Return to the Featherlands: Chapter 16

A dreadful cacophony haunted the halls of Sprites Hollow. A chorus of haunting laughter bellowed and echoed. It was laughter as far removed from joy or mirth as the sound could be. Wailing shrieks of ticklishness poured through the grounded catacombs like distant spirits. Nysadia’s shades stormed through the grounds, finding and capturing all those that found peace within them. They viciously harvested their laughter, their ticklish cries, as fuel to carry out their ruthless queen’s plans and pleasures. Tendrils and clawed hands danced freely over captive bodies. Those that had sought serenity and protection within the halls began their digestion into Nysadia’s maw, tormented by those that she commanded.

Many of those that had found refuge in Sprite’s Hollow howled and cried out for one another. The frightful chorus of laughter echoed with the haunting visage of the Badlands itself, such coarse manners creeping into the haven. Shades hunted freely as they poured into the opening they had made. They scurried to capture those running and to seek those hiding, quickly securing both in their collective clutches. Some souls dared to race out into the surrounding lands, only to be found and to face their ticklish turmoil much farther away from their friends and family. Relatives watched as their loved ones were bound and suspended with ticklish tendrils making them sing and dance like macabre puppets. Lovers held onto one another for as long as they could before being torn and made into ticklish playthings for the snickering Shades. Frightened Featherlands screamed and ran until all had been found and trapped within the grasp of Nysadia’s army, subjecting them all to various extents of ticklish torment.

Deep within the Hollow, the fairy queen, Deidra, received such treatment. Removed from those she had sworn to protect, she found herself pressed against a cavern wall by a pair of tendrils gripping onto and splaying her wrists. Her wings crushed between her body and the packed dirt behind her. After the two Shades had brought her to a more secured and remote spot, the two had taken it upon themselves to conduct the frightened queen’s treatment with lively abandon. Following Scenna’s orders, the two took great pleasure in being the first of the Shades to tickle the queen themselves.

“Coochie coochie coo!” Francia taunted, snickering with mischievous giggles. She stood in her upright form. Her appearance was not significantly different from the rest of the Shades, those she did wear her hair length noticeably shorter. She wore the same gaming smirk and malicious glimmer in her darkened eyes as the rest. Francia held herself with an assurance of authority, a powerful stance before the trembling queen. Her fingers, long and clawed, scribbled around Deidra’s sides. The queen’s dress had been ripped and torn to allow access to her more sensitive areas. Deidra squirmed as she cackled, tears flicking from her eyes, as she twisted side to side in the hold of the other Shade’s long, opposable tendrils.

“NAAAHHHHHEEEAAHHAHAHAHAH!!!! LEHHEHEHEHEEET ME GAGAGAGAGAAAOOOO!!!” The queen cried out. Francia stayed close to her, watching only just another ticklish toy in Nysadia’s clutches. She smirked as she reduced Deidra’s delicate senses with a barrage of skittering tickles, spanning the queen’s sides, ribs, and belly before her. Several hours of constant tickling had left Deidra panting and wailing through fits of gasping laughter. Her voice had begun to fade into a weary, scratching sound, one deep with desperation, hopelessness, and defeat. The other Shade watched on. She remained in her beast form, snarling as the tendrils from her back held the queen tightly aloft to continue suffering the ticklish assault.

“Not until you pledge complete loyalty to Nysadia’s reign,” Francia said, grinning as her long nails scurried quickly and methodically across Deidra’s bare skin. “And even then, if I can get you to do that, she’ll probably give you to me, so I’d get comfortable, if I were you.” From behind her back, a long tail whisked around her body, swiping against Deidra’s stretched armpit. Each touch sent flurries of ticklers through Deidra’s senses, slow and direct. The Shade took her time breaking the queen down and drinking in her strained laughter.

“PLEEAAAHHAHHAHHAHAASSSEEE!!” Deidra cried out. She wailed with the dismay of all of those that she had let down, all those bellowing in the distance. Her teeth gnashed, her face beamed bright red. Her wings ached as they had long since stopped beating in the struggle. Her arms and stomach and head pounded with the rapid thrashing of her heart. The tickles came quickly and ruthlessly, each Shade equipped enough to break any Featherlander down to tears and compliance. Deidra held out for as long as she could. Fatigue would greet her before willful subjugation, exhaustion painfully approaching.

“Pretty cute for an older fairy,” Gilade, the other Shade, said, shifting into her upright form. She continued to hold Deidra against the wall by two tendrils rising from her back. She too wore obsidian skin with a pale white face like the rest of them. Her hair was longer and braided. She came up close to the queen, staring up at the fairy’s forlorn expression as she laughed. Her eyes were dark and sunken, as black as she was down her neck and body. Both leered over Deidra like predators circling and assessing a fresh kill. 

“It’s going to be fun breaking down a queen,” Francia said. “Making her realize that she is no more a ‘queen’ than anyone else under the rule of Nysadia. No, she’ll serve just like everyone else, probably more so to snuff out any remaining assumption that she could ever be anything more than that.” Francia’s claws spanned and scribbled up and down Deidra’s sides and ribs. They scraped over the delicate ridges and pinched at the plush, soft dips down by her hips. Each touch sent explosions of tickles rupturing throughout the queen’s thrashing body. 

“PLEEAAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHASSSEEE!!” Deidra continued to beg. She wheezed and coughed through her laughter. Her voice had begun to grow hoarse and raspy, her laughter falling silent every so often to gasp and fight to catch her breath. Tears trickled down burning cheeks. More turmoil came in the images of what all could be happening to the others, any others, that might have been taken to suffer similar treatments. She pleaded with every groaning strain of air at which she could grasp, pleas that only served to amuse.

“See, she still thinks she can just talk her way out of this,” Gilade said as both Shades cackled. “No, no, you and everyone else here now belong to Nysadia. Which means, for the time being at least, you belong to us. Now sing for us, little fairy!” Gilade came in closer, unleashing her own claws upon Deidra’s bare, blushing belly. Her fingers scurried and scratched quickly across the delicate skin, sending rampant flourishes of tickles raging through Deidra’s body. A surge burst through Deidra’s figure. Her muscles tightened more, her head fell back to unleash a newly desperate bellow of wailing laughter. The time she had spent undergoing the ticklish torture had left her body useless to fight against it. Her struggling came as twitches and natural unrest, each made at great and terrible exaggeration to her muscles. The Shades merely laughed at the fairy queen’s expression, both sending scurrying tickles all across Deidra’s torso.

“Oh, but we’re going to have so much fun with you all!” Francia said. “All to prepare you for the Great Absorption, where you’ll all undergo this, and so much more, forever and ever and ever!” Her nails dug into the dips of Deidra’s ribs. Her knuckles pressed into her sides with tight and intense squeezes. Her tail continued to swish and prod into her armpits while Gilade held her suspended and dug her own digits into Deidra’s quivering stomach. Her nails scurried all over the spots, freely exploring the tender surface, slick with warm sweat. Both Shades laughed as Deidra’s expression melted further and further into blind fatigue.

“STAAAAAHHHHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAAA!!!” Deidra howled. She laughed harder than she had in a long time, suffering tickles more intense than she could accurately recall. Her squirming had been reduced to fruitless twitching, a bodily surrender to the stimulation pouring through her senses. The hopelessness and helplessness hurt more than anything else as images of the others plagued her mind. Even in her own turmoil, her true torture was imagining just how much she had let down all those she had sought to protect.

“Nothing to worry about, though,” Gilade said. “We’ll take good care of you and all of the others. The Featherlands are ours now, and soon, it’ll be the Pruritum’s playground.” The Shades giggled. Their loyalty to Nysadia glowed through every look and touch. Their expressions were of glee, just as much mirth as any Featherlander would feel at play or pleasant tickles. Their joy, however, was built on suffering to an extent that seemed gruesomely immeasurable. Their fingers dashed around Deidra’s body as easily as they would torment any other Featherlander. Their comments about tearing down a queen began to recede, emphasizing that Deidra should no longer consider herself at such status. To that notion, Deidra began to surrender her mind. Her failure to protect weighed on her with the assurance that no queen worth leading would ever let her people fall to such a threat. She hung against the wall, her wings aching between her and the roots, knowing that she no longer deserved the title that she wore. And as her mind ventured back to the cause of it all, she questioned if she ever deserved it in the first place.

“PLEEEAAHAHAHHAHAHAAASSSEEEEE…..” Deidra cried. She pleaded through gasping sobs, wanting the thoughts to stop far more than the tickling itself. Still, the Shades delighted in her distress. They relished in every minute reaction, every tear, and every twitch closer to total exhaustion. Their claws never wavered in their ticklish mission, becoming tools with which to conduct hysteria and anguish. Deidra laughed until her voice began to sting in her throat and her stomach ached more and more. Still, she could do nothing else beneath the touch of the malicious Shades.

“Francia!” a voice shouted from the opening to their reclusive hovel. The Shades turned to see another in her upright form, staring wide-eyed back at the pair. “We have to go. Now!” 

“Why?” Francia asked. “Is this Scenna's orders or–”

“No, we have to leave!” the Shade said once more, her expression haunted and more pale than the others. Before the two could inquire further, their visitor darted down the hall and out of their sight. Francia and Gilade stopped. They paused and looked at one another. Gilade pulled away first, her tendrils loosening to drop Deidra’s body limp and still down into the dirty ground. With the fairy queen's laughter having faded to deep panting, distant sounds of banging and commotion could be heard traveling the adjacent halls. Voices cried out in echoing fits, hurried and faintly frantic. Gilade inched out into the hall, looking left and right. 

“Come,” Gilade said. “Just in case.”

“What about her?” Francia asked, gesturing to Deidra. Gilade's eyes barely fell upon Deidra’s body before shooting Francia a sharp look.

“Leave her,” Gilade said, almost bitterly as she looked back at the limp queen. “She’s not going anywhere.” Francia glanced back down to Deidra on the ground, laying like a sack of broken pottery. Deidra’s tired body released soft and weakened wheezes as she laid across the floor, dirt dusting up onto her face and clothes. The Shades gave her little concern before they hurried out of the burrow to investigate the claims and the wayward screaming echoing through the halls.

Deidra’s staggered breath huffed in and out of her open mouth. For a moment, she considered what they said to be true. Lifting even one arm felt like trying to upend the root of a tree older than she. Her arms and legs trembled, the tickling that she had withstood proving more surprisingly effective at keeping her in place. Sweat dripped from her tangled hair. Her face glowed a bright shade of rouge, her chest heavy as she fought to catch her breath. All the while, ferocious screams bellowed through the halls of her sanctuary. They clashed against her ears with dread and worry, much worse so than the shrieking laughter that had pierced her heart. The sounds were violent and scared, something beyond that of Featherland convention as if plucked directly out of otherworldly nightmares. Deidra gritted her teeth. With one quaking arm, she plunged her palm down against the dirt and began the strained climb of pushing herself to her feet.

Having risen, Deidra’s first move was to slam her shoulder against one wall for support. She panted and swallowed through some dirt that had gotten into her mouth. The fairy queen wiped her lips and pressed onward, using the wall to brace herself until she felt as if she could walk on her own. Deidra made her way to the adjacent corridor, glazing left and right. She knew not what she would do upon encountering more of Nysadia’s Shades, but knew she would do whatever she must to keep her people safe, even if her drive would ultimately prove futile. With balance and composure on her side once again, Deidra slipped around the corners of the Hollow, hurrying through the halls as she followed the screams.

The echoes were sporadic and yelped in cascading distances. The air stirred with strange and off-putting scents. The halls were empty, yet the sounds of footsteps bellowed from all directions. The fairy queen gathered herself before racing through the halls, her strength steadily returning. She stayed low and as sightless as she could, ducking and hiding behind each crevasse that she passed. Deidra pushed her hair back. Her face was glossed with sweat and strands of shimmering hair. Her wings fell still and pressed against her back. She looked with striking vigilance around every corner for threats and the Hollow's residents. Deidra stilled her senses as she darted through the subterranean halls.

“What is it?” a voice cried in the distance. Diedra looked toward the voice. The sounds that poured through the corridors were busy with acute bangs and gargled screams, as far removed from tortured laughter as they could be. The commotion thumped against the walls, harsh abrasions vibrating up and through Deidra toes. She swallowed, not knowing what could be making such violent ruckus, yet knowing it to be just as pressing an issue as the Shades’ intrusion.

“Get back!” another voice shouted. “Get back! Get ba–” The cries cut off abruptly while more screams and hurried panting could be heard from nearby directions. The air around Deidra ran cold. She inched further around the corners of the Hollow, certain that she would encounter something that would cause further alarm. 

“Get out!” Deidra heard another voice call out from behind her. She darted her head back to see a pair of Shades rushing through the halls in their beast forms. She pressed against the wall of the tunnel, but as the pair passed, she remained sure that they had seen her. The expressions on their faces were haunted and chilled, their eyes gleaming with wide worry. Deidra watched them race by her without a word or gesture of acknowledgment. She stared curiously at where they vanished from around a corner and glanced back from where they had run. The queen took it upon herself to hurry more away from the place that the Shades had been so desperate to escape.

“What…?” Deidra muttered to herself. She glanced back at hearing more rapid scuttling, yet more storming echoed from all directions. Pounding thrashed against the walls. Dirt and dust rained down upon Deidra’s head as she pressed on. Upon turning another corner, she was met by a Shade in her upright form. The Shade collapsed against her, her hand weakly grabbing onto Deidra’s collar, as she gazed up into the queen’s eyes. Deidra stumbled back a step, catching the tainted soul, as horror washed over her face upon seeing the Shade's expression. Terror was as prevalent across her gaping maw as hopelessness drowned her eyes. She breathed quick, staggered breaths, black blood splashed upon her teeth. Deidra held her closely and guided her to the ground. The Shade became heavier and heavier as the life washed from her wayward stare, fear replaced by blank stillness. Deidra stared back with quiet confusion, only realizing, after she laid the Shade out across the floor of the tunnel, how much blood had spilt from a wide opening splitting her stomach.

“Gods, no…” Deidra murmured in pondered trepidation. Horror washed over her in waves. Blood rested upon her hands and arms. It had soaked into her dress down her knees and calves. She stared upon the Shade laying still in the hall while screaming commotion continued to vibrate through the Hollow. The figure before her had ceased breathing. She stared blankly up at the ceiling, nothingness draping the horror that remained on her face. Deidra found herself stumbling back against a wall of the tunnel. She pulled her eyes away from the sight, and any remaining hope that the Shade would still bestow motion, and continued forth, withholding all hope for finding her people before they too would meet a similar fate. 

“Th… Thea…?” Deidra found herself calling out. She pressed on through the halls still reverberating with cries and distant commotion. As she continued through the interior of the Hollow, more splatters of dark splotches hung smeared across the walls. The lights flickered. The air had grown stagnant with strange and alarming scents. 

Turning the nearest corner, Deidra could see more of the Shades scattered and laid out across the Hollow floor. She lifted a hand to her mouth, her fingers having run cold and stiff. Those she came upon laid out in their own pools, some resting in piles. Their postures were still and conveyed a frantic scurry in their final moments. nts. Some held one another. Some clung onto the wall, claw marks digging into the hardened soil. All were damp with darkness, full wounds exposed and open. 

Deidra pressed her hand tighter against her mouth. The smell of rot and blood clenched at the air around her. Her wings sputtered and lifted her off of the ground, carrying her over the fresh and unrecognizable corpses. She held back the urge to lurch. She kept her eyes off of the bodies and pressed onward, hurrying to find evidence of her own people. 

As more activity echoed through the halls, Deidra turned the corners carefully. She came across one of the alcoves that they had made for food storage. Peering inside, she recognized frightened Featherlanders huddled together between the crates of carrots and a few sacks of turnips. Greta and Val, two younglings from the Sarric Plains, clenched onto one another with their eyes closed. Across them, Hasia, a wolvan beastie who had lost her own children to Nysadia’s army several weeks prior, held them close, also shivering. Her tail, long and white, wrapped around where their knees pinched into their chests. Deidra raced over through the air to greet them all.

“Hasia, are you okay?” Deidra asked in a hushed tone, doing her best to hide her hastened worry. Hasia looked up. Her expression was whiter, yet Deidra could tell that she was doing her best to stay calm for the children. Her hands shielded their eyes as they cried into her fingers.

“Y-yeah, w… we’re okay,” Hasia said.

“What happened?” Deidra asked, finally getting out the question that loomed like a storm over her mind. Hasia shook her head.

“They… were… you know,” Hasia said, struggling with her words. “But then something happened and… they took off and haven’t been back.” Deidra paused and looked around.

“Anything else?” Deidra asked. Hasia’s eyes glimmered as she fought back tears.

“I… I don’t know…” Hasia said. Her voice grew more quiet, as if whispering in a way that the children would not hear. She leaned in, her teeth chattering a bit. “I… smell blood?” She asked it, wanting confirmation to the contrary, confirmation that Deidra knew to be true. Deidra swallowed, maintaining her composure. 

“Come with me,” she said. “There’s a storage room they might not have found. Come.” She hurried the trio to their feet as quickly as she could while minding their panicked dispositions. She held her hand out to take one of the Sarric younglings while Hasia held the other, both still shivering and shielding their eyes. Deidra floated quickly back out into the hall with Hasia right on her heels. Both peered around the corners, doing their best to avoid lingering too long on the horrors that laid scattered across the grounds and painted around the walls. 

The lights continued to flicker. The commotion echoing from the distances of the Hollow grew more faint, yet no less gruesome. The fairy queen traversed the halls back toward the upper and more populous levels of the retreat. The ground was damp and sticky with each step. Dark pools grew steadily from mounds of Shades laying still. Out of the corner of her eye, Deidra could see several remains while others laid out with shortened arms, legs, and tendrils. Their cackling taunts had become immense, eternal silence. Their pompous expressions had faded into long stares into nothing. Their loyalty to their queen became littered remains on a battlefield of their own making. Deidra kept the eyes of the youngling buried against her shoulder, upholding her duties as queen to know as much as she could while struggling to process any of it.

The survivors passed by more alcoves, finding more Featherlanders huddled together and waiting out the storm. Deidra did what she could to console and gather them for a trek to a closed off retreat where they could better hide from whatever loomed around the corner. More Shades screamed in the distance while others scattered through the halls, desperately searching for a way out. Deidra and Hasia managed to lead about two dozen more frightened Featherlanders from their acute hiding places back out into the hall, where they were encouraged to keep their eyes raised and to walk over anything that they might feel in their path. The younglings that had to walk on their own were told to remain silent and to not question anything that they felt along the way. 

“No, please!” Deidra, leading the way, caught Gilade dashing around the corner. The Shade, still in her upright form, clawed onto the dirt wall, her eyes wide and her face smeared in darkened ooze. She tried to fight her way toward the group, but her tendril, still slimming from her back, remained caught on something just around the corner. Her eyes met Deidra’s, who kept the group she led from coming any closer to the Shade. Gilade stared back in horrid confusion, her expression whitened and forlorn, as if wearing all of the guilt and fear and sorrow she had ever felt in her life at that exact moment. She gave one last piercing cry, reaching out toward Deidra, before being pulled harshly back around the corner. Deidra watched the spot closely. Gilade gave one last panicked shriek before her voice unleashed a guttural, liquidy sputter. It ended as quickly as it began, concluding with a limp plop onto the ground. Deidra kept the group still, her eyes fixed on the spot, but saw nothing. Nothing but another darkened pool inching from around the corner. 

After a moment of tense contemplation, the queen led her people forward. She handed off the youngling to one of the other adults in the group and took a considerable distance out in front. Carefully, she navigated the group further through the horrors that painted the halls in Shade remains. Fewer cries of anguish echoed in the distance, replaced more so by muffled sobs trailing behind her. Foot by foot, Deidra brought the group through the halls of the Hollow. They passed by bunkers, rooms, and open storage spaces, gathering anyone still left alive they could find from inside. They moved forward with their queen far out in front to intercept and relay anything of immediate danger. Deidra kept as close an eye out for whatever it was that had also breached Sprite’s Hollow and left such a macabre mess in its apparent mission. 

As more footsteps scurried about in the farther reaches of the Hollow, Deidra came upon a hatch door partially buried into the ground. She grabbed onto the knotted rope used as a handle and pulled as quickly as she could while the others kept watch from her back. As the heavy door creaked open, Deidra peered inside to see more faces hiding in the darkness. 

“Your majesty!” Thea cried upon seeing her queen. She rushed forward, stopped only by Deidra’s raised hand. The queen peered inside, seeing Thea standing before more frightened Featherlanders and younglings, buried and peeking out from behind sacks of more root vegetables. Thea’s face was puffy, her eyes red with long dried tears. Deidra rushed, first and foremost, into getting her own collective into the darkened and enclosed hovel.

“Help them in,” Deidra said, loudly yet hushed. Thea nodded and took each by the hand, leading them into the hole and reminding them to stay quiet. Deidra slipped outside the storage room, cattling her people into the hole while watching out for more threats. As the last of the Featherlanders slipped inside, she took one last look around before heading inside herself.

“Your majesty, are you alright?” Thea asked. She had pushed forward to be next to the queen. Deidra looked back and sighed. She shook her head and began closing the door behind her. Before she could, a harsh scream bellowed just outside. Before the wooden door could meet its frame, the arm of a Shade plunged through the opening. It nearly flung the door open completely, but Deidra kept a tight hold on it while the others inside the hole screamed and backed away.

“Help me!” the Shade shrieked. “Please help me!” She tried to thrust her way inside, to pull herself in by the edge of the door. Pushing against it, Deidra could see that it was Scenna, her face washed with pale and drained terror. The Featherlanders backed away as far as they could, huddled against one another. Deidra grunted, still trying to push the door closed as Scenna’s screams dug into her ears. “Please let me in! Please! I don’t want to–!”

The door slammed. Deidra’s weight pressed against it completely. She could hear Scenna’s cries carrying on just outside. Deidra’s hands trembled. She backed away slightly, her hands still onto the door. Only when the shimmering end of a blade broke through the wood into the room did Deidra’s body shoot back and the screaming, on the outside, stopped. Deidra’s voice became caught in her throat. The blade dripped with dark, thick substance. It remained plunged through the wood of the door before being quickly pulled out from the other side. Those in the room cried and trembled in one supportive mass of shivering warmth. Deirdra had been the only one to not avert her gaze, instead keeping her eyes locked onto the spot should whatever was lurking about dare to come in. Her heart raced as she fought to steady herself for confrontation and whatever it was that would bring. 

“Wh… what is… it?” Thea asked in a faint and hushed whisper. She spoke of it with fearful reverence, as if the thing was somewhere in the room with them. Deidra looked back to see more tears streaking her cheeks. Her ears had fallen atop her head, her tail coiled down at her legs. Deidra swallowed through a viciously dry throat.

“I don’t know,” Deidra said. She remained still, her hand cold and trembling as it stayed raised up toward the door. A light shined through the slivered hole left behind by the blade. Splinters and chips of wood littered across the ground at the foot of the door, slightly stained with a dark scrape of blood where the hole let the light flicker through. 

The scuttling noises beyond the hole began to subside. Yelling and crying faded to a whisper of those that had either escaped or were on their final breaths. A stillness befell the Hollow from behind the door. Deidra felt the placidity in the air, a sudden absence of panic and activity. It betrayed an eerie air, carried upon hushed and frightened breaths. Deidra peered through the bleeding slot. Light flickered in, showing not much else in presence or looming company. Slowly, the queen inched closer. Her arm extended toward the rope handle, caught only by Thea's tackling grasp.

“Your majesty!” Thea said. “Don't. It isn't safe…”

“Thea, it’s fine,” Deidra said, forcing more assurance in her words than her own mind could muster. “It'll be fine.” She took a moment for her words to convince herself before taking another to convince Thea. Thea’s trembling hands loosened. With fear and reservation painted across her face, Thea took a step back, freeing her grip on Deidra’s arm. Deidra met her eyes with purpose. “Stay here with them. If anything happens, protect them. Protect yourselves.” The entirety of Thea’s assurance rested on her trust in the fairy queen. She nodded a faint agreement and retreated back into the hovel, standing between Deidra and her fellow Featherlanders. Deidra paused, giving Thea a moment to secure her position as she gave herself a moment to gather her strength for what was to come.

Deidra turned back to the door. She took one hard and heavy step toward it, grabbing onto the rope with a cold and trepidatious hand. She swallowed and forced herself to breathe slowly. Another step closer had her pulling at the handle. A vile creak echoed through the room as the door began to open, light seeping inside through the growing opening. As she gathered her thoughts and summoned herself at the behest of her responsibility, Deidra slipped through the opening, minimizing the time spent with the door opened, and closed it behind her without looking back.

The air tasted of rot and sorrow. The dreary stillness remained draped over the space around her. At her feet, Scenna’s body laid as still as the others, a gargling hole pooling at the center of her throat. Deidra gave the Shade no mind. She had become no different than the others. The queen listened for more voices, more scurrying, more activity. Hearing only blankness answer back nearly filled her with as much sickness as did the initial breach of the Hollow. The halls around her were smeared in darkness. The lights continued to flicker. Claw marks had slashed and dug into the walls where containers and minor decorations had been ripped and scattered with the rest of the litter. Deidra pressed on. Her ear picked up some slight movement in the central chamber. Her wings fluttered her off of the ground as she made her way toward the sound, not knowing what she would find.

Deidra stopped at the edge of the hall looking into the central chamber. The floor was matted with Shade bodies and soaked in putrid fluids. What little she and the rest had done to make the place tidy and neat had been torn apart, leaving the room a shambled grave. She peered around the corner, picking up more crying from within the room. As she looked, she witnessed the figure standing in the center of the room, just beneath a gaping and broken hole where the night sky stared down in silent sorrow. A crisp chill grazed her cheeks as she watched the being stand among the bodies. It was unlike anything she had ever seen before. Its frame was almost mechanical in a way that was beyond alien to her. Its two legs were powerful and postured the being in an assured stance. One arm held a blade, one that captured Deidra’s fixed stare, while the other lifted a Shade by her neck. She was sobbing and stared back in an expression that Deidra had stepped over several times getting to that very spot.

“Please… please, just let me go…” the Shade pleaded, tears rolling down her eyes. “Please do–” Deidra clutched her hands to her mouth. The Shade’s death was quick, a sudden entry into the side of her head that ended her speech almost immediately. From what Deidra had seen, it was almost merciful compared to what all her own mind had conjured, yet still beyond anything she had ever seen of the Featherlands. The being held the Shade for but a moment before tossing the corpse aside, tumbling atop her friends and sisters. Deidra stared back at the blade, shimmering with a gloss of blood. It was a dagger in size, one not dissimilar to what Silvia had shown her. With that, Deidra’s bleak assumption began to become far more clear. 

The Featherland Assassin wore a suit that covered the majority of their body. It was silver in some places, steel worn and stained by various elements, and black in others. With their back turned, Deidra could see two jets harnessed to the suit behind them. They wore hardened boots and gauntlets. A helmet covered their head, one that featured a strange, glowing visor and a breathing apparatus with two filters reaching around the front, one of which had been crudely bandaged. Deidra watched as they stood in the stillness of their horror and wiped the blood from their blade against their hip. She imagined them listening out for anything else in the area, assuming that they would have the means of picking her up as well. Summoning her nerves, she took the initiative to assume a defensive, proactive approach. Stepping out from the corner, she kept her eyes fixed on the being before her and raised her palms in front of her.

“Y-you… you can… stop now,” Deidra said, her voice timid and shaking. She walked out slowly, her eyes never leaving the Assassin brought before her. The Assassin turned. They were slow and confident in their movements. Their visor glimmered a bright red light back at Deidra. They breathed slowly and loudly.

“Your highness,” the Featherland Assassin said. Their voice was heavily masked by a mechanical distorter, much deeper than any voice Deidra had ever heard before. To her surprise, the Assassin knelt toward her as they turned. The arm with the dagger folded over one knee, their head lowered in defined respect. Deidra’s eyes fell to the blade once more. Upon closer examination, she began to piece together further telling details. Her eyes widened. A grim image, more so than the massacre she had passed, came over her in waves. 

“It’s you…” Deidra stammered, tears welling up in her eyes. “Y… you’ve returned…” The Assassin rose. The light of the visor remained fixed on Deidra as the being stood upon a small pile of bodies left from its assault.

“Took some time and a little help from a human up above, but yes,” the Assassin said. “Sorry I couldn’t get here sooner and have to leave you with this mess, but I still have a mission to complete. A little visit with the Badland Queen.”

“A… mission?” Deidra eyes squinted. She shook her head and contemplated for a moment. The Assassin turned around in front of her, the motors in their jets beginning to whir. Only then did Deidra begin to remember. “No… No, wait, you can’t! You can’t! Nysadia, she’s–!”

“I know!” the Assassin barked back at Deidra in a loud, booming voice. They turned their head. They flicked the dagger in their hand around in a swift, fluid rotation, one that sparked Deidra’s familiarity. Their glove tightened around the hilt, positioned to stab. The Assassin breathed heavily, their voice behind the mask shaking ever so slightly. They lowered their tone to one far more frightening. “And it changes nothing.”

The jets on the Assassin’s back began to fire. A roaring scorch filled the air, causing Deidra to shield her face, as the Featherland Assassin took to the sky. They flew from the gaping hole in the ceiling of the Hollow and out into the dismal lands beyond. Deidra raced forward to watch them fly out into the night. The fire that shot from the Assassin’s back spanned like flaming wings. Her mouth hung agape, witnessing how the Assassin struggled in the air with one engine sputtering and failing them, making them struggle to stay straight in their path. She raised a hand to her lips, tears finally breaking and trickling down her cheeks. After a moment of watching the figure vanish into the night sky, a small voice reached out to her from behind. Thea had emerged from the storage room, stepping forward. She spoke with a faint tremor in her voice, far more concerned with the state of the queen than of the terrible scene that the Assassin had left behind.

“Y… your majesty…” Thea asked softly. Deidra failed to respond. She kept her eyes locked onto the spot in the sky where the Assassin had left, her mind leaving her assured with the worst conclusions imaginable. “Your majesty… are you okay?” Deidre paused. She swallowed, lowering her fingers from her lips as she fought back the urge to weep.

“Yes,” Deidra lied.

“Who… was that?” Thea asked. Deidra paused again before turning to face Thea, her eyes puffy and red.

“I don’t know,” Deidra lied again.