"𝕮𝖍𝖎𝖑𝖉, 𝖞𝖔𝖚 𝖆𝖗𝖊 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖔𝖓𝖊 𝖙𝖔 𝖘𝖙𝖔𝖕 𝖙𝖍𝖎𝖘 𝖜𝖆𝖗," 𝕬 𝖈𝖔𝖑𝖉 𝖛𝖔𝖎𝖈𝖊 𝖊𝖈𝖍𝖔𝖊𝖉 𝖎𝖓 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖉𝖆𝖗𝖐𝖓𝖊𝖘𝖘.

"𝖄𝖔𝖚 𝖈𝖆𝖓 𝖓𝖔𝖙 𝖊𝖘𝖈𝖆𝖕𝖊 𝖉𝖊𝖘𝖙𝖎𝖓𝖞," 𝕬 𝖘𝖊𝖈𝖔𝖓𝖉 𝖛𝖔𝖎𝖈𝖊 𝖊𝖈𝖍𝖔𝖊𝖉.

"𝕹𝖔 𝖔𝖓𝖊 𝖈𝖆𝖓," The voice thundered

The girl thrashed around trying to break free of their words. Their cold whispers echoing around the room. The words formed strings that grabbed and weaved around into one large entangled mess. Their gold strings come together to write down the girl's fate. Pain grabbed and possessed her, giving her no chance for escape. Until light shined upon her face and the pain began to cease. Almost as quickly as they started, the voices stopped leaving only calm silence. The light graced her face and she slowly opened her eyes...

Lyria woke up in cold sweat. She had no idea what had just happened or what it meant. Those voices were undeniably cruel. Plus it was impossible to have a vision like this; she was a princess. The fact that she was next in line for the throne didn't help either. Not that she wanted to be queen... Unfortunately, she was the oldest, and it was her duty. Even though Lyria was only sixteen, she was to become queen of the Zelora, the city of angels, at age seventeen according to tradition. There was no escaping it.

There were far too many other problems to worry about and she could not really split her focus on each individual one. The voice in her head was already beginning to ask questions about what happened and about her emotion, but she offered no such response; Lyria would tell her later. Besides, if she were to worry too much about the dream (more like a nightmare), she was already swamped with other problems. There were two assassins going around killing nobles, some attacks on Zelora's gate from hell, and possibly more than her mother wasn't telling her! The main reason she even knew about these problems was because of Diya, a friend. The lucky girl knew everything.

Suddenly, Lyria heard someone knock on the door to her room. She sighed and said. "Come in,"

A brown-haired girl entered the room and smiled at Lyria, who couldn't help but smile back at the girl. Lyla was seventeen years old and one of Lyria's best friends. She had long brown hair, typically put up into a bun like it was at that moment, and small glistening earrings. Lyla always seemed to have a friendly smile on her face even when she hated someone. It's what made her so unpredictable.

"Hey, Lyla."

"Hi!"

"Why are you in my room?" Lyria asked softly.

"We have classes, or did you forget and your brain died," Lyla said with a sly smile.

Lyria immediately jumped out of bed and looked at the clock. 8:30.

"Oh, my angels...I am so going to be sooooo late!" Lyria shouted and ran out of the room with her long white hair unbrushed and in her nightclothes.
"Lyria, come back! You are still wearing your nightclothes," Lyla shouted after her, laughing. Lyria immediately darted back to get changed. Unfortunately, by the time she was dressed and had her bag for school, it was already 9:00 AM, meaning they were late to classes...

Lyria quickly threw on a white dress from her closet, brushed her hair white hair, and applied a small amount of make-up on her pale face to make it less, well, pale. Then, Lyria took her signature wreath, a small green wreath that had been gifted from her father, and placed it on top of her head.

They immediately left Lyria's room and ran to their class. They did, after all, have all the same classes.

"Ms. Amani, Ms. Night, do you mind telling me why you are late to class?" The teacher, Mrs. Darhk, asked as soon as the girls rushed into the classroom. She was a woman who had been teaching for at least thirty years. In her fifties, she always had her hair in a bun and some strands of her once radiant blond hair had turned gray.

"Well, um," Lyla started, nervously.

"Mrs. Darhk, we were late because my mother needed us," Lyria lied. Lyla shot a look at Lyria that basically said 'Are you crazy? We are going to get caught lying'

"Oh," Mrs. Darhk said, her face paling, and voice wavering. "You two are excused."

No one wanted to argue about that. If the queen wanted you, you could and would drop everything and anything. It was, after all, the law.

"Today, we are going to talk about the sins and why you should never commit them," Mrs. Darhk said in that flat tone of hers.

Lyria groaned quietly in boredom. She hated talking about sins. She hated that their lives involved sins. She hated that Sins depicted their lives.

"As I go over the Sins, remember that they all go in order of okay to terrible."

"The first sin that we are talking about is sabotaging someone. This is never allowed. Not in the slightest way. If you sabotage someone in a competition, it is punishable by losing your halo for a few days."

"The next sin is being mean to others. This can cause many things to happen. You could lose your halo permanently, depending on what you do. Other punishments include not being allowed to eat that night and-"

Lyria zoned out after that. She's heard this all before—several times. I mean, everyone did. But she, more than others, because she is next in line for the throne and her mother usually lectured her about them. She didn't pay attention until Mrs. Darhk said the worst sin in all the angelical world.

"Now the worst sin anyone can commit is talking to a demon. This crime is punishable by...banishment to you know where." At that, some of the students in the back mocked a gasp and others giggled, as they have been reminded over and over again of this punishment and it all now seemed like a long, boring game that everyone was forced to play.

Hell. The twisted place where the demon's resided. The place where evil souls were punished. Lyria had seen pictures of the place and personally thought it was beautiful. She had never seen pictures of demons before, though, because they were forbidden. A lot of things were forbidden, including Lyria's secret and perhaps everyone else's. Maybe that had something to do with her dream of the voices. Although she doubted it. Suddenly the door opened, and one of the Queen's personal guards came in.

"Princess Lyria, come with me. Your mother wishes to speak with you," He said.

Lyria got up and prayed that she didn't have to deal with this for too long. Lyla sent her a look of pity, which she sent back with a look of '𝖍𝖊𝖑𝖕 𝖒𝖊.'

Lyla just laughed, as Lyria left the room and followed Marcus, the guard until they reached the throne room.

"In here, Princess," He said.