The Flower of White Walls

"Puft…pat...pat…”, went the soft top-head of a kitten against the hardened sills of a village window. The nature of this small and gentle creature was unlike the encompassing dilapidation of the lower boroughs it called home - never once bothered by it's dreary conditions.

In a castle dungeon watched the princess, "Why must he keep doing that?" asked the princess, drawn in her countenance. "Mayhap his desire for a moment's respite is a desperate one...to live out one's night pilfering and sauntering in one's own self-wrought misery is no way to live at all," ill-advised a demon tucked into the shadows of her cell; drawing erroneous travesties at the innocent kitten's livelihood. "No matter how ephemeral one's life is..." it hissed once more.

Auburn-haired, and piercing brown eyed princess Eleanor of White Walls Kingdom was not frightened by the consternation that was the sudden presence of a demon. Nay, it may be a fair assessment to say that the young maiden has never experienced any unforgiving fear in her life. Instead, her eyes remained fixed on the purity and freedom of the happy kitten before her. She paid no mind to the shrills of the ravenous demon - confident in it's fear... of her.

You see, this kingdom is the sanctuary for what remains of humanity and their knowledge; a kingdom all alone in the world. Nearly a thousand years ago, our world had some semblance of unanimity and peace. Nations united under a truly cooperative utopia. Science had advanced and blossomed at humanity's whim thus paving a way to a golden era for Earth and it's diverse populace from all over the galaxy. But, like all things that are wonderful, this age of resounding glory too came to an end - a dark and tragic end. A highly transmissible and sinister pathogen of unknown origins greeted the world. In the blink of an eye, all had been torn asunder. History would have it known as the Demon's Blight. The symptoms of this disease create what creature would attempt to torment even a fairest maiden in her cell. This ghastly pathogen alters the organic composition of any living organism, man and creature alike, into the embodiments of evil. Hence, the name of demons bestowed upon them. But, how can something so sinister fear a lone maiden tethered to the pits? What greater power is she hiding?

To the princess, she was indeed trapped within a cell. However, her predicament was of no concern to her for her entire life she had been in a much larger cell: the great walls and palisades of the kingdom. One could never find the princess under duress over her imprisonment as she never once put up a fight. Advisors and doctors from all over the vast kingdom frequent her, and each one could attest to her dull and lifeless countenance. And neither can they attest for the girl she was once before. Since birth, Eleanor had not been favored in her kingdom. Her mother, Queen Evangeline, beloved by all, tragically died during the birth of Eleanor, her and the late King Avery's only daughter. Growing up, the warmth and love a child needs was a hard thing to discover for the young princess. Her father, old in his age, attempted only his very best until it was his last breath. For it was he who died at the hands of his own daughter.

The princess grimaces at the stench of the demon behind her; reminded of the blight that plagues her world. "Tell me. How is it you have come into mine kingdom - let alone, this cell, undetected?" she snarled at the blackness of her small, and dreary cell. The ancient technologies that protect the kingdom serve to prohibit demons from ever entering. "Thine kingdom? My word, truly a travesty if this princess believes the meaningless wind spewing from her own mouth”, the demon hisses from the shadows once more before exposing a decrepit figure of what was once a man. "Thine own people would have you strung up in ropes and cindered for one's own actions against her own fa-", Eleanor's fingers swiftly seize the demon's throat - each finger clutching tightly against it's rotting skin. "I never wanted to hurt my father", the princess confesses in a blank expression. "You wield it with you... do you not? You will fail to disconcert this demon into submission, princess of light." it laughed. "For I may hav-", a blackened and bloody corpse falls from the princess's fingers before turning to ash - spewing into the wind. "If only your words were as serviceable as your means”, she remarks before laying her eyes upon a once locked cellar door, now wide open.

Princess Eleanor rids her hands of the demon's dust on her moth-bitten gown. She pauses and breathes. Betwixt her collar bones is the the only heirloom from her long and royal lineage, bestowed upon her by her father. It belonged to the late mother she wishes she knew and was promised to her when she would come of age. She gently holds the golden, heart-shaped locket in the palms of her hands. The princess is reminded of her mission in her attempt to overcome this new emotion: fear. Since the establishment of White Walls Kingdom, never has a demon entered it's walls. None, other than her father; who turned before her very eyes. Bound to solve the mysteries of the demons, a determined princess heads for the world beyond.

Eleanor pauses once more. Still wiping the dust and entrails from herself, it would have seemed that her locket popped open. "It is just like it was before", the princess remembers the first time it opened. In the fingers of her dead father's hands reaching out to her. Back then, she clasped it shut and held it tightly as tears fell from her sullied eyes. And as guards came to her aide, and eventually to imprison her - with the advising court in denial of the king's disfigurement. Now, she notices a small and beautiful flower of onyx-shade laid nestled inside of the locket. "That must be it! The locket must react to demon-blight", she remarked. "So it is true", the princess weeps in insurmountable joy. As legends tell it, the true bloodline of the royal family are immune to the Demon's Blight and hold the answers to the demons. Never once confirmed, and only a tale until now, the royal family would also carry a light; a demon's bane. She always knew this within her heart. Her depression and lifeless countenance prior to her discovery allowed her to recklessly put this to the test with the demon that once stood before her.

With a new sense of power, the princess Eleanor would write a final missive addressed to the noble families before departing the suffocating walls of her cell. She would highlight what she has discovered so far and what she will hope to discover in her first journey, beyond the Kingdom of White Walls. Upon gathering herself, she would notice one final thing. Her feet become heavy, and her breathing turns rapid. From her cell, she would notice the screams of her people and their blood spilled... by demons in the walls.