Friend's Dilemma

Aliyah and Alice were sitting on the sofa watching TV, when Alice looked at Aliyah and asked, "Why is your face so swollen? Did someone punched you too hard?" Aliyah patted her swollen cheek with an ice pack and said, "Not funny, Alice. Not at all funny." Alice laughed, "Well, it's a good thing, Elgin is taking stand for the woman he loves." Aliyah said, "Bullshit. Love and responsibilities doesn't go the same way in Elgin's heart. I have been there and trust me, the outcome of their clash was too very tremendous to handle." Alice asked, "What? Cindy isn't Elgin's first love?" Aliyah said, "Elgin has always been quite a lovelorn and after Wanda jilted him at the altar, Elgin went into a full lovesick mode for almost two years. Then, a little regret and the news of the incoming war talks pulled him on the path of his responsibilities. But, what was done was already done and there was definitely no turning back from that. We lost the war and Elgin came to the mortal world for some peace and search for love and well the rest is history." Elena asked, "Wait a minute. Elgin was engaged?" Alice and Aliyah were startled and Alice asked, "When did you two sneaked in?" Trisha said, "That's not important. Tell me more about this Wanda." Aliyah said, "Nothing much but sad and messy memories. Some cries are ringing in my ears and that night is still flashing before my eyes. But, let's start from the beginning." All sat around Aliyah and Aliyah started to narrate Elgin's lovelorn love story.

"Love is a dirty game and whoever plays it gets way too dirty than he is capable to clean himself. But, again who doesn't love the sweet and tempting fruit of love that grows at the end of the tree of patience. Personally speaking, I never got too much attached with the romantic part of my life, but a strange wind did pushed me into the whirlwind of love for a period of time. But that's a story for another day. Now, back to the orginal story. Elgin as usual has been a man with a very large heart and at some point in time, his heart started to crave for a feminine presence in it. That's when started the grand quest of Elgin for his love partner or in his own words, "the mother of his kids". Elgin was not the prettiest guy in the kingdom, but his standard and polite behaviour combined with his affiliation with the royal family gave him some boost in his quest of love. He and his brother were orphaned at a very young age and therefore didn't got much necessary information about how a woman's body works. So, Elgin would spend hours behind me and Camilla trying to learn about the feminine behaviours and the secret provocative and sexual parts of a female body. I once even suggested him to have coitus with a willing maid, but he said he wanted to stay virgin for his "special" one. Camilla wasn't much lenient with him and tried some outrageous experiments with him which are too bad to say, but Elgin did learned some stuff from those experiments. I, on the other hand was myself quite a rookie in the matters of sex and love, but I tried my best by showing him some erotic paintings and even conducted a small sex act for him to learn.

Elgin did learned some stuff there too. So, at the end of the shameless yet necessary education, Elgin finally gathered some confidence to met some beauties. I really am not a fan of the concept of dating as I consider it too much time wasting and also people act quite deceptive in these dates. Elgin met many ladies in a couple of months and majority of them wanted to see what type of future prospects can Elgin offer to them and Elgin kindly refused. So, after a couple of months, we reached a comparatively low yet respectful number of ladies who seemed to have some kind of future as Elgin's wife.

Most of the ladies were good and by good I mean of royal families which was out of Elgin's fate. The ladies rapidly started to get married and Elgin's stock was beginning to deplete. I even talked with some of the ladies and managed to talk them into discussing the possibility of their union with their parents but well not every girl was as independent as me back then. So, after the harsh wipeout, only two ladies were left, Riberta and Wanda. Riberta was quite a woman and her physical attributes were enough to make any man crazy after her. Even, I wanted to have sex with her. Princess of glorious Lunin dynasty and the daughter of wealthy and kind hearted king, King Lamar, she was the real deal.

Elgin was quite sceptical about her and to be honest he should be. Riberta was rumoured to be a witch's daughter and that on eclipse, she turns into some hideous creature. Well, I definitely was not superstitious nor a fool, but somebody was and he rejected the proposal kindly. Riberta then went on to marry three princes, who were mysteriously killed on every eclipse. Riberta never had any children and at some point, she slitted her wrists and died. Poor girl and sad story. But, Elgin was always bragged about his decision of not marrying her, which was kind of both irritating and cold. Anyway, Wanda was not the prettier of the two and she had hair at some particular parts of her body which was considered unhygienic at that period of time. She lost her mother at birth and her father never really liked her and seldomly minded what his daughter was doing or how was she. Wanda had five brothers, two before and two after and one illegitimate and to be honest, she didn't even got an iota of the love her brothers were showered with everyday. Elgin was immediately in love with her and soon started disturbing me with his lover's talks. Wanda was quite an introvert and the three mets that I had before their engagement day were basically me asking her the questions all the time and her answering them with a subtle yes or no. She did sometimes shed a tear around Elgin and kissed had her first kiss with Elgin, which was also quite bragged about by Elgin frequently.

I never got myself too intrigued in their relationship and kept much as distant as possible, but again that Wanda girl always gave me suspicious vibes like she had some secrets buried under that dry and deep brown eyes. She had no rumours nor had quite a praise, in fact her own father said that even if a pauper marries her daughter, he isn't giving a single fuck about that and the couple can take away all Wanda's share and go as far as possible from him and his sons and his kingdom. I really never understood the reason for that. I mean, yes I have seen many orthodox fathers but such hatred was suspicious. I tried to dig deep and only after that unfortunate incident at the altar, I got to know about the truth behind Wanda and his father."

Alice interrupted her and said, "Please, wait for a moment. This girl needs to pee." Alice quickly ran to the bathroom and came as quickly as a tornado. Aliyah said, "Wanda was a good and sweet girl on the outside and seemed like the perfect girl of Elgin's dreams. But, that's when tragedy occurred. Wanda's father unexpectedly got himself severely hurt during some annual hunting trip. Two of his sons were allegedly killed by some unidentified beast and soon news spread that some mysterious creature is on loose and nobody is safe. Mothers started to keep their children in homes and husbands in bedrooms, but somehow some alarming amount of men, especially soldiers and guards outside the palace were viciously attacked by that same unidentified beast. My father was eager to anticipate in the hunt to kill that beast, but ministers and my mother advised him otherwise.

My father then someone convinced the people to take me and Elgin in that hunting trip, but we were mostly for the jobs of squires. Anyway, we never caught that beast and after three months of no activity from the beast, father decided to call off the hunting trip and return home. Things were good again and the usual stuff was going on at a horribly rapid rate. I don't know but Elgin did mentioned about losing his virginity with her which was also a bad and disgusting story for another day. Things were quite stable and we met Wanda's father who unfortunately died couple of months later in his sleep.

Wanda rarely sobbed at her father's funeral and the eulogy was also quite dry and short. I after some drinks and a little weed, started to roam around the palace like a ghost and since most of the guards were present in taking their deceased king to the grave, I rarely stopped anywhere at anytime and soon I got inside a room where something very bad was happening. I saw Wanda eating a dead beaver and that too raw. I saw many people eating many things in many absurd ways, but never a beaver uncooked. I wanted to tell Elgin about the weird eating preferences of his fiancee, but again who would have believed that anyway. So, I kept my silence and stealthily walked away from the scene.

Things were pretty again good and boring, especially with Elgin busy with his new life and Camilla secretly sneaking out to meet her new lover. I was not afraid nor melancholy about being alone all the time, but again I was a gregarious person and staying alone was not doing me much ease. I finally decided to entertain myself in other reachable ways like taking up a hobby, listening to some music and reading the books I have already read once. I even tried to make some maids my friends which was definitely a very not royal thing for a princess to do at that period of time. My mother fumed and burned me with her anger and distasteful words and soon I was again smoking weed and roaming around the palace like a ghost.

I walked and walked and soon reached a room where I saw something happening quite strange. Wanda was chewing meat from a human hand and my the looks of it she was enjoying it. I at that very moment decided to dig up information regarding this cannibal and stop my friend from becoming her post wedding brunch. I secretly sneaked inside Wanda's palace and started to look for very detail about her and her weird eating preferences, but no avail. I defeated climbed down from the freakishly long and soon I was spotted by a drunk guard who was too drunk to mistake me with his fellow mate who just joined recently. I asked, "What are you doing here? You are so drunk that even the cats and mice will defeat you easily." The guard said, "It really doesn't matter. Even if I am sober, I would definitely not be able to fight the beast." I asked, "The beast?" Then, he narrated the whole story. But that's a story for another day.

Just kidding. The story was not that convincing, but again what I saw was also not that believable too. The guard said when Wanda's father was young, he and his brothers went to a distant forest to hunt for a silver deer which was a wonder sight to see and killing it was a matter of true valor and royalty. Wanda's grandfather promised the throne to the son who will kill the deer first. Wanda's father was young and handsome, but definitely not the most skilled hunter in the kingdom. Wanda's uncles were easily killing any animal they felt like killing, while Wanda's father was just serving as a person who carries swords and bows for his brothers. After many days of tiring journey through the middle of the forest, they finally saw a silver deer roaming around. All were running behind it but the deer was way too fast for them to chase and soon Wanda's uncles were panting and sitting under the trees.

But, Wanda's father was determined and he kept chasing it till it reached a spot too deep in the forest which was yet to be discovered by any man. Wanda's father was not a good archer and all his arrows were wasted in the chase and he didn't had a sword. But, Wanda's father's luck was blooming that day as the silver deer was a female and was pregnant. The run made her go into labor and she was moaning with pain. Wanda's father took out his dagger and was about to kill the silver deer when the silver deer transformed into a beautiful elf and said, "Please, don't kill me, young man. I will grant you any wish you want but please don't kill me." Wanda's father said, "I want to be the king. But, my father will never let me take the throne in place of my successful brothers. If you want to fulfill my wish, make me the king." The elf said, "I will make you the king. But, promise me that you will raise my child as your own and give him or her your name. She will live like a princess and die like a queen." Wanda's father agreed to the condition and vowed on his life that he will never let her daughter be an orphan. Soon, Wanda was born and the female elf passed away. Wanda's father took Wanda in his arms and took her to the camp to see that his brothers died. Actually, his brothers were so tired that they fall asleep and became the food of a group of hungry lions.

Wanda's father returned home to see that his father died from an unexpected snake bite. People elected him as the new king and soon Wanda became a princess. But, the real problem was that she was not a mother's girl, but more of a father's daughter. Well, that means that she was more like her father and liked to eat her meat raw. The thing was that she was the daughter of the notorious cannibal beast, Adam Wolf. Adam Wolf was a student of Assayah and has mastered the art of disguise and in one such disguise, he disguised as a male stag and mated with Wanda's mother who was also herself disguised as a silver deer. At first, Wanda's hunger would be satisfied with small animals like rabbits and cats, but with her growing age her hunger grew too and she started eating beings way bigger than her like horses and elephants. Wanda's father was going nuts trying to hide the fact that his daughter is a ferocious cannibal. And that's the whole story.

I wanted to inform Elgin about that cannibal fiancee of his, but things turned pretty much ugly from then on. Elgin was unexpectedly gloomy and grumpy and Wanda was surprisingly quite good and well mannered. I seldomly tried to do any act of interrupting their sweet dreams nor tried to tell the truth of Wanda. But, one day an unexpected accident changed all. I was trying to get some flowers to make a tiara for Wanda as she was soon going to be my best friend's wife. I was plucking rare roses and white lilies for the base of the tiara and a very expensive Ruby stone for the center piece. I was busy with my job when I heard a scream that echoed throughout the palace. I ran towards the forest and saw that many people were also running at that direction, but I stopped them and went there all alone. I took out my sword and looked around when Wanda jumped on me and bit my hand. Those were some sharp teeth and my hand started to bleed. I tried to dodge her attacks but she was too fast. I jumped under a stone to hide but Wanda turned that over and jumped on me.

I kicked her and then punched her in the chest. Wanda showed no pain and became even more dangerous and terrifying. She jumped on me and tried to tear me up and I had no other option to make that lethal strike. I took out my dagger and slitted Wanda's throat. I fell unconscious as I saw Wanda's body slowly turning into ashes and fade away in the wind. The next week was Elgin's marriage and pretty much you know what happened next."

Elena said, "How can you do that? You are so cruel." Aliyah said, "I had no option. l have hidden the truth from Elgin for several years and that's because he won't believe any part of the story but the part where I stabbed and killed a vicious animal whom he still considers his first love." Alice said, "Sacrifices has to be made and she did what was right for her friend. Anyway let's go shopping." Elena and Trisha shook their head and went away with Alice and Aliyah smiled, "You are right, Alice. Sacrifices must be made.".....