Princess Amara Elise Northaven had grown used to this cycle.
She is the only child of Prince Hadrian Elliot Northaven, the heir apparent to the Sprent Throne. The Scion of the Sclysion Kingdom. The Cobalt Star of the Kingdom.
Enemies to the crown. Former rivals of her father. Families of the knights that the Prince had struck to death. All of them resorted to kidnapping the princess as an act of revenge.
Amara could remember her earliest memory of someone abducting her. It was a huge man with auburn hair grinning menacingly above her, the knife in his hands glinting against the moonlight. It brought her nightmares from time to time as a young child.
Still, she braved herself over the continuous attempt on her life.
It always began with an ambush, a rag over her mouth and then the darkness of a cellar or a tent. There was one time where she was also placed inside a cave. Amara almost found the inside of the cave more terrifying than the other enclosed space she was captured in.
Nevertheless, the kidnapping incidents never terrified her.
She had long stopped crying and begging her captors for her release. Because on the third or fourth day of her capture, they would always come without fail.
First came the thunder of hooves, then the clash of swords. Then her father, Prince Hadrian Elliot Northaven, would step inside to search for his daughter. He would always find her bound and blindfolded, ropes tied tightly around her arms. The prince will then unsheath his words, ready to take down his daughter's captors with cold precision.
With her captors either dead on the floor or on the way to their death, Prince Hadrian would then walk towards his daughter and hug him tightly, thanking the gods for keeping his daughter safe. With her tucked safely in his arms, he would set her on the saddle and lead her home, never sparing a word to the pleading captors behind them.
This time, it was different.
Her current abductors were not mercenaries or disgraced knights. They have gold masks on their faces to conceal their identity. At first, Amara thought they were gilded but upon further inspection, she found that it was real gold. Shivers ran down her back as she realized something.
They were not doing this for money.
They were anomalies. They were whispering and muttering about an awakening. This abduction pattern was unfamiliar to her.
Her abductors have no ounce of sympathy or respect towards her. Her hands were tied and attached at the end of the hook. They did not even blindfold her, letting her see that the hook was attached to a lever that can pull her up and suspend her in the air.
And for the first time in her life, Amara felt fear for the first time.
Amara found herself pleading for her life once again, an action that she grew to forget when her father gave her assurance whenever she got abducted.
"Good sirs, please let me go," she begged.
Her abductors have stopped whispering among themselves. One of her abductors turned her head like a mechanism towards her. They began to walk towards her like a snake slithering towards its prey. They only stopped when Amara was quivering in fear.
The golden mask figure tilted, observing the princess.
"I am not a sir," a female voice came out.
A woman among her kidnappers was no different to her. There are some who joined in to lure the princess in their plan. It was not uncommon yet, it was still unusual.
And, this slithering woman was giving Amara the shivers.
"P-please," Amara pleaded one more time, trying to tap atleast mercy from her kidnapper.
The golden figure tilted her head once again, observing her. As fast as a snake, she grabbed Amara by the chin. Her fingers dug on the princess' cheeks as she turned Amara's face to further inspect her.
"You do not look like her." She commented.
Chortles of laughter erupted from her two companions. Male ones.
"Asides from her ruby eyes, you did not inherit more," she explained. She then pushed Amara's face away from hers and turned to her companions. "Are you sure this is the right girl?"
One masked figure stepped out and said, "Aye. My source told us that it was said that one of the Empress's daughters was born from a small kingdom of venom and scales," he explained. "There was only one kingdom whose sigil was a snake. The Sclysion Kingdom."
The other masked figure added, "And, there was only one girl in the kingdom who possessed the same eyes as the Empress."
Amara listened to their conversations, mind reeling at the information. There was an Empress looking for her daughter. A daughter who she left in the Sclysion kingdom. A daughter with ruby red eyes like her as her abductors told.
"Your mother dared to sullied our nobility by mixing her blood in the lineage."
"Do not look at me with those peasant eyes! You disgraced us, half-blood."
"You would have been thrown in the ocean if not for your striking resemblance with the Prince. Sunkissed skin. Brown hair. Doe-eyes. You looked exactly like your father, like a proper Northaven princess. Yet, you opened your eyes and the image shattered. The one thing we detest was the color of your eyes. A reminder of that wench who nearly destroyed our kingdom!"
All those years she endured the constant insults, ridicules and mockeries of her paternal family of her being a half-blood royalty flushed down the drain upon hearing the word 'Empress' and 'daughter'.
Years and years of yearning for a mother. Of begging her father to tell more stories about her lost mother. Of praying to the gods at night to finally be reunited with her mother.
Amara had wished for this very moment. She could not help the tears that welled up in her eyes as she stared straight at the eyes of the female kidnapper.
"Please bring me to the Empress," Amara whispered, her voice trembling in desperate need.
At her sudden plea, the male kidnappers were stunned into laughter. Perhaps, it was an unusual scene to watch as a princess of such a well-known kingdom desperately pleaded to be brought to the person who ordered her kidnapping. It reeks of hopelessness and weakness. Things that kidnappers loved to gobble down to manipulate their prey.
Yet, Amara did not care if she looked weak in their eyes. She had always embraced weakness as her weapon. And, she will use it once again. Just so she can meet the person she longed to meet.
"Please," she once again pleaded over the cackling laughter of her two kidnappers.
The female one, the only quiet one among the group, just observed her behind her golden mask. Whatever she saw in Amara's face was met with a wistful glee.
"I take my words back," she said under her mask. "Weaponizing your own weakness, that's her feat. You really are her daughter."
Amara watched as the female kidnapper turned her back at her and faced her other companions. As swift as a snake, she withdrew her knives from her backpocket and threw it with precision to her companions.
Her two kidnappers who were still laughing at her desperation realized too late that there were knives latched on their neck. The glee in their eyes slowly turned into confusion as they turned towards their female companion.
"W-wha.."
"You forgot your place, my dear comrades," the woman said as she took off her mask.
Amara was given a view of the female captor and she was awed by the beauty hiding in that gilded and bloodied mask. A different take from her abductors who have their eyes wide opened in horror as they recognize the true identity of their abductor.
"You forgot that ridiculing a member of the Imperial family is treason and punishable with death," she informed them before the two men dropped on the floor and met their doom.
She then swayed her hips to return her attention back to the forgotten princess.
"Ready to meet your mother, Princess Amara?"