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Chapter 7: Element Bender!

The island was as beautiful and majestic as it could get but today it was filled with dreaded, eerie silence. This island had been one of Selena’s fortitude where she often found peace and solitude and now here she was to bury her own sister.

As she and Demetri entered the grounds side by side, she realized that true to his words, only her father’s most trusted men were on sight which means that the Queen was intent on her decision to make sure that the news doesn’t reach the outside world.

For a brief second, Selena wondered what made the Queen so confident that she will indeed succeed in taking Selena into the palace in place of Mia.

She narrowed her eyes dangerously as she saw the Queen standing there, right next to her twin sister’s body.

Selena approached the body and shot a formal, stiff bow at the Queen, then knelt down to the ground to take one last good at her sister. She was dressed in royal blue robes and even in death, she still looked serene and poised.

Selena gulped as she remembered her sister’s last words.

*Selena, Take care of our mother

Selena felt that even though she was her twin, they were miles apart in terms of their breeding and personality. From what she had heard of the princess, it was obvious that Mia had a timid and reserved personality whereas Selena was more outgoing and not afraid to stand her own ground.

The princess’s eyes had gone white and her tongue rolled out with her mouth wide open. She looked scary with the poison filling her veins.

Selena gently kissed her sister’s forehead then proceeded to shutting her eyes and closing her sister’s mouth.

Despite Selena’s desperate attempts to hold it in, rebel tears were making it's way out. She cleared her throat loudly and stood up on wobbly legs and straightened out her shoulders, indicating that she was ready to carry on with the ceremony.

The Queen, even though she remained silent, she was watching everything Selena did intently like a hawk, never once taking her eyes of her.

“Are you really going to swim till the middle of the sea?”, her foster father inquired again.

Selena shook her head no and replied firmly, “No, I intend to walk.”

The Queen raised her eyebrows in surprise at Selena’s confidence and she shot a camouflaged look at the General.

“Does my daughter have some kind of special ability?”

The general nodded at her while Selena shot a surprised look at her mother. She didn’t even know that? Didn't she even inquire about her or how she was doing after she had chucked her daughter out?

Selena felt that the Queen did indeed deserve her nickname 'Ice Queen' as she was indeed quite a conniving, cold woman.

“Why? Didn’t Mia have some abilities too?”, Selena asked in a flustered tone, taken aback by the Queen’s evident surprise which was written all over her face.

The Queen shook her head at her and replied through gritted teeth, “Do you really think that if she had any sort of powers, she would be this easily bullied to the point where she is half paralyzed from the waist down? Her vampire genes would have healed her long ago had she not been mentally stunted by their abuse”

Selena frowned at her. The Queen did have a point. It never crossed her mind that her sister didn’t have any special abilities. She had assumed that since she possessed it, so did her sister.

Though original vampires did indeed possess an additional set of skill set or power, it wasn’t very common among royals too to have special abilities so it wasn’t that earth shattering to hear that.

She nodded meekly then proceeded to concentrate at the task at hand. She concentrated on the sounds of the waves crashing then silently willed them to break apart.

The Queen, the General and everyone watched in awe and disbelief as the sea split into two, giving Selena space to walk into the middle. It was a beautiful sight to behold. The sea splitting into two at Selena’s command. One could see the fishes swimming and the beautiful underwater corals.

She then took the logs one by one and built a tomb with no interference from the sea. She then, took her frail sister into her arms and gently walked back into the sea and placed her on top of the tomb she had just built with the wooden logs.

She pressed another farewell kiss to her sister’s forehead and promised her, “I swear to you, Mia Langdon, my dear twin sister who I didn’t even have the good fortune to spend some time with……I promise you that your preparators won’t sleep soundly. I will make sure that each and every one of them who had ever raised their hand to harm you would pay the price for their sin. Rest in peace, dear sister”

With that she left, without another glance back and walked back into the shore. She snapped her fingers together and the sea immediately fell back into place, the waves breaking free from her spell and roaring and clashing into each other again. Then she dipped the edge of the arrow that Demetri had prepared for the sendoff into oil, then with another snap of her finger set it into fire.

The Queen raised an eyebrow as she saw Selena set the arrow on fire with her powers. Previously, the Queen had reckoned that Selena’s powers were limited to controlling water elements but now she was certain that Selena had a control over all natural elements…..fire….water…air….earth….

The Queen glanced at Selena approvingly as she realized that her daughter just might be one of the mightiest vampires in the planet.

With tears in her eyes clouding her vision, Selena set the arrow flight and as expected the arrow flew straight to the tomb and set the tomb on fire. She watched her sister’s ashes starting to melt into the sea, going back to nature. She closed her eyes and followed a minute of silence for her sister’s departure to the spirit realm.

Everyone followed suit and for one whole minute, all that could be heard was the birds singing.

Selena opened her eyes and let out a sigh, feeling drained out all of a sudden. She suddenly felt all alone in this world. Her family had abandoned her at birth on purpose. She had hoped that it was just an accident and that her family too was driving themselves mad to find her but apparently that wasn’t the case. Without another word, Selena took off into a run, wanting to be left alone. She needed to find an empty place to let it all out before it get's anymore dangerous.

She didn’t even have to look behind. She knew, Demetri was closely following behind, but keeping his distance so that she can grieve openly. This time, she didn’t even try to outrun him. Demetri always followed wherever she went.

The Queen on the other hand was deeply impressed by Selena’s control over her power and she felt deeply grateful to the General for taking such good care of her daughter.

“General, I feel like I owe you a thank you. Thank you for raising Selena into the strong, capable woman she is today. I can never thank you enough. You can’t imagine the relief I felt when I saw her just split apart the sea like it was nothing. At least one of my daughters would be saved from the bullying. The palace is a tough and treacherous place to be and I hate that I have to put both my daughters through that but I am afraid I have no other choice. And I vow to you, I couldn’t protect Mia but to get to Selena they would have to go through me.”

The General bowed to his Queen, touched by her words. It was indeed true that he had trained Selena harder than any of his soldiers. He didn’t want her to have any weakness.

When the Queen had handed him her baby, years ago, she had told him about the prophecy and he had known beforehand that he was training the future Empress of Valyria. She can’t afford a single mistake or weakness. Though Selena was always miffed and upset that he always treated her so roughly, it was all for her own good.

“In time, I hope she understands my action and stops hating me”, The Queen said softly, closing her eyes.

Selena’s open declaration of hatred to her mother had affected her more than she was letting it on. The General let out a sigh and replied politely, “Selena is a person who would go through hell multiple times without hesitation for the people she loves and annihilate the enemies cold heartedly without a second of hesitation. She is good at battlefield and military strategy because she had been trained by me personally from childhood but politics, that’s on your hand. There might come a time when she is forced to make hard choices….forced to join hands with an enemy but I don't think her pride would allow that.”

The Queen nodded at him, getting what he meant. Teaching the political affairs of the kingdom to Selena would be a difficult task indeed since Selena had the patience of a squirrel.

“She has an enormous potential and I refuse to allow her to waste it. She just might be the most powerful vampire except for maybe Dominic Vanhuesan.”, The Queen stated firmly.

The General raised an eyebrow curiously at her and said politely, “Yes, there is no doubt that Dominic Vanhuesan is indeed stronger and more powerful than her since he is the direct descendant of Count Dracula and he can literally manipulate objects and matters alike with just his mind but Selena is not an easy opponent either. I heard that he took over his father and established himself as King in the North. We don’t have much time left.”

The Queen nodded at the General fully acknowledging his words. It was indeed true that they were running out of time. Dominic Vanhuesan had already established himself into the throne of the northern kingdom and he has an impenetrable claim to Valyria since he was the direct descendant of the first vampire, Count Dracula.

Though the North and South Kingdom come under Valyria’s rule, the north could easily rebel since Dominic was its new king while Valyria would be busy fighting its own internal civil war.

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