Caroline

Caroline stood in front of the mirror, eyeing her long, brown hair and her new armour. She picked her shield up and stomped her boot on the chest that held her clothes. Her hand gripped her double-edged sword's golden hilt and pointed it at the ceiling while holding her chin high.

The young princess had spent days riding to this kingdom, the Kingdom of Alexandria, just to spend even more days locked in a room with nothing to do until the Nobility of Alexandria elected a new leader. She could accept that as an excuse but there was a problem with it; as long as a Kingdom follows the practice of primogeniture, there is no need for elections. That's one of the things she realised on the second day in her room.

She also realised other things, things about her family and the male line's weird practice of hiding their actual names only to be called "Wolfsbane", "Old Griffin" or some other dishonest name. They would always claim to use those because names have power but Caroline knew that nobody had power over her, not even her name.

She sighed and remembered that when first came here she wanted to see the portraits of the former rulers of the Kingdom, inspect their army and learn their tactics, visit the Royal library and do things you wouldn't imagine a lady to do. She wasn't a lady, though. She was the Captain of the Red Pack in the Darlean Army

But every time she tried to leave, someone always told her that she had to wait for the soon-to-be Queen to call her. And she did, but she only called her for the day of her coronation, which was starting on the morrow.

In these long days she'd spent in her room, Caroline had been looking at her reflexion, counting the days until she could go back to her armies, back to her kingdom.

She had been counting the gems on her shield, the Royal shield of Darlan, remembering the name of the king they represented. A King that stories would remember as Constaner Ogglett, the King of the Night, the Flame of the Dragon, the Tentacle of the Sky. All because he rode a female dragon.

"Overall there are eight minerals, my sweet girl. One black, six yellow and one pearl", she remembered the Master of Scrolls saying, "Seven of those, the black and the six yellow ones, are on the top belt and one on the bottom."

"On the top, the black one is higher than the others, representing the founder of your Kingdom, milady, Constaner the Great. The other six represent his reforms, those reforms that made the Empire great in the first place. They represent the enforced conscription in the army, the building of the Tower of Scrolls, the redistribution of land..." his eyes would shine as he talked. Such was his fascination with this ancient history.

"And the Pearl. That pearl that represents the city of Darlan, the Pearl of the West. The biggest port of Cartago... but also its biggest ruin" he would say, his eyes losing their spark.

She thought of her only visit to Darlan, the ruined city and how it had seemed so ancient. It looked as if it had been built a million years ago, with only a set of traitors sitting in its ancient keep. They would fish for knowledge in its libraries or jewels in the broken homes. They would fish for everything that was left after the Bannermen of the Axemen brought its high walls to the ground and killed all of the civilians.

They killed the screaming babes and the nobles and the standing armies and brought half the city to the ground. Those were things Caroline admired them for as they did it without magic, without siege engines and without anything but their Old Gods in their hearts.

But while she was sitting on the saddle of her horse, away from her escort and in front of the port that used to be filled with thousands of boats, her eyes flamed in anger and tears.

She rode back to her party, ordering her men to dig a hole and put her old shield in it, making them swear that they would lead her armies to this very spot and reclaim her ancestral Empire.

Time went by and her ideas of the world changed, but every year she would make her men repeat this oath. The oath to kill the people of the Axe that stood between them and her ruined treasure. The people that had now turned their backs to the kingdoms and openly showed supported the Rebellion laughing at the steady decline of the Darleans.

Caroline was still looking at the ceiling when she realised someone was knocking on her door. She rested her sword on her bedside and quickly ran her fingers through her hair, in an attempt to brush them as she opened the door her shield still gripped by her hand.

As she opened the door, a teenage girl with hair that was the colour of the morning sky and huge violet eyes wrapped her arms around her, her own white gown wrapping around her developing teenage body. "Carolineeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee, if I knew you were here I would have visited you sooner!" she screamed at the top of her lungs, laughing as she held her close.

"How are you, little one?" Caroline smiled and placed her lips against her sister's hair, her shield still in her hand as she wrapped her arms around Diana.

"I just got back from my studies with the Priest, we learned about ice magic today! Isn't that amazing? Did you know that Ice can be used to wake the Dead? Or that any Ice Wizard is also a Water Wizard but that it doesn't go the other way around? Or that there were Ice Wizards who could freeze time?" the girl asked another million questions, but Caroline simply cracked a smile.

She had missed her little sister over the years but later that same night, she found herself resenting the youngling.

Even though the Kingdom of Darlan banned magic from its lands, the royals always sent a Royal Child to study it in the Kingdom of Alexandria. This was a way to strengthen relationships between the Kingdoms.

Caroline reflected that she could have been the one learning about ice magic on that day, but even the mention of the dresses she had to wear to meet the former King's expectations of what a princess should be made her want to pierce a knife through her skull.

She and her father could only agree on one thing. Caroline was a warrior as she had fought in the Civil War (a war that was still taking place in the political landscape of Darlan), even though she avoided killing a man herself. But the thirst was there.

The two sisters sat down and talked for hours, except that it was Diana who did all the talking about her life and her friends and the evil Rebels that attacked the noble family of Alexandria. She talked about the evil peasants who dared raise their arms against the nobility and how they were led by someone who didn't earn his title. That of the Last Darlean.

Caroline felt like she was talking to someone brainwashed, someone who wasn't from the fierce land of Darlan, that was known for respecting anyone who had the will to fight. She was talking to someone from the Kingdom of Alexandria, someone who believed that war was only noble if it was started by the nobles that believed in Naem, the All-seeing god.

That made her sick, but Caroline didn't utter a word, instead, she closed her mouth and waited for hours to pass until dawn when she had to be present for the new Queen's crowning.

By midnight, she had sent her sister off to her chamber and talked a maid into preparing her a last-minute bath by boiling the water in it. She entered the water slowly, wearing nothing but her necklace. One which shone through the water with its dim bronze light. By that point, she had sent all the maids away and waited for her skin to start feeling numb before she even thought of getting out of the now cold water.

Without putting on any clothes, she laid on her bed and murmured the tune of her Kingdom's hymn, ready to fight her way through waves of enemies to defend it. Why would her sister change so much in only two years? Caroline couldn't understand.

By sunrise of the next day she hadn't slept, she had just cleaned the Royal shield and played with her necklace. She was smelling her clean hair in the process, coupling them around her lips, behind her ears or under her nose as she ran her fingers across the necklace.

Until the sun rose she had murmured battle songs and continued her journal, which she was going to pass down to her firstborn child in Darlean tradition. She wrote about her dreams, the dreams she had since her 7th name day, the dreams she was ready to kill millions of people for.

When she heard the first rooster calling the sun, she put on her dress and armour and raised a cloak over her head, to hide her face from the unworthy generals of the Kingdom that couldn't even defeat a handful of farmers.

She strapped her arm in the shield and took one last look in the mirror and thought about letting her sister turn her hair into a dark red, to give her a colour that nobody else in the world ever had or ever will have.

She laughed at the thought and strapped a dagger in her belt, before opening the door of her room, ready to march out. In front of her, soldiers, maids, stewards and priests frantically ran up and down the hallways, preparing feasts and escorting the Officers and the other Diplomats to the main hall. Others carried trumpets and banners and prepared the long line that would greet the Queen inside the Great hall. It was a chaos she could watch for endless moons but she had been called to somewhere the day before.

A servant came to her, offering directions, but she didn't want to go to the Great hall. Instead, she headed down a long hall, passing the portraits of countless Kings, Queens and merchants, and up the stairs, to find a huge door at the end of them. A door engraved with runes. A door that was made of pure gold. A door that her men would die by thousands to obtain. Such was their lack of loyalty in the face of gold.

Two guards stood in front of that door, wearing the red tunics and the helmets of their legion. They held their pikes in a crossed formation to guard their future Queen. She laughed heartlessly and then eyed them both. "Tell Titanya that the Darlean don't like to wait too long", she hissed at them. One of them, the taller one, entered the room, before coming out mere seconds later. He whispered something to the other guard and let his pike sit in a position that allowed her to pass through. "Good boy!" she exclaimed, before laughing at him and entering the room, only to see the Princess looking out the window.

Her golden hair was braided over her green dress and her shiny green eyes were fixed upon her gardens. Titanya was taller than you'd imagine her to be when you first hear about her. And prettier, oh, so much prettier than you'd imagine, Caroline envied her for that but she couldn't help but smile when she saw her. "You know, I was never even born to be the Queen", she said, without ever taking her shiny green eyes off the garden.

"Seems you were destined to be Queen, then", Caroline answered, smiling under the shadow of her Cloak. " Naem wills it".

Titanya sighed and took a sip off what seemed to be a cup filled with wine from the East. "Naem wills it", she gave a bitter laugh. "Just as he willed the death of my father! In the hands of its own Counsel nonetheless..." and with that she dried the inside of the cup, gulping it down and letting no drop go to waste.

Her cheeks were fired up and her eyes were sprayed with redness, Caroline could see that she hadn't slept either. "At least your father died in battle and in the name of Naem, there is no greater honour than that. Now, it is our turn to fight his fight, we've to get you ready to be a Queen".

Titanya smiled, but when Caroline tried to touch her she nudged her off. "You should be the one up there, always so calm, yet fierce at the same time. How do you do that?" she said with a sad smile crossing her face, with her sharp nose pointing down at it.

And with that, she remembered the days she had spent here with her when they were children. She remembered playing the Knight to save the Princess of Alexandria and then get 'married' to her. She also remembered a young son of a merchant tying their hands to an oak tree, as was the custom in marriages, before her lips touched the one's of Titanya playfully, thinking they were kissing.

"This is your kingdom, Titanya. Additionally, once you see your first battle you will follow my example, the fewer words the better", Caroline rushed her words out and prepared to take them back before the Queen gave her a drunken smile.

"I will fight the Rebels myself! Lead my men to victory!" she pointed her fist in the air, laughing. To that, Caroline shivered, the screams of her men ringing in her ears. It was true that the Darleans respected war, but they didn't like it, unlike most men thought. But most of all, the Darlean people didn't like weak leaders and this Queen was just that.

But instead of saying anything, she shook her head and grasped the knife on her belt, before looking down to the marble floor. Why did her father let this Kingdom survive? It was always caught in civil war, it didn't have a big army, although it did have the most infamous cavalry in the world, and it didn't have strong, albeit mad, Kings like himself, why would he leave it be?

She'd have to go back and ask him to march inside it. Or she could start a war right here and now. She dropped the cloak from her brown hair and looked at the ceiling. "Is this your will?", she whispered, her voice slightly shaking with the fear of Naem.

Titanya was now looking at her, her head tilted and her golden hair falling over her left shoulder. Caroline couldn't make out her expression with her peripheral vision, but she knew she was confused. She could have killed her right there but then she remembered her vows to her. The vows she had made as her loyal knight when they were children.

She let the dagger sit on her belt and smiled at the Queen. "You need to prepare, my lady. I shall observe you from the crowd" and with a bow, the young princess of Darlan, third daughter of the Royal couple, stopped herself from killing one of the noblest women in Cartago by stepping out of the room. Afterwards, she would grumble about failed Kingdoms under her breath, storming through the halls like a ghost that used to live in them. But now, she was pleased with her choice.

Now, nobody was running through the halls, which gave her time to inspect the red carpet across the floor and the paintings of each individual ruler on the wall. She went forth, between the pillars that led to the garden and the wall where her room was at, before turning left and looking at the back door of the Great hall. She need not disturb the Trumpeteers by letting them cheer for her.

Why would I want to kill her? she thought while scenarios ran through her head. She didn't pay the portraits much attention, even though it was a thing she always wanted to do. Something she hadn't done as a child. With these thoughts in mind, she pushed a small red door open and sighed, stepping in.

After entering the room, she saw a crowd, a crowd of more than a hundred officers, dressed in golden and brown, admirals, dressed in blue, white and black and Diplomats, dressed in their Kingdom's colours. She couldn't see across the room, or even at the ceiling, because of the light that came out of the windows.

She hissed a curse under her breath and made her way to the middle of the room, to the front row, pushing the people out of her way with her shield, just to find her way in front of an altar to Naem.

She smiled when she noticed the Goblet with the ashes of the dead King and waited for the Queen to come and take her role. She felt two pairs of eyes stuck on her side, before raising her cloak over her face again.

With her hand laying on her dagger and her mind punishing her for the decision she made in the Queen's room, she now prepared for what she knew was coming.

The two sets of eyes on her now shifted around the room and she got a chance to glance back at them. They were a white-haired boy who wore the gold uniform of the Generals and a, no more than half a dozen years older than the General, young man who wore the navy, white and black uniform of the Admirals. The latter also wore a black hat with a red feather on it and a belt of weapons that she had never seen before. The admiral's eyes shone under the shadow of his hat, their mix of sea-green and icy-blue chilling her soul, making her want to punch him in the face.

She shrugged her thoughts off and looked up front before the trumpets started chanting. They were hurting her ears, something she was used to feeling during battle.

The Queen started marching in the room, letting her notice the throne behind the altar for the first time. Caroline inspected it thoroughly, looking at the various creatures on the throne. But she did not know what they were and simply got confused by them. She liked being confused, it meant that she had more to learn.

The throne itself was majestic, too majestic. The back was shaped like a heart and it was made of gold, silver and platinum, with diamonds, emeralds and sapphires integrated within it. She found herself hating on the complexity of the design, but she would have to accept that this kingdom wasn't her own. But most of all, she had to accept that she could change its patterns in the middle of the Queen's coronation.

Behind the Queen came a stewardess, dressed in clothes inappropriate for anyone, even a slave. With a rusty armour on the top and just a flag of the kingdom, with a red background and two stripes across it, one horizontal and one vertical, to cover her feet. Her red wavy hair was braided with mud and dirt as if she was on garden duty just a moment ago. She was holding the Queen's dress high while her cheeks flared red through the mud and her large grey eyes pointed to the ground.

She felt a strange chill around her as if winter suddenly arrived in the lonely port city of Alexandria. She looked behind her to investigate, but all she saw was nothing. Nothing but men laughing with roars as loud as boars.

She looked in front of her again and saw the Angels dive from the sky, holding harps and other instruments while one wore heavy armour. This was the Council, she knew much about the Council. Or rather, enough to wholeheartedly hate them.

In a mask of disgust and pain, she decided to shut off any thoughts about the Council and their ways, deciding to close her eyes and sleep through the ceremony.

Hours seemed to pass until she first heard the Common tongue again after she had rowed through the endless Naemese prayers by thinking of a huge meal worth of her status that she hadn't gotten in weeks.

But the voice wasn't the one she expected. It wasn't the Queen, promising things that she couldn't give to the people, it was a man, the same man who's aura seemed to chill her soul to the bone and he didn't sound that bad.

For one, even though she couldn't make much of his Northern accent, she realised he had knowledge of Naemese, an art that was exclusive to the Angels, because, by the tone of his voice, he seemed to be questioning what the prayers said.

The armoured Angel called for the guards, something the drunken Queen couldn't really do. The stewardess punched a guard in the face, taking his crossbow and shooting him in the throat. Chaos emerged everywhere, but she knew what she had to do. She ran past the man, raised her shield and pulled her dagger out, ready to protect the now somehow fallen Queen.

The admiral was slowly walking towards the Queen, one of those new weapons pointed at the angel's direction. "I am here-". The ground shook before he could finish the sentence and some metal object hit against some wall of the castle. The man punched towards the ground, spikes rising around them all.

In a manner of seconds, his ice had killed a man and she watched him scream towards his death. The ice had pierced his armour and the insides of his body would soon be running out if the ice melted. Or rather, when the ice melted, Caroline thought.

As the man approached closer, he mumbled something about a ship and a Crest- or was it Cresselya?- she didn't know. He flung his right wrist and a knife-blade emerged from his blue coat, and flew into his hand, ready to cut her down. She could hear Diana calling for her and men getting slaughtered, but she couldn't see anything, the ice was just too high.

The Queen squinted her eyes to look at the man, but he was too well hidden by his shadow, with only his eyes and his smile showing behind it. "And to think I only came here to congratulate you and give your throne a light kick", he said and with that he flung his wrist forward, his blade thrusting through the air, followed by a chain that allowed him to control it.

Caroline jumped in front of the Queen, her shield blocking a hit that could be fatal. The dagger went through the shield, allowing the man to pull the chain and her with him.

With overwhelming force and probably the help of magic, the man pulled her body to him. Then, when she thought she could stab him with her dagger, he started slamming the shield against her face repeatably.

She tried to stop him, but instead, she felt her nose and her mouth bleeding, her muscles powerless against him, unmovable. As if the man controlled the blood inside her veins, making her stand still.

With one last hit following all the others, her body found its way to the ground, her vision slowly darkening and the cold marble floor rubbing against her face, letting the blood create a pool around her face, one that she hoped to drown in. And the reason was simple, she had been beaten.