Princes PlanetTerra, fourth in line for the throne of
Meridell, couldn't believe what she was seeing. For months now she had been
holed up inside her father's castle, while the war against the hordes from Darigan
raged on. Princess Terra hadn't liked being grounded like that. She was used
to going wherever she pleased and wasn't about to let a little thing like war
stand in the way of that liberty. So, earlier this night, Princess Terra had
managed to sneak past the Draik guards, which had been simple enough to do since
she knew the castle better than the back of her paw. After her escape from the
castle, she had wandered towards the nearest town, just to take a peek at how
things were. And there, for the first time in her life, the royal Acara had
seen buildings on fire. Walking through the muddy streets of the small hamlet,
Princess Terra witnessed families desperately fleeing their houses, trying to
save as much of their belongings as they could, saw how a desperate Wocky asked
everyone who happened to pass by if maybe they had seen his family. The answer
was always no, but that didn't seem to discourage the Wocky from asking yet
someone else.
"Excuse me?" Princess Terra asked the Wocky.
"What?"
"Are you..." Princess Terra wondered what to say.
She was used to handing out orders to lackeys, but had never really had an actual
conversation. "Are you looking for your family?"
"Yes," said the Wocky. "Have you seen them?"
"Err... no," said Princess Terra.
The Wocky looked crestfallen. "No-one has seen
them. I hope they managed to make it out of the house all right."
"Erm... can I ask you something?"
"What?" said the Wocky distractedly. "I mean,
sure."
"What is going on here?"
"The Draconians," said the Wocky darkly. "They
came here a few hours ago and set fire to our town."
"What?" Princess Terra said stunned. "How is
that possible? Surely my fa... I mean... surely King Skarl's knights would stop
them?"
The Wocky chuckled bitterly. "Our main army is
battling their main army quite a way north from here, near the Citadel. Sometimes
a small group of Draconians sneaks past our lines to cause some mayhem and the
result, well... look around you."
Princess Terra nodded, even though she didn't
quite understand.
"Listen, I have to go," said the Wocky. "My family..."
"Sure," said Princess Terra. "I hope you find
them."
The Wocky gave a half-hearted smile and hurried
off down the road. Princess Terra watched him go, thoughts that she had never
had before racing through her mind. She turned around and started walking. She
wasn't really walking to get somewhere, she was simply doing something while
she thought. Princess Terra's concept of war had always been simple. There were
these two large groups of knights on horses with shining armour and waving banners.
And when the time was right, these two armies would meet on a large field of
grass. And then they would ride towards each other and then... well... then
they would fight. Princess Terra didn't quite know how that was supposed to
look like, but she imagined that there would be swords clanging on shields and
possibly some handsome knight with beautiful fur that would heroically keep
the enemy at bay. And then at the end of the battle said handsome knight would
proclaim victory and that would be that. The battle was over, the good guys
won. That was war. Not this... this sneaking around in the dark and setting
fire to harmless villages. That wasn't war, that was, well, monstrous.
Then again, the Draconians are monsters, thought
Princess Terra. Otherwise they wouldn't have attacked us for no good reason.
But still... father ought to do something about this. I'll tell him about what's
happening here and then he'll send troops and stop those Darigan monsters from
doing any more harm. Dad'll probably ground me for the rest of my life for sneaking
out of the castle at night, but I don't care. He needs to know what's going
on.
"Hey, what are you doing here!?" Princess Terra
snapped out of her thoughts and looked up. She wasn't sure where she was. She
could feel the heat from the burning village somewhere behind her. In front
of her she could see some sort of barn with its doors wide open. A small group
of Neopets, all with red eyes, were carrying bags, crates and barrels filled
with something or the other.
"Girl, I asked you a question!"
Princess Terra looked at the person talking to
her and managed to stifle a scream. The person in front of her was one very
large, very mean-looking Shoyru. His skin was an unhealthy shade of green and
his single eye was as red as blood. A large scar ran where the other eye should
have been. Princess Terra noticed that the others looked a lot like the Shoyru
and realised that they were Draconians. The enemy.
"Nothing," Princess Terra squeaked. "I'm not
doing anything."
"Well, then I suggest you go do it someplace
else," the Shoyru growled. "We're busy here."
"Right," Princess Terra said quickly. "I should
just go then. I'll... I'll be on my way now."
The Shoyru quickly grabbed Princess Terra's lower
arm. "Or maybe, I shouldn't let you leave at all."
Princess Terra froze. Surely the Shoyru didn't
mean to...
The Shoyru drew a dagger that glittered eerily
in the dark.
"No, wait," Planet Terra shrieked, trying to
squirm out of the Shoyru's grip. "Don't! Let me go!"
"Give me one good reason why I should?"
"Because... because..." Princess Terra thought
frantically about how she was going to finish that sentence. But somehow 'I
don't want to die' or 'my father won't like that' really didn't sound like very
good options.
"Oh, for Fyora's sake, let her go." The Shoyru
quickly turned around, but kept his hand securely around Princess Terra's wrist.
"Get back to work!" he snarled.
"Yeah, that's right, work," said the speaker,
who turned out to be a Zafara with fur as black as ink and with the red eyes
that seemed typical of the Draconians. "If I'm not mistaken, our work is to
steal food supplies and cause a little bit of chaos. Not pestering small girls."
"She's the enemy!" the Shoyru bellowed.
"She's just a kid," said the Zafara.
Princess Terra opened her mouth to give an indignant
protest to that 'kid' insult, but quickly thought the better of it. She did
not want to make anyone angrier than they already were.
"We're at war!" shouted the Shoyru.
"So?" said the Zafara calmly. "Is that a good
excuse for murder?"
"You weren't arguing when we set those houses
on fire," said the Shoyru.
The Zafara shrugged. "Houses can be rebuilt.
And besides, we needed a diversion, didn't we? But what purpose will killing
her have?"
The Shoyru snarled and looked back at Princess
Terra. "She won't be able to tell anyone what she's seen."
"Yeah, like the sudden disappearance of the contents
of an entire storehouse will go unnoticed unless there's an eye witness. Look,
could you just come over here and help us carry? Some of these crates are pretty
heavy."
"I will," said the Shoyru, his single eye gleaming.
"After I deal with this."
"Oh for the love of... OK, fine, kill her," said
the Zafara exasperated. "I'm sure Lord Darigan will be very pleased to hear
you've been so busy slaughtering innocents. I bet he'll even give you a medal."
The Shoyru hesitated for a moment, then threw
Princess Terra to the ground. The terrified Acara quickly scrambled to her feet
and stepped a few paces back.
"Get lost kid," said the Zafara. "Unless you
want to give our sergeant over here some time to change his mind."
Princess Terra turned around and ran as fast
as she could. She ran and didn't stop running until she had long cleared the
burning village and could already faintly see the castle in the distance.
So this is war, thought Princess Terra.
Screaming men and burning houses. And dad just kept talking about how simple
all of it was. Our knights against their soldiers and we would win without any
problems. He never said anything about fires or soldiers sneaking around like
thieves! And then that Zafara... he saved my life. I'm his enemy and he saved
my life. Why? The Draconians are monsters, aren't they? They destroy everything
they see, don't they?
With a sort of grim determination, Princess Terra
walked back towards the castle. She had a few questions to ask. And this time,
she wouldn't be pleased with fancy tales about dashing knights and helpless
damsels. This time, she wanted the truth - even though she wasn't quite sure
if she would like the answers.
The End | 
