Chapter 8: Flowers and Stones
Normally, being made of fire, Flame Princess would never be able to feel the sun shining against her face; but this morning was different. She could feel its warm radiance as she opened her eyes, welcoming her into the morning. It was one of the best experiences gained from being the ruler of the great Fire Kingdom: seeing the beauty of it from all the way up in her room. Seeing her home. There was nothing that could possibly compare to it.
A light breeze accompanied the sunrise, blowing at the curtains that decorated the balcony's archway. They were like ghost, with tails so long that they floated above her like the dress of the fairest maiden dancing at a ball. Flame Princess wanted to know why such images came to her mind when waking up, but she decided to leave it a mystery. Despite the honesty law of the kingdom, she had to admit certain mysteries left unanswered were better off that way. It would always be that way when inside her lamp.
Flame Princess hated to recall that glass prison, but there was one positive thing she could say about it: it gave her great interest in the world that awaited beyond the glass itself. Every day she would imagine what the world outside looked like, each image different every day when she closed her eyes. When she actually managed to one day leave that prison, everything the world was enticed her nothing ever had before.
The green grass, the tall trees, the gentle breeze of the wind as she flew across the sky; absolutely nothing could ever compare. And now, as she stood from her bed and walked out to the balcony, that world now stood before her, even if most of it was just hills of coal and piles if fire, she was seeing part of the world. The part that she would always call "home".
It brought a smile to her face every time she enjoyed the view, especially when her citizens seemed happy and prosperous. The grogginess of sleep seemed to wash away in mere seconds, replaced by the will needed to make sure the Fire Kingdom remained as it was. However, while everything was as normal as always and the day was made out to be beautiful, Flame Princess would not be smiling any time soon.
This was the one day of the year that always stripped her of her happiness. The one day of every year where she made the long walk among the seemingly endless amounts of stone. Anyone else would have been able to handle it just fine, but since Flame Princess had only been out of her lamp for a few years, the entire experience was completely new to her. Right now, all she wanted was to get it out of the way as soon as possible, so she wasted no more time in enjoying the morning view of the sunrise and began to get ready.
She did not feel like wearing anything too fancy. The bright orange dress that she wore for most occasions would suit nicely. Of course, it was not the exact same dress. But it was a perfect replica tailored to suit her stature since outgrowing the old one. Wearing it always reminded her of all the good times she had with…she cast aside the thought. Right now was not the time to be reliving past events.
As Flame Princess finished by placing her crown atop her head, she stared at her reflection in the clothing cabinet's mirror. When she first took control of the kingdom, there was no possible way of knowing where she would have ended up. Now, as she stood with her head held high, it could be safely said that her rule had gone a lot better than she expected it to. During her first few days, she thought it would have ended very soon. But now, she was confident in herself, and in everyone else who served the kingdom.
However, could she really keep it up? The more the Fire Kingdom prospered, the harder her tasks would increasingly get. And who else would be able to take her stead should she be unable to handle everything on her own? Then again, it was one of the main reasons she had chosen Blayze as her suitor.
With every passing day, he always showed more promise of being a worthy king for the Fire Kingdom. To have someone by her side who had more experience among the common folk than Flame Princess, it would definitely relieve much of the tension clouding her. But while being with Blayze was one thing, thinking about actually marrying him in the coming future was another matter entirely.
In any case, it was a new day, and Flame Princess would not be bothering herself with such distant troubles. She would be focusing on the present.
She took a deep breath in front of her mirror. "Okay Phoebe," she mumbled to herself. "You can get through this. You always have. Just get through it quick and then it'll be just another day of ruling the kingdom."
After slightly fixing the position of her crown, Flame Princess turned and left her room. She was immediately greeted by the two guards that were always posted outside right beside the door. They straightened their poses and slightly bowed their heads in respect as she walked outside into the hall. Flame Princess appreciated the gesture but mostly ignored it.
It was only natural that the halls of the palace were still empty of anyone except for the guards. The day was young and hours of work were still a ways off, which made it the perfect opportunity to walk around before having to start any of her normal duties. She decided to take a quick walk through the gardens behind the palace, picking several flowers that she found along the way until they formed a neat bundle in her hands. Their individual flames mixed with each other to form one big torch, making them glow even more.
Flame Princess kept her head down through most of the walk back inside the palace and into her throne room. But she would not be sitting down at her throne just yet. Instead, her guards opened the main doors of the palace for her as she stepped outside, still carrying the bundle of flowers in her hands. And, as she had requested the night before, her personal carriage was waiting just out front for her arrival.
The rider jerked as he saw her and kept a steady grip on the reins keeping the two fire steeds in place. Flame Princess walked up to the nearest one and petted its fiery mane, earning her a small puff of air on her face as the beast smelled her. After telling the rider where she was going, she stepped inside spent the entire ride looking out the small side window.
Shops and businesses were just beginning to open while others still remained closed. But from what little movement there was on the streets, the civilians seemed happy and safe enough, just as she wanted them to be. It was for this brief moment of sightseeing that she actually managed to smile since waking up. The heartwarming feeling of seeing several children run past her carriage, all while laughing and playing with each other, was her reason for ruling the kingdom, no matter how hard it could get at times. But all of these feelings were overshadowed when the carriage came to a halt as it reached its destination.
Before the rider had the chance to open the door for her, Flame Princess opened it herself, stepped out, and simply thanked him for the ride. And as she turned her head to whatever was blocking the sun's rays from reaching her, the words "Fire Kingdom Cemetery" loomed overhead, carved into a stone sign over a metal gate.
Her carriage would be waiting for her return while she walked inside, passing by all of the tombstones that housed the ashes of all fire people that were extinguished. All of them, from the smallest to the largest, held the names of those that had fallen recently, before Flame Princess even had the chance of meeting them. That was another thing that saddened her about being the ruler: her duties kept her from familiarizing herself with the very people she was ruling. She felt like a stranger in her own home most of the time.
The entire cemetery was empty; devoid of any other elemental looking to pay respects for the dead. It was a lot windier than she thought it would be, and the howling made it seem as if the spirits of the graves surrounding her were all speaking to her at once. She knew better than to believe that, but she also somehow wished it was true. That the dead could speak to the living even after they were gone from the world.
As her heels continued to make noise every time she stepped on the stones of the path she walked on, Flame Princess came ever closer to the center of the cemetery, where the largest of all pantheons stood. Her family's pantheon.
She remembered the first time she laid eyes upon it. It was truly a sight to behold. Two dragon statues were placed on each side of the door, each of them pointing at each other with their maws wide open. The roof of the pantheon was triangular and was decorated with small pikes around its edges. Unlike the rest of the pantheons in the cemetery, this one was made exclusively from obsidian; obsidian that had held up quite well since it was built. Its surface was smooth and shined when the light if the sun hit it at just the right angle. Flame Princess and her family were the only ones in the entire kingdom with the key to open the gate inside, which she carried with her at all times inside of her pocket. While holding the flowers with one hand, she used the key and stepped inside.
Multiple torches shined the staircase leading further down into the crypts. The place always creeped Flame Princess out, but she never found herself wholeheartedly afraid. She would always shiver at the inexplicably cold air. Her brother once told her that the reason it was cold was because their dead ancestors kept any cold that entered the kingdom locked down here, allowing it to remain hot all of the time. And over the years, as more winters covered Ooo, the crypt would get colder from helping to keep out the snow. But it was only a legend told to the children of Fire Kingdom by their parents.
Upon reaching the bottom of the staircase, what stood before Flame Princess was a long hallway, lit by torches that glowed purple rather than orange. While the torches on the staircase had to be lit again every so often, these ones never went out. Something about the burning material that they put in them whenever someone new is buried, it helps them burn forever. Even she was unaware to the secret of their mysterious flames.
On each sides of the stone hall, lined up beside one another with a torch in front of them, were the statues of Flame Princess' dead ancestors. All of them were here, from the very first Flame King, to the very first Flame Queen. The kings stood opposite from the queens to depict who ruled with whom. She stared at each of their carved faces, shuddering to think that they were staring down at her. It made her uncomfortable to think that one day, a statue of her would be also be carved and placed beside the rest of her family, with nothing but the purple light of the torches to light her face forever.
As Flame Princess continued to walk, the faces from some of the statues became more familiar, from her great-grandfather to her grandfather…and all ending with her.
Flame Princess stood quietly before the final statue in the row, before the hall continued with empty spots for those that awaited in the future. She knelt down to the ground while holding the flowers and closed her eyes from a brief moment, allowing the torch in front of her to warm her in this cold place. When she opened them again, fresh tears now running down her cheeks, she stared directly at the eyes of the statue.
"Hey, Mom," she said.
Looking at the statue of her mother was like already looking at the statue of herself. She stood with her fingers entwined with each other, standing as gracefully as Flame Princess wished she could. There was a warm smile carved on her face, but it only served to make Flame Princess feel worse; not better.
It was on this very day over ten years ago, when Flame Princess was still a child trapped in her lamp, her mother was taken from the world. On that day, when the news had been brought to her father that she had passed, he seemed rather indifferent, but Flame Princess spent the rest of that day bawling her eyes out on the floor of her lamp, not even allowed to attend her funeral no matter how much she begged. It was also the day she started to loathe her father.
In every single memory she had of her mother, she was always happy. Almost every night, when Flame King was done for the day, her mother would come into the throne and lower the lamp so she could be face-to-face with her. Flame Princess could remember her mother singing a lullaby to help her sleep, going out almost instantly from how soothing her voice was. But before she closed her eyes, she would always hear her mother whisper the words, "I love you, my sweet daughter." She always said it without fail.
Looking away from the statues eyes, Flame Princess now stared into the purple flames. Whenever a member of the royal family dies, their bodies are turned to ashes and are used to light the torches. It is supposedly these ashes that make the flames burn forever.
It is also said that looking into the flames is like looking directly into their souls, and they could hear every word uttered to them even in the afterlife. The thought was disturbing; to think that her mother could actually be able to listen to her daughter every time she spoke into the flames. It was one of the reasons she was always a bit frightened to come visit her. Nevertheless, here she was, mourning for her mother as she had always done since being freed from her lamp prison.
"I, uh…I brought you some flowers," she said as her voice slightly broke. "You always told me these were your favorite before you…went away. Figured you would want some of them to smell…wherever you are."
Flame Princess wiped the tears from her face and tossed the flowers into the torch, watching the flames grow even brighter for a brief moment as they disintegrated completely. It was also a wide know theory that the dead could receive gifts from the living by burning them in the fire. While she did not fully believe it, she hoped that the flowers somehow reached her mother.
"The rest of the family will come say hello later," she continued. "I just really wanted to come here before I had to start working for the rest of the day. It's only fair since…since Dad never came by to visit you after you died. Luckily, there's a chance, a slight chance but a chance nonetheless, that he might actually turn over a new leaf. He's got a sweet little candy person and a few chipmunks to keep him company." Flame Princess chuckled. "Stupid, I know. But it'll be good for him, I think."
Every time she spoke, Flame Princess always expected some sort of answer, but she was not very surprised when none came. She cleared her throat and took a deep breath.
"Mom, I need your help. Every day, my life only gets harder and harder. If this kingdom is going to prosper, I can't continue on my own. Which is why I know you'll be happy to hear that…I have a suitor. Someone who I'm certain will make a good king when the time comes. His name is Blayze. But…I still can't get him out of my mind."
Flame princess paused for a moment.
"I've grown to really love Blayze, but…I also still love Finn. But, as much as it pains me to say this, he just wouldn't be cut out to rule. Finn is a fighter, and a really good one at that. He cares about the people around them, and they all see him as a hero, just like I do. But I have to put the Fire Kingdom before my own desires. If we're going to prosper, then Blayze is the best person to lead us in that direction. However, that doesn't mean I don't want Finn in my life anymore. Far from it. I just wanna live in a world where the two of us can continue to be good friends, as long as he understands why I chose Blayze."
She looked at the flames to see some sort of response, but sighed when there was none.
"Every single day I worry that I'm gonna get a message saying he died at the hands of some monster out in the wilderness, or that he fell down a ditch somewhere and was never found again. So please, Mom, all I ask is that you look after him. And Blayze. Don't let anything happen to either of them. And help Finn find someone he can be happy with that's not me. And hopefully one day…our families can share stories to one another as close friends."
Flame Princess was done, and she expected nothing from the fires, but she still continued to look at them either way. When her knees began to hurt, she stood from the ground, giving one last glance to her mother's statue before turning to leave the crypt.
She felt herself get a lot warmer when she made it outside. The feeling of the still rising sun shining against her face made her almost forget she was crying just a few minutes prior.
When she made it back to the cemetery's entrance, where her carriage was still waiting, the rider jerked on his seat when she cleared her throat next to him. "R-ready to go, my lady?" he asked.
"I am," she replied.
As the carriage rode off with Flame Princess inside, the sun had now fully risen and was shining over all of Ooo.
Note: Not much character dialogue in this one compared to the rest, but I hope you enjoyed nonetheless.
-TimeManipulator99: I'm glad you are.
-Ooobserver: And more to be revealed later on.
-Blizzard209: Thanks. Will do.
Next Chapter: Barrier