"Mom! Dad! Please don't go!"
Naomi had only been as young as seven years old, when her parents had decided to set out to go on a business trip. They told her at the time that it would take at the very least three years for their return, and that it was important that Naomi stayed behind to accompany the Queen in her rule.
Naomi had been aware of her responsibility as a Crown Princess by then, and she understood objectively, but she was also a kid that knew the world through her selfish wants.
If there was one thing she felt like she could be selfish with, it would be regarding her parents' time.
The business trip had not been their first, but little had anyone known that it would be their last. The news came at night. Naomi and Queen Celine had been sleeping together in Naomi's bedroom, when their butler, Oliver had woken the both of them up with a letter at hand.
Naomi was half asleep as she watched her Grandmother read through the letter. She shed no tears and her expression stayed firm, but Naomi had lived with her Grandmother long enough to know what went through her mind.
Naomi wrapped her tiny hand around her Grandmother's thumb that had began trembling, as she tucked herself into her warmth. Oliver stood by them, and unlike the Queen he had never been particularly talented at masking his emotions.
Tears streamed down his face reflecting the soft glow of the only candle in the room. The wick on the candle was on the verge of completely burning away, and as Naomi watched the only two people in the room she couldn't help but feel as withered as the wick.
What was appropriate at the time? Should she stay still as the Queen or should she grieve like Oliver? Naomi was too young to find her own answer, so she went back to sleep instead. She'd pretend that the letter was a normal letter, that it was a normal night, and the warmth that enveloped her were her parents' arms.
There wasn't a formal funeral procession for her parents. The Queen found it was best to let their family grieve in private. Their family was made of two now, her grandomther and herself.
The rest of the estate was to continue as if nothing had happened, while Naomi and her grandmother spent time in the cemetery.
When Naomi saw the two stones with her parents' names engraved on them, she couldn't find it in herself to cry like Oliver, but she also couldn't find it in herself to seem indifferent like her grandmother.
Rather, she felt sick. Her whole body ached, and even the wind that blew over the hill sounded muffled. If the Queen hadn't kneeled down to her eye level, she would have never noticed that her grandmother had been calling out to her for a while now.
The Queen's infamous blank gaze was gone. It was replaced by a foreign expression Naomi had never seen on her grandmother. What had it meant?
The Queen held Naomi's face with both her hands as she laid a kiss on Naomi's forehead.
"Naomi, my dear. It's okay to cry."
Naomi turned away from her grandmother, and looked at the two stones. She didn't want to cry. It made her mad. How could two important people in her life be reduced to stones? Immobile stones that was no better than the dirt of the earth.
The Queen called her back again.
"Child, cry." Her grandmother had said more to Naomi, but the rage churning in Naomi's chest was distracting. Her grandmother took her in a hug, and only then Naomi had registered that her grandmother had been crying. She leaned on Naomi's shoulders, and through the silent of the hill Naomi could hear her bated breath.
"Naomi. My sweetest, dearest Naomi."
Naomi held her breath, she refused to cry. She would never surrender to the reality of the stones before her. She hadn't even gotten the chance to see her parents' bodies before it was buried. They could go home at any time, and everything would go back to the way it is.
Naomi slipped out of her grandmother's arms and walked right up to the stones and thought through the most vile things she could spit out, but to no avail. She couldn't even catch enough breath to speak one vulgar word. So with the little will she had left, she clenched both of her fists and punched the two stones.
She let the engraved names dig into her skin, before lifting her fists again. Another punch, and another, and another, and when it got hard to breathe she let out screams that ripped through her throat.
Naomi went at it until she began to lose feeling in her arms. Her senses were all dulled. Her grandmother might have been sobbing in the background. She might have been holding onto her shoulders. She might've been pulling Naomi away from the stones.
Naomi had lost all awareness of her surroundings. It was just the stones before her, and her tiny frail frame. Naomi wasn't sure when she stopped punching the stones. The skin on her fists were raw, trembling against the rough ground below her.
Naomi looked around, but she was suddenly alone in the cemetery. Her hearing cleared, her vision focused, and her skin had finally registered the gentle breeze that blew over the hill.
When she looked up a dark robed shadow materialized from the stones. It stayed within her eye level, before letting out a ghastly cry.
"Have you seen my parents?" Naomi's small voice barely cut through the wind.
The robed figure spun around, and returned back to Naomi's side.
"She loved you. He loved you. Live. They had said." The figure croaked, but its voice filled the entire hill.
"Tell them I love them too." Naomi reached out to the figure, and as she passed right through it, a huge gust of wind blew to her, completely overwhelming her tiny body.
She fell back, but for a single moment, she saw her parents standing behind the stones. They held each other as they waved Naomi away. In a single moment, Naomi landed in her grandmother's arms, who'd been endlessly crying out her name.
Completely disoriented, Naomi clung onto her grandmother. She looked back at the stones and her parents were gone. Naomi finally took a single breath, before breaking into a complete sob.
She cried, and cried, and cried along with her grandmother, as the wind blew over the hill. With only the two of them before two stones, they held each other almost as if they let go just a little the other would disappear.
She'd live. Just as her parents told her to. She'd live.