, she couldn't get ahead of herself.

"Even though there is a certain comfort in knowing one's destiny, the weight of bearing its knowledge might wear us down someday. Now that you are so close to accomplishing it, I wish to alleviate some of that weight." 

"But...why?" 

Suddenly, he looked up, his grey eyes zoning into hers. Elowen backed up, flattening herself against the pond's stony edges for it felt like Valen was closing in.

"Why because we're married now. I am bathing in your blood, afterall." 

At that moment, Elowen realised that she should have brushed up on vampire lore before sending herself to be eaten. 

Blood Bride — 1

"The Blood Bride is here! The Blood Bride is here!!" 

A scarlet carriage embellished with gold jewels rolled over the cobbled driveway. It was a spherical machine with big wheels and intricate flower detailing of gold around its surface. It was being powered by a white elongated pentagonal stone levitating over its top. 

The carriage halted to a smooth stop in front of the open castle doors. Through the lacy curtains over the round windows, Elowen caught sight of multiple pale skinned, ruby eyed, folks curiously eyeing her ride. 

She rested a hand over her chest to calm her raging heart. For, being sent all alone as a sacrifice, all the more, to the vampire kingdom, no less, did come with a main course of nerves and a bitter aftertaste of abandonment. 

To think there was no one to recieve her, a human princess, at the castle doors held another dash of dampness to her already sullen state of mind. Even if she intended to run away — how could one escape a place with eyes and ears in every nook and cranny?

Surely, no less than ten people might be relishing her fear hastened heartbeat in proximity. 

Where is the Crown Prince who was supposed to meet her? Should she get out all by herself? Is it disrespectful to stay inside for too long? If she were to dash the carriage back home — how much international tension would it cause? The last question was easily answerable. She would be murdered unceremoniously and the vampire kingdom, Valoria, would declare war on the mortal empire of Imania. 

The inside of her carriage was dark and musky. Her gloved hands sweated against the door handle as she gently twisted it. The door sprung open and Elowen almost yelped, lunging into the back of the carriage, at the sight of the person before her.

"I was beginning to think you'd never open the door," the person said. She was a woman with the most perfect rosy complexion accentuated by her curly chestnut hair and emerald eyes gazing into Elowen's soul.

"Ah, no, I was just making sure I look presentable," enough to die, Elowen didn't add; she ran a hand over her hair and outfit to convey her point.

The woman's sharp features softened into a smile and she held out her gloved hand for Elowen to take. Her fitted suit jacket and dress pants made Elowen wonder if she was a knight. Nonetheless, the human princess gently held the girl's hand and let herself be escorted out of the carriage.

"I am Astrid Atlier, the highest ranking Lady of Valoria and your aide for the stay. Welcome to the land of the cursed, Princess Calyx," she curved in the most elegant bow and pressed a kiss on Elowen's lacy knuckles. A chill of awe ran down her spine. 

The princess sucked in a shy breath, for Astrid Atlier was the most charming woman she had ever laid her eyes upon. "It's an honour to have you by my side," for as long as I live, Elowen did not add. She smiled with a tilt of her head which ever so slightly bared her neck.

Instantly, Astrid's hands were around Elowen's neck — choking a cough out of the princess. Though, instead of wrangling her neck or stabbing her artery, Astrid tied a small shell shaped necklace around the smooth curve of her throat.

"It has been scented by the maids. It shall dampen your scent until the ceremony begins," Astrid informed as she stepped back and eyed the necklace with a satisfied nod.

"What about my heartbeat?" Elowen asked, her hand instinctively crept over the necklace and brought it to her nose. She sniffed the miniscule shell only to whiff nothing out of the ordinary. 

"I'm surprised," there was a twinkle in Astrid's eye, "It is a smart question. The castle has plenty human maids and servants. You don't have to worry about it." Astrid turned to lead the way into the hauntingly bejewelled castle. Elowen followed behind, closely inspecting the aged precious stones embedded into the tiled walls colouring up her way. 

"The Valorians don't believe in subtlety, I see," Elowen whispered as they crossed the crystalline foyer. She felt a sudden drop in temprature as goosebumps rose over her exposed skin. Vampires littered the hallways, loitering around with hushed whispers or dull laughter. Everybody could hear everyone, everyone could see everything, as long as one was in sight — their flaws were out for scrutiny amongst the cruelest of all races on Eidryn. 

With eternal time on their hands, as Elowen expected, everything inside the Valoria castle was slow. The deep vibrato of a cello, the slow clinking of wine glasses and Astrid's patient steps which threatened Elowen to accidentally step on her heels on more than one ocassion. 

They rounded a corner and Elowen gasped at the sight of a glass staircase. The wall alongside was covered with intricate beaded tapestries. The first one showcased, in warm colours, a silhouette of a man kneeling in front of a deity. The second depicted the man staring through the tapestry, the warm background a stark contrast to his cold blue gaze. The third continued as the man had his arms spread and the land in front of him was covered in dark beads. Behind him was another deity, blended in with the dark greens and blacks, controlling the man. 

Elowen turned to the fourth tapestry but it was covered by itself; one of its corners had come loose and rolled outwards. Elowen wanted to ask Astrid what it was about but was swiftly reminded of her surroundings by two chuckling vampires, staring at her from the landing.

"Want a game?" 

"What do you bet?"

"I'm bored. My lifetime? What do you put on line?" 

"Eh, my lifetime?" 

They chuckled, sipped from their scarlet wine glasses and sang, "Fang~ Blood~ Cloak~" while waving their hands. As the chant ended, their hands stilled. One of them had two fingers out and curved to represent fangs. The other had his palm swaying left and right.

"Aha," the winner scoffed monotonously, "My fang tears through your cloak," he stated after a look at their hands. 

"It is what it is," the other shrugged. 

Elowen witnessed with cold fascination as the winner's face darkened. His fangs enlarged and his body lunged onto the other, attacking his neck so violently that his head fell and rolled off. 

Elowen whimpered. 

His calm scarlet eyes caught her bewildered auburn gaze. A devious smirk eased up his bloodied face.

"Don't litter, Evander," Astrid chided as if the man hadn't straight up murdered another at hand. 

"That is no way to talk to your Prince," the blonde retorted and flung the blood-oozing-body off the stairs. Elowen shimmed to the right as the vampire's colder corpse rolled off the staircase with much haste owing to gravity. 

"I'll be formal when you'll be princely," Astrid rolled her eyes and extended a hand in Evander's direction, "Unfortunately, he is our crown prince's younger brother by blood and ill fate, Evander something Sythar, pay him no heed." Her words did not sound like a suggestion and Elowen wasn't there to take chances on warnings. 

She bobbed her head in acknowledgment and proceeded to climb up the stairs without Astrid's lead. If the younger brother was a cold, heartless, murderer — what did it say about the Crown Prince? Was he equally vicious or even worse? 

"See, you scared the poor child!" Elowen heard Astrid's harsh whisper.

Evander probably replied in a hushed tone because Elowen couldn't hear it out of earshot. She chose to wait at the end of the staircase, tapping her gloved fingers on the banister. One second she had her eyes on Astrid's back and the other Astrid was on her left, urging her to continue following.

Everything around Elowen was a horror movie made out of candid shots and jumpscares while she was its sole audience. It's fine, this is what she was made for. The end was within grasp.

"You seem on good terms with the royal family?" Elowen questioned as they headed through a hallway of consecutive gothic chandeliers and slow piano music echoing off the marbled walls. 

"I was raised with Evander and your fiancé, oh talking of your fiancé, he apologises for missing your arrival. He'll be there when the ceremony begins," Astrid informed. Elowen stared at her back, the squared shoulders and swaying brown ponytail, almost hypnotically in awe with her slow gait. 

"How long have you lived?" Elowen blurted out, quite rudely if one considered Lady Manners. 

Astrid chuckled at the question, "Long enough to have witnessed your grandfather's fascination with centaur milk. That was quite a time," She drawled much to Elowen's disgust.

They stopped in front of a door, wide and characteristically bejewelled. 

"Do you want to make sure you look presentable?" Astrid mused.

Elowen ran a hand through her silver curls and looked down to check for wrinkles in her flowy pastel shirt and wide legged pants, "I think I'm good," she concluded her observation.

"Cute," Astrid coughed and opened the gigantic door with a flick of her fingers. "I will leave you here, until then," she curved into a bow as Elowen stepped inside. 

The hall was marvellously covered in mirrors and peacock jewels. Grand windows swept in moonlight reflecting all through the hall in illumination. Shrouded partially in darkness and partially in the silver of the moon, two figures awaited her welcome.

"If it isn't the blood bride," the woman drawled.

"And before time, for once," the man deadpanned.

"Did you schedule your mourning hours before arriving?" The woman snickered.

"Pity, I was looking forward to some drama around," the man tsked.

They were the Sythars, King Draven and Queen Lilith Sythar, her in-laws to be. They were a tall and pale pair, gracious looking with elegant stances and bejewelled corsets. It was all Elowen could gather without staring like a dumb fool.

"Are you mute?" Queen Lilith asked, sounding mildly concerned. 

"Ah, good evening, Your Royal Highnesses," Elowen curtsied with grace, "I am Elowen Elyra Calyx of the Mortal Empire, Imania, introducing myself as the centennial blood bride." 

"Why isn't she cowering like all those before her? You know that you're a bride in name but a sacrifice in deed, right?" King Draven scoffed. 

"I happen to be comfortable with my mortality. My parents did not raise me with worldly expectations," Elowen explained eloquently, maintaining her curtsey. The crystalline floor was sparkling enough to reflect a grey image of herself.

"Be at ease," Queen Lilith said as she sped out of the shadows to stand in Elowen's face and pushed a finger under her chin. "The ceremony starts at eight," she whispered as her fingers flicked the shell necklace to the ground. 

Elowen stood perfectly still as Lilith inhaled the scent of her nape and sped back to her husband's side. "She is Arcturus' daughter alright," the woman confirmed. 

The King exhaled a throaty chuckle, "Would've made an excellent ambassador, wouldn't she?" He mused. 

"Excellent indeed," Queen Lilith agreed.

Elowen should have felt proud of the praise she was receiving from the most dangerous couple in the world. But her heart stayed calmer the longer she stayed in their presence. Elowen had been raised with the concept of death at the tip of everyone's tongue. Her mere existence was doomed the day she had her first cry in the arms of her frowning mother. Elowen had had twenty-one-years at her behest to dream, give up and mourn all that she could have or never had. 

To be a human princess in Eidryn was an inconvenience at best but if one were unfortunate enough to be born at the end of a century, they were destined to be dressed up in pretty clothes and sent off as a peace offering to the Kingdom of Valoria. 

Following her fate would be the Blood Ritual. Then, death. 

As Elowen stood on the tallest tower of the castle, looking up at the red eating up the silver of the moon, she sighed in relief at the predictability of her fate. All of her life had surmounted to this moment, she turned to the glistening pond in front, reflecting the changing hues of the moon. 

The ripples in the water were concentric and eternal, a fate Elowen could only wish to possess. 

"Apologies for my late arrival, beloved."

The sudden comment, shot out of silence, startled the wits out of Elowen. Her torso twisted to have a look behind, her feet jumped back out of instinct. Her eyes widened as they laid on a man stripping off his silk shirt. A gasp escaped her lips as her body arched a full ninety against the ground. Her heartbeat hastened as cold arms wrapped around her waist and caught her, mid-fall.

"Hasty to die, aren't we?"