Robert stood up, carrying the unconscious girl in his arms. His fur cloak wrapped around her tightly, even the winters in the south were harsh, the cold seemed to find its way to even the warmest countries. When he was at the door and twisted the round handle to unlock the door he stopped, he forgot to put on his necklace. Just in case.
He rummaged around in his pants for a few seconds and fished out a beautiful emerald stone, wrapped in dirtied silver that spun around it like a snake, ending in a smudged silver chain with a worn clasp. He really needed to fix it before it broke completely.
Kneeling down to free the hand that held Anna's unconscious body to put it on. The silence which was only interrupted by his own breathing was welcome. The screams he had heard in the hall so many times before haunted him. He was never a bad man, he had always followed the kings orders, his loyalty had never wavered. Until two months ago.
At first he thought that the kings plan was, at best, understandable. But as time went on, and with every day he saw that red hair splayed out on the table, his loyalty was ever so slightly pushed to the side, the protective instinct a father should feel for his kids filled his thoughts every day. And finally his loyalty disappeared entirely. A week ago he lost the last drop of respect he had for his king, when he saw him toss a maid out on the street, with nothing but her nightgown, for spilling water on his shoes. He had finally lost his mind in search for whatever it was he was looking for.
Robert steeled himself for what could end up as the toughest day of his life, and twisted the handle. The hall was empty, torches still lit, and the chair still vacant. Not that he was expecting anyone to be there. As he moved through the damp hallways en route to the exit that lead to the mansion above ground, he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder. First thought was to bolt, run as fast as he could. Not an option. Second thought, act heartbroken, luckily he had pretty good acting skills and he let his eyes tear up enough to make them glassy, and turned his head toward the person.
"Where are you going with that girl?" the hooded figure didn't seem to hold any malice or bad intent in his words, no, it sounded like he had just asked him about the weather.
"She died, I'm going to bury her, as a priest I feel obligated to give her a proper burial" Robert replied, in the most convincing manner he could, not trying to give away his intentions.
"Hmm, let me see if her body is stable enough to be moved out of here".
Before Robert had any time to reply with disagreement, the unknown man had produced a needle and pricked his thumb, smearing the tiny amount of blood over the tips of his fingers and held his hand out towards the girl, never touching her. He mumble some form of enchant or spell, Robert didn't see or feel anything, but the mans calm demeanor had disappeared and it was replace with an almost smug expression.
"She isn't really dead is she?" he said looking directly at Robert. He had hoped no one would notice, or at least not this early on in his escape. He still had to go through the mansions foyer located above them before he would be outside and could get away.
The man caught him by surprise when he released a sigh and spoke up, "I can understand why you would do it... But I have to warn you, if the king finds out you will be hunted for the rest of your life"
"Then let me ask you this, why are you not running to him right now and telling him?" Robert couldn't come up with a reason for the mans warning so instead he asked.
"Because that girl," he pointed at Anna, "is going to be the first artificial hybrid that doesn't die as soon as she, how shoud I put it, awaken perhaps. And I would like to see how her powers are going to evolve... So my proposal is, I come with you and observe her until I have enough information about her development to give myself the very same powers she has" he chuckled a bit.
"W-what..." Robert had no idea what to say about such a statement.
"Confused huh.. Well let me tell you something that might change your mind," he leaned closer "my family is dead because of the king, I've been waiting for a chance to get my revenge, and she's the key to my success" he almost sneered.
Robert relented, "Fine then help me escape." he didn't ask, he commanded, the man tilted his head to the side, and then nodded, "Follow me then, I know how we can get out of here".
Robert followed the man through a couple of halls until they reached a door at the end of the hall, inside was barrels upon barrels. The smell of oil and something else was almost to strong for Robert to stomach, he wasn't normally squeamish being a war veteran used to smelling burnt flesh and rotting corpses, it probably had to do with being underground and not having fresh air run through the dungeon-like environment. The man stood in front of the barrels, again he poked a tiny hole in his finger and held it up against one of the barrels closest to the entrance, again he spoke a short sentence and turned to Robert.
"There, now we just need to get back to the surface, and avoid the west wing of the mansion. Pretty soon it won't be there anymore, along with the guards living quarters. I hadn't planned on doing it this soon, but you got to grab the opportunities when they present themselves." he grinned.
Both men turned and made their way towards the stairs leading up to the mansion, a loud explosion was heard, the heat from the explosion made its way through the halls and even to the men who was now halfway up the stairs, ready to exploit the confusion the spectacle would have produced.
"Shit, that went off faster than I expected, let us hurry".
But as soon as they opened the door, three guards and an elderly man was standing, looking as if they knew something was up, even with the fire that licked its way across the ceiling turning the otherwise pristine white paint dark and blistery.
The old man was the first one to speak, "Well well, Jonas, you didn't really believe your little plan was going to succeed did you? We have mages here that can read your minds. We knew about this escape before you even carried it out, the explosion wasn't expected this soon, so you did manage to kill off most of the guards here, I'm kind of impressed"
"I had hoped it would have taken you too.. Well, guess I just have to kill you myself" his words were jagged, he clearly had no love for the old man.
Robert who stood a foot behind Jonas, took his free hand and let his powers flow from his body, and put his hand to Anna's forehead, trying to undo the magic from the potion, but his attempt was interrupted by a blade he barely twisted away from. The swing took his ringfinger and littlefinger, in addition to creating quite a gash into Anna's hip. In the small amount of time it took for his brain to receive the signal of pain, Jonas had reacted with seemingly inhuman reflexes. He had cut off the hand of the guard that had attacked Robert.
"ROBERT! GET HER OUT OF HERE!" Jonas yelled, but his mind was occupied with getting the potions effects out of her and the pain that somehow ceased as soon as he focused.
"Hold them for just 10 seconds" he spoke calmly, he had to keep a cool head and somehow force himself to trust Jonas. He knelt and let Anna's body fall to the floor, a little hastily if you go by the sound her body made upon impact. He quickly stopped the bleeding where is fingers had just been, and focused with closed eyes.
Jonas caught on and started counting, one, knowing that the girl had enough power to stop whatever backup they had called for. Keeping up with two skilled fighters proved to be a real challenge for Jonas, the first swing of his sword was skillfully blocked, two, and the fist that collided with his wrist made him drop his sword, three, the swing meant to take of his head was dodged by crouching, four, he put all the power he could muster into his legs and lunged for the legs of both guards, five, he held out his arms to each side and grabbed a leg on both men, six, he kept his momentum to the best of his abilities but the guard on his left saw it coming and jerked his leg away, seven, the guard that didn't heard a pop from where the hip and thigh meet and dropped his sword, he wasn't as experienced as the other guard, eight, Jonas rolled to the side as soon as possible but it was a little too late his left calf was pinned to the floor and pain shoot through his body, nine, he turned his head towards the guard that had avoided him and the sword that stood straight up, lodged in the wood beneath his leg, a second before another sword reached his heart Robert threw a knife into the throat of the guard, ten.
Robert bent down to whisper in Anna's ear as soon as she opened her eyes, "I don't know what you can do but now is the time to do it" just as he finished his sentence a horn could be heard on the road in front of the mansion.
"Fuck...the...fire" Jonas coughed.
Anna looked at her surroundings, first she noticed the flames that managed to make the roof and walls creak, the second was the pain from her hip, the third was the old man. The man that she had heard speak in the arena, the man that was running this experiment for the king. Hatred and rage overtook her as she released a wave of uncontrolled magic hitting Robert point blank, flinging him towards the wall behind him, Jonas was the next to get hit along with the three injured guards, the sword that had his leg pinned didn't move, he did. Ripping his leg of at the knee and tossing the rest of him close to the front door.
The old man was the last to be hit but he was the target, so the force that was directed against him was strongest, the power felt good to Anna, it almost taunted her to release even more, but she had seen what it did to the kids she had killed, her mind broken as it was told her this wasn't an innocent kid, this was the evil man that had made her life a living hell for six years. She smiled and let the it flow, no matter how much agony she felt, this man had to die. His ribs cracked when he was hit, it took him off his feet and in a matter of seconds he was pressed firmly against the wall a foot above the floor, and a few feet from Jonas.
Robert had gotten the wind knocked out of him but was otherwise okay for unknown reasons, he lifted his head and saw a frightening sight, the flames around the room looked as if they were drawn in the direction of Anna, the flames which before had danced across the ceiling as an inverted ocean stood in spikes downwards, likewise the flames that covered most of the walls was now horizontal. He felt bad about his thoughts, but he now understood why people would seek out such powers, with them a single person could probably take over an entire kingdom unless they wore themselves out and keeled over from exhaustion that is. When his eyes landed on Anna's form his mind was filled with fear, the magic had a dark and heavy feeling about them, as if it was an empty vessel looking for anything to latch onto, tear apart and swallow up. From the peripheral of his vision he saw his necklace light up, more than he had seen before until the emerald finally had enough, cracking then crumbled to dust, the magic in the room was too much for his worn catalyst.
Anna who was approaching the man slowly but surely, every action she took was instinctual, she could feel the power take hold as it had done multiple times before, but this time it didn't act on its own. This time it almost caressed her insides, making her feel good throughout her body, it submitted to her, for the first time since she was placed here she was in control. And she had every intention of releasing her anger on the man she held to the wall.
The front door was kicked in when Anna was about ten feet from the man, the first guard that entered immediately regret it, the girls attention had shifted towards the door and the old man had dropped to the floor. Before the new arrival could prepare for the impact, Anna's body had moved according to the training she had received, the second it took for her to cover the distance to the guard was enough for the old man to watch the scene, his life's work was finally here, he had done it. There was no doubt when he saw her eyes glowing, there was no mistake, he had managed to create a hybrid. He saw the force she put into the punch directed at the guards plate mail, denting it inwards and throwing him out the front door, the whiplash probably broke his neck and ruptured several organs. But the old man was staring with satisfaction.
Anna thought she was in control until the man she had just hit lay still on the dirt several yards in front of the large double doors. As much as she would like to stop it she couldn't, there was too much magic, she couldn't reel it in. Her muscles started aching, her head pounding, her heartbeat quickening. She was gonna pass out soon, perhaps die, she didn't know. One thing she did know however was that if she were going to die she would take him with her. So she closed the distance between her and the old man not caring about the beam that just fell from the ceiling right next to her.
At the same time Robert had seen his chance to make his way to the front door, on the way he grabbed the hand Jonas held up and pulled him out, the guards outside was standing a good distance away from the burning mansion and let them through without second guessing, everyone was too struck with terror after the first guard was disposed of so violently by a small child.
Anna now stood towering over the old man, even with her small frame she was a sight to behold, the last word he managed to get out was, "beautiful" before Anna screamed at him and released the rest of what power she could feel. It was focused enough to crush his skull, the broken ribs protruded from his back covering the wall behind him with a sheet of blood. His whole body along with a large chunk of wall was blasted towards the dozens of guards outside, five of the men that stood a bit too close was hit by the wall and sustained severe injuries.
After the last power drained away Anna fell to her knees, the pain was gone for now, yet she couldn't stand. All of her energy had been spent. The mansion that was now pretty banged up and broken could not hold out for much longer, the flames righted themselves as Anna's anger faded, she was still aware of the predicament she now found herself in, the roof was soon going to collapse, the same way she had, and no matter how much she wanted to move her body didn't listen.
Kneeling on the floor she could feel the immense heat from the flames pick up and the supporting wood in the structure was being weakened by the fire. A flaming pillar had slowly begun tilting in her direction, when it was angled enough to fall she looked up and accepted her fate, but the large pillar of fire was knocked askew by another smaller pillar underneath it, made of ice. Unfortunately it wasn't enough and it still took her right arm with it, crushing the bones in her forearm and hand.
The pain hit her with force, she screamed out as her view darkened, all she saw was blonde hair bordering on white, flawless skin, piercing blue eyes and a voice so beautiful telling her to hang on, that only one conclusion could be drawn. She was being saved by an angel, her eyesight was fading, the skin on her arm had been severely charred and the angel in front of her tried to get the large pillar away, but it wouldn't budge. The angel tried and tried, but kept failing.
"Cut it off" Anna's voice was weak but commanding.
"What?!" the angel sounded surprised by her words.
"Cut it off, it's to broken to fix anyway, the roof is gonna collapse" she refused to let her angel die because of her, to much death had happened today already.
The angel hesitated, she looked around before her eyes started glowing a pure white, a blade formed in her hand, and in a single slash Anna was pulled free from the confines of her destroyed limb. The heat she felt was quickly soothed by freezing ice encasing the cut. The ice was covered in strips she tore from her dress acting as bandages, then Anna felt a couple of cool hands lifting her up and carrying her out of the building before it tumbled down and was nothing but an oversized bonfire. Then she was out again, so soon after waking up to chaos.
AN: Shit, so yeah. Anna has power! Still, Elsa can freeze an entire kingdom so i thought it was justifiable that Anna could mutilate a human and a wall. According to another story I stumbled upon she could control the suns position on the sky, talk about climate change.
Just in case you were wondering, yeah the characters will be slightly OOC mainly because I didn't feel like writing a story where the main characters were saints, no one is, so it seems unrealistic. (As if magic is realistic)
PS. In the prologue i wrote, "I wanted to write something new". This is the first thing i have ever uploaded not the first thing I've ever written, the rest of my stories has simply been for shits and giggles, expanding my creative side, it needs some heavy duty polishing and that is best accomplished with feedback, things I need to work on, change, whatever it might be, it's just a little difficult to notice your own mistakes. Ramble done, enjoy!
Love Mr. Turtle