ridley achelous, eight || fin

She let them all burn. Without a second thought, she turned away from the garish light of the fire and its heat, licking her back, nearly bare in the tank top she wore.

She wonders if she was given a second chance, she'd do it all again — probably. Because that is just who she is, and she will always put herself high above anyone else. Ridley did love her parents, but she saved herself anyway. She can't quite consciously decide if their death could be blamed on her — if she had gone back into that flaming house for her parents, she probably would have died with them. And Ridley, more than anything, wanted to live. That is something that often outweighs every other desire and emotion, even love.

The day she arrived at the orphanage, she immediately felt out of place. She was twelve years old, wearing her black velvet funeral dress and polished red flats, her vibrant hair was tied into a pair of pigtails, and she was carrying two huge suitcases chock full of luxurious clothes and expensive belongings. The others didn't dress the way she did, or act like her. She immediately felt out of place, but also felt above them. Her parents had always said that she was better than anyone she'd meet at school — "You're richer, prettier, and smarter than all of them, darling."

She assumed that the same applied here, at the orphanage. These children were not her equals, least of all the enigmatic Alice, a girl Ridley despised the moment she met her. Once, at the age of thirteen, Ridley wrote "UGLY" on Alice's mirror in red lipstick. Even now, she would love to smack the ugly right off of Alice's face.

Ridley believes that when her parents burned, her heart did, too. Though, perhaps she does actually feel something for her most loyal follower, Zeal, or Pet, as she prefers to call her. She was once Alice's loyal subject, but the idiot had the nerve to reject Pet. In the end, she supposes it turned out well, because Pet ended up with Ridley instead, as it should be.

Pet is the closest thing she has to a friend, as she isn't exactly kind to her peers. With her air of superiority, narrowed glare and bitter words, most people are drawn away from her, but she doesn't mind much. As long as they know who is in charge, she couldn't care less about what they think.

The Queen of Hearts has no heart, they say — a rumor well known from the orphanage to the school. Someone once wondered aloud why her clique at school follows her so obediently, like dogs, they said, when she is so callous. (She laughed at the word.) And she said, "Because they know power when they see it. And power, at the end of the day, is what separates the strong from the weak. Now fuck off —" and she recited her favorite threat "— or it's off with your head."

She won't deny the thrill that rushes through her when she walks through the hallways at school and sees fear flicker across their faces — the weak ones she may have tormented one, two, or ten times. She relishes other people's pain, perhaps the fill her own void in her chest. Ridley doesn't care about the reason behind it — or maybe, she's just ignoring it — only about the rush. She doesn't know if she could ever physically harm someone, make them bleed, but she does know that she loves twisting and tormenting the mind, and most of all, revenge.

Ridley Achelous is not quite everything a ruler should be, as much as she hates to admit it. She is cold, calculating, callous, cruel, and yet not completely heartless or free of regret. The flames eating away at her childhood home are burned into the backs of her eyes, following her into her dreams.

("Such a pretty dress! You look like a princess, Ridley."

"I don't want to be a princess, Mom, I want to be a queen."

"Then there you have it, Ridley. You are a queen, if that's what you want to be."

"Just like that?"

"Of course. You always get to choose who and what you are."

And her mother would smile, but after a few excruciatingly long moments, it melted off of her face.

Literally.

Flames rose up all around them, melting her mother's flesh like candle wax. It bit into her mother's body, leaping limb to limb, devouring her in an instant. There was a scream, and then no mother at all, just a pile of black ash on the ground.

Ridley woke up screaming into her pillow.)

She isn't everything a queen should be, but someday she will be. Her reign is long from over, after all.