Legend of Kataria (Draft Version)

Chapter 26

"Yes, Bush. Me."

Her voice was like ice; ruthless and cruel. Her eyes burned with a fury that he'd only ever seen in one person and all the shattered pieces of the puzzle began to morph and shape into a weird reality that seemed far from possible, but yet, now, when faced with the awful truth; made perfect sense.

"Y-you're h-her," he gasped, trying and failing to back further against the pedestal. "T-the princess. Morto's d-daughter."

"Oh, very good!" she laughed. "You are the smart one after all! You have no idea how worried I was that Red would figure it out first! Especially when he began to suspect someone was dirty. And you. You were such a pain in the neck with all of that talk of love and kindness. It made me sick! And then I had to pretend I cared about you. Any of you."

Greeny attempted to flick his wrist and send her sword flying, but in a blur of silver, she moved the blade from his heart to his throat. "Don't do it. You may have forgotten, Bush, but I am faster and stronger than you. You didn't stand a chance when I was going easy on you. You certainly don't stand one now."

"Pinky...Pinky, please don't do this," he pleaded, still struggling to grasp all of the loose pieces to the puzzle. "This...this isn't you!" He was desperate. He needed to find a way to coax her off of the ledge of vengeance and keep her from taking him with her.

"You don't know me!" she hissed. "Until seconds ago, you didn't even know who I really was!"

"Rebecka King," Greeny said. "That was a pseudonym, wasn't it? That's not your real name at all. Who are you really?"

"Escaldia," she replied loftily. "Rebecka Escaldia, heiress of Griffion, daughter and only living child of King Morto Escalldia. A pleasure to finally meet you." She grinned wickedly.

"I'm afraid the feeling isn't mutual," Greeny growled. "So this is what it was about, wasn't it? Everything you told me; about...about Red and Blue and...and your family! Those were all lies! But that was your plan from the start, wasn't it? Infiltrate the team, get them to trust you, get me to trust you, and then stick around long enough to find the amulet and steal it back for your father?"

"That was part of it, yes." Pinky smiled smugly. "My original mission was simple. Find Russian Blue and his allies and eliminate them. Easy. In and out. No one would ever know it was me. I've had years of practice. But it was so much harder than I'd anticipated. Weston wasn't a fool. It took me years to gain his trust, to prove to him that I was worthy of his friendship. He believed my story about my parents' death. I think he even felt a little sorry for me, the fool. Red was tragically easy. He was far too trusting. He would never have lasted a day in my father's army."

"Not too trusting," Greeny snapped. "He knew someone was bad. He just never got the chance to prove it."

"And, unfortunately for you, you'll never have the chance to tell anyone the truth. Such a shame, really. If you had only died in Southpoint when you were supposed to, none of this would have been necessary. Of course, you discovering your powers threw off the entire plan. We were forced to rescue you, but not before I informed my father of our location, and then I went along with you."

"You were responsible for the attack at Miles's house!" Greeny realized.

"Oh no," she laughed. "You did that one all by yourself when you hacked into the castle's servers. I only...helped you along by planting a virus in the very back of Miles's servers. He never suspected a thing. After all, I wasn't a cold-blooded traitor. I was just a girl with a mysterious past and daddy issues." She smiled again and raised the sword above her head. "I am sorry it has come to this, Bush. I meant what I said earlier. You really are a nice guy. But, you know what they say about good guys and it would be foolish of me to let you remain. Farewell, and for the last time, good riddance."