A/N: This entry is highly inspired by a poem called This Can't be Dangerous by Laura Marie Marciano. While I was revising for unseen poetry, I looked up some random poems and this one actually gave me some inspo for a short Melizabeth piece. So yeah.

I also want to apologise for not updating anything for a VERY long time. I had some really important and intense exams in the past two months, so I've been studying like crazy. I had no time to write. But (thankfully) I do have a HUGE backlog of stuff to finish and post for 3,000 years, so don't be surprised if there's a sudden influx of updates for this fic. I had a lot half-written stuff in my files when I started final exams.

Till next time,

D.L.D

This Can't be Dangerous

She lost herself over four years. First it was the creeps, peering at tiny creatures in pleats - watching as she grew up, honed her skills, got stronger and better at things she'd never done before. With age came beauty, they said, great beauty came with greater age and what better way to show it than she did?

Day by day, year by year, she lost herself within the praise of her peers. Once a goddess ruled by frugality and simplicity was now a goddess blinded by adoration and pride. Gone were the days of sweetened barley strips, small animals cradled in her grip as she comforted a lone goddess teased for his inability to fight. Hate.

Now she did all the hating. All the bad things - all the things she'd once been against - had now turned into her greatest friends. Her finest, sharpest tools.

"Bloody Ellie," They would say. "The bloodiest of them all." Terror would rain down on the battlefields, eyes wide with terror as the enemy set their sights on her, lightning striking down from the stormy heavens above.

Glorious, she would be. Bright silver hair of starlight, glowing skin of sun. Heavy armour weighed her down, glimmering in all shades of metallic shine and gemstone gleam. With her sword and her skill, she was a formidable enemy. One of the legends that had been passed along the battlefields, whispered between shivering troops who cowered behind their well-dug lines and fortresses.

Bloody Ellie. Daughter of a God. The one who would take over this world and rule it in her mother's stead once the demons were gone.

How far she had fallen. Lost herself to hopes and dreams of others who did not care for her. Battle after battle, bloodstain after bloodstain, she would tread further and further away from the girl she used to be.

Bloody Ellie. Once Elizabeth. Only, she couldn't see her anymore.

Young, bright goddess, so unaware of all the creeps. Smiling and laughing as she wore her little pleats. Sweet words and wishful smiles, shared between her and a brother who was teased for quite a while. Now where is she? Sweaty palms, nails of yellow, the soft rogue of cheek. All these things she'd thought she'd never be.

Yet here she is, battling for her people, Bloody Ellie - not Elizabeth - and swiftly being lost, piece by piece.

When she finally realised that they had all left the table because of her smell it was too late. Everyone fled. Anyone fled. Too skeptical of her intentions, too envious of her skill, the other goddesses began to isolate her once more.

No longer did they send her kind smiles. No longer did they credit her as the clan's greatest weapon, a true rival to the Ten Commandments and the Dark Demon Prince himself. Instead she was a threat - an unpredictable ruler. No-one knew what would happen once this war was over, once Elizabeth received her title as queen, and so they chose to dance around her. Act as if she didn't exist.

But then she might as well not exist. Built around their hopes and dreams, their pride and aspirations, Elizabeth no longer knew how to function without everyone else around. Over all those years, years at war, she had lost herself. Deeply. So much so, she didn't even know how to find herself again.

So what could she do next? What could she do to gain their attention, their trust, their adoration once more?

Biting her lip, the goddess peers around the battlegrounds, strewn about with groaning bodies and screeching attacks. Blood, so much blood - bloodshed she had caused with her striking arrival. Why? She does not know. This war she fights, this battle she is in, is fought all for them. Always for them. Only for them. Never herself. Why was a reason lost long ago.

About to give up - she's about to throw in the towel. Golden armour glittering, sword bathed in crimson - yet she feels like nothing has changed. Hot blood still stains her pristine hands, empty actions still seek admirable praise. She will never be complete without their love; she will never be herself without her people's love.

Another person spliced in half. More red splashed upon the upturned earth. She sees it then - her chance. In the middle of it all, merciless, godlike, he is waiting for her, surrounded by an aura of darkness and power that far exceeds the others. Dangerous. Wild. Bold. Just what she needs to prove herself. Just what she wants to prove herself with.

Not much thought passes through her when the idea strikes her: corner the most powerful demon in the battle and force him to surrender. Hold her sword to their throat, secure her status as Bloody Ellie, warrior princess, goddess, of Britannia.

Shaky breath. Sweaty palms. Her hands slip on her sword as sparks fly through the air, blue eyes meeting onyx in equally heated glares. Meliodas. Son of the Demon King. Leader of the Ten Commandments. By birthright, he was her enemy, her sworn enemy. Fitting that they should face each other here, on the battlefield, in the middle of a battle that means so much to her.

Brilliant at fighting - he was. Definitely an example of one of the best soldiers in Britannia. For her it was a miracle that she did not waver, did not struggle, to meet him strike for strike, blow for blow, delicate as she was. Cracking as she was. But she still did.

"I will win," She chanted. "I will win. I will win." She needs to win - wants to claim the sweet taste of victory on her tongue once she has defeated the demon prince. That is all she needs; that is all she wants to satisfy her lost and stormy soul.

Then, rain falls. Heavy, pelting rains that drench her to the bone, making her sword slick and clothes cling. Mud smears across skin, fat droplets melting in heated air, as the goddess takes in a deep breath, wings twitching with anxiety. Exhaustion.

Over. It's over now. Rainfall and thunderstorms always meant that the demons were bound to retreat; her mother had complete control over the skies.

He's still here though. Meliodas. Son of the Demon King. Her now sworn enemy who she would have slayed. Meliodas - a curious thought. A curious thing.

"What are you staring at?" She spits, cheeks red and wet with rainfall. Once dry dirt is now grubby smears on her skin, feeling gritty and sticky.

"Nothing," He grunts out, but she's not convinced. There's a shift between them. There's no longer any vitriolic tension. There's no hatred present. Nothing. Just the blazing determination, the powerful hope, that she once had to win this battle. To defeat the Dark Prince.

"I'll win next time," She finds herself saying, a smile fixing itself onto her lips. "I will win, just you see."

Humming, he acknowledges her. But it doesn't seem to stick - though there is a glimmer to his once dull eyes.

She had shaved her public hair to vanish the hardest years. After not being accepted, after seeing how her encounter with Meliodas had only made things worse, Elizabeth decided to shed all traces of who was once was. What she once was. Starting with the hair.

Cut, cut, cut. Rip, rip, rip. Piece by piece, chunk by chunk, she broke her first rule against her people. Hot, sticky wax, sharp metal blades, were used to nick away the hair that once crowned her femininity and purity. Closer to being a woman - closer to being independent - she didn't see the harm in it. It wasn't like there was anyone else left to reject her.

So Elizabeth continued with it. Shaving the hair, painting her nails, dressing in clothes that most of her people would thoroughly disdain. She's no longer a young goddess filled with bright hopes and innocence; she's a woman, a fierce fighter and leader, plowing ahead with experience and knowledge.

Power is temporary. Fleeting. She knows that now. Power is not what she wants, nor does she want the adoration of her people - so foolish to fear her. Power and pride are two ps that she could go without. Two aspects of life that she had experienced well enough.

Instead, Elizabeth craves something more. Something that is made of substance, can be held within her hands without it slipping through her fingertips. Love - that's what she's looking for. Peace and love and rest - rest from all of this fighting, rest from all the watching eyes, rest from so many things...

Maybe that's why she is here, hot breath over white lace bra. Stifling the sounds she makes with the solemn procession of some noble fighter's funeral. Really she should be up front, paying her respects, but she is too busy hidden away in darkness, two steps closer to insanity and sin. Arms and hands, always tense and anxious. Tongues and lips, always wet and needy. Always there to hold her together, keep her close, when she was feeling as if she were toppling over the edge.

Meliodas. The demon prince. He'd found her again at Heaven's Theatre, wallowing away in her own self-pity. After that she found herself sneaking out to meet him regularly at dusk. All too eagerly she followed him, small bodies slipping away from the watching eyes of the world.

To survive, she told herself, she would have to enjoy it. All that came with this decision, all that came with involving herself with this man, would have to be enjoyed. It is all she has left now. All that she holds within her quaking hands, still solid but gently melting. Disappearing. Once it did, that was it - time was up. She would have to go back to not existing once more.

When the procession stops and they're heaving heavy gasps, he asked if she came for him. She said in her own way. A way he'd never truly understand.

Twenty years later, she finds herself doing the same thing. War is still continuing, her people still scorn her and she is rather unchanged herself. Striking silver hair, bright blue eyes and a soft smile that could cut as sharp as knives - yes, she was still the same. Still bold, still brilliant, still attracting the eyes of creeps who eyed tiny girls in little pleats.

All the eyes still clung to her every movement. All the mouths still talked behind cloaked hands, joining countless faces who ran away from her table, terrified of the horrific stench. No-one wanted anything to do with her. No-one wanted to know anything about her.

But now Elizabeth ignored those things. Intertwined her hands with a demon lover, who never saw anything but the amazing parts of her. Parts of her that wrapped around her damaged, severed parts, joining together in a strange patchwork quilt that only he could call a masterpiece. Meliodas. The demon prince. Her demon prince. How funny fate can be. Only he, her sworn enemy, could ever stand being around her; only he, someone who unknowingly put her back on track, could make her change.

From a tiny girl with shattered hopes and dreams, Elizabeth blossomed into a woman who was pressing for peace. Advocating for an end to the very thing that dictated her life for so many empty years.

So much had changed and yet so little. So much to share and yet so little words to say it in. What Elizabeth can tell you for free though, without a single doubt, is that one time a fairy had sex with a human behind a wooden porch, and threw the condom wrapper right at her nose.

What they have, what she has, couldn't be bad. This can't be dangerous.

...