Enceladus

Caelum ordered several guards to look after Lainie.

I had a few minutes to say goodbye.

She hugged me like she’d never let go. “I love you, Amelia. You’d better come back to me. If you don’t I’ll resurrect you just to kill you again. You can’t leave me too.”

I winced. She was referring to her mother. I held her face, wiping away some tears. “I won’t leave you, Lainie. Ü mïð zü.”

I squeezed her once more and Lynx pulled me out the door.

We took off into the sky. The princes and princesses of Enceladus. Plus several guards, including John. We were all in similar attire. By my wings, people would instantly know who I was. Everyone else had white wings. Not white and black.

We landed in the Planet Square. Shockingly, there was no one around.

“So what’s our plan?” Lynx asked.

Cal, Del and Cass all spoke at once.

“We attack them in there.” Delphinus.

“We sneak in through the windows.” Cassiopeia.

“We distract them with our elements.” Caelum.

I walked away from their bickering and scanned the building. “No.” I thought of something. “We draw them out. There could be traps inside.”

My siblings faced me like I was a stranger to them. They had never seen the real side of me. The side I had come to be. “We make loud noises out here so they come. Then we attack. We also need a formation.”

John cleared his throat. He looked so fierce in his armor, I could see why Cass liked him. “Us guards shall be first. Your Highnesses last. It is our duty to protect you five at all cost.”

I agreed. “Don’t use your powers unless they come at us with their own. Most of them are only trained in one power.” Thanks to Orion’s rules. “So we can take them down easier. Don’t use the same power they use on you. Be creative. We want to keep the fight on the ground. It’ll be easier. So tuck away your wings, only to be used when needed. But Del, I want you to use your invisibility at first since you specialize in it. Surprise them.” I wouldn’t show how scared I really was.

My siblings again stared wide-eyed at me. “Understand?” They all nodded. “Good. Now Cassiopeia, make some noise.” I grinned.

Cass used her elements to bring up a giant piece of the earth and smash it down. It shook the ground. We heard chaos ensue; yelling from inside the Hall. I could only imagine how each Division was doing with our government-less planet.

Cass did it once more. Suddenly the doors to Planet Hall swung open. We were about ten feet away from the building.

“Ah, the rest of the messy royal family,” yelled a man, stepping out of the building. “Come to fight us?”

“We’ve come to avenge our parents’ death and take back our planet,” Caelum shouted back.

The man chuckled. Several more men came out behind him, all armed.

“Once we kill you, we can finally take what your father stole from us.”

A sour feeling sprouted in my stomach. My father was an awful man. He was controlling, manipulative and cruel. The people of Enceladus just wanted to be free.

“Now,” whispered Cal. Then we attacked.

I had never killed anyone before. So when I did, it was a shock to say the least. I pulled my sword out of the man’s chest. Blood spewed everywhere. I almost threw up. I became dizzy and sick with guilt. What did these people do to me? Nothing and I had just killed one. Bile rose in my throat again. I pushed it down but fell to my knees.

“Amelia!” Lynx yelled. “You can feel sorry later. Now, fight!” He had just decapitated someone. My siblings hadn’t killed people either until a few months ago. They seemed to be doing just fine.

I snapped out of it when someone punched me.

“So, the môn is back. You’re a pretty little thing, with your unusual wings.” The man who’d punched me was holding his sword at his side, not in a ready position. He was underestimating me.

I wiped the blood from my mouth and straightened. “Fëŵ zü.”

He laughed. “Feisty.” He tried to hit me again but I blocked it with my sword. He screamed, falling to his knees. He gripped the nub where his hand used to be. I lifted my sword to kill him but I heard Lynx scream.

I whipped around. Lynx had a sword stuck through his shoulder. It wasn’t fatal but it opened something inside of me.

My vision got darker. My wings unfurled. I cried out as my wings felt like they were growing. Suddenly I lost control of my actions.

I soared into the air, just high enough to see the whole fight. I lifted my hand and somehow threw off a guy that Delphinus was struggling with. I was nowhere near close enough to touch him.

I silently thought to one of the men fighting Cassiopeia, “you want to stab yourself.” And he did. He stabbed himself right through his own heart. Cass looked up at me, stunned.

I took out all the men who were responsible for the coup. Breaking their necks, slitting their throats, making them kill themselves, suffocating them, setting them on fire, ripping off their wings.

All of a sudden, all traces of Amy vanished.

I wanted to kill everyone.

Something primal stirred inside me. I opened my mouth and inhaled deeply. The people below me looked to the sky. Their mouths opened too and with each second, I grew stronger. Everyone had some kind of white/blue mist coming out of them. It was empowering. They were at my mercy. I felt invincible. No one would ever defeat me.

Our fight had drawn a crowd. I took from them too. Whatever the white smoky mist was, it made me tougher.

“Amy!”

I shut my mouth and all the ants collapsed. I turned my head to see a blue-haired human. Why was a human on Enceladus?

I lowered to the ground.

“Amy! What are you doing?”

I stared at her enchanting hair and flew closer. I landed and folded my wings. “Who are you?”

She gazed at me, hurt. “It’s me, your girlfriend Lainie.”

“Lainie.” It sounded strange in my mouth.

“What happened to your eyes? What were you doing to those people? This isn’t right,” she said.

I reached my hand out and lifted her up using telekinesis. She started to gasp for air as I used my wind to take her breath away. I smiled.

“Amelia . . .”

I was tempted to crush her windpipe but she was just so enticing to me. I could keep her as a trophy for when I became queen.

I set her down. She panted. Before I could react, she lunged at me and knocked me down. She straddled me, pinning my arms down. As if I couldn’t kill her with a single thought. But I remained still to see what she would do.

She kissed me. Her mouth tasted like mint and I threw her off of me.

“Amy . . . ?” She crawled towards me.

“I’m not . . .”

I was.

Suddenly it all came back to me. I knew who this hunan was. “Lainie.”

She hugged me. “What the hell happened?”

I blinked several times, getting my bearings. “What did I do?” I was horrified. At least two dozen people littered the square. I did that. Right?

“I don’t know . . .”

My hands started to shake. “Did I hurt you?”

She shook her head.

“Lynx?” I questioned. “Lynx!” I rose to my feet. I scanned the roads. “Did I kill them?”

Lainie shrugged. In her eyes was fear. She was afraid of me. “Your eyes were black. You should’ve seen what you did.” She shuddered. “All of these people had their mouths open with white stuff coming out. It was all going to you—inside you. It was like you took their-”

“Energy,” I finished. “I felt it. Coursing through my veins. It was a rush. A terrible, power-hungry rush.”

I heard painful moaning. I glanced around. Some of the people were stirring.

“Lynx?” I saw him amidst the people. He still had a sword through his shoulder. I rushed over. He sat up and cried out in pain.

“Amelia.” He reached out a bloody hand in a “stop” motion. “You nearly killed us,” he coughed out.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing. It just happened.” I slowly stepped closer. I had to take the sword out or else it would damage his flight for the rest of his life.

“How did you do that?”

I shrugged, feeling my wings. “I took your energy.”

Delphinus, who was next to Lynx, woke up with a gasp. She stared at me, frightened.

“I need to get that sword out of you,” I said. Luckily the sword was short, more of a long knife.

Lynx nodded. When I came closer, Del scooted away.

I tore off the breastplate of his armor. I put one hand on his chest and the other on the hilt of the sword. I gave it a swift tug. He screamed in agony. Then it was out. He huffed when I tore some of his shirt to press it to the wound. Even when he was on the verge of losing the ability to fly, he still cared about his clothes.

He gave me a grateful nod. “I’ve never heard of the ability to suck energy.”

“That’s because it’s a legend.”

I turned around and saw Caelum and Cassiopeia. I was relieved to see that I didn’t kill them.

“It is called energy sourcing. And somehow you managed not to kill us all,” said Cal.

I opened my mouth to ask him how he knew that but more of the citizens started to wake. I remembered brutally killing those responsible for the deaths of Orion and Vela.

Apparently I didn’t “energy source” anybody for long enough to kill them.

I also realized that I got my powers. That was how I did all the murdering before I took the energy from the citizens.

“You really are the devil,” whispered Cal.

I felt like he’d stabbed me. The insult hurt me more than it ever had but I ignored him. “I’m sorry everyone. I don’t know what came over me. I wasn’t thinking.”

Lainie came up to me. She stood next to me and grasped my hand. “Ü mïð zü.” The words were clumsy in her human mouth but beautiful nonetheless.

“I love you too.” I kissed her cheek. I had no clue what time it was but I was exhausted.

The citizens gathered around us. An older boy came up to me. “Be our queen,” he said in Enceladian.

I stared at him incredulously and struggled not to laugh. Though it wasn’t funny. “Queen? That’s ridiculous.”

“You are a force to be reckoned with. No one will ever attempt a coup again, not even our neighboring planets,” said an old woman, coming forward, also speaking in Enceladian.

“I-I can’t. I’m not meant to rule. I know nothing about ruling a planet. I’m two centuries younger than my siblings, who are much more capable. Like crown Princess Cassiopeia.”

Cass brushed off her armor and stood straighter. Caelum desperately wanted to be king but it was Cass’ right, being two years older than him, so he kept his mouth shut.

“My life is on Earth with my human girlfriend,” I said proudly. The citizens instantly started whispering disapprovingly. From the research and the rumors they’d heard about Earth, they thought all humans were dumb, greedy and wasteful. Three words that described Orion as well.

Lainie squeezed my hand.

Cass stepped up. “As your crown Princess, I will restore our government to the way it should have always been. I do not agree with the late King Orion’s policies. My first abolishment as your queen would be the sanction that you cannot fly or use your powers in public. That is absurd.”

The crowd cheered.

“But what about using all of our God-given powers?” asked an elderly man.

“I will have to talk that law over with my council.”

“Will you be getting married?” said the same older boy that asked me to be queen.

“I-” Cass was stopped by John, battered and bruised, stumbling up to her.

“Crown Princess Cassiopeia Ladus, would you do me the honor of marrying me?”

Everyone gasped, even me.

“John, I don’t know what to say. We haven’t been together in eight years,” said Cass.

“I never stopped loving you. There wasn’t a day on Earth that I didn’t miss you.”

I decided they needed some privacy. “Everyone, why don’t we give our crown Princess a little space?” The citizens groaned in protest but hurried along. I suspected they were afraid of me.

“Are we going home?” asked Lainie.

I hugged her tight. “Soon, love. All I want to do is curl up with you and not move for maybe the next week.” My body was sore.

“Well it is winter and we can happily get snowed in.”

Her blue hair blew in the wind. “You’re gorgeous, did you know that?”

She grinned, her cheeks becoming redder than they already were due to the cold.

“Lynx, can you fly?” I asked him.

He flexed his wings and winced. “I’d better just rest them.”

“Okay, we’re going back to the castle.” I took off with Lainie in my arms.

“Can I see you old room?” Lainie asked.

I couldn’t say no to her.

We climbed the elegant staircase.

My room, Cass’ room and Del’s room were right next to each other.

We stepped into my room and Lainie was taken aback while sour memories filled my head. The room was exactly how I’d left it.

Lainie walked further in and made cute gasping sounds. “It’s beautiful! It’s bigger than any room I’ve ever seen.” She sat on the four poster bed. “What’s this?”

I was saved from the brink of a nasty flashback when Lainie held up an envelope with my name on it. I grabbed it and instantly recognized the handwriting. It was my mother’s.

It read;

My dearest Amelia, if you are reading this then it means that you have returned to Enceladus and something has happened to me. I’m sorry that I had to write this to you rather than explaining it in person. I wish I could have seen you again. I always loved you even though at times it may have seemed like I despised you. I must tell you how you were really made. Orion is not your father. I am barely even your mother. I conceived you, yes, but you may have noticed by now that you are not entirely normal. One hundred nineteen years ago, I was dumb and reckless. I loved Orion but I was unhappy. I did not cheat on him in the physical sense. But on the religious level. I prayed to the gods to bring me another child. One that was kind and beautiful, with a strong heart. But what answered me weren’t the gods. What, or who, answered me was the Devil. The Devil in whatever sense you think about him. Whatever religion, whatever faith. I made a sacrifice to him, not knowing who he was. The sacrifice was my soul. I sacrificed everything for you and still managed to feel love for you. I gathered ingredients and made potions. I killed to create you. I lied, I stole and manipulated everyone close to me. The day after I made the first sacrifice, I was pregnant. I conceived you just six short months later. You were made from dark magic and a soulless being. I don’t want this to change how you are, who you are. You are amazing and I wish I could’ve known the real you; the you not trapped on Enceladus. Ü mïð zü. Don’t forget yourself.

~Vela

I fell to my knees and nearly stopped breathing.

“Amy?” It sounded like Lainie was under water.

I shakily handed her the letter.

She gasped as she read through it. Her voice still sounded far away. “Oh, Amy.” She put the letter next to me.

I used my telekinesis to crumple it up. I had no clue how I had mastered my powers so effortlessly. I had them for only an hour or so and they seemed perfected, just like my flying abilities.

Lainie, the darling that she was, held me while I had a panic attack. I only knew that was what it was from my psych textbooks.

I didn’t know how much time had passed. I knew Lainie was speaking to me but I couldn’t decipher what exactly she was saying.

I couldn’t believe what was in the letter. I was created by dark magic. I was a daughter of the Devil. The Devil. Seriously?

I laughed hysterically. Who even was I?

Eventually I pulled out of myself, eyes watering.

“Amy, you do know who you are. I know who you are. You’re brave and strong and sweet. You are not the Devil’s daughter. You are not evil or void of emotion. You love me. I love you. You’re passionate and kind.”

Apparently I had said those things out loud during my panic attack. I ingested what she said. It was hard to believe but I couldn’t let this break me. I had just gotten my powers. It was time to live. I grabbed her face. “I do love you. And you’re right. I know who I am. I’m Amy Thorne of Earth,” I said. I stretched out my wings in the enormous room. The tips of my wings touched the ceiling from my position of the floor. I couldn’t extend them fully if I were to stand.

“Can we go home?” Lainie asked.

“Yes, love. We can go home.”