In the darkness, a burning fire seemed to draw the attention of a pink haired woman who sat there in the void darkness mindless. All she could see were the blue flames. Her hands seemed to be covered in strange beads. She stared numbly at a golden thread forming around her wrist
From the background she could hear a voice coming from the darkness. A deep voice she couldn't decipher.
Then something metallic breached her tongue. It tasted like blood. As the taste grew in her mouth so did the line of the golden thread on her wrist.
Valyha watched silently as the thread grew and grew, connecting until it connected, forming what looked like a bracelet.
'What was that?' Valyha mentally questioned but she couldn't speak. Nor move her legs or arms.
She felt trapped. Trapped in her own body.
Valyha jerked up gasping for air. Her arms rose to eye level immediately.
Nothing on her wrist. Valyha breathed out in relief.
"She's awake!" A feminine voice said. Followed by giggles of girls who rushed to surround her bed.
Valyha blinked as she looked at the women around her. "Who are you?"
"We're your ladies in waiting your highness!" A woman who was dressed in a prim and proper uniform answered excitedly.
Valyha rubbed her forehead. She had a splitting headache as she looked around. She was in a room large befitting of royalty. The bed was soft and comfortable with a high double wing window.
She had to stop waking up and appearing in places.
"Where am I?"
"The Moonlight Palace! Your highness!"
Your highness. She liked the sound of that. But they were demons why would they call her that.
Why would they call her that?
"Why am I here?" Valyha noticed that her clothes had changed to a red robe.
"Where else would the Emperor's bride be?" The woman said.
"Pardon?"
"Yesterday, you were fortunate to be chosen by the Emperor to become his Fifth chosen bride!" The woman answered and the girls behind her practically squealed.
Valyha ignored what she was saying and slowly got up, before walking to the open window.
All she needed to do was leave this crazy mess.
The maidens watched Valyha stand by the window, her body was shaking.
Valyha wondered why she was tired for some strange reason. Like exhausted-exhausted. It was as if all energy had been drained from her. She did lose all her magical abilities. That's one trauma. But it was nothing compared to the exhaustion she felt. Like she hadn't slept for days.
Valyha pushed the window open and climbed it. The view was high but she stretched a leg to jump regardless.
She transferred all her weight to the stretched leg, causing her to drop. But as her body breached the blocks of the window a strong surge of electricity bolted through her body, striking her in place.
The maidens screamed as their Lady was literally getting electrocuted before their very eyes.
One of the maidens had to use an object to pull her out.
Valyha lied on the floor, as her body burnt like ash. "My hair..." She cried as she smelled the scent of burnt skin. Which seemed to be healing on its own strangely.
"Are you alright your highness?" Hiriah shouted as she slapped her mouth. They all gathered around Valyha's body.
She was in pain.
No worries!
Valyha got up abruptly and ran out the window, this time with more force, to see if she could somehow push through.
Upon her body crossing the threshold of the window, a strong voltage of lightning struck her twice as harshly.
Valyha screamed. The pain was unbearable.
It seemed as if the lightning understood her nearness to death, bouncing her back into the room.
"Please stop what you're doing!" Hiriah begged clasping your hands together.
"What... was that?" Valyha asked as smoke escaped her lips.
"That appeared to be His Majesty's barrier. He wants you indoors for unknown reasons," Hiriah answered.
"Oh no. Please your highness, don't try to—"
Valyha had already stood up, dragging her legs to the door. She had to escape, she had to get out of here.
Thankfully the door swung open letting her through.
"You're highness!" The maidens cried as they followed behind her. They knew she was heading outside. "If you try to leave through the main door you will only be hurt again!"
Their voice sounded like fly buzzing in the background to Valyha. Not a word was heard.
All that went through her mind was that she had to get out of here.
She couldn't let herself be trapped here.
No..
Surely there must be a way out.
++-----++---
There was no way out.
After hours of being struck by lightning time and time again. For the sake of her hair, Valyha gave up and retired back to the room she woke up in, to rest. Her body ached relentlessly. Not just from the being electrocuted.
She had tried every corner, openings and holes. Even tried breaking the walls.
Each time, the same excruciatingly painful results.
The only good thing about the situation was that, the burns on her skin healed itself. Only the memory of the horrible experience remained, otherwise there were no permanent damages to her body, thankfully her hair.
The women who had been following her around tried their best to explain the situation to her.
And it took hours of groveling before she could accept the new information.
"So, I'm in the land of the demon—Qiras." Valeriah corrected at the end. Demons referred to themselves as Qiras here.
"Yes," the maidens said in unison.
"And that man I met earlier was the demon Emperor?" Valyha knitted her eyebrows recalling the white haired man. He was the leader of the Demons? That explained why he was so powerful.
Two women glanced towards each other unsure of what she meant by the 'man'. "Perhaps so."
The maidens were just glad that after hours, the Lady had finally decided to pay them any attention.
Valyha tilted back and slapped her head with both her palms. "I was so close!" She cried from the great loss. She should have killed him first, the time she awakened. If she had known then that he was the Demon Emperor, she would have targeted him specifically.
Valyha just kept slapping her face. Again and again.
The women blinked completely confused by the scene unfolding before them. Their Lady was quite strange.
Then suddenly she stopped slapping her face and looked up, gazing into the mirror. Her reflection was the only thing that could calm her down. That was why she chose to sit by the mirror side.
"But did I stand a chance to kill him to begin with?" Valyha placed a hand on her chin, wondering genuinely.
Deep down, she already knew answer but she would never admit it.
A being who could manipulate time. Who could a win against that?
"But..." Valyha silently gazed into the distance plotting in her head. "What if I get another chance to behead him before he turns back time? Surely that can be a possibility. I can do that, it's me."
A voice cleared her throat drawing Valyha's attention to the group of ladies gazing from a distance. They appeared to be dressed in some sort of expensive and well color coded uniform of all black and lace...
Kind of similar to what she was wearing when she first awakened. Did they make their clothes to match her previous clothes?
These women had some really nice style!
Valyha smiled as she opened her palms to summon her sword. She still planned on killing them though. They were demons so they had to die, no matter how fashionable they were.
Just as she felt the cold breeze in her palm, she briefly remembered that she lost her powers moments ago, and these women belonged to a species studied to be able to lift things twenty times their own body weight at minimum.
Valyha awkwardly withdrew her hand and gave them a warm smile, placing them on her thighs.
"So, who might you people be... again?" Valyha asked. They may have introduced themselves earlier but she hadn't really been paying attention.
The women looked excited to have received another response from the woman who had been staring at the mirror and ignoring them mostly for the past hour.
"Apologies. We were meant to introduce ourselves. I am Hiriah, your Head Maiden." She then motioned back, "and these are your palace maidens, you need not their names by heart immediately."
Hiriah and the uniformed girls, bent their heads with a curtsey. "We are all at your service, your highness."
Your highness? She liked the sound of that. "But I prefer, your Majesty." Valyha rested fully in her seat crossing her legs. Reminded her of the good old days in her palace with her slaves obeying her every command. it felt just like yesterday.
"That is reserved solely for our Emperor, I'm afraid," Hiriah responded softly. "But we may call you, your highness. As we are here to fulfill all your desires."
Valhya's expression stilled as she froze. Demons willingly wanting to be her slaves? "...Why?"
"Yesterday, you were chosen by His Majesty, to be his bride," Hiriah answered with a smile. And the girls behind, held in a squeal.
"Who?" Valyha pointed to herself. "Me?"
They all nodded their heads.
Valyha's lips parted.
"You jest me not," Valhya said in disbelief.
"Oh, but it is true."
"It can't be."
"It is.
"No."
"Yes! His bride!" Hiriah said in an excited tone.
Valyha gasped deeply. It was no jest. "How dare that demon do this to me? Who does take me for? He dares dishonor a queen of my caliber?" Valyha bursted in anger, feeling utterly disrespected.
The maidens did feel like Valyha was overreacting. But they did expect a human to have some reaction to being pronounced as a potential mate to the Emperor. "Well, the Emperor is allowed the right to take whatever he wants. Even a human woman."
The fear of ending up as the wife of that demon Emperor caused an immediate headache. What would her underlings say? The glorious queen has become a servant of entertainment to her enemy's leader. Her worst nightmare was unfolding before her very eyes. One she had never even thought or dreamt of before. How humiliating. Truly humiliating!
"Ow!" The headache worsened. Quickly she glanced into the mirror, touching her forehead. It seemed she had dreaded too much about her current position, she had aged her five year out of her life span in the span of second upon hearing the news.
She lost her powers, if he truly wanted this, there was really nothing she could do about it. No escape.
There was a little heart attack.
She clenched her chest tightly where her heart raced. She was losing face she need to calm down. Quickly she hid her panic from the maidens, can't be seen as weak.
But then just as she thought the rain was over, and even greater disaster struck. As her reflection cleared, she noticed two dark shadows underneath her eyes.
Oh no!
Her eyebrows wrinkled as she touched her face. Suddenly a forced marriage to a demon Emperor didn't seem to be her worst thing to happen to her today.
Her face was. "Look what that man did to my face." Dark circles had formed beneath her eyes from the stress and the trauma that man had given her.
What had happened to her while she was unconscious?
It seemed she had been more overwhelmed asleep than in her awakened form.
Three days of beauty sleep would be the only remedy.
Judging by the looks of it. She needed to start now. She was still gorgeous but going back to a healthy face would make her beautiful-er.
She rose and gazed back at the bed.
A smear on her beauty was worse than any situation. If only they would let her rest unbothered
"So, when is this wedding?" Valyha asked, strolling.
She'd find a way out. She always does. She is the great Valyha after all.
She needed to gather as much information as possible. Including when she would be supposedly sworn to the one she had resented for years. Far before the war.
"In three winters," Hiriah, the one in the middle answered with a smile. Her hair was bright blonde with hazel eyes and fair white skin.
Valyha yawned as she climbed on to the bed and covered herself with the sheets.
My, it felt quite heavenly.
"You won't eat me while I am asleep, will you?"
"No. Of course not, your highness," Hiriah answered finding it absurd. "You are our lady. Bride to the Emperor which makes you queen. Above all of us."
A mini heart attack triggered in her from the word bride, but was quickly distracted by the softness of the pillow.
Valyha snuggled in with the pillows. Wow, demons make the best beds.
"Good, because I'll make sure to give you food poisoning." Valyha answered as sleep came over her.