She loved him. His sapphire blue eyes and jet black hair. The way he bit his lips when deep in thought.
She loved him. But did he even know her?
Of course he does, she would assure herself. No one can forget an enchantress this talented.
How talented she was before, we may never know. However, we do know, magic was her escape. Escape from a poor life, miles and miles away from the heart of Elysion. The bricks weren't crumpled to dust in Elysion. No one went hungry in Elysion (or so she dreamed, imagining luxurious dinners every evening). Magic was a lost art back in the slums and often she would create a spark or fizz in the air for a coin or two. Gotta make ends meet. When her talent got to her head, she left. Ran away- a young girl's dream of being more than a street performer.
It was there she saw him. Her first show on the polished, cobbled streets of Elysion. She would never quite forget the smell of the conjured fire that singed her hair in distraction. Children giggled and cheered, sympathetic old women searched for a coin to spare. Standing in the back, eyes as blue and fierce as the sky above them, he stood with four guards flanking him. She heard whispers from the guards. The word potential was passed around. And she was invited to dinner. It's a wonder she didn't forget how to use her spoon in his royal presence.
Life got harder. She wanted to impress the prince. Needed to. She couldn't just fall out of interest- she was here to be admired. Somewhere, after the evenings the royal family watched her perform, an idea grew in the pit of her heart. That by some miracle, the prince would cast aside a noble bride and choose her. He would love her. The same way she was beginning to love him. She had to impress him. And that's when the dark magic began.
It was easy to justify at first. She was only using a little dark magic, it couldn't be that powerful, and hey- all it was doing was improving her tricks. Once a month she crept off and with a pricked finger's blood, whispered to a shadow and refilled power. Metallia, it called itself. But pressure, real or imagined, sank in, and months turned to weeks. Then she came. Weeks became days.
How dare another woman snatch the prince up under her nose. He's only spending time with her because she's a princess! That had to be it. A little blood every day in exchange for her own benefit wasn't going to turn her into a crazed witch. Just a little bit more magic and some help protecting her prince. He was hers, of course.
The more Serenity visited, the more the shade would talk.
I can make you powerful, Metallia would hiss. You can protect him. You can have him. You can have everything.
She listened.
The Silver Millennium fell.
But it wasn't the end. It would never be the end. She had unfinished work and knew it the moment she awoke years later. Because she loved him.
And now, head in her arms, he lays, blue eyes distant. Tamed. She wraps and arm lovingly around him and this time, he doesn't flinch. His mind is hers now.
She loves him.
Whatever strange definition of love she has.
And he is hers.