It was amazing how different a place could look in the dark.

            During the daytime, the royal family's castle was a symbol of trust and safety, for there was little else that the family condoned; they were the epitome of kindness towards their subjects, and many attributed this characteristic to Queen Lisabeth's humble upbringing. The gray walls, while slightly overbearing, were seen as always open to the public for their problems; after all, before the twins turned sixteen and everything seemed to spiral out of control, the king and queen held weekly meetings with any villagers who wished to speak about issues in the kingdom. The family was known for their kindness, and the castle was the symbol of this generosity, a symbol that could be seen from anywhere in the kingdom at any time of the day.

            Yet at night something changed. At night the castle seemed to decline in its beauty and grace, and changed into an image of darkness, something that you wouldn't dare walk into if you valued your life. Without the daylight, there seemed to be nothing of good fortune in the place. There were simply shadows and nightmares, with the unknown lurking in the bushes and the wild prepared to attack at any given moment.

            She had never admired the castle in the dark, but at the moment it seemed to be the only thing that Dawn could clearly focus on.

            Since her switch to the Darkness, Dawn hadn't truly felt fear. She knew that she was powerful, and she knew that she was important. She knew that no one could actually defeat her or overpower her, not even her Light sister. There was nothing to be afraid of, and nothing for her to worry about in the slightest.

            Yet standing here outside of her former home, preparing herself to enter without being seen, Dawn felt the smallest prick of fright in her chest.

            If anyone gets in your way, you can always dispose of them. She thought comfortingly. Shrugging off the impulse to turn around and run as fast as she could in the opposite direction, Dawn stepped out from behind the tree she had been leaning on for the past hour and walked briskly towards her family's home.

            She reflected on the fact that she hadn't been inside the castle since she had destroyed her room in a vicious anger and fled out of the broken window. She had grown since that night, had become a more mature version of the raw Darkness that had exploded in her in that moment. Yet the desire for revenge still burned strong, a fire that would not soon go out.

            As she remembered her escape from her bedroom, she wondered what the room looked like now. They surely hadn't kept it in the tatters that Dawn had left it in; they had to have fixed it up in some way. Perhaps they had made it into Rissa's bedroom; the sorceress didn't seem intent on leaving anytime in the near future.

            The castle gate was coming into view now, and along with it came two guards. Dawn prepared herself to simply walk past them, feeling immensely conscious of her deep purple gown that trailed along the floor a solid three feet behind her, and her dark hair pulled into a long braid down her back. She had opted for soft black slippers instead of her preferred high heels, knowing she would be walking through woods and attempting to sneak around the castle.

            "Excuse me miss, but you aren't allowed to be here." One of the guards said nervously as Dawn approached. "No one is allowed to enter unless specified by the Light Princess—"

            "Cease your talking already." Dawn rolled her eyes and flicked her wrist, causing both the guards to crumple to the ground in a deep sleep.

            The gate swung open as Dawn walked towards it, not hesitating in her steps. The guards would let her sister know about her visit, but not until they woke up in a few days.

            There were no candles lit in the castle windows, which meant that it was late enough in the evening that everyone had retired to their bedchambers. Dawn had planned her visit carefully, down to the exact amount of time it would take her to collect each individual object.

            She was determined to win this.

            There were no guards directly outside of the castle doors, which was slightly odd, especially with Dawn's presence clearly having caused such trauma to Adriana in the past few days. Yet the Dark Princess didn't question it, and let herself into her home, closing the door behind her quietly.

            There was little light in the castle, with the only illumination coming from the moon outside shining in through the sole window that sat above the main doors. The foyer looked identical to how it had when Dawn had left, and she felt her heart sinking a bit as she realized that this life would never be hers for the taking again.

            Shaking off the negative thoughts, Dawn started walking towards the kitchens in the cellar of the castle. Knowing that she needed a large number of objects from the castle, she had decided before arriving that the simplest objects to take would be silverware.

            The stairway that led to the kitchens were completely dark and smelled of moldy cheese. Dawn had hardly ever been down in the kitchens, even when she had lived in the castle; she had never felt the need to see where her food was prepared so long as it made into her mouth at the proper time every day and night.

            She felt her way down the staircase, trying to control the sound of her feet on the cold stone. Surely no one would be in the kitchen at this time of night, but she didn't want to risk passing by one of the cook's rooms with a ball of light in her hands.

            As she reached the bottom of the staircase, the stench of moldy cheese vanished, to be replaced by the sweet aroma of chocolate and strawberries. Dawn decided that it was time to shed some light on the room, and let a small ball of white light come to life between her hands.

            There was no one in the room, and no doors leading to the outside except for a single wooden door that undoubtedly was to dispose of the garbage. The kitchen was completely clean, with not a scrap of food letting anyone know that it had been used just a few hours previously.

            Unaware of where the silverware was kept, Dawn opened a few drawers and cabinets one at a time, closing them softly when they were revealed to contain plates and bowls, pots and pans. She circled the kitchen multiple times, unable to find the silverware drawer anywhere.

            At long last, the light was shed on a small drawer near the wooden door that led to the outside. Dawn opened it to find hundreds of forks, spoons, and knives, with different designs, emblems, and jewels embedded into them.

            Thinking solely of the number 200, Dawn waved her hand over the drawer. Immediately half of the silverware disappeared, and Dawn closed the drawer gently, knowing that the two hundred forks, spoons, and knives were safely in her castle in the Forbidden Forest.

            She let the light in between her hands burn out and started the long walk back up the staircase, taking care to not make a sound. She reached the top of the staircase without any issues, and started for the doors.

            As she reached the foyer, a soft voice in the back of her head begged Dawn to turn back, to look at her old bedchambers. She had to know if they had given the room to someone else, someone who hadn't turned into a monster and vowed revenge on the entire kingdom.

            The Dark Princess turned back around and started for her old bedchambers, hoping desperately that she wouldn't run into any member of her family. She wasn't prepared to destroy them yet; it wasn't the right place. She couldn't kill them in the dead of night with no audience; it wouldn't do justice to the wrongs they had committed against her.

            She approached the door to her bedroom slowly, and was shocked to find that the door was still knocked off of its hinges, in the same place that she had left it. The glass shards and wood splinters still littered the floor, the ripped clothes and tattered furniture in the same exact location as Dawn's raw anger had left them. The words "Happy now?" still dripped from the wall where she had written them in her own blood, and the room hadn't managed to rid itself of the smell of burning wood.

            The only difference was the window. 

            The window which Adriana and Dawn had stared out of every night in their childhood, which had been smashed in the Dark Princess' fury, was no longer completely smashed. There was a plank of wood placed against it, in a way that could only have been accomplished by magic.

            Dawn crept into the room, picking her way over the glass and wood, and walked up to the window, placing a single hand against the cool glass. She remembered this room, this place. Yet she couldn't understand why it was still in ruins, why her family hadn't fixed it yet.

            Soft footsteps echoed in the hallway, and a soft, sleep-laden voice whispered from behind the Dark Princess.

            "Dawn?"

——-

A/N: Writing this chapter actually made me kind of sad, because you get to see how Dawn actually misses her old home, behind the whole "I'm Dark and powerful" facade.

Anyways, hi! I hope your week has been wonderful!

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-Katherine