The Poison Princess

by J. Stone

  The feat for which he was most famous for was helping drive back a horde of goblins that had united under the banner of what they called their goblin king. Naturally a fairly unorganized lot, the goblins had never posed a potential problem despite their vast numbers spread throughout the various kingdoms in dark places and hidden hovels. This goblin king, however, had managed the impossible feat of bringing these vile little creatures together to do his own bidding. That bidding, of course, was to conquer the nations of man. At first, no kingdom truly paid the threat the attention it deserved, resulting in several small villages being completely wiped out.

  It was then that Hendrik stepped forward. He was, at the time, a relatively unknown wizard, but he came with a plan that he claimed would wipe out the goblin horde in one fell swoop. Goblins, as a whole, were known to both fear and revere, of all things, owls. They had formed the semblance of a religion revolving around the hooting bird, and to a goblin, it was a terrible slight to ever harm an owl. Hendrik, then, suggested bringing owls to the battle and painting images of owls on the soldiers’ armor and shields. The little creatures then refused to fire upon the men, fearing they would hurt and anger the owls. Hendrik supplemented this tactic with his own spellcraft, creating illusions of owls swooping down over the battlefield and scaring the goblins off. With the army scattered, the goblin king was easily dispatched, and the conflict came to an abrupt end.

  Ruby had heard such stories from Durin, and she was eager to meet the clever wizard. The final room of the tower was a large, single unit that was not furnished at all like a prison cell should be. Among the furniture in the room were five small beds, several comfortable looking chairs, various tables with books or alchemical beakers and flasks sprawled out in disarray over them, a strange fountain with blue energy spraying up into the air and dissipating there, an altar with a silver colored orb floating several inches above it, a stuffed raven perched on a book cabinet peering down at the chaos of the room, and a window that was open with no bars blocking it whatsoever. The most important things in that room, however, were the five little men running about the room frantically working on various tasks. Little isn’t quite the right word. You see, each one was little more than a foot tall. This had led to an abundance of stools and stepladders in the room that they used to get them all to the appropriate heights they needed to be at for their assorted undertakings.

  Each of the little men looked very similar. You couldn’t say that they all were exactly the same, but they looked like they could be brothers at the least. They all had the same dark skin, and their hair looked very similar, though each wore it differently. One with a mustache had shaved the hair on his head completely off, another had shaved off everything except for a single, tall streak down the center of his head, one with a full beard had let it grow wildly in a giant uncontrolled puff of hair, another kept it very short and had a bit of growth on his chin, and the last of the little men had molded it into braids of some sort without any real weaving - the strands were just matted and fell limply to his forehead. They were all dressed similarly as well, but different enough that they could be distinguished by their preferences. Their clothing looked to have been custom made for them given their small stature, and every one of them had on a different color of the similarly crafted fabrics. Red, blue, green, orange, and black were all represented among the strange men.

  Ruby wasn’t quite sure what to make of all this. “Hendrik?” she asked tentatively.

  “Yes?” each of them said in unison, turning their head from their activities to face her.

  “You’re… all Hendrik?” she asked.

  “Mmm,” the one with the bald head said to the others. “This must be the sister.”

  The others nodded in agreement and finished what they were doing, hopping down off their stools and step ladders and chairs, each of them approaching the pair of women.

  “Close the door,” the same one told Scarlett.

  The demon did as instructed, and each of the little men lined up in a semi-circle around them.

  “You know me?” Ruby asked them.

  “I saw that you would come!” squeaked the one wearing orange clothing who had wild, puffy hair.

  The princess was at a loss for words. She didn’t even know why she was really there. An oracle had told her she would go there, and now these little men who all claimed to be Hendrik said that they too knew she would come. She was having more than a little difficulty with the situation.

  The one with the mohawk spoke up with a harsh voice. “Clearly, she needs a proper introduction.”

  “I’ll do it!” the one with wild hair exclaimed in his high pitched, almost squealing voice.

  “No, you won’t,” said the little Hendrik in red with neatly trimmed hair in an almost smarmy voice. “Yes, we are all Hendrik, or at least we used to be. We separated ourselves in an attempt to further our academic progress.”

  “Though that’s met with mixed results,” the bald one chimed in.

  Clearly, the overly tidy and smarmy Hendrik did not appreciate the interruption, but he continued regardless. “To make things easier, we have taken on our own titles. You may call me Master.”

  The bald one in blue spoke again. “I am Prime.”

  “Overlord,” said the Hendrik in black with a mohawk.

  “My name is Supreme,” said the one wearing green clothing and with the hair in divided little locks. “And he is Mad.” He pointed to the one wearing vivid orange and with wild hair.

  “Mad?” Ruby asked.

  “That’s me!” he replied in his squeaky voice. “I saw that you were coming! That was me!”

  “He sees things,” Prime offered. “We’ve each studied different fields, since our split. His efforts have been toward scrying, though it has… altered his mind a bit. Thus… Mad.”

  “And each of your names identifies you in some way?” Ruby asked.

  “Some more than others,” Prime said, looking to Master and Overlord.

  “Why are you called Prime?” she asked.

  “He believes he was first,” Master explained. “Hendrik Prime, as it were.”

  Prime was clearly not on good terms with Master. “And what about you? Master? What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Master leaned forward and smiled at Prime. “I thought it was quite clear. It means I’m better than you.”

  The two stared at each other with ill intent in their eyes. Ruby cleared her throat in an attempt to dispel the tension. “What about Overlord?”

  He smiled. “Everyone has to have goals in life. Mine is simply to rule over everyone.”

  “Right,” she replied, a bit horrified by his forthrightness. “And Supreme?”

  Master chimed in again. “He incorrectly thinks he is better than all of us. That he is the ‘sorcerer supreme,’ as he puts it. Nonsense.”

  Supreme didn’t reply, just raised an eyebrow and looked at Master. Each of them was clearly the same man, but they were so radically different than each other. She couldn’t imagine what bizarre spell had done this to them.

  “I don’t understand how you’re even able to study here though,” the princess replied. “Isn’t this supposed to be a prison?”

  “In a way it is,” Prime replied.

  “Your sister has allowed us to continue our studies,” Master interrupted. “She lets us research but keeps us here, where she thinks we can do no harm. She expects us to report all our findings to her for her own devious uses. Thus, we must give her bits of magic to placate her now and again.”

  Ruby backed up a step, her eyes narrowing. “So you answer to my sister, then?”

  “We have no loyalty to her,” Prime assured her.

  “We just want to be left alone,” Overlord added. “We each have our own hobbies, after all. I for one spend my time trying to find the best way to conquer Nabiria.” He smiled pleasantly at her.

  “Right,” she found herself saying again. “Well, it seems we all know that I was supposed to co
me here and find you all. What I’m not clear on, is how you’re supposed to help me.”

  “We all know your situation,” Prime explained. “That you’re infected with a poisonous magic energy, what your sister has become because of the craggy hand demon, and even the demon you yourself have now bonded with. We don’t believe we’re expected to help with any of that though.”

  “Then what?”

  Supreme finally spoke up again. “We must remind you of what you are fighting for.”

  Ruby narrowed her eyes. “What does that mean exactly?”

  “When you reach the end of your path, you will be forced to make a decision,” he continued. “That choice has not yet been made, and even Mad cannot see the outcome. We hope to shape your decision - to point you toward the proper path.”

  “And what path would that be?”

  “Choosing to save your sister.”

  “I think you might be wasting your time then. That’s all I want. Saving my sister is what I’ve been striving for this whole time. She’s why I’ve done everything that I have.”

  “Are you sure? Is it love for your sister or hate for the craggy hand demon that is driving you?”

  Ruby didn’t reply.

  Supreme continued, “Your path has not been one of light, princess. You have a terrible darkness inside you. That is what the spell unleashed. You survived the assassination, but left as you are, you will never be that same young woman you were eleven years ago. You are different, and you must recognize that fact. The darkness in your heart drives you now. You have succumbed to every dark thought and desire that you’ve come across. You’ve killed and maimed men and women, as though it meant nothing. You’ve shackled yourself to a demon that you now lust after. You’ve sworn vengeance against another demon that you have no way of harming without also hurting your sister. Your motives must be questioned, princess, and we are here to push you back on the right path. Your sister can be saved, but it will require great sacrifice.”

  Ruby took a step forward, turned and walked back the other way, beginning her ritual of pacing.

  “Uh oh,” Scarlett said. “She’s pacing again.”

  “Is that a bad thing?” Prime inquired.

  “Only if she’s considering that there’s anything wrong with her current path. She’s fine the way she is.”

  “Fine?” Master asked. “Not according to what we’ve seen.”

  “She is on a dark path,” Supreme reiterated. “We must correct it.”

  “There’s nothing to correct. She’s perfect the way she is.”

  “What would a demon know?” Overlord suggested with a certain snarl on his lips.

  “More than some little--”

  As she paced, the princess drowned out the argument and thought about what the little men had said. Part of her denied that there was any motive beyond saving her sister in her mind, but another part of her recognized all the foul deeds she had committed since being poisoned. All the death and destruction she had caused. All the time spent desiring Scarlett. She’d only recently killed a man just for touching her, though her demon had found that an endearing gesture. Ruby recalled that it was greed for power that had driven her down into the tunnels below the Abyss. She had spent eleven years in a gluttonous dream world, eating the toxic blissroot and forgetting about the problems of her real life. There were entire days she didn’t recognize herself.

  “What are you proposing exactly?” Ruby asked, interrupting the argument but not halting her repetitive movements.

  Scarlett knew that no good could come of this. “You can’t be really listening to this, my princess.”

  Ruby raised a finger to silence her demon. “There is no harm in hearing them out.”

  Scarlett did not agree with such sentiments, but she did as her master instructed and held her tongue. The princess then turned back to the Hendriks to listen to the rest of their speech.

  Supreme continued, “Your sister has been corrupted by the craggy hand demon. We believe we can carve through that layer of darkness to allow you to speak with her.”

  “I can… talk to Leina?” she asked.

  “That is correct,” Prime answered.

  “Unfortunately, it will be short lived,” Master added. “And after your conversation has ended, she will know that you are still alive.”

  Overlord chimed in. “The craggy hand demon will have her try to kill you. You’ll be exposed. You’ll have to fight off many attackers.”

  “You will see what he is doing to her,” Mad said, his speech speeding up. “See the pain she’s in see the darkness she is enshrouded by see who she used to be see what she’s become under his influence see why you must save her see the new color of the castle see the… Well you’ll be seeing a lot… I guess is my point.”

  “That is what we are proposing,” Supreme finished for them.

  Ruby thought about it for a moment. She looked back to her demon who was already shaking her head. “I need to see my sister.”

  “Princess…” the demon replied. Scarlett loved the darkness inside her. That was in large part what had attracted her to the princess to begin with. Telling her that she needed to think about why she was doing everything might mean weakening their bond after it had just grown so strong. She couldn’t bear to think about such a loss.

  “Your demon must sit this one out,” Master said. Turning to Scarlett with a sneer, he added, “You’ll only be a distraction. Wait over there.” He pointed her to a table behind them.

  She walked by the smarmy sounding Hendrik, sulking about her potential loss in Ruby’s dark character and sat down in a chair at the table.

  “We’ll need you to sit over here,” Prime said, pointing to a comfortable looking chair.

  The princess, too, complied, and the five Hendriks formed another arc around the seat. They each closed their eyes and muttered something under their breath, holding their hands out toward the princess. Her eyes became quite heavy after a few moments of watching them work their incantation, and she soon fell into a slumber.

  Chapter 23. Nightmares

  Ruby found herself in a wholly new but also familiar place. She was in the same old drafty castle that she kept waking up inside, but this wasn’t the same, as it had been. Nothing seemed quite real, and there were significant chunks of the room that were colored incorrectly or just plain missing. She thought it looked like a mental reconstruction that wasn’t yet complete. She knew it was a dream state. The princess recognized that fact immediately. After eleven years inside a dream world, she now had adeptness for spotting a fake.

  Just as she did in that other dream, though, Ruby woke up in her bed. This time she knew what she had to do. The split Hendriks had given her the ability and time to speak with her sister, as she hadn’t been able to do in over eleven years. Perhaps this was a shared dream that they were both having, she thought. Whatever it was, she wasn’t going to waste any time.

  The princess hopped out of bed, still wearing the clothes she had been wearing in the real world. She dropped the hood of her cloak that she’d picked up from Slip and left her room to find hallways that were barren of anyone and rather unusual. They too had sections of the wrong color. They looked like a combination of two different hallways, split unevenly and randomly between them. One was what she was used to - the soft grey cobbled stone lining the floors and walls, but the other was unfamiliar to her eyes. The stones were blood red with black mortar between them. Somehow, Ruby knew that this was her sister’s representation of the castle. Perhaps this was what it looked like now, she thought. After all the time she’d been queen, maybe she’d redecorated.

  She ran down the empty halls towards Leina’s room and pushed the door open, but found that no one was inside. It too, looked to be a mixture of the castles. Ruby’s version was what her sister’s room had looked like as a child, but the red castle was left empty. That version of the room looked as though no one had lived in it for some time.

  That made sense, the prin
cess realized. Leina wasn’t a small child any longer. She was the queen of a sprawling kingdom. Surely, she would spend her nights in the master bedroom, her parents’ old room. Ruby left the girl’s room and went in search of the woman’s. Her parents’ bedroom wasn’t that much farther, but she found herself dreading finding it. She feared what her sister had become without her and what the craggy hand demon had been doing to her all those years. Her rage grew and covered up the fear. The princess soon came to the door and, gripping the handle, pushed inward.

  What she found did not defy her expectations. Leina and the craggy hand demon shared a bed. The sight may not have surprised her, but it did disgust her. The thought of this creature of the nether world taking advantage of a child for its own purposes, defiling her sister, and killing everyone else she loved enraged her.

  He still wore his cream-white mask, and his craggy arm and hand stretched over Ruby’s sister. The bed sheets covered most of his body, but even in his sleep, the craggy hand demon still wore a black robe with a hood that shadowed over anything that the mask did not. Looking at him, Ruby couldn’t tell if the dark entity was actually asleep or if he was really watching her. It was disconcerting to her, to say the least.

  The princess approached Leina’s side of the bed, and she kneeled down to see her sister’s face. She had grown so much in her absence. Leina was now a beautiful young woman, though the corruption of the demon was plainly visible on her face. Even in her sleep, she scowled, and her body shook and convulsed in what looked like angry little spasms. Leina’s skin was nearly as pale as Ruby’s, and her hair was just as dark as the poison the princess secreted. The veins underneath her flesh stood out in stark contrast, and there was almost a greasy sheen to her skin. Seeing her for the first time since her ejection to the Abyss, Ruby didn’t know if she really could help her sister. She looked to have been lost to her long ago.

  Despite her doubt about saving her sister, the princess was there, and she had to take advantage of the situation for whatever it was worth. She hadn’t had the opportunity to speak with her sister for far too long. Ruby held out her hand and grabbed her sister’s.