The Baby Ice Phoenix

"What's wrong?" Roselyn asked as she looked at Xander whose eyes were fixed on the beautiful white baby Phoenix in her hands. There was a weird expression on his face but the one on the Goblin's face was pure horror. She looked back and forth between the little bird in her hands and then the other two who were giving her and the baby Phoenix weird looks.

"That..." Xander pointed at the baby Phoenix as he spoke. "... that's an ice Phoenix, the rarest shadow beast to exist."

Roselyn arched her eyebrows high in question, not understanding what was so 'impossible' about the said ice phoenix. "So?" She asked.

Instead of answering her, Xander just let out a small sigh as his attention returned to the Phoenix. But unlike him, the goblin decided to clear out her confusion.

"The late Dark Fae Queen had an Ice Phoenix as one of her Shadow Beasts and it was the last one in the existence of its race. That Phoenix passed away after the death of its master and everyone thought that with it came the extinction of the legendary Ice Phoenixes. But then one day, a servant noticed two Phoenix eggs in the late Queen's quarters and with it returned the hope that we will be able to preserve them."

Roselyn looked at the beautiful little creature in her hands as she listened to the goblin's story.

"A Phoenix egg only hatches when it's ready to choose its Master, but for several hundred years, none of those eggs showed any reactions until..."

She finally turned her attention away from the baby bird and toward the goblin as her interest was finally picked by the little pause he took before the big revelation. However, the one who spoke next was not the goblin but her guardian slash mentor.

"Until the day of the birth of the Crown Prince. When His Highness was born, one of the eggs cracked and the first ice phoenix was born. His highness got his first shadow beast at the age of one month and it was the Ice Phoenix." 

Roselyn wasn't prepared for such a shocking revelation but only 'him' as the master of the legendary Ice Phoenix made sense - a powerful shadow beast for a powerful master. Still, what she wasn't able to understand was why they were so shocked by her taking the other Ice Phoenix as her shadow beast. Was it because she's a halfling and the Ice Phoenix was a very powerful beast?

If she thought that the reason was this simple, she was in for a huge shock.

"On the other hand, this egg remained intact even after that. It was only four months ago when the other egg started showing some reactions and it finally broke the day before yesterday." Goblin explained further.

"The day before yesterday?" Xander repeated in a questioning tone as his eyes landed on her. He didn't need to speak it out loud for Roselyn to understand - it was the same day she was brought into the Shadow Realm.

"What about four months ago? Did something happen?" He asked, there was an urgency in his voice that made her worry... for herself.

Roselyn thought for a while, trying to recall if something rare happened four months ago, and then it hit her. "My birthday! I turned twenty on the full moon four months ago." 

"That's it!" The goblin intervened as he clapped his tiny hands together as excitement brimmed in his eyes. "It was the night of the full moon when the first crack appeared on the egg." 

She looked between her mentor and the goblin, trying to understand whose reaction she should focus on. The first appeared devastated while the latter now looked more excited than horrified. "Can you at least tell me why this is such a big deal? Because I'm a halfling? Or because I'm a light fae?" Her question was directed at her guardian.

Xander turned his attention to her, his deep green eyes staring into her amber ones as he spoke while pointing at the baby Phoenix in her hands. "This... According to the rules of the Shadow Realm, this bird was supposed to belong either to the next heir of the Shadow Realm, or the Queen-to-be of this realm." 

Levine Winters - the fiance and future Queen of the Shadow Realm! 

Roselyn felt like a headache hitting her head sharply without any mercy as the realization dawned over her. Why things were going so against her all of a sudden?

She glared at the little bird but its soft and cute little eyes that were looking back at her immediately melted all her anger toward it. The Ice Phoenix had chosen her as its master, no matter what the rules of the Shadow Realm said.

She turned her attention back to Xander as she asked, "So what now?"

The man shrugged as if he also had no idea. "I'll report it to the King, only then we will find out what's going on and what should be done."

"Should I be worried?" She asked even though she already knew the answer pretty well.

"Of course, you should." Xander seemed almost irritated but she wasn't sure if his irritation was directed at her or the entire stupid situation which didn't make any sense.

A chuckle left her lips as she shook her head in pure disappointment. The look that she received from Xander in response only made her boil with anger. "I was the one who was forcefully bitten by one of your kinds. I am the one who's being punished for doing nothing wrong. And now, I'm once again in trouble without doing anything wrong. You are the one who brought me here. You were the one who forced my blood on that globe thing, yet, I'm going to be punished because a shadow beast of your realm chose me as its master. Just great!" 

Her voice boomed through the closed walls of the basement as she felt her anger reaching new peaks. She was really done with the Shadow Realm and its double standards.