Dawna: 24
Pixie: 21

I was so young
You should have known
Better than to lean on me
You never thought of anyone else
You just saw your pain
And now I cry in the middle of the night
Kelly Clarkson; Because of You

'Is there any news on the resistance?' the pale woman asked with a stern voice.

'Not that we know of, your majesty,' one of the counsellors spoke whilst looking down on the table.

'Odd is it not? They used to pay me a little visit and make a sad attempt to assassinate me and now we have not heard a single thing from them in months,' the Queen spoke with a sad sounding voice. 'You would think that they loved are little game too. All those miserable murder attempts, only to disappear on me now. How else am I supposed to play?'

'Dawna, dear, please take this seriously. It is suspicious that they have not done anything in months now and I have reasons to believe that they have chosen a new leader,' her aunt Delphinium spoke with her hands folded on the table in front of her.

'Well pray tell, auntie.'

'It is clear to everyone in this room that they move their location every week, but we do know that they meet every once in a week. However, the day and the location change every time, which makes it difficult for our man to find them. Since you publicly murdered the man we believe to be their previous leader it is only normal for them to have found a new leader. We just have not figured out who this leader is.'

The pale Queen shook her head before a deep sigh left her lips. 'I get all of that, it is quite obvious. It is very boring, however. If all of you fail to do your job right, we must wait until they make a move and if they do not make a move then there is no game. I love playing games. I love watching them make the same mistakes over and over again.'

'Darling, do try to take it seriously.'

'Why should I auntie?' the young woman asked. 'I am so much stronger than all of them combined. I could kill them with so much as a blink of the eye. They are no threat; they are nothing but a bunch of people who think that it is both smart and brave to stand up to their Queen.'

None of the counsellors dared to speak up nor move. Dawna hated how they were always afraid to speak up to her, none of them ever dared to challenge their Queen or to disobey her and it bored her. The only ones that wanted to play her sick game with her was the resistance and they had not done anything. No assassination attempts, no threats and no public demonstrations. It was a clam before the storm and the pale woman hated every second of it.

'We do it as follows: I demand all of you to seek this new leader and when you have, I want you to bring this person to me. Once we have found the leader, we will be able to dismantle the entire organisation.'

'Then why didn't we last time?' a soft voice mumbled so softly that no one expect the Queen heard it.

'Excuse me, sir with the red blouse, could you repeat that for me?' Dawna asked while she tried her hardest not to smile devilish. Perhaps this meeting could get interesting after all. 'Come on now, do not be shy.'

The man got a pale look on his face as soon as he realised that his Queen was talking to him. 'Well I,' he stuttered, and the pale woman could almost feel his fear. 'It was nothing?'

'Nothing?' she asked with a high-pitched voice. 'It almost sounded as if you were insulting me, huh? Saying something about how I failed to dismantle the resistance last time. Does that ring a bell in that fat head of yours?'

Her voice was playful yet filled with a coldness. Everyone in the room was aware of the fact that their Queen was not someone who handled criticism very well. The man was on thin ice and by the look on his face Dawna could tell that he was more than aware of this.

'That's technically what I said, but I didn't mean it that way!'

'No? Oh, I am sorry. What did you mean?'

'I meant that we failed to ask it the last leader before he got burned.'

'Wrong answer,' the pale Queen spoke before she snapped her fingers.

At first, no one knew what had happened until loud screams started to leave the mans lips. He hoisted himself from his chair and tried so desperately to extinguish the fire that the pale woman had lit in his pants. His screams filled the air long after he had run out of the room towards the bathroom to drown his lower half in water.

'So, I suppose that there are no other complains or suggestions?' Dawna asked with a satisfied smile on her lips as her eyes noticed the fear in everyones eyes.

The Queen certainly could not handle criticism well.

! Dawna: 23
Pixie: 20

It was hours later when the Queen felt stable enough to leave the hospital with a brave and strong look on her face. Only a handful of subjects were aware of her breakthrough and those who knew were informed to not tell a soul about it. Unless, of course, they wished to die a miserable death.

'Come on, sweetie. We will be home soon.'

It was only when they left the building that her bright blue eyes spotted him: the man that had been haunting her dreams ever since that horrible night. He still had short red hair, only now the red was accompanied by grey strand of hair. He still had a round nose and two big brown eyes. However, the one thing that really gave him away was the small scar between his thick eyebrows. There was literally no doubt that this was him: Semual. The man that lured Prince Damien and Dawna to a trap that led to her brothers death. He was partly responsible of her beloved brothers death and had haunted her dreams for years. The pale Queen had searched everywhere for him; she had been to every village but had never even caught so much as a glimpse of him. Until now.

Now he had carelessly walked into a trap that would lead to his death.

Her cold and bright eyes forced the man to fall down on his knees in the long grass. She had broken his kneecaps, causing the man to suffer immensely. Anger rushed through her veins as Dawna let go of her aunties hand and walked towards the traitor with no mercy in her mind.

The pale woman had dreamt of this moment ever since that night; she had dreamt about ways to make him suffer the way she was. It was her mission to make him feel the same aching she felt every day.

'Dawna? Where are you going?'

The young woman did not answer as she reached the aching man. Tears were making their way down his cheeks as she grabbed a handful of his red hear in her fist.

'Hello, dear,' her angry voice hissed.

All of a sudden, panic showed itself in his eyes as he noticed the Queen. 'I think it is safe to say that you remember me, right?'

The man nodded slowly as he whined in pain. 'Please,' he begged weakly. 'Have mercy.'

A smile crept upon her lips as an insane sounding giggle left her lips. 'Mercy? I will show you the kind of mercy you showed my brother.'

It took Dawna a blink of her blue eyes to make the man lose his consciousness as he fell down on the damp grass. Perhaps they were right; perhaps after the rain did come sunshine. Or at least it did that day.

'Come on, now. Wakey, wakey,' Dawna hummed happily.

Semual slowly opened his brown eyes as pain filled his body immediately. A satisfied grin appeared on her plump lips as he became aware of the state, he was in. The Queen had stripped the man down and left him in nothing but his underwear. She had tied his hands and legs to steal pipes in the dungeon. The man looked in pain and confused; just the way she had hoped he would look.

'Finally, sleeping beauty awakes!' the Queen shouted. 'Or should I rather say the beast awakes?'

Fear filled his eyes as the merciless woman came closer. Her hands grabbed his face and forced him to look at her. The ropes made sure that he could not bend or fall; causing the man to stand on his broken knees.

'What kind of beauty would betray two young children? Surely, only a beast would get one of them killed; so, I suppose that you are a no beauty but a horrible and devilish beast.

It was clear that the man was far too afraid to speak up, much to her annoyance.

'Have you lost your tongue?' the young woman with the long white hair asked as her fingers forced their way in his month. 'There it is! It appears that your tongue has lost his ability to work. You know what we do with broken things; we cut them out.'

Her free hand grabbed a sharp knife and brought it close to his lips. Suddenly, Sem seemed to be aware of her intentions as he shrugged sacredly; causing a giggle to leave her lips.

'No? You do not want a tongue removal? But today is your lucky day: today you get it for free. How generous of me.'

'Please, my Queen.'

A sarcastic laugh left her lips. 'Queen, it is now huh? How convenient that you can suddenly remember how to address me properly. Did you spontaneously forgot that one night?'

'N-No,' the man mumbled as he looked away from her angry blue eyes.

'No? So, you actually knew that we were royals? I suppose that is the reason why my brother died, right? Because you and your sad little resistance hate the monarchy, or my father. Please interrupt me if I am wrong, okay?' Dawna rumbled as she cut with the knife in the walls. 'You decided one day that you were absolutely done with my family and took off to our castle with your sad little group. Once you came there, you realised that you could not take the King down, so you decided to go after his young children. My brother was ten and I was eight, did you know that?'

Dawna stopped talking and looked over to the man who nodded slowly.

'So, you did know?' her voice asked in a fake shock. 'Do you know what I find even more shocking than this? The fact that right now you have five children and one of them is eight-years old.'

'N-No, leave m-my c-children out of t-this!' Sem begged as tears of desperation left his eyes.

The pale Queen shook her head in disappointment. 'Why would I do that? You were the one that decided to take the innocence away from children. I was eight-years old, remember? I was your sons age when you took away my brothers life and my innocence and joy in one single night and left me broken and shattered. I suppose that you do not care about this and I do not wish for you to feel guilty. I do not do well with guilt, I prefer vengeance and pain over anything else.'

Her hands now made a small cut in the mans bare back, just to make sure that he was still following her words.

'If you had the right to take away the innocence of an eight-year old, then why should I not? I am a Queen after all, which pretty much means I get to do whatever I want, and right now I want to make everyone you love suffer. Especially your son.'

'No! No! Please your majesty, leave my son out of this. Take my life, break me and hurt me but not him!'

His begs actually satisfied the pale Queen; causing a smile to creep upon her lips. There was something so beautiful about taking a life. The person who knew that his death was nearby would always beg and make up excuses for his behaviour.

However, this time nothing could he would say could save him from his faith.

'I begged too, you know, her insane sounded voice said. I begged everyone not to kill my brother. Yet, you refused to listen to me. So why should I listen to you now?'

The broken man did not reply. Dawna saw the silence as a sign to continue.

'Your life could have been so differently, you know. I should have never become Queen; I should have never married that horrible fake piece of husband that I had. No, I was destined to just be a Princes who would stand on the side-lines. I was a reserve, to say at least. The only reason my father had two children was to make sure that there would always be someone to step in his footsteps. When you took Damien's life you marked mine. Suddenly, I was not just a Princes anymore but a future Queen with many responsibilities. I had to attend boring meetings, read many books and watch my father closely to make sure that I was ready for a job that never should have been mine.'

The pale woman softly stroke his skin with the tip of her knife; she made sure that the knife would not go in too deep, yet.

'So, I think that it is safe to say that you dug your own grave there. By killing my brother out of hate for this monarchy you created a monster and put it on the throne. That is plain suicide there. So do not dare to beg for your miserable life. You do not deserve happiness nor love; you deserve the worst death possible.'

'Please, your majesty, I never meant to-.'

'To what? Huh? To kill my brother who was only ten-years old? To take my soul and torture it every single night? Do you even realise that I have been having the worst nightmares ever since you betrayed us that night? I cannot trust anyone around be because of you. In a way I should be thankful to you for making me see peoples true nature. Nobody can fool me now with nice words and a helping hand. You made me both stronger and weaker and I absolutely loathe you for it.'

'What are you going to do with me?' the scared man asked with tears running down his face.

Dawna loved every second of it. The pain, the fear and the desperation of the man gave her more energy then she could handle.

'It is very simple, darling,' the pale Queen spoke. 'You will be burned on a stake for treason and I will let everyone in my Queendom watch your treasonous body burn. Including, of course, your eight-year old son. He will sit on the front row to watch his father burn for what he has done.'

Two days later, after Semual had been tortured and starved the Queen prepared herself for his burning. He had had a fair trial (as far as it could be fair) and was sentenced to death by burning at a stake by the jury.

The pale woman had taken a seat on her throne in the garden as people filled the field. It would be the first time someone would be burned to death in years; the citizens were both terrified as curious to see what would happen. Dawna wore a gorgeous long red jumpsuit with a coat made of sheepskin and a rather large golden crown with red diamonds to make sure that everyone knew who was in charge.

A devilish smile crept upon her lips as her blue eyes noticed how a small, eight-year old boy together with a familiar looking woman that must have been his mother took a front row seat. Guards had been assigned to make sure that the two would stay on their place during the burning. They would be the ones that smelled the burned flesh the best and that could hear his screams the loudest.

After minutes that seemed like hours the man was brought in by guards and tied down on the stake. His feet stood on a large pile of wood that would burn together with his flesh.

'Are you sure that this is what you want, honey?' the familiar voice of her auntie asked while Looky crept upon her lap.

'I have never been surer, Auntie. This man deserves his fate,' Dawna replied with a devilish smile on her lips. 'He deserves to burn for his treason.'

'Very well then, will you do the honours?'

As Dawna stood from her throne (placing her beloved cat on the seat carefully) a deep silence fell upon her subjects.

'Today, this man will be burned for his treason on the monarchy. Semual will be the first in years to be burned and I am not trying to scare you. I am merely trying to warn you. Semual betrayed your King Damien and your Queen when the rebels tried to take over the castle. This was years ago people and I can honestly say that I have never forgotten his face. This man, right here, is the reason why my beloved brother, your Prince and future King died that night. He made us believe that we could trust him and ended up causing my brother to die. For this he will burn, not only here but also in the eternal flames of Hell. The jury has found him guilty for both treason and murder for which he will burn today.'

A dark silence echoed through the garden. Citizens looked absolutely terrified, yet curious as they heard her words. The only sound that tried to kill the silence were the silent whimpers of the eight-years old.

'However, I am an honourable Queen and therefore I will give you a last chance to speak up. What are your last words, Semual?'

The broken man looked up at her before he spit on the wood angrily. 'I might be the one that burns today, but you my Queen will be the one to burn in the eternal flames of Hell. Your brother did not die because of me but because you decided to follow me that day. You are the reason he's dead. Perhaps it's better that he died, now everyone can see with his own eyes how bad this fucked up monarchy truly is. You're no better than that piece of shit King we had before you and I know that the people will see this sooner rather than later. When they will, you'll be the one that burns on the stake.'

'Very well, if that is all you have to say,' the Queen -who was clearly not impressed by his words at all- spoke. 'Say goodbye to your miserable life.'

Before the man even got a chance to respond the pale woman had lit the flame that would devour him with her eyes. The flame started out small but grew big within seconds. Soon, the mans feet burned as his screams filled the air.

However, the sound of his son who cried desperately was the only thing the Queen could hear. Her unnatural bright eyes noticed the way Sem looked at his son; trying his best not to let him know his pain. He failed in doing this, however. Soon, the smell of burned flesh and wood filled the air and got mixed with his cries.

It did not take him too long to die at the burning stake. His body was far too weak to put on a fight and his mind had accepted his faith.

That night was the first one in years in which Dawna could sleep well without waking up every now and then to make sure that the red-haired man was not there to kill her as well as her brother. No, that night she slept like a Queen.