Aligasha and the Dragons War
“Where are you taking me?”
Arabella’s voice wavered - delicate as the first shiver of dawn through a restless night.
She was twelve — a slip of a girl with skin pale as moonlight and hair like spun silver, catching the night’s glow like stardust. Torchlight quivered in her frightened eyes, while the forest - dark and unyielding - rose like a tied to swallow them whole. The pink gown she wore, trimmed in gold and delicate lace, was mostly hidden beneath a thick cloak, its hood drawn low to shield her from the world’s gaze.
Her breath came in bursts, painting pale clouds in the cold air. Beneath the fabric, her small hands twisted in her sleeves. Her heart beat wildly — not just from fear, but from grief, from the strange heaviness that had settled inside her chest the moment the castle walls began to scream.
She wasn’t ready — how could anyone be?
Not for this.
Not for fleeing her home in the dead of night like a fugitive.
Somewhere in the distance, the great bells of Angarth Keep began to toll. One. Two. Three...
The sound rolled like thunder over the forest, deep and solemn.
Four. Five. Six...
A sound that did not belong to celebration or ceremony.
Seven. Eight...
It was a mourning song. A funeral hymn.
Nine. Ten...
A call to all who still listened, that a Royal had fallen.
Eleven. Twelve.
The last note faded into the trees, lingering like breath on cold glass.
Arabella flinched. Her legs buckled slightly beneath her, and Damian caught her by the arm, holding her upright. The bells had spoken what no one had yet dared to say aloud: the King was dead.
In a world of wonder — where dragons flew beneath the stars and magic hummed softly in the stones — there was always a price. And when magic fell into the wrong hands, it demanded payment in blood.
Aligasha had once been a kingdom bathed in light — an emerald land of ancient forests, silver rivers, and towers whose spire chimed softly as the wind danced through their hollow crowns. Its capital, Angarth Keep, stood proud at its heart — tall and golden, crowned in marble domes and laced with bridges that stretched between towers like silk ribbons. Waterfalls wept along the cliffs, their voices low with the weight of ancient memories.
But peace is a fragile thing.
King Augustus held it fast through strength, wisdom, and bonds of trust woven between men, elves and mystical creatures of the realm.
Yet peace is never permanent. It is a flower that wilts when left unguarded.
And tonight, it had withered completely.
“Listen to me, Arabella,” Damian said, his voice rough with urgency. His hand, calloused and warm, gripped her wrist like an anchor. His hood cast his face in shadow, but his brown eyes — sharp, alert — held hers with unwavering focus. “No one can know you’re alive.”
Arabella blinked at him. “But my father—”
She stopped. Her chest ached. Her tongue felt heavy opening her mouth but no words dared to be spoken.
She didn’t need to say it.
The bells had said it for her.
Augustus, the only father she had ever known — who had lifted her to the stars when she was little, who had kissed her forehead before battle, who had whispered old legends at her bedside — was gone.
She stumbled over a tree root, nearly falling, but Damian caught her.
They passed an old statue standing sentry at the edge of a glade — Elrian the Wise, the last great seer of the elves, carved in white stone and cloaked in vines. His gaze, forever fixed upon the stars, seemed to glow with ghostly light.
Did you see this coming, Elrian? Arabella thought bitterly.
Did your wisdom know the castle would crumble beneath betrayal?
Beyond the statue, they descended into a hollow where the trees grew closer together, and the moonlight dared not follow. The air changed — it smelled of damp leaves, old stone, and river mist.
At the bank, two horses waited.
Arabella saw them — and she saw something else: a shadowy figure stepping from the trees. It was Jasper, the stable boy. His face was pale in the starlight, his eyes sharp. He looked like a ghost of the castle — too young for war, too old to be innocent.
“Here they are. I feared you’d been caught,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
Damian met his gaze with quiet intensity. "You've done enough. Disappear now, before the shadows catch your scent. When the storm breaks, we will meet again"
Jasper stepped forward, holding Arabella’s gaze. “Be strong, princess. You are our last hope.”
Before she could reply, he mounted his horse and disappeared into the darkness.
Damian turned to her. “We ride now. Every moment we stay puts you in danger.”
She stared at the smoke curling into the dark, stars blinking behind its ghostly form. It carried the scent of endings - And Arrabella stood, hollow, as everything she knew turned to ash.
“What if we’re too late?” she whispered.
“We’re not,” Damian said. “But we don’t have long.”
He lifted her onto the smaller horse, swung into the saddle beside her, and together they rode into the night. The sound of hooves became the rhythm of survival. Behind them, the bells of Angarth fell silent.
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Two days passed in silence.
They traveled by forest paths, avoiding roads, stopping only to drink from streams or eat what dried bread Damian carried. Arabella slept on moss, her cloak wrapped tightly around her. She dreamed of fire and steel, of her mother’s emerald eyes gleaming with something cruel.
They arrived at dawn. A village nestled in a valley, quiet and crooked, where stone cottages slouched together like tired old men. Chimney smoke hung faint in the sky, and the sharp scent of woodfire mingled with fresh bread and morning dew.
No one recognized her — not as the girl with silver-blond hair and royal blood. Not as the lost heir to a shattered kingdom.
Damian led her to an abandoned cottage at the edge of the village. The windows were cracked, but it stood firm. It would be enough.
Inside, he tore the gold trim from her dress, stripped away lace, and brushed dirt on her cheeks.
“You must disappear now,” he said.
Arabella sat on the edge of the bed, still trembling. “How will you find me? How long must I hide?”
Damian crouched beside her. “Every fifth dawn, go to the ancient oak where the crows gather at the edge of the village. In its roots I will leave a letter only you will understand. Read it, then burn it to ash.”
She nodded slowly, the fear thick in her throat.
He rose, hesitated, and then said, softer now, “A seed grows in silence, Arabella. But when a tree falls, its noise shakes the earth. Octavia cannot harm what she believes no longer exists.”
She stood and walked with him to the door. The morning sun spilled golden light across the field, turning the frost to diamonds.
Arabella turned her face to the wind, listening. Somewhere beyond the mountains, the dragons mourned — she could almost hear them, could feel the ache in the air. Something ancient was stirring. Something she would one day awaken.
“I’ll be brave,” she whispered, more to herself than to him. “I’ll be brave.”
Damian smiled, grief flickering behind his eyes. “You already are.”
Then he mounted his horse and rode back toward the crumbling kingdom — toward the woman he once called queen and the darkness she had become.
Arabella stood in the doorway, her hands clenched at her sides.
She was alone now.
But not broken.
And not done.
She turned from the door, stepped into her new life, and the wind carried her name through the trees like a prayer:
Arabella.
The girl who survived.
The girl who would return.
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