Guided by the strange power she had thought only her father could possess, Amelia guided Bone-Crusher closer and closer to where Grace was located. There were a few close calls on the way, what with the number of straggling civilians now flooding the streets; heading away from the conflict, but like a fish cutting through water, Bone-Crusher’s thunderous charge adroitly weaved through them all, towards the smoke and flames of the harbor.
Amelia urged Bone-Crusher to stop at the first sight of water. Where she received the strangest of impressions that her princess’s location, had begun ascending to the clouds.
A ridiculous notion. Amelia turned her sights from the ships raining down cannon fire, towards the Marquess of Rutherford’s manor, located at the top of the cliffs overlooking the harbor.
“I… I don’t see any stairs, do you?” Amelia whispered.
Bone-Crusher snorted and began galloping towards the cliff’s face. “I do,” he said, upon reaching the jagged rocks of its base, before beginning to rapidly climb.
Holding on for dear life, Amelia closed her eyes when Bone-Crusher’s footholds started shrinking to impossible levels. Though the noise of his scraping horseshoes never once stopped, until they did, upon reaching the top.
With the wind in her hair, Amelia half fell; half dismounted Bone-Crusher. Marvelling at the choice plot of plateau, which only someone incredibly wealthy would ever dare place a home atop, Amelia approached the Marquess’s Manor where a mix of foreigners and country-men had been sitting around a table playing cards.
“I am Amelia Strightsworth!” shouted Amelia, to the guards so fixated on Bone-Crusher it took hearing her voice to notice her presence. Removing her mother’s ring, confident she would be able to find it no matter where it might land, Amelia then threw it at the first man who began reaching for his weapon; clonking him on the head. “And you will step aside! My father will soon lop your attempt to invade us, and if you don’t stand down right this instant, your heads will be next!”
Only one of the guards threw down his arm. The rest, nervously reached for their swords and their spears.
“Bone-Crusher,” Amelia said, pointing to those who had made their decision, “I give you permission to treat them like dirt!”
A wind stronger than the gales buffeting the cliff’s plateau fluttered Amelia’s clothing as Bone-Crusher charged past her and began living up to his name.
“Get the girl before the demon horse kills us all!” Cried a guard, only for Bone-Crusher’s hoofs to stampede him low. “Does anyone have a gun!?” hollered another, before a mighty hind kick separated his skull from his rest.
The Manor’s doors opened as if to answer his question. Three more guards, holding flintlocks, quickly took aim at Bone-Crusher, while the others trying to avoid the horse, made for Amelia who backed away not a step.
“Not this time,” Amelia muttered, reaching into her satchel to retrieve and raise high the dragon tooth her father had gifted, “They’re over here, Dad!” she shouted, then flung the tooth as hard as she could onto the ground, where on impact a hairline crack split the bone from its tip to its bottom.
A pillar of flames illuminated the sky. Rising like a geyser, attaining a height bested only by space, one of the distracted guards had time only to say, “W-What the hell?” before a shard of the sun broke away to crash-land amidst them.
In the blink of an eye, Havoc had arrived to evaporate those who had managed to get in arm’s reach of his daughter. While near the Manor, Bone-Crusher shrugged off a volley of gunfire and splattered the rest, leaving but one.
“I… I surrendered!” begged the last guard, “If you’re here for the Marquess of Rutherford, you… you can probably still catch him before he finishes packing and flees using his private harbor! There’s a spiral staircase inside, it leads all the way down!”
“I believe you,” said Amelia, only for Havoc to catch her shoulder before she could leave for the manor.
“You don’t have a weapon on you, take this, you might need it,” Havoc said, removing a dagger that had been sheathed on his belt. Small and ornate, it was sharp enough to get any job done and the perfect size for Amelia to comfortably hold. “It belonged to your mother,” he explained, before quickly adding, “But Amelia… Your friend, Grace… You love her, don’t you?”
“Of course I do! Why? What is it?”
“She’s not quite as… Innocent as I think you believe.”
Was this the concern of a parent? Amelia didn’t quite get why her father had only chosen now to bring up Grace’s foul language.
“I know, Grace isn’t innocent,” Amelia said, “She’s a liar who won’t bat an eye when manipulating strangers… But I think there’s a whole lot of good in her as well, so it balances out!”
“Amelia…” said Havoc, and Amelia grew afraid of what he would say next.
“Y-Yes?”
“No more sweets until we get home,” grumbled Havoc, while rubbing his jaw, which upon close inspection, appeared to be swollen. “We’ll leave this place to you,” he added, and only then did he let go of his daughter.
Amelia watched as her father mounted Bone-Crusher and proceeded to ride his steed off the cliffs edge, leaving her with a dagger in hand and puzzled beyond measure.
**
Inside the manor, beyond the entrance’s hall, in a welcoming room, one that was connected to several other rooms seemingly built to wrap around a large, circular pillar, Amelia came across a wholly unexpected situation, and the shattered remains of a chair, with ropes all around it as if someone had once been tied up. She blinked in surprise at the debris, then again when Stanton came flying out of the adjacent dining room, with a thing that might have once been human right on his heels.
“Why are you here?!” shouted Stanton in surprise as he landed beside her. Leaping back onto his feet, he intercepted the creature that looked on the verge of death in a head-lock and began grappling to push the thing back.
Beyond the pair, in a kitchen, Amelia found Richter furiously gritting his teeth. In his arms he held tightly to a bag stuffed to its brim with parchment and paper.
“You!” Richter shouted, with spittle spat from each incensed word, “What did you do to the sample I took! There was nothing in it! Nothing! You tricked me, you must have!”
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Maybe you were just wrong, man!” Stanton shouted, while pummeling the abomination that seemed to respond to its creator’s venom. The thing reached for Amelia, Stanton chose to kick it away, “A-Amelia,” said Stanton, “If you’re looking for Grace, she should be running back to the castle! I… I helped her escape while they were bringing us here!”
Richter began laughing maniacally, “Lies! You’re all liars without reason or sense! Why? What’s the point of it all?!”
Seeing Richter losing his marbles, Amelia reckoned she lacked something crucial in order to understand what exactly was going on. She looked down, past the floorboards to where she could feel Grace moving lower and lower.
“Don’t worry,” said Amelia to Stanton as she came up with a plan to pursue the Marquess who must be bringing Grace with him, “I’m going to go get help, so can you hold on for just a bit longer?”
“Of… Of course!” Stanton said, and the relief, which washed over his face confirmed Amelia’s guess that the Historian had given him some sort of instruction to lie about Grace’s location.
Turning around, Amelia ran for manor’s main entrance, only to make a quick left through a doorframe upon escaping from Richter’s line of sight. Then left again, into the next room, then left once more, bringing her to the side entrance of a particular kitchen.
Now behind Richter, holding her mother’s dagger in two hands, Amelia let the full weight of her momentum help plunge its blade into the alchemist’s back before he could realise, she had circled behind him.
“This is what you get for not taking my offer!” Amelia shouted as they both fell. She used the impact of them hitting the floor to drive her dagger as deep as it could.
The alchemist’s creation, drawn by the noise, looked confusedly towards its creator. Stanton, seizing his chance, hollered with grit and snapped the creature’s neck from behind. Exhausted by the effort, he collapsed with it, making it so not a person or thing in the room was still standing.
“Good job!” Amelia said loudly, giving Stanton a solid thumb’s up for his work. She then got off Richter, who had begun blubbering words amidst the blood he now drowned in.
“But… But I was so close… Why? I was only trying to make a panacea for all…”
Amelia felt indignant. Even in the face of death, Richter still believed his methodology was justifiable.
“Don't worry," Amelia said to Richter, “I will make sure your research is funded to the point that one day we will succeed in creating a world with elixirs… But don't think for a second that I’m going to accredit your name!"
"Y-you bitch,” managed Richter, before the light was lost from his eyes.
"Really,” Amelia said, dusting herself off to walk towards Stanton, “They picked a fight with my family first. It's not like I've done anything wrong. Now… don’t worry, I know Grace is below us. And while I don’t know what bargain you’ve made with the Historian; I promise to not hold it against you.”
Eager to continue, Amelia headed towards the spiral staircase. Stanton began yelling desperately after her back.
“No, you don’t understand! It’s me! I’m the Historian! Don’t worry about Grace, she can take care of herself! Please, you’ve got to believe me!”
“I believe in you Stanton, but you’re a horrible liar!” Replied Amelia cheerfully, before she began her descent.
**
Round and round Amelia went, lower and lower to where Grace had stopped. Thankfully, she could still feel the occasional movement, meaning her greatest fear that the Marquess might kill Grace, had not come to pass.
Reaching the base of the staircase, Amelia slammed open the exit door and stumbled out onto a flat rocky beach overlooked by a blue sky; peeking out from a gap in the cliff. Tracing one light blue for another that lapped against the shores of a bay, she discovered two figures.
“Stop, don’t do it!” Amelia shouted, as the one holding a flintlock, discharged their weapon moments before her eyes finished adjusting.
“A-Amelia?” spoke Grace, as the kneeling Marquess of Rutherford slumped onto the beach with a blooming crescent of a rose now staining his white shirt, “You… You shouldn’t be here! I sent you back home!”
Amelia, believing her princess had somehow turned the tables on the Marquess, skipped her way over. “I came to save you!” she said, growing unsure of the atmosphere upon seeing how upset Grace seemed to be, “But… But I guess I wasn’t needed?”
The sternness of Grace’s expression was starting to scare Amelia. Was there something she’d missed? Amelia decided to test a hypothesis.
“Grace… Have you met someone who refers to themselves as a ‘Historian’?”
Dropping her gun, Grace’s concern fell away to be replaced with a smile, “What are you talking about, Amelia? A Historian? Are you feeling alright?”
No doubt about it, thought Amelia, as she caught Grace’s hands and held them to try and calm down whatever it was that worried her lying friend, who must have encountered the Historian in some way.
“It’s okay,” Amelia said, wanting to make it clear that no matter what, she would be there for Grace, “I’m sure there’s a reason for hiding why you… why you…”
Out of nowhere, a blinding pain shot up Amelia’s arm and into her head where something shifted. Painful enough to stop her from finishing her sentence with a ‘didn’t tell me’, Amelia screamed without knowing why.
“I’m sorry,” said Grace, as the buried memories of Amelia’s past began to stifle her breath like the hands that had once strangled her throat. Followed soon after by a rushing tidal wave of sensation as Amelia’s rap at the hands of the Marquess of Rutherford’s men and her encounter with Richter, became vivid to the point her assaulted senses believed she had returned back in time.
“G-Grace, h-help me!” Amelia gasped as the phantoms of her past began dragging their hands along her body, “I don’t… I d-don’t want to remember,” she pleaded, “S-something’s gone wrong, Grace… Y-Your magic, it’s stopped w-working… P-Please make it stop.”
The guiding fire inside Amelia, wailed like a child and began pushing back against the nightmare. Buying her a precious few seconds to figure out why Grace remained so impassively silent. Or why her friend had chosen to unseal the magic that had been keeping her trauma at bay. Believing Grace would never hurt her without a good reason, Amelia found herself desperately searching her surroundings for a third party.
And in the shadows of the cliff, did she find someone watching.
Relief filled Amelia, even after the shadow on the rocks flickered and disappeared from her sight. She had almost forgotten about the Historian’s obsession with Grace.
“G-Grace, I need you to trust me,” Amelia said, hopeful that they might be able to work through this together.
“Don’t talk, it isn’t safe,” said Grace, and her friend’s acknowledgment that they were in danger gave Amelia the courage to speak once again.
“N-No, It’s… It’s alright!” Amelia said quickly, as she felt her hysteria begin enclosing once more, “My… My Dad is nearby, I know everything, I… I know The Historian is—”
Another burst of indescribable pain racked Amelia’s body. With a whimper, she fell, into Grace’s arms where her friend pleaded and said:
“Please, don’t say that it’s me!”
“It’s… You?” Amelia numbly replied, as her understanding of the world fell apart at the same time as the sky, which through the gap in the cliff, shattered like glass. Revealing on the other side of the looking glass, a horizon of innumerable teeth that began to stretch wide.
“I’m sorry, I’m… I’m so sorry,” said Grace, her face gaunt, her eyes dead and hopeless, as nature itself, like a devouring serpent began shredding existence. “I tried so hard to protect you, but in the end, it was me who messed up… I… I hurt you for no reason… In our final moments no less.”
“W-What is this?” Amelia asked, as the maw of existence snapped shut on the sky, plunging the world into night. Leaving her with only the sensation Grace whose body silently trembled with sobs.
In the distance, a meteor rose to defy the end of their world. As a rider and his horse burned all that they were to strike the heavens beyond, to become nothing more than a twinkling firework, which exploded on impact against the night sky.
A force beyond what she could imagine began crushing Amelia’s body against itself as she witnessed the death of her father.
“Grace… Can you make the flames dance for me… One last time?” Amelia found herself asking, when all hope felt lost.
“N-Not anymore,” Grace lamented. Though in a clumsy attempt to adhere to Amelia’s final request, she snapped her fingers anyways, to light but a spark.
In the brief moment lit between them, Amelia saw Grace’s expression turned startled.
She felt Grace grab her face to plant a tender kiss on her brow. “Do you still believe in me, princess?” Grace whispered, and Amelia answered with all of her heart:
“Of course I do.”
Grace’s lips left her. Amelia could feel herself fading away. Though she managed to smile when Grace again snapped her hands, to create with her magic, a single red flower crafted from fire. The sight reminded her of the place she most wanted to be.
“Then… Next time, I’ll believe in you too, until the end.”