Chapter 14: Most Valuable Prince 

The sun rose through the window’s blinds, touching every inch of the tunnel and coaxing the flower petals to release their scent throughout the eerie walls that had been ravaged by past rebellions. The soil had turned almost black; the sparse, surviving flora bent their delicate stems toward the ground, having resisted years of destruction. Crystallized Tunnel felt foreign and unspeakable. Citizens fled the ground, afraid and solicitous. The favored Queens didn't last more than a few glorious years. Love and hate intertwined. Love lingered among the nobility, while hatred consumed the public. When Queen Iselda first married Queen Laima, they decided upon changing the regulation, cracking open the Tunnel so that the sun would be a light warm blanket over the ground as well as the humans. It didn't attune well with the wild and mountainous nature of the tunnel and failed miserably, though the Queens were persistent. They demanded their people to struggle with the forces of nature. 

The crystals were gone. 

The air was stale. 

The gleaming gem gardens were no more. 

The power within the people had waned. 

No true wielder of magic had been born. 

The gates were forced open 

To escape this living hell. 

The soil burned, 

The precious white morning glories were 

Carelessly plucked, 

And through it all, 

The Prince of the Realm remained powerless. 

Prince Elliott of the Crystallized Tunnel had been born without a shred of power. The Queens gave their best effort to change circumstances; they called the best doctors, lied through their teeth, deceiving the people with flashy pink smiles, and trained him with the most powerful, yet all were in vain. Elliott didn't have any power. He had the signature white hair of his lineage, and not a sliver of magic ran through his veins. The doctors concluded that he did not even possess a power core, something every inhabitant of the tunnels was naturally born with.  The public shamed him, laughed at him, dishonored him… Queen Iselda was in shock when she first grasped the meaning of this. Her precious prophecy was a lie. A huge lie. She wasn't the Queen in the Queendom, nor was Elliott the white morning glory that would atone for a greater cause. He was useless. Why would Iselda even go through all these shenanigans? Just to be humiliated? Some of the physicians she commissioned had even attempted to surgically implant a magical core into Elliott, subjecting him to agonizing levels of pain, but the results remained entirely unchanged. 

By the time Elliott reached the age of locating his powers within his body, he wasn't that chummy and talkative little kid anymore. He grew quiet, serious, and cold. Any comment thrown his way made him close himself off more and more. Opening the tunnel to let in the sun only made him close his eyes in return. He was seventeen now. He had some friends inside the palace, like the chief commander called Will helping him with his sword swinging lessons, and one friend in particular whom he met during his early escapes from his chambers to the nearby bakery making the best pastries in the realm, not that he had any others to compare them to. She was a red-haired girl; her hair shined whenever she moved her head, the sun catching it just enough to make it redder than her usual color. Her name was Rudy, and Elliott was sure that it was what everyone described as love. They met when Elliott ran off without his mothers knowing, pulled his long brownish cape over his shoulders, and dragged its hood down to his temples to hide his bright white hair in a delicate braid reaching down to his hips. He desired to be free to roam around his own Tunnel without people judging and cursing him due to his condition. Not that it was his fault, but the constant talking was wearing him out. 

These thoughts cut off abruptly when someone shoved him from behind, sending him tumbling toward the knee-high white marble fountain, which featured elegant swan figurines decorating its second tier. Elliott fell backward into the water, landing on his rear in utter shock. His hands landed on either side of him as his long legs dangled over the edge of the basin. He was drenched to his waist, his trousers clinging tightly to his calves. Annoyed, Elliott tried to push himself up, but his wet hands slipped. He was about to snap when the person who had pushed him extended a warm, helping hand.

"Oops, my bad. Are you alright?"

The girl was red-haired, with a dimple on her right cheek that showed up when she made her signature half-smile, which Elliott was now accustomed to and very fond of. She wore a simple black shirt with matching pants and sandals, and Elliott could swear that she was strong enough to lift Elliott with one arm. At first, when she reached to help him, he despised her. How could a commoner push a Prince down into a fountain? What a disgrace. But now that they’ve been hanging around at least 6 months, Elliott happily showed up at the bakery where Rudy and her found family lived. 

Now, he found himself at the training grounds, sparring with his comrades in an effort to refine his swordsmanship. These halls echoed with swords clashing and soldiers grunting. Elliott stood still; he was exhausted after his duel with Will, his close friend and the best of the swordsmen. Leaning against a granite wall inlaid with red and blue gems that matched the intertwined ivory patterns on the floor, Elliott let his gaze drift. The walls were half-open to the gardens below, which were unkempt, all the plants piled on top of each other presenting an unsightly view. He exhaled, taking in every detail he saw: the wind tangling his unbraided white hair, the sun touching the tip of his nose making him sneeze, and the hall gracefully accepting nature into it with the oak tree brought in from the outer tunnels decorating the inner circle. This place was the only one where Elliott felt at peace. Growing up in these halls, his mothers mustered up everything for him to feel at ease. They decorated the training hall, opened up the tunnel, and planted various kinds of flowers so that this place felt more like his homeland than that magical gem tunnel he first saw as a kid. 

"Oi, Your Majesty, you've dozed off on me," Will teased, nudging him playfully from where Elliott was leaning. 

Elliott looked to his left to see the bright smile of his friend, dark hair falling onto his identical colored eyes. He was one of the only people who was comfortable with Elliott’s powerless self, as well as his white hair. Realizing he had left the commander waiting, Elliott cleared his throat.

"This place is a constant reminder of who I am and who I might have been. But now..." He clicked his tongue softly. "It wasn't always like this, you know. My mothers tried their best to shield me at all costs." He watched Will's expression soften with a touch of shared nostalgia. "I know they did it out of love, but I don't even have a core to show for it."

 “Maybe you have some weird mind powers,” Will suggested, playfully wiggling his fingers near his temples to mimic a psychic at work. 

“I still don't have a core, Will.” 

“Well, maybe you'll develop one later” he gestured above his navel where a core should be located. 

“I am seventeen; there is less and less of a chance for me to develop any kind of power, let alone a core from scratch,” said Elliott, sighing. He didn't like to talk about his powers; he didn't think that he would develop a core or anything. He would die without it. 

Will rested his head on Elliott’s shoulder. “That’s okay, I’ll drop the subject. I still care about you the way you are.” He tilted his head to look into Elliott's green eyes, reminding him of the beauty of nature. 

“Pick one,” he added, extending both of his closed hands playfully, a familiar gesture he used whenever he sensed Elliott needed a distraction.

“Right,” he tapped Will’s hand. 

Will opened his right palm, revealing a single candy wrapped in pink and green stripes. 

“I still don't understand how you do that,” Elliott chuckled. 

Will whistled at his comment, “A magician never tells their secrets.” He winked, folded his arms behind his head, and walked toward the exit of the training ground. “Come on, Prince. We have a gem to see,” he shouted. 

Everyone around the training ground snickered. Elliott decided Will was no longer a close friend, yet he followed him way too eagerly to see Rudy.