You Must Listen To Me! // Queen Stella Beck

Theresa stood in the center of a torn room. As though the top was blown off completely crookedly, the rooftop was missing, gaps were between the floors. Spears were below, jutting out of the waters in a cruel fashion. Broken and shortened in size, the Tattered Spire was still a sight to be seen, stretching towards the peaceful sky with such height that the lands below Theresa were small in shape and size. All seeming insignificant.

And oh, they were. They changed in shape beneath her sightless gaze, time passed and the terrain moved, danced, swirling and morphing into land forms that no longer resembled the original form in the slightest. That was what happened to Oakvale, to everything that started in her time, and would happen to all of Albion. In time, with patience, and undying perserverance, the world would go on.

Go on without her. Go on without Oakvale. Go on without heroes, without towns, cities, rulers and tyrants. Theresa tilted her head back, sliding her eyes closed and stretched out her arms to her sides. Will channelled through the Spire, and swirled in a blue, electric manner around the blind woman in a spiral. Theresa threw her head back, snapping her eyes wide open.

Black smoke danced in her site, a vision, she could recognise. This one clear, precise and ominous in nature. A feeling of darkness spread through Theresa, but it was more then that. It was deeper then hate, fiercer then fear or anger, more rampant through her body then corruption. Evil, black in color and thick on her tongue with heavy and disgusting taste, spreading through the woman from the vision. Once, this would have been the whole vision, a mere feeling of coming danger, of demise, of torture, of suffering, of undying evil.

But with the Will channelling into her from the Spire, the vision was pushed back with a flash of blue light. Black shadows spread into the sky, moving as though it were ink in water. Ghosts were shaped, familar in figure and actions. A small one held a box of chocolates to another that was slightly taller, with pigtails in her hair. The smaller figure felt heroic, this feeling washing over Theresa from the vision (as such things often did in visions).

The taller one was innocent, bringing a small smile to Theresa's face. Both figures suddenly turned towards the gate way that swiftly came into veiw, growing from nothing in the air, the taller one shouted warnings and sprinted. From what, was hidden. The smaller one fell to the ground beside the fence line, hiding. Evil spread like a crippling wound, black shapes launched themselves out of the gates and sprinted not towards the way the children were. Not towards the seer. But towards Albion below her. The vision melted away just as the visionary screams started.

The heroes were coming back. But so was the evil that had long since been killed. Death would hold no one, and anyone could return to life. Whether or not they would appear black and wispy in shape was yet to be seen, she was sure. The vision was more then a memory, Theresa was sure, it couldn't be her mind cracking after so long, couldn't be her paranoid mind at work. She wasn't mistaken, danger was coming to Albion, no, to the world.

Sliding a hand into the small pouch on her waist, her fingers closed around a small wooden box with paintings of chocolates on it. It couldn't be a memory, could it..?

No. She firmly decided, Theresa setting her mind back under her own firm grip. Not with all of that Will, not with the Spire under her control, and not with that change in the bandit's direction. The bandits, the evil, hadn't been chasing after the town like in her memory, but towards Albion. Danger was coming to their world. It would be stronger, and death would be less reluctant to reclaim these once again.

Theresa drew her red blindfold out of another pouch, tying it over her scarred and white eyes. Drawing her hood in a single motion Theresa spread her hands, slowly rising them from the ground in flat fashion. A white light held her frame for a split second, then flashed outwards, revealing the woman to be gone. Theresa stood behind the newest heir to the throne of Bowerstone, sensing that her appearance was less then desired. A strange thing, every other heir had searched her out to no end to find the answers to their reign!

"Death is coming to Albion." Theresa mumbled, her voice old in tone and purring in nature.

Drumming her fingers against the arm of the throne, Stella fought back a yawn, biting the inside of her cheek hard to keep herself awake. Her chin rested against her palm, and though she wore an expression of polite interest, anyone that properly knew her would instantly understand that the monarch was bored out of her skull. Her beloved border-collie lay at her feet, snoozing peacefully. Averting her gaze subtly to look down at the sleeping canine, a hint of a smile curled up the corner of Stella's mouth. Lucky thing.

She'd spent all morning in court, having been forced into actually performing her queenly duties by Hobson instead of dodging them yet again. But oh how dull it was! The queen would much rather have been trekking up to Silverpines to get some much-needed Balverine extermination in. The population there was again getting out of hand as of late and Stella was itching to destroy some furry butt.The potential wounds and scars she was not as excited about, but then she couldn't have everything.

Her mind began to wander, as it often did at such events and subsequently wandered to her friends that she'd met over the course of her travels. Somewhat sadly she wondered what they were up to now; she hadn't seen the likes of Ben Finn and Page for months now and Stella missed them dreadfully. She kept meaning to track them down and have a catch-up with them at Riveter's Rest, but every time she set out to do so, something or other came up to stop her. Villages to save, antique artifacts to recover from the Shifting Sands, hearings to attend over why a certain chicken belonged to Steve as opposed to Richard. All extremely riveting stuff; especially the chicken hearings.

She roused herself from her thoughts long enough to realize that the whole room was staring at her in anticipation. Clearing her throat, she gave a sideways glance to Jasper who gave an imperceptible nod in the direction of the person that she was supposed to side with. The look of exasperation didn't escape her notice, but she flashed him a grateful look nonetheless, as if that could make up for her not paying attention enough. Giving the vaguest ruling that she could without making it seem that she hadn't listened to a word, Stella stood up, stepping over Digger. "And that concludes this morning's proceedings. We shall break for a two-hour lunch before the afternoon's proceedings begin," she announced, biting back a smile as the hordes of villagers began to retreat back into the sunshine.

The moment the throne room was empty of everyone but her, the female gave an almighty groan, burying her face in her hands. How she hated this part of ruling! All the decisions, the rule-making, the rule-enforcing. Exactly how it was going to make Albion a better place escaped her. While major decisions such as lowering or raising tax, figuring out benefits and help for children and the homeless, and other such life-impacting stuff she was more than happy to actually work on, Stella wasn't exactly sure how matters such as property feuds that started because a caravan was five centimeters too close to its neighbour was going to help Albion.

Oh how she wished she could just put Logan on the throne so he could deal with all this petty nonsense while she went out into Albion and actually made a difference. She bet that he was snickering about it all right now, gloating that someone else now had to deal with such mind-numbingly dull business while he got to do whatever he pleased with his day, free as a bird.

A startled bark, a giant orb of light and a light breeze made Stella look up, interrupting her thoughts. As the light and breeze settled, Stella eyed the newcomer and sighed internally. Now there was a a sight for sore eyes. Stella had purposefully been avoiding going to see the Seeress after the Crawler's attack. She was certain that Theresa would predict doom and gloom for the kingdom again, and that was the last thing she needed. The wretched beast haunted her dreams at night, clawing at the back of her mind in her waking hours as if warning her that it would come again right when it least expected it.

"Death seems to love our kingdom to the point of worry," Stella replied, getting up and bowing to her elder. Death, it seemed, simply could not take a vacation. Even after everything Albion had gone through, death was still clinging to their kingdom in a most unsettling way. From the various corpses being discovered in some of Bowerstone's more unusual areas, relics from the Crawler attack to the recent string of prostitute serial-killings, death just couldn't leave her beloved kingdom alone.

"Theresa," she greeted her, giving her a smile that belied how much the Seerer's comment unsettled her. "I had been wondering when you might come to visit Bowerstone again."

tagged theresa
notes i know you don't like posting templates so thought i'd try without one xD seriously though, you killed me with that post; longest post i've written in months!
word count 837
outfit queen attire
credit Miss Calypso off Caution 2.0