Weiss awoke to the muddied light of morning, casting and shrouding her bedroom. The books cast aside on the bedstand were tilted haphazardly. She had binged in their lessons before her eyes had given way. A knock reproached her door.
"Princess!" called one of her family's maids. "Please awaken! Your parents make request of you!"
"Thank you! I'm coming!"
Weiss sighed, and rose into the sun bright through her window. She dressed, ornamenting herself in the proper garb befitting the morning's ritual, and set to groom and bathe. As she exited her room, she discovered several maids and butlers awaiting her, though this was in itself, routine.
"Our Princess is yet late," commented one of the cheekier maids. Weiss smiled to her.
"My studies matter a great deal; I am reminded of that again and again by you, so why feign surprise?"
"Oh, our lords' tendencies never cease to surprise… We should think you a goddess for your energy, were it not for how you slept."
Weiss laughed with her. The maid showed her down the hall, as is somewhat usual, her maid retracting herself to an upright posture as they broached the lords' conference room.
"Daughter, please, seat yourself," Weiss's father decreed. Weiss nodded, seating herself aside her older sister and beside a now retired general. They kneeled on the room's cushions about a center, high rise seat. Her father was upon it.
"Lord, if it pleases, we should like to fortify the roads beyond the city. We can inspire greater security there for any traders."
"The roads are not safe enough? Or is the concern untracked goods?"
"…A better tack of goods in the city would alleviate some concerns…"
"Hm. It is a consideration to be taken. Those in the…"
The morning goes on like this on most days, Weiss recalled. As the talking ceased, Weiss rose, leaving shortly before her constituents. Winter later tracked her. She expressed concern for her behavior, and Weiss bowed and thanked her. The lecture she'd given was stilted before growing kinder as she addressed Weiss of her evening plans.
Dispatching herself to guard duty, Winter left Weiss, and Weiss continued outside, seating herself in a hill overlooking her city. She trifled grass against her palms. She breathed the cool air. As late day approached, she scanned the palace, then reentered it for her bedroom.
The night sky mixed with the day's, turning the horizon aglow with an orange mix. Weiss was upon her upperstory balcony, watching the stars seep in.
As the darkness came, a swirl of sickened spite filled the sky. It wrapped into itself. An encirclement formed, directly above the city's center. It was as though a tunnel with no entrance, only its final point.
Bodies fell from it. They were of the portal's color and feeling, wrenching the city from its nightly civils and drenching it in chaos. The bodies struck out and killed guards with their odd appendages. Skulls of creatures who could not exist were the only solid anatomical expressions upon them. Civilians ran and screamed as they rampaged.
Guards bearing naginatas speared for them. Many were knocked away. Others were maimed. Yet some managed strikes and cuts, feeding from the creatures a puss-like black. Gradually the creatures were driven back with few being killed. The portal shut. The darkness traded itself for the stars.
The halls clacked with a rightful stride in sandaled steps. Weiss opened her parents' throne room.
Her father was speaking with Winter of guard duties. Newfound rules to be put in place. Weiss had heard.
"Set denser watches inside the city. Place them at the center. Is this sound?" the lord questioned.
"Yes, my lord," Winter replied. Weiss frowned. Winter went off to attend her duties, yet stopped short of the door as she noticed her sister.
"Father, mother," Weiss began, a tempered tone with boiled anger, "Are we not engaged in war?"
"Calm yourself, Weiss," the lord said, "Our city is entrenchment enough."
"And in our entrenching, where are the others? Our allies and friends? Will they die, for our sloth?"
An embittered look pierced through Weiss's eyes. Two weeks had passed since the incident and allies were suffering worse from the attacks. Her father leaned forward from his throne.
"Quiet!" he shouted. "A protected city is needed for them to look to! If we should fall they will be without respite.
"If we should fall, we should fall together, and if we stand we stand together! Rising is not an option… it's a definite!"
"Quiet, Weiss! Quiet and silence your nonsense!"
"Dears… Please…" Weiss's mother spoke from beside him. "Your father and I must attend this, but you have yourselves to think of for now. We need to ensure you can become the ruler our people need. Take care of yourselves in these times. Focus upon your studies."
"If I have luxury for self-care, I should have luxury to help."
Weiss left the room. She returned to her bedroom, and did not leave for the day.
As a similar night came, in its weather and atmosphere, Weiss waded in the halls alone. She heard servants speak within the estate with their families, sharing tales of those lost. She heard the invited traders speak of their friends' deaths, and the cities gone. Other traders had not been invited in, to the palace or the city. Outside, the world was in apprehensive spite.
None had mobilized to discover the portal's origin, or of the its neighbors' creations. Though there had come word of one portal, far, far… deep in the throngs of the lower country.
Weiss readjusted her hood, assuring her face under shadow. She opened the closet in her family's storage and searched about inside. Her sword was there; white as her own hair. Fastening it to her waist by a rope tether, she then packed food and goods. She opened a drawer, and smiled, as she had at last found it.
The mark of the Rose family was upon the promised scroll. To rise whenever the Schnee clan called upon them was their duty. The warriors had won the Schnee clan the war and positioned them in dominance. Taking the scroll, she tucked it into her robes and began out as she had gone in.
The darkness was thick. Weiss's eyes were well adjusted, but the hall ahead obscured a tangent passage. She jumped as another figure appeared.
"…Mom!?"
"Shhh!" her mother whispered. She looked over her daughter's pack and the sword at her waist. She brought herself in to Weiss, hugging her.
"Just… take this with you," she said, producing a broach from her robe. A white flower was pegged into the design; a gorgeous wedding vow.
"Mom…"
"Promise me, you will share it with one you love."
Weiss silently took it, huffing a nod. Her mother hugged her once more, then allowed her past.
The dirt road sprawled miles out ahead and past the glades known for their high rises and beautiful sways of grass in the wind. Early morning swam in all directions, thankfully not housing any new attacks from the sky. Weiss continued along.
A thundering of steps quaked the glades. Weiss froze. She drifted her sight to a rightward hill, seeing a morose darkness climbing over. The skull upon it appeared like a bird over maligned ink. It had wings and claws scrawling the earth below. It squawked at her like an orchestra of abrasive brass. Weiss's expression hung in surprise.
As it lowered to the road, it stood to Weiss, staring over her. As it did, Weiss prepared, her face hardening. Then, with a calm gait, she began toward the creature. The creature hissed once more, Weiss aligning her hand upon her sword's handle.
The beast flung to her, but in an instant, she was opposite it. She drew her blade back into its sheath, and the creature bled its odd fluid in a spitting cascade. Weiss did not bother to look back as she continued in her travel for her Rose warrior.