My mother was eager to see me, even though we hadn’t communicated in several years. We didn’t have much to say to each other, but she had always tried. I was actually surprised to show up on the docks without a single bodyguard, although they followed me as we were transported to the space ship that would take us back to Earth.
The people of Earth didn’t know I was coming. I had worked my way up in the military, and there was no telling when they would discover I was alive. I didn’t think they would be too pleased to see me.
It had been an authoritarian regime, and any talk of ridding ourselves of the ruler were often met with harsh punishment.
The royal family had lived far away, and most of the people had never seen the young princess. There had been rumors that she was alive, and they were rumors that were met with fear. The people were not sure they wanted to be ruled by her; in fact, they didn’t know what she was like at all. The stories of her vibrant hair had caused a number of people to dye their hair, but the rumors were never that the young princess was still alive, only that she had been killed.
I knew a better world existed. The idea of a revolution against the royal family was never discussed, but that didn’t mean that it couldn’t happen. I had been taught to never rise up until the right time.
“You’re the youngest princess,” the captain of the ship said as I entered the room.
“I was made Crown Princess as a child,” I reminded him.
“You were still the youngest,” he observed.
I nodded. My life before this moment had been a nursery-worthy life of pleasures and play—until I became the Crown Princess at four years old. Now, I had been taken from the nursery and thrust into adulthood. The people around me had been trained to treat me as such. There were days I had envied them and wished my life were still that simple.
“We’ll be landing shortly,” he informed me.
It was the first time I’d ever heard Earth called that. I wasn’t going anywhere but the capital, so I supposed it made sense.
“I want to stay in touch with you,” he said, surprising me with his sincerity, “if that’s all right with you?”
I nodded with a smirk on my face. He smiled back.
“I had a fairly normal childhood,” he said. “I didn’t know who my parents were. We were sent to a school where we were trained. Mother and Father held no rights to me when my marriage was arranged, which was before I was ten. My life was always very structured—I was lucky. You’re the only child of the King and Queen of Earth. Do what you want, when you want,” he said casually.
“I’ll talk to you,” I replied.
“We’re just about there,” he reassured me. “Get prepared.”
I pushed at my hair. It danced around my shoulders and I pulled a few stray pieces behind my ears. He smiled at me, seeming to understand my need for reassurance before my home planet, which was completely foreign to me. I’d always known the story that it was covered with water, but now? Now I was seeing only frozen land. It didn’t look good at all. I wondered if I should leave the city and go live somewhere in the country, where it was warmer.
The jet lowered itself down onto the ground, and I saw several people looking at me. A dozen black cars pulled up, and they all stopped. They shut their engines down and their doors were opened simultaneously. I saw a large red carpet move forward and it pulled the cars up until they were near.
I steadied myself and walked out of the jet, stepping down onto the ground. A servant, dressed in royal blue, hurried up to me and ushered me forward. I walked, feeling everyone in the world look at me as the servant led me through the cars. I was so used to walking through these vehicles, and it was strange to me that anyone would be so surprised to see me walk on my own. We reached the carpet, and I climbed over the seats, which were covered in a nice blue material. I lay down, wrapping myself in the carpet, trying to feel safe at home once more.
I quietly cried as I was taken through the planetary city, which was larger than I thought possible. I was amazed to imagine the buildings that had been preserved from before. Whoever had said that living in a frozen planet was better? They were crazy. I had pictured the country to be tropical, with all sorts of strange plants, leaves, fruits, and flowers. When I’d been brought out of the palace, I had expected to feel like I was in a jungle, but it was hive, full of drones.
Was there no biodiversity on Earth anymore? It didn’t look that bad. There were still humans there, and I was happy to see that. They were colorful, and just as curious about me as I was about them.
I looked down at my left hand and noticed the ring-shaped jewel in the middle of it. My right hand held the ring, which I was sure had been placed there as a baby. I was the only one who wore it. I was the only one who knew its significance; to even imagine the purpose of it was difficult for me. I was the only hope of the royal family. I was like a royal, and I was royalty. I was the Crown Princess.
I knew that the upcoming days would be those that I would remember. There would be a lot of talk of my life before, and I was curious about it all. There were still people who hadn’t seen me in a long time, and many of them could only remember the stories they had been told. I wanted to know what had really happened to the child who was so brash and funny.
“Is it true that you grew up in a palace?” they asked me over and over again.
“Humans grow up in castles,” I told them, “but I was not raised in one of them. I was raised in a fantasy world.”
It sounded crazy, but it had made complete sense in the palace. Green grass had been on the balconies, and I had seen walls made out of ice. They were cold in the winter, but it was never unbearable. I’d drawn griffins on the walls, and originally they had all been orange. I grew up my entire life with orange eyes and orange hair. I had grown up with a deep dark tanned skin. I was meant to be a fair skinned girl, although I wasn’t quite sure why.
The doors to the palace opened, and I was surprised to find that they narrowed as I walked towards them. I didn’t have any Royal Guards. I had been protected at all times by technological machines and etiquette lessons, but now, as the Crown Princess, I had finally been given my own security.
I was led to a large, empty room. It wasn’t unlike the room I'd walked into earlier, adorned with a red carpet. I sat down on the very throne that I’d climbed off of when I first arrived, not bothering to stand up like a real princess would have.
I was so tired from my journey, and I wanted to tell my security guards to push me to the ground and stay there for a while. It was time to take a nap. I’d had so many lessons about what being a princess was all about, and it wouldn’t be easy to go from one extreme to the other. Still, I could already tell that I would like this a lot more than I’d liked the other.
“May I help you, Princess Anna?” a deep voice asked me.
It startled me, and I looked around the room. I finally realized that the voice was coming from the man standing right next to me. I looked at him, and he bowed his head down to me. I nodded back, not knowing what to say.
“You may go,” I told him. I said it because I had been told that the order was important. I didn’t even know what to call him.
“Yes, Princess,” he replied. He left the room and closed the door behind him.
I had the room to myself. A refreshment table sat just off the floor, close to the tree, and I reached into it, picking up a cup. It was cold, and I froze for a moment, thinking of how I was entering my own home. It was the palace, but it was my own private room now, and it was made to look like home.
There was a murmur in the air, and I turned my head back towards the door. It transformed into a mirror as I looked at it, and I saw a servant in it. She stared at me, and she reminded me of my own maid. She wore a blue dress, which matched my own shade. Her blue hair was curly and hung around her face. Her eyes were blue, and so were her lips. I reached out to her, and I realized she was only a hologram.
“This is crazy,” I said to myself, leaning back.
I was now the ruler of an entire planet and the royal family. It would be great to be living in a palace like this. I could get everything I wanted, and it would never get old. It would get old to me, but it wouldn’t be to my subjects. I could afford to have everything I ever wanted. I could have anything, whenever I wanted it.
I hated my life before, and then I hated my life after. I did not want to be the Crown Princess, but I knew I was one, and it was good to take all of my responsibilities. Still, it seemed so fake.
“What are you going to do with your life?” a voice asked me. I turned my body back around.
“I could be a tree,” I said.
“But you cannot choose to be anything but what you are now,” a voice answered me.
I walked to the tree and wrapped my arms around it. I could have said something, but I did not. It felt so wrong, and yet, in that very moment, it felt like I was doing the right thing.
I unclasped my arms from the tree and turned around. It was just a hologram that had moved while my emotions were somewhere else. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead, I fell to my knees. I fell to my knees in front of my father. He stood above me, creating an imbalance in the room.
“Princess,” he said, his voice echoing in the distance. “I am proud of you.”
“I am so sorry for everything you had to go through.”
“Then maybe it’s better that we don’t talk about it,” he said, walking back and forth in the room. “We have a lot of things to do in the next few days.”
I stood up, and the hologram turned into a chair. He gestured for me to sit, and I nodded, sitting back down.
He walked over to the tree and put a hand on it. His eyes narrowed, and his lips tightened. He wasn’t smiling, and it made me very nervous.
“I am sorry about your tree, Father,” I said to him.
He turned to me with a confused look on his face. “I don’t think that this tree is for me, honey,” he replied.
“Then I am sorry about your tree,” I said, turning to my mother. “This is a marvelous tree.”
She looked like she was just as confused as my father. Her skin looked smooth, and her eyes were sad. Her lips were drawn slightly.
