by J. Stone
“Leina,” she whispered.
Her sister’s eyelids fluttered a bit, but she didn’t wake.
Ruby didn’t know how this dream world worked exactly, but she was worried she might wake the demon and lose this chance. She shook her sister’s hand and repeated her name. “Leina.”
Leina’s eyes opened so widely that the princess nearly fell back in surprise. There was a blackness to her eyes that was completely unrecognizable, but the darkness began to recede, replaced by the blue that Ruby had known. The corruption of her face suddenly vanished. The Hendriks’ sorcery must have started working, she thought. Leina looked at her sister with such confusion for a moment, like she couldn’t believe what she was seeing to be true. She then clasped her eyes shut, and her whole body shivered terribly. When they opened again, Leina stared into Ruby’s face searching for the truth in it. She looked at her sister’s hand on her own. The princess grasped it and smiled.
“Leina?” she repeated once more.
“Ruby?” her sister asked. “What’s happened? I remember… What have I done?” She looked at the craggy hand sprawled over her, and her face indicated that she might scream in terror at any moment, but she held it inside.
“Come on. Let’s get you out of here, so we can talk.”
Leina nodded and tried to shift out of the bed. Ruby grabbed the craggy hand of the demon and lifted it up, so her sister could get all the way out, but touching his craggy flesh made her skin crawl. The princess then laid it back down and watched as the demon shifted in his sleep. She wanted to kill him right then and there. She doubted she could in that place though. Besides, she thought, her sister would suffer for it. Instead, Ruby turned back to face her sister who was shivering in a blood red nightgown. The princess picked up a blanket from a chest at the end of the bed and threw it over her sister’s shoulders.
“Come on. Let’s take a walk,” she suggested, keeping her arm around her sister’s shoulders.
The pair of women then made it out into the hallway and walked through the amalgamated castle structure that both their minds had created.
“Is this real?” Leina asked.
“It is,” Ruby replied.
“But… you died. I remember he…” She struggled to think. “He sent you somewhere. Somewhere you were supposed to die.”
“Yes, he did. The Abyss, but I didn’t die. I had to come back for you.”
“He tricked me,” Leina said. “I was just a little kid. I didn’t know what I was doing. He’d been my imaginary friend for years, and I trusted him. He told me that if I just wished hard enough I could play with him for real. After I did, everything went kind of… hazy.”
“He corrupted you.”
“What have I done, Ruby?” Tears started to fall from her eyes. “I killed mother and father. I tried to kill you. So much death…”
“We’re going to fix this, Leina. I’ll find a way to save you.”
“It hurts. I feel like there’s a boulder crushing my chest. Everything I’ve done…”
“That wasn’t you,” Ruby assured her. “That was the demon. He did all of this. Not you.”
Leina shook her head. “You don’t know what he’s made me do… Things I’ve done with a smile… I’ve slaughtered thousands of people all for his approval. Why would I do that? Every night he comes to me… Makes me do things to him… Moreover, I do them happily… I can’t be saved, Ruby.”
“I know that this has been a nightmare for you, but--”
“You don’t know!” Leina screamed. Some of the darkness was returning to her eyes.
“You’re right. Of course, you’re right. I don’t know what you’ve been through, but I’m not going to abandon you. I will find a way to save you from the demon.”
“What if I don’t deserve to be saved?” Leina stared at the floor of the hallway in a daze.
“That’s nonsense. You’re a good person. The demon can’t change that.”
“I was a good person. I’m not what I once was, sister.”
“No, I can save you.”
“How?” Her voice had lost the tremble it previously had. “Saying it doesn’t make it true.”
“I’m not sure yet. I thought I would start with the Cloister. They’ve studied the nether realm for generations. Surely they will know of a way to separate you from the demon.”
“And then what?”
Ruby shrugged and looked away. “Then I find it. Nothing will stop me, Leina. I’m going to save you. I’ll separate you from the demon, and then I’ll kill it.”
“What makes you think you can kill it?” The question was almost defiant.
“Because I have to. After everything it’s done, there has to be justice. I have to save you, save our kingdom, save our people. And I have to put it down.”
“I don’t need your help, you foolish girl.” The voice had changed completely. Ruby looked back at her sister to see the full corruption spread over her face once more.
Ruby backed up from Leina’s darkening form. “What have you done with my sister?”
Leina tossed off the blanket and pursued the princess. “Your sister is dead. I am all that remains of her. I am not corrupted, I am freed. Free to do as I see fit. The demon saved me. Saved me from the shackles that this world sought fit to place on me.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying.” Ruby backed up into a wall.
Leina placed her hands on either side of the princess, leaning in close. “I know exactly what I’m saying, sister dearest. This place is better without you. You should have stayed dead. I don’t need you.”
“That’s the demon talking. You have to fight it. He’s done something to you.”
Leina arched back and laughed. “Done something to me? You really want to know what he’s done to me? No. I know what you want to hear. What I’ve done to him? Mmm, yes. Every night I beg him to let me suck his prick. To swallow every last hot drop he shoots down my throat. I plead for him to stick it inside me. To bend me over and fuck me, until I moan with desire. Make me howl with pleasure.” She imitated the sounds, echoing through the hall before continuing, “And do you know how long I’ve been doing it?” She smiled so widely, it looked like her cheeks would split and bleed. “Every night since I got rid of you! Since I was a tiny little thing hanging off the tip of his cock!”
Ruby cried for what her sister had become. Finally, choking away the tears, she managed to say, “I will save you,”
“Say it again! That’ll make it true!” She mocked. “Do you know how many men and women and children I’ve killed? How many I’ve personally tortured, until they could fight it no longer? Until their bodies gave in and simply ceased to live? That’s what I do for fun! I stick people on spikes and watch their bodies slowly slide down until even their skulls are pierced! I eat, while I watch! Sometimes I eat pieces of them and make them watch!”
“I will--”
“YOU CANNOT SAVE ME!” She roared with such ferocity that the princess had no choice but to believe it.
Ruby slumped down against the wall only able to cry, wishing the dream would end. Leina leaned down and looked into her sister’s eyes. She wiped the tears from Ruby’s cheeks and lifted her chin with a finger. “I’m going to kill you, sister. Probably slowly if I can manage it. Though, you always were such a weak little thing. I expect you won’t last very long. Maybe I’ll keep you alive and share your body with my demon. Maybe he’ll like to play with you and use your holes before I put you on one of my spikes. I’m not jealous. He has his needs after all. My advice? Stay away from this place. There is no redemption here, big sister. If you come home, you will only find death.”
Ruby had nothing left. Her sister had emptied her out and left her a hollow shell. With a terrible cracking sound, the world split in half and the princess was left alone in her own, grey dream. She curled into a ball and cried, until the terrible nightmare finally ended.
Chapter 24. Coming to Terms
“Why!? Why did you make
me see that!?” Ruby shouted, tears rolling relentlessly down her cheeks. She stood up from the chair only to fall to the floor, landing on her knees and sobbing in a ball. The princess lost control of the lever, and the poison began to spew out from her mouth despite all the time she’d spent teaching herself how to harness it.
Master sighed loudly. “And she’s spitting up again.”
Mad raised an eyebrow. “Told you she would.”
“All over my rug.”
“I told you to move it. You never listen to me!”
“He never listens to anyone, Mad,” Prime agreed.
Scarlett ignored the little men and ran across the room, embracing her princess, wrapping her arms around her. She turned and glared at the little Hendriks. “What did you do to her?” she demanded.
“We showed her what we had to,” Prime said, stepping down from his stool.
“What does that mean, you little--”
Master cleared his throat before adding, “We reintroduced her to her sister. We showed her who she has become.”
“Showed her the demon’s corruption!” Mad cackled.
“Look at what you’ve done! What was this supposed to prove?” Scarlett asked.
“It isn’t supposed to prove anything, demon,” Overlord said.
“Ruby needed to see what had become of her sister,” Supreme explained. “She needed to understand what she faces. She needs to understand the task she’s undertaking to save her sister.”
The princess looked up, her face flooded with tears and black mucus dripping from her nose. She forced control back over the lever in her chest. “How?” she demanded, spitting the poison from her lips. “How could I ever save something like that? That wasn’t my sister. My sister is dead. That foul beast has destroyed her.”
“As Mad has seen it, there is certainly a way,” Supreme insisted.
Ruby wiped her face and forced herself to stop crying her black, oily tears. “How?” she repeated in a quivering voice, looking to the wild Hendrik.
“The knowledge will be given in the Cloister!” he cheered. “There is yet hope and redemption before death!”
Those were the same words that the Oracle had chosen for her prophecy to the princess. Knowledge. Hope. Redemption. Death. She was still unclear what either Thea or the Hendriks had meant. “Whose redemption? Whose death?”
Mad smiled. “Unclear. That decision hasn’t been made yet.”
“Who decides that?”
“You, princess. Always you.”
Ruby went silent. She felt like she was getting nowhere.
“What did you see?” Scarlett asked her, whispering at a level intended to keep the Hendriks from hearing.
“My nightmare,” she replied, standing up. “We have to go to the Cloister. If there really is a way to save her, then I’m supposed to find it there.”
“I will follow you anywhere, my princess.”
“And what about you lot?” Ruby asked the divided Hendriks. “Am I supposed to just leave you here?”
“This is where we belong,” Prime replied. “Freeing us would only lead to our death by the queen.”
“As much as I hate to agree with him,” Master began, “he is right. Our place in your journey ends here. It is time for you to leave.”
The others nodded with him, while Ruby wiped the last of the tears from her eyes.
Scarlett wrapped her arm around the princess’ and asked, “Are you ready?”
“Let’s go,” she replied.
The demon helped Ruby toward the door, where they exited the Hendriks’ cell that was anything but a prison and set back toward the stairs. Ruby kind of turned off her mind at that point, allowing Scarlett to take over. The princess wasn’t paying any attention to where they were going; her focus, like a frightened turtle, had shrunk back inside the shell of her mind, still focusing on the dream state she’d woken from. You couldn’t really blame her after what she had just seen and heard. Her sister was a very different person than what she remembered.
The demon at her side took the lead, and she propped Ruby up, as they descended the stairs. The urge to show the Hendriks some proper respect for Ruby had been difficult to resist, but it was clear that she needed to get out of there. After walking down a flight, they came across a guard. The princess was in no condition to deal with it, so her demon handled it. Strengthened by her bond to Ruby, taking care of a single guard was far from challenging for Scarlett.
She raised her unoccupied hand toward the guard and then pushed it forward. The guard followed her hand’s instruction, tumbling backwards down the spiral steps with incredible velocity. She heard his body break and tear and the metal of his sword and armor crash against the stone steps. Ruby seemed not to notice. The noise, however, attracted another pair of guards. Scarlett dealt with them similarly, tossing them down the stairs with her magic.
The pair of women soon came to the bottom floor, stepping over the twisted and mangled form of the three guards. Another sat at a desk, but he had the good sense to stay seated and let the women pass by. Scarlett pushed open the door prior to approaching it, pushing it with her power as well, and they then crossed the threshold and were back in Elythine’s streets. The night had come and gone during Ruby’s dream state, and the light of dawn washed over their faces, as they moved forward into the city.
Scarlett knew where Ruby wanted to go next, but she didn’t know how they intended to get there. She didn’t want to trouble the princess though, as she knew that whatever she had seen in the dream was still causing her more than a little distress. She would take care of this small matter for her princess, while she recuperated.
The demon escorted Ruby to the edge of town on the west side of the city, closest to where she understood the Cloister to be. Perhaps, she thought, she could find some transportation to the monk’s monastery. Scarlett sat her princess down near a stone fountain, while she went to ask around. There was a young man tending a horse at a stable, who she approached.
“Excuse me,” she said.
He stopped brushing the horse and turned to face the demon, his eyes tracing up every curve of her beautiful form. He didn’t even seem to pay much attention to the horns on her head, choosing instead to spend his time on her other, more attractive body parts. Finally, he stuttered, “C-C-Can I help you?”
“I’d be careful,” she warned. “The last person to look at me like that is a puddle of filth.”
“You mean he’s lying in a puddle of his own filth?” he asked.
“I really don’t,” Scarlett said with a strange little smile.
The young man cleared his throat. “Right… Well, then, how can I help you?”
“I’m trying to find transportation to the Cloister. Is there someone here who can do that for me?”
“No one goes that far. It would just cost too much to be worthwhile.”
This wouldn’t stop Scarlett. She twisted her hand, pushing it through the veil between realities to retrieve another (or possibly the same) bar of gold. “Would this cover your costs?”
The young man stared with awe at the gold. He had clearly never seen that much money in all of his life. “I-I-I think we can come to an arrangement.”
“I suspected as much. You just work out whatever little details you need. I’ll retrieve my friend.”
The young man nodded, and Scarlett left to find the princess and tell her the news. Ruby wasn’t where the demon had left her but had instead moved to the fountain and was looking down into the water. She stared at her own reflection thinking how hopeless her quest felt.
“I’ve got us a ride to the Cloister, Ruby,” the demon told her.
“How did he do it?” the princess asked, ignoring the news.
“How did who do what?”
“The craggy hand demon. How did he corrupt my sister? There was so little of the girl I remember left inside her.”
“I’m not sure what you--”
Ruby was crying once again, and the quiver ret
urned to her voice. “You’re like him. You’re from the nether realm. How does it work? How did he destroy my sister?”
Scarlett was offended that she would compare her to that kind of creature. “My princess, while I am from the same place as him I am nothing like him.”
“How did he do it?” Ruby was determined to get her answer.
“It’s part of a spell.”
She felt a glimmer of hope, though she knew better than to rely on it. “Then, does that mean it can be reversed?”
“The spell feeds on their bond. If we sever that connection, then it is possible all the corruption he has caused to grow in her will recede.”
“Possible? You mean it’s possible it won’t? That my sister might never be the same?”
Scarlett didn’t want to hurt her princess any more than the vision already had. “I’m sure you can save her. Even the… Hendriks… rude though they were, seemed to think you could save her.”
Ruby looked up at her demon. What Leina had said howled in her head. “That’s not what she said. She said I couldn’t save her. After what she’s been doing for the past decade… maybe she’s right.”
“The corruption inside her would say anything to keep you from destroying it. You can’t trust it. It only wants to hurt you. That’s what such sorcery feeds on - negative emotion.”
“Then it certainly got a meal from me.”
Seeing her master in pain was hard for Scarlett. She wished she could do something to repair the damage that the dream had caused. Again, she thought about harming the Hendriks, but that would help her not Ruby. “What did she say to you, my princess?”
“I couldn’t possibly repeat it…” She tried to push away the words in her head. “But it was clear that the corruption you speak of has taken over.”
“Those little Hendriks said that the spell would allow you to see her without that corruption though. Did you not get the chance? Did they lie to you?”