The Origin of Friendship

Solitaire Dusk was running. She was used to it by now…running. Strange, unearthly creatures raced after her, their jagged, twisted black skin scraping against their bones as they ran on all fours. She hissed in irritation. Quite frankly, she was less than irritated - she was bored.

She did this every day. She got angry. She fought. She ran. Ran from her own subjects, the people - or rather, demons - she had created just as Sonata had. Her demons who had been born from murder and blood, shadows and fear. The only forms of life she knew. Without bothering to look behind her, Solitaire shot a stream of black magic from her horn. It soared into the air behind her and wrapped around her two pursuers. They struggled to break free, and she swivelled smoothly in their direction before sighing melodramatically. She rolled her eyes and bowed her head.

Almost immediately, three, six-meter-long metal thorns sprouted from her makeshift rope.  Each was more than long enough to penetrate the skin of starving, hideous creatures such as these. Creatures she had decided to make in her own image…an unwise decision now that she thought about it. A decision that had been the result of the first sight she had seen and the first sound she had heard…something too horrible to describe. Her first sight had been the death of the sunbird…and her first sound, its final song.

She shivered in delight as the graceful notes of pierced flesh and dying screams cut into her mind…she loved those sounds. The sounds of victory. The sounds that meant she had survived yet another challenge. And then the anger returned as the air hissed with her memories…

She was angry because her own subjects had turned against her. She was angry because there was absolutely nothing she could do to control them since she had dragged them into existence thousands of years ago, the same day she had been born along with Sonata Dawn and Cavallor itself. She was angry because she was hideous, and her twisted, brutal form reflected itself at every corner whenever she looked into the eyes of her slaves-turned-masters. She was angry because Cavallor was beginning to evanesce and these fools were forcing severe and unnecessary obstructions into her journey towards the centre of her world, currently the safest place on the entire planet.

But most of all, she was angry because she was Solitaire Dusk. The Empress of Darkness, all alone in the Universe. Her story was shorter than that of Sonata’s. The Queen of Light had lived a life brimming with variety and exploding with spirit. She had loyal subjects which would happily give their lives to protect her.

Solitaire couldn't even be certain if Dawn, or anybody else in her kingdom, knew she existed. Her life was the same tired tale, repeating itself day after day after fearful day.

She was angry because everything was black.