Irene's eyes found the most beautiful person she'd ever seen.
The newcomer had a similarly stoic face, but she was very young, maybe only slightly older than Irene. Her hair was a startling shade of crimson. Her eyes were dark and firm, she wasn't scared of the fierce soldier at all.
She wore a marigold dress that was parted down the middle. Her skirt swayed behind her legs that were clad in brown pants. She wore a pair of polished boots that were planted firmly on the ground.
Soldier Kolfor straightened himself, leaving Irene space to breathe.
"With all due respect, this child is trespassing…" Kolfor said. Irene barely surpassed a shiver at the foreign word the soldier used, it didn't sound like a good thing.
"So, I will deal with her, what could a child do? Doesn't a commander have more," the beauty's hand circled the air as she struggled to find a suitable word, "important duties to attend to?"
Kolfor's eyes narrowed, he didn't seem to be convinced by her words. Irene started to feel an inexplicable fear for them both. Perhaps Irene's imagination was overreacting again, for she swore she could see sparks of lightning dance across Kolfor's teal pupils. She feared the soldier would be angered, her mother would be crossed at this point if Irene tried to argue.
Her legs were like a newborn fawn's as she stood up. She waved her dusty hands towards Kolfor to get his attention. His teal eyes nearly paralyzed her again, but sudden newfound courage filled her veins, prompting her to speak.
"I'll be obedient, I, I'll leave. I'm sorry," Irene stuttered.
The soldier eyed her warily. Every twitch, nerve and quiver in Irene's body was taken into account, he watched her like a predator ready to pounce at the first sign of danger. Irene, saved by some instilled primal instinct, chose to wisely remain motionless.
"We'll take our leave. You ought to watch over the soldiers, commander. The safety of the palace lies on your shoulders," the beauty's tone seemed to take a strange turn at the end. Irene couldn't put her finger on it, but it sounded much more threatening than it should, especially when Irene was trying to convince the soldier to leave them be. She couldn't believe her efforts just got disparaged like that. The beauty was a child like her, they couldn't take on a soldier like Kolfor even if there were two of them!
Her messy hair bounced as she turned to give the beauty a warning glare to pipe down, to which the beauty accepted wordlessly with a deadpan look on her peerless face.
"This matter will be your responsibility. I suggest you see her out the gates as soon as possible, wouldn't want her parents to come running to find her," said Kolfor, who finally turned away and walked in the direction that Keith went. His armour did not make a single sound as he retreated, perhaps that's how she didn't hear him approach earlier. Irene didn't relax until Kolfor's figure was swallowed by the trees.
"Now. What to do with you?" The beauty spoke.
Irene nearly jumped again when she spotted the beauty over her shoulder, she seemed to have moved closer without her noticing. What's up with people sneaking up on her so often?
"P-please. I'm sorry, I was, I just couldn't believe," Irene's tongue wasn't cooperative, and words failed to compute in her brain that was running low on energy from all the activity today. The beauty didn't seem to pay attention to Irene's stuttering, instead, she leaned in closer. Irene was squashed between the bush and the beauty; she couldn't look away from her.
Up close, Irene could see the golden flecks in her black pupils that was unnoticeable earlier. They reminded her of fireflies near the riverbank when she visits her grandmother. Every firefly seemed impeccably bright even though they were as small as ants.
"You're a human child. How old are you?" The beauty asked.
Irene blinked. At the distance, she could feel the beauty's breath on her face when she spoke, which made her scrunch up her nose because she wasn't used to being stared at so close. It wasn't like she smelt bad or anything, she just wasn't used to such behaviour.
"I'm five, and also, what are you on about? You're a child too. Don't go starting fights with fierce soldiers!" Irene couldn't resist adding that part in the end.
The beauty raised a brow in question, "I wasn't starting a fight. I was dismissing him. He wasn't needed."
"Still! He was a royal guard! He could tell the king on us!"
At the mention of the king, the beauty's pulled back. The spirited beauty suddenly adopted a forlorn look in her eyes that watched the palace as her lips dug deeper into the corners of her mouth. Her crimson hair was tied in a braid down her back, there were the faintest tints of blue at the tips of her hair. Several strands of hair that fell loose from the braid strayed to her cheeks as a soft breeze blew.
"Stop avoiding the topic, who sent you here? What is your purpose for visiting the palace?" The beauty's former curious aura froze into an aloof indifference when she turned to Irene again. She raised her chin slightly as she spoke, her hands were crossed over her chest.
Irene's eyes were inevitably drawn towards the pendant at the beauty's chest. The centre piece was a polished gemstone in the shape of a teardrop that would've fit snugly in Irene's palm. The gemstone gleamed in the sun like it had a thousand faucets. It was connected to a golden chain that went around the beauty's neck.
The beauty's glare successfully snatched Irene's attention back to the question at hand.
"Sent me? No one. I came here because I heard the king was ill—" Irene barely finished her sentence when the beauty all but disappeared before her eyes. She felt a sharp pain at her wrists as she was forced to hunch her shoulders together.
A cry escaped her lips as fire ignited at her wounds. The beauty pressed her sharp elbow into her back as she pulled Irene's hands further behind, ignoring Irene's whimpers.
"Aa, it hurts, it hurts!"
"How did you know the king was ill?" The beauty's tone was absolutely frigid as she forced Irene to her knees. The pitiful child fell onto the ground with the weight of another on her back, pebbles dug mercilessly into her legs.
Irene's lips quivered in response, "I don't know, I don't know. My father talked about it!"
"Who is your father? What, is, your, name?" The elbow dug deeper into her back at every enunciated syllable at the end of her sentence. Tears streamed down her cheeks, the excruciating nearly made her see white for a second, but she remained conscious.
"My father," she hiccupped, "his name is Eric Wincott. My name is Irene Wincott." She struggled and tried to free herself, but the vice grip on her wrists tightened.
"I don't know how you heard about it, Wincott. But you and your family will face the consequences for spreading misinformation." Her voice was thunderous in her ears as Irene hastily shook her head.
"No, it wasn't their fault."
Warm tears rolled down her dust-coaked cheeks, revealing streaks of fair skin in their wake. Fear and guilt entertwined like a raging hurricane in her chest as the beauty's words truly sank in. All the work her father had put in for the family would be blasted to smithereens. All because of an adventure.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, please forgive me."
"Slandering the royal family will not be passed off lightly."
The beauty seemed to have completely transformed into a different person. In the beginning, Irene viewed her as a friend, albeit a little strange and uptight, but now she's become a very mean person. Her words were so wrong that they managed to abate Irene's pain and brought forth the anger of being misunderstood.
"I love the royal family! I love dragons!" Irene's indignant yell rolled off her tongue faster than her rationality could step in, "I would never hurt them! I want to be a knight! I want to serve the royal family! My family loves dragons, we'd never hurt them."
Irene's throat was raw at the end of her declaration, but the forest fell silent as if they acknowledged the truth of her words.
The beauty was stunned to silence. Her eyes widened at the guttural cry that she didn't know was possible from a human child. Her expression was almost comical when compared to her aloof face earlier.
She frowned when she realized she was in a conundrum. The child was telling the truth, certainly, it was hard to believe she could be lying when she was on the verge of pain and despair. However, there was also the matter of the "Wincott" family catching wind of the king's illness, which only a selected number of people were sure of. How could an outsider, a human nonetheless, hear of such dire news?
She couldn't just let the child go without interrogating the family. She needed to find the traitor among them. She tilted her head to observe the child who was busy crying pitifully, her teardrops fell onto the grass like dew droplets. Something in her chest felt heavy like a weight has materialized and made her so undeniably sad at seeing the child so helpless. Though she wanted to ask the child more questions, the child looked like she was going to break if she pressed any further. The family definitely won't cooperate with her if she hurt their offspring.
"If you are truly innocent, then return tomorrow. You are not off the hook yet," she released her grip that was starting to strain her own hands. She stepped back, hiding in the forest where she knows the human child won't be able to see her.
Irene's arms fell forward with a sharp breath of surprise, her back screamed with relief when it was free from the stabbing pain. She shakily raised her hands, she was horrified to see her wrists blossoming a bright red, they were definitely going to bruise. The beauty's last words finally caught up to her after a while, Irene rubbed the tears off her eyes and pushed herself off the ground. She swiped the pebbles off her legs. Her periwinkle dress was almost unrecognizable now.
She turned to find the stranger, but she saw no sight of her. Inhaling a shaky breath, she turned away from the forest and tried to find her way back to the tunnel, where she came from. She'd better return home before someone else decides to deal with her.
It took nearly another hour of wandering around slowly, cautiously, and painfully, but once she found the tunnel, she was too overjoyed to care. Irene pushed the door of the tunnel with her body weight and left the palace, all too desperate to leave the not-so-fantastic place of her dreams behind. Meanwhile, she remained oblivious to the pair of black eyes watching her disappear behind the wooden doors.