The Bat Princess, By S.E., Age 18
March 31, 2020
The Bat Princess
By S.E., Age 18
If you are here to find out how the story ends, click here.
Once upon a time……
There were the enchanted lands of Dremwell and Nighmourne. Dremwell was a kingdom of light, dreams, and excitement, while the kingdom of Nighmourne was mostly dark, secluded and sometimes even dangerous.
Even so, the kingdoms got along with each other and lived in peace, sometimes. Many years ago the Kings and Queens of Nighmourne and Dremwell made a truce after a long brutal war in which many a life was lost. …One hundred years later in the kingdom of Dremwell, the entire kingdom was bustling. People hurried back and forth, cleaning, cooking, crafting, and searching for the best clothes they could possibly afford.
Everyone in Dremwell was preparing for two huge events that were happening at the same time. First and foremost the princess, Princess Silvane, was turning sixteen this month meaning that she was going to become Queen very soon. Second, a princess from another country was visiting in honor of her celebration! There was going to be a massive ball held in the palace gardens and everyone in Dremwell wanted the royal visit and ball to feel perfect!
…The sun shined through the beautiful ornate stained glass windows of the palace.
“Are you sure she’s ready?” Rotello frowned. As his daughter Silvane’s birthday drew ever closer, his worry and fears grew.
“Roty, she is going to be fine. I almost find it offensive at how much you’re worrying about her!” Susean gave her husband a small playful smile. Rotello sighed and a faint smile appeared on his muzzle.
“I’m not worried about how she is going to do, I know that she is going to be a brilliant queen. I’m worried because the closer her birthday gets the bigger of a target she becomes! If someone were to take her from us, they would have the power to take over Dremwell and control the entire kingdom!” His face had turned solemn again, his eyes big and worried. Susean understood her husband’s worries and prayed that it wouldn’t come to that.
Meanwhile in the princess’s chambers…..
“How are you doing that?!” Silvane watched in excitement and awe as three of her most trusted hand maidens taught her how to bend the sunlight using just her paws.
“Well dear princess, to bend light you must clear your mind of all bad thoughts and focus on positive memories. Then you must hold out your paws and the light will come to you.”
Silvane thought “This is going to be easy! All my memories are positive and nothing bad has ever happened to me!” Silvane closed her eyes, opened her paws and waited for the sunlight to come to her…nothing happened. Silvane opened one of her eyes, then the other. “Huh? W-why isn’t it coming to me?” The handmaidens faces looked grim. “What’s wrong? You look scared! Is it because I did it wrong? Is something bad going to happen?”
The handmaidens were scared. They were horrified because everyone who was born in the kingdom of Dremwell was able to bend light when they came of age. If the princess wasn’t able to bend light that would mean… no! That couldn’t be possible…could it? “Y-you’re going to be fine Princess, but will you excuse us for just a moment? H-here! Play with Fluffy! He always cheers you up!” One of the handmaidens handed Silvane a fluffy dark grey tabby coon cat. The handmaidens hurriedly walked out of the chambers. Silvane looks worriedly at Fluffy, who purred while dangling in her arms. “I need to clear my head, I’m going to go for a walk. But I’m going to take this one alone and without the guards.” Silvane put Fluffy down and put on the worn brown cloak her grandfather had given her all those years ago. “I’ll be back soon” She pet Fluffy and left the room. Little does she realize how long she would be gone. Silvane couldn’t imagine that Dremwell could become any more beautiful and cheery, but she was wrong.
The windows of every house were polished until you were able to see your reflection in them. There were bright, colorful flowers in every vase and empty pot, and some people were even making their own rainbows over their houses! Smells of delicious foods wafted from food stands. Silvane then realized she hadn’t eaten lunch! She decided that she should buy something from one of the food stands before she got too hungry. She walked up to a food stand with some homemade breads. She was about to buy a loaf of blueberry bread when she felt a small tug on her cloak. She looked down and saw a small puppy child. “P-please help me miss! My brother has fallen into a very deep hole and cannot get out! Nobody believes me because they say that he should dig himself out! But he can’t! Because the fall broke his paws!”
“Oh dear! The poor thing must be terrified! Lead me to your brother, I’ll help! I am an expert digger.
“Thank you so much!” The puppy boy smiled so widely that Silvane was sure she did the right thing. They seemed to have been walking for hours and Silvane knew that she was most likely way too far from the castle and the main town. “Are we getting close to where your brother fell? I really need to get back home soon, or my parents are going to be worried. “Yes we’re almost there! You can see the hole he fell into from here! Brother! I brought help!”
There was distant yelling but Silvane couldn’t make out what he was saying. They had appeared to have finally reached the hole and it was indeed as deep as the child had claimed. Silvane saw what appeared to be a faint glow of a crystal lantern. She heard the yelling she heard earlier, but this time she was able to make out the word “help”. “Please hurry! We don’t know how much longer the hole will stay stable, I don’t want my brother to get hurt.” Silvane walked closer to the edge, frantically hoping to find some way faster down to the injured child before the ground would give way. Suddenly she felt something ram her in the back! She fell forward, straight into the deep glowing hole. She heard crackling laughter as she fell. She tried to scream, but she was falling too fast for anyone to possibly hear her. She was certain that she was going to die from this fall, so she closed her eyes and made one last praying wish to the Pawds that she would at least make it to heaven. She landed hard in a deep pool of water, the impact knocking her already exhausted mind out… but she didn’t die. The water was imbued with a magic spell. The water changed the princess’s form. Her ears got shorter but wider. Her muzzle grew longer and fangs grew within it. Her paws grew claws and skin stretched between her arms. Her tail grew longer and a ring of thick fur grew around her neck. She had become a bat.
…Princess Thundertail, of the Stormflight tribal kingdom, from the country of Fogone, had very strange dreams on her way to the kingdom of Dremwell. The closer she got to the kingdom, the more the dreams happened. The dreams mainly showed a silver bat. The bat appeared to be scared. She kept running from something. Why didn’t she just fly away? Did she even know how? Thundertail kept trying to reach out to help the bat. She felt like the bat was important, even if she didn’t know how or why yet. Something suddenly woke her up. “We’re here your highnesses! The kingdom of Dremwell awaits.” Thundertail stepped out of the carriage and she and her family were met with thunderous applause and a plethora of people offering gifts to them. “Welcome Lightningmane, Sparkfeather and Thundertail. We welcome you to this, our fair kingdom of Dremwell, and hope you enjoy your brief stay!”
“That’s odd I thought the letter said we would be greeted by the royal family” thought Thundertail. “Where is Rotello? I would love to speak to my old friend!” Chief Lightningmane boomed. “We’re terribly sorry but the king and queen couldn’t make it! They said they had urgent business to attend to! In the meantime I and a few other paw picked subjects will show you around!” The guide smiled but something was definitely wrong. The smile was undeniably fake. They were hiding something.
The tour went on for the rest of day. They saw as much as they could on hoof, but one part of the tour had made Thundertail uneasy. They were walking past a dark, lush, huge forest. Thundertail had a strange compulsion to go to the forest and tried to get a closer look. “Don’t go in there! That’s past Dremwell’s borders! If you go in there, you will be crossing into Nighmourn and trust me even though it’s always dark, it’s more dangerous at night”. They had returned back to their carriage and had been brought to the palace. They unpacked and when dinner came, King Rotello and Queen Susean finally appeared. But something was wrong. King Rotello looked somber and Queen Susean…had she been crying? Her eyes were red and her ears were drooping. They sat down in their seats and everyone seemed to sit in silence for a good three minutes before Sparkfeather started a conversation. “Are you alright Susean? I noticed you look tired and that your fur has a little dirt on it.” “I’m fine, it was just a long day of work that’s all.” There was silence once again. “Did you know that Thundertail is leaning how to hunt? She’s a natural! Almost as good as you Rotello!” “That’s great to hear Lightningmane. It sounds like she’s going to be an excellent Chieftess…” The Royal families picked at their dinners. Suddenly there was a knock at the dining hall’s doors! “You may enter” said King Rotello. Five guards entered the hall and one walked up to King Rotello and Queen Susean and whispered something in their ears. King Rotello stood up from the table. “Will you excuse us? Another urgent matter has come up”. (Susean stands up too) “Please forgive us, we don’t normally have this many emergencies in Dremwell”. King Rotello and Queen Susean then briskly left the room, leaving a large fog of curiosity over their guests. “Well that’s odd. Rotello and I used to be like brothers and share everything together, even our kills. I wonder what’s so wrong in the kingdom to have this many “urgent matters?” Thundermane scowled. “Do not be jealous. I know how much you wanted to go hunting with him like you used to together. But even you know the phrase ‘the kingdom before its king’. Let’s try to finish dinner and get some rest, it has been a long day” said Sparkfeather. Thundermane grumbled but knew his wife is correct. They finished their dinner in silence and then went to their rooms. Thundertail was given her own guest room, so her mother and father would be allowed to have some alone time. She walked for a while. Where was she supposed to go? She did not remember where her room was and the hallway was almost pitch black, besides the glow of the flowers one of the subjects had offered to braid into her tail.
She stopped suddenly. Was she hearing things? She swore that she heard King Rotello and Queen Suseans voices. No she certainly was not crazy. She could definitely hear their voices behind a large door with a silver trim. The door was cracked open. Should she really be eavesdropping? She heard whimpering and sobbing. She couldn’t resist it now. She silenced her breathe and her mind just like in her hunting training and peeked into the cracked door. Queen Susean and King Rotello were talking to the five guards from earlier. But didn’t they say that they needed to go to an urgent matter? Why were they here if it was that serious? Queen Susean was crying and King Rotello was sobbing. A king sobbing? That was something she hadn’t seen since her dad had to get re-shoed. King Rotello was holding an old brown cloak. “WHY DON’T YOU HAVE A LEAD?” he screamed. “Why was no one guarding her room and how did she sneak past all the guards?” The King and Queen looked more than distraught…they looked heartbroken. They looked like they had lost something important. She then saw a picture in the corner of the room that caught her eye. It was a picture of the King and Queen, and a small silver-furred rabbit child was standing in-between them smiling. She had bright shining blue eyes and holding a small fluffy gray kitten. Thundertail tripped backwards over her tail when she realized who the bunny was. She ran off before she was caught. The bunny in the picture was the princess of Dremwell and was the bat she saw in her dreams.