The growls and screams took a long time to stop. It made Nana wonder how many had gone to feed the beast this night. She must get more null stones before she left with Zoey, or there would be no servants to come back to. The noise ceased, and Nana used all her courage to knock upon the door.
“You may enter,” Sasha purred like a well-fed kitten.
Nana swallowed her fear and opened the door. She had expected a gore filled scene, but the room was spotless. Sasha sat at her vanity, running a brush threw her still wet hair. Her skin glowed, but her eyes held malice that Nana had never seen before. It was as if Sasha had been replaced by an unknown source.
“It’s about time someone came to dress me. I have been waiting for over an hour.
She simpered.
“I apologize, Princess Sasha, you were assigned three girls to help you prepare. I will find them after we finish and see to it that they are punished for ignoring our future Queen.”
“Thank you, Nana, a servant, came earlier and dropped the dress I ordered while I was at school. I need your help putting it on, and then we shall tend my hair.,” Sasha said sweetly. It left chills crawling up Nana’s spine, but she walked directly to the box and pulled the dress from the tissue paper. It was a beautiful gown made of the deepest crimson. Laced with jewels that shone like the sun. It was so different from Zoey’s, and yet there was the same type of magic imbued within the dress. Sasha’s held spells that would entrance and compel all who saw it to a mindless devotion.
Clearly, even with the changes in Sasha, she still held the same need to be loved and obeyed. Nana held the dress in place as Sasha slipped herself into the garment. It stuck to her body like a glove giving the illusion of the rising sun and purity where Nana knew none existed. She preened before the mirror, her eyes admiring her own reflection with awe that seemed unnecessary.
“Tell me, dear Nana, has our little Zoey arrived yet?” Sasha questioned.
Nana knew her question was not out of concern or curiosity. The flash in her eye looked more like a competitive streak than any other emotion. “She had arrived and is preparing her own gown to be present for your celebration. She is your protector, after all.”
“Please tell me you don’t believe her capable too? She was always so week and loving.” Sasha all but snarled. Nana paused for one second as she styled Sasha’s hair, giving thought to her words. She needed to tell Sasha what she wanted to hear, not what she should hear.
“It’s her training that leads me to believe she will be a good protector for you; however, you are correct, your grace. She was always soft of heart and weak compared to the strength held in you.” Nana replied. She looked away from the mirror, fearing Sasha’a wrath, but knowing she was protected help her steel herself for whatever reaction the beast princess would have.
“I knew you loved me best, Nana, and I knew you understood. I need you to convince my mother that Zoey is not ready to come home. Mother dearest has decided that Zoey need not train any longer and that it is time for her to take her place by my side. I feel she is no longer necessary. The magic school has made me strong, and I can take care of myself. Will you help me convince her, dear Nana?” Sasha asked sweetly.
Nana knew better than to refuse, so she agreed without words, thus making no real promise. Sasha seemed satisfied and relaxed under her fingers. She let her thoughts stray to memories of her sister and how she was always overlooked in her younger sibling's presence. It wasn't something she had ever enjoyed. Nana seemed to always be the one who saw both of them and gave each sister the love they needed to be their best when their Mother Queen Elise required it. Sasha was hoping that that maybe she would not have to do the unthinkable and murder her own sister to ensure her power, but she would if circumstances forced her hand.
She was sad to see the magic she remembered in Nana, all but a tiny trickle. She had planned to eat the woman but had found her trust and confidence more valuable. Nana would be a tool she could use to help influence her way to the throne and, ultimately, the scapegoat she could kill when she took the Queen’s life. Mother or not Queen Elise had ruled long enough, and Sasha felt it was time for a change. She gasped when Nana stepped away from her face so she could see Nan’s handy work.
Her eyes were painted like fire and seemed to burn behind the makeup that enhanced her eyelashes, giving them the illusion of smoke. She was more than stunning in her mind; she was a Goddess! All would obey her or suffer. Nana helped her into the softest heels of deep crimson red that matched the darker part of her dress and made her excuses to leave. She would go on to help the queen ready herself, and Sasha hoped Nana was able to do her bidding.
Meanwhile, she would check the status of her maker Royal. As the beast, she was aware of her beginnings. Like Sasha, she was just a princess. The beast preferred her freedom far more than she would like to admit. With her minion, Malenhiem close by taking over the throne before her actual time would be a feat most would never expect her to accomplish. She squealed as she called for an attendant. It took quite some time for the attendant to appear, and when the young woman entered the room, she was no better than human. They were rare in the kingdom of Astra as they could not breed with wereanimals, but as novelties went, their presence was required as a show of status.
This one she could not eat, but she had eaten her fill earlier and would not have to eat again for at least a week if she used her magic carefully. This last speel would be her sisters undoing. Who better to rid her of Zoey than her own father?
“Fetch me my Uncle Royal, I require his counsel,” Sasha ordered. The girl bowed but did not move. Instead, she looked up with tears in her eyes.
“Your Uncle royal has gone missing your grace. Your Queen Mother has had us looking for him for the past hour or so. I am sorry to bring you such bad news on this your day of birth and betrothal.” The human said softly. With her message delivered, she strode from the room, not even waiting to see if Sasha had finished with her questions. What is going on within the palace walls?
No matter she would find her Uncle/father herself. He was easy to track as her own scent was very close to his. It had something to do with the hunger that tha both craves and partook in to stay powerful. Waving her magic through the air. Sasha set a tracker that could find her Uncle Royal as quickly as possible. She did not want to be late to her party; she had a grand entrance planned and, of course, a great shock for everyone there when she decided to change the rules of her entire kingdom with a public execution of her sister by her Uncle Royal’s hand. She giggled as she sent the tracking spell into the air. Today her plan could finally begin, and tomorrow would be organized chaos as her reign change the face of Astra forever.
She knew one thing for sure Zoey would not make it to the ball if she had any say in the matter. She would see to it herself. With a purr in her chest, the beast princess followed her tracking orb towards the crypt.
Chapter 20
Dead Bodies Everywhere
Sasha giggled as she walked through the carpeted hallways. Servants scurried to an fro, all making preparations for her celebration and all in fear of Princess Sasha. The beast reveled in their fear and drank the essence as she followed her tracking orb with sure feet. Her Uncle was still on the grounds of the castle, or the orb would not work, but at times, it doubled back and seemed to lose the traces of her Uncle Royal’s essence. Sasha was prepared to find him injured or in the throes of passion with her mother.
However, the orb continued to travel away from the royal quarters and into parts of the castle she had not seen since the day King Anthony was buried. She generally didn’t venture to this part of the castle as a rule. It held too much death and reminded Sasha of being trapped in the dark oblivion the gods of this world had banished her to. There was no way she was ever going back. She would find a new body for her lover the Malenhiem the Lich, and together they would rule Astra with an iron thumb. The power they would attain would be unlimited.
Once they had all this world
had to offer, they would discard the husk of its remain in to a fire finish and move on to the next world. The beast had suffered too long to leave this world living, and she would be damned if her plans would be thwarted now. Malenhiem and the Beast had existed as one being once upon a time until adventures in another world split them in to two parts, making them stronger and more lethal. A white wizard was the reason for their sundering, making one whole into two halves that suffered without each other.
To kill one, you had to kill both. Before, they had been more like a parasite, happily feeding, using, and destroying all that came across their path. Oh, they could play innocent, win hearts, and even steal kingdoms, but once their control was established, destruction became their goal. Each plane they had eaten, leaving them stronger and stronger until no one could match their power. No one except the Merlin. They had found him once intending to eat him, for that is what they were the eater of worlds and magic. Know only as the beast or legion. They had no other purpose until Merlin tore them in two.
Giving each half a personality and sex. The old god became two creatures like the very things they ate, dependant on each other for their needs and wants. Mimicking what they could from the worlds they had encountered, they chose names and became a team. To be apart was terrible and caused a lonely ache in their bodies. Their suffering was meant to be a lesson to help them stop the destruction they caused, but its meaning was lost on both of them.
It did nothing but enrage them more and lead to far more destruction and terror. Ah, those days were glorious until they stumbled on a great world of magic that held the true heart of a beast forged with a thing called true love. Neither side of the beast could understand the meanings, so they sought to eat the power, becoming trapped until now.
Sasha’s orb had stopped at the entrance to the crypts, a foreboding place of the dead who had no chance to rise. The inhabitants of this place gone and unable to transfer all that strength to herself and Malenhiem. Her dearest Lich could eat from this pit of waste if he chose, but it came at a price. He gained strength but also the memories of the creatures he fed on from here. It had given him very strange wants and desires over the years. His lust for the women of this plane being one of them.
Oh, how they had fought when Sasha had first discovered his love for another. The cheating useless fool was nothing more than a tool she planned to eat and absorb at a later date. How dare he leave her for someone else. It was because of his wandering eye that the magical beings of this world were able to trap her. It made her angry, just thinking about it. She stepped in to the crypt, checking around her to be sure she was not seen. She did not want to explain her actions to anyone unless she had to. She closed the doors behind her and made her tracking orb bright enough to navigate the underground burial chamber.
The ord hummed and danced in front of the crypt of King Anthony. Diving in to the statute and then coming back out again, making the world around Sasha strobe from light to dark, light to dark. It was becoming nauseating. Royal better have a good reason for being down here. The whole place reeked of fresh death and decay. The beast in Sasha roared as she struck down the statue of King Antony, throwing it onto its side. The sight that met her eyes was one that left her horrified. All that precious power has gone to waste and trapped in a bloated poison corpse!
Not even the beast herself held the powers strong enough to eat poison while in her current form. Damn him for getting himself killed. She couldn’t even eat him; all that wasted power sent her into a rage. She screamed over and over until servants and attendants came running.
“Who has done this! Who do I punish?” She screamed as she threw a burst of magic at servants in her anger.
“Get me the queen!” Sasha screamed as she fell to her knees with her heartbreaking. This was a new experience for the beast. She had never loved anything, yet the body she inhabited loved the bloated corpse like a lifeline. She couldn’t explain it, but it hurt her beyond her ability to describe in words. She sat on the floor, whimpering like an abused cat and killing anything that came too close. The servants ran to fetch the queen, but not before Sasha had killed over a dozen of them. Zoey and Zephyr were summoned, as well as every available knight. The other nobles that were visiting for Sasha’s party were sequestered in their rooms for their safety. Echoes raced throughout the castle like howling cats, as each person muttered a prayer or an observation as to what had possibly happened. None of this mattered to Sasha, it was death she wanted and death she would have. Killing a few more servants because she could she melted into a puddle of misery and wailed.
Chapter 20
Challenges and Greed
Zoey composed herself, she would have to be especially careful around her sister. She had witnessed the tantrum leaving Zephyr to wear a disguise and pretend to be her should anyone come looking. He was also able to give himself an alibi as it would seem to any attendant that knocked that the two assassins were busy planning Princess Sasha’s protection. Sasha no longer existed in the body in front of her, no it had become pure beast. Zoey had to admit that she was intrigued by the beast’s reaction to the corpse of her Uncle Royal.
It would seem that all the pieces of the host were not lost once the beast had control. The beast was distraught, and it had no idea how to deal with the emotion, so it destroyed anything that came close to it. It would not be long before Zephyr would come along, and Zoey would have to step into the hologram he would have used to walk them both through the hallways. It was an effective trick when an assassin was visiting for a job. Though most nobles refused to house the assassin anywhere inside their castles.
Queen Elise arrived first and stopped at the foot of the carnage that lay around her daughter. “Sasha, what have you done?” She questioned when she took in the corpses that littered the ground around her daughter.
“It isn’t what I have done, mother, “ Sasha snarled.
“It is what someone has done in our home. I did not trust anyone closer to me than you are standing now.” She spat. The beast princess seemed to struggle for words for a moment while the Queen looked at the carnage.
“What has caused all this? I have heard tales as I ran here that someone has killed Prince Royal,” Elise said, her heart stuttering in her chest as it finally hit her that her first love was truly dead.
“Regicide!” Sasha screamed.
“How can that be? I am the Queen, and you’re the heir. There is no one else.” Queen Elise whimpered. Her daughter’s pain seemed to sting all that got close enough, so it broke her heart that she couldn’t go to her daughter. That she could not calm the suffering in her babe's heart.
“Zoey has done this! She is the only one capable, and we all know that there is no proof she was actually your daughter.” Sasha snarled.
Queen Elise gasped, she had told Sasha these suspicions long ago, it had always troubled her that she seemed to forget the pain of Zoey’s birth. That she could not remember being pregnant was another factor, but she had taken Anthony’s word for it when he told her of those moments and how she had passed out during the birth due to the pain. She had always excepted the explanation as long as Sasha’s parentage wasn’t questioned.
“Be that as it may, we cannot accuse the one meant to protect you. Zoey was seen in her own chamber’s the whole time. Prince Zephyr was with her after she was dressed by Nana. There is no way she could be in two places at once.” Queen Elise stated, choosing to overlook the outburst of suspicion Sasha had tried to lay with her first comment.
“You summoned me, your grace,” Zoey said as she approached Sasha’s kill zone carefully. She could play innocent and even feign disinterest in the matter. She had not grown up in the castle. Being sent away at five years old afforded her more wiggle room than most would imagine. She had no ties to the bloated corpse in front of her, just like she held no ties to Sasha.
“There has been an attack. I need you to check the castle for a traitor to the crown. Your Uncle Royal has been murdered.” Queen E
lise said, her eyes searching Zoey’s face for any inkling of her guilt.
Zoey let tears pool in her eyes.
“How can this be? Who would do such a thing?” She asked as she let the first few tears slip down her cheeks. It was her way of reminding Queen Elise that she was still young. Though Sasha had reached the age of maturity, by the kingdom’s standards, Zoey had not.
“Tell me this isn’t your handy work.” Sasha raged from her spot on the floor. She had scooped up the bloated corpse of Prince Royal and all but thrown it at the feet of her mother and supposed sister.
Zoey cried harder but steeled her face looking over the corpse as a trained assassin would. “He was killed with poison. Some sort of snake if I am guessing right,” She said through a volley of fresh tears. She waved Zephyr forward, and he echoed her words. Zoey’s favorite pet had already been hidden well away from the castle. In fact, Eros had used his own magic to send the beast home to the special cage Zoey kept her in.
The beast that sat before Zoey quieted and calmed. Composing herself, she became the princess everyone expected to see. “No one is to talk of this until Prince Royal’s murderer is found. We carry on with my banquet as planned. Zoey, you shall never leave my side; send your minion to search for the unwelcome guest,” Sasha said rising.
“And the dead dear daughter?” Queen Elise asked.
“Dispose of them and compensate the families for their loss. Just remove them. I will not be held responsible for their deaths. I was protecting myself, Mother,” Sasha replied, her tone cold, but her eyes lit up as her lips pursed together. Only Zoey could see her feed from the remaining magic attached to the servants she had killed. Her pile of death was growing larger, and it made Zoey’s skin crawl in disgust. A beast princess indeed, she was a monster of the worst kind. It was never her fault.
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