A Dynasty of Gold and Ivory

Prologue: Rhiannon of House Whittaker

Blood and Ivory

It was a pun deep down. All the nobles said so behind closed doors. Not much of a pun but a common negative moniker when the serpents weren't near. The white takers. The takers of the white. Hair and skin of snow and eyes of blood and a serpent of the same colors draped around their collar. Their heiress was adorned with gold and ivory. Her silk gown had been fastened by gold belts, chains, and jewelry. Her gown hung loosely over her arms and legs and her hands were clasped together as if she were praying. Beneath the silk, her snow-white complexion was peppered with violet and navy blotches. Her abdomen, her breasts, her thighs, her neck. There was even a small formation on her cheek.

He thought he was a king. He lived in a castle above the subjects. He had servants that bent to his every command and knights that guarded him. How could he not be a king?

But it was her name that he had. Her colors he wore. Her castle he lived in. Her bed. Her food. Her family that he was invited to. He shared her complexion, but he was not of her blood. He deserved none of her blood.

With the strike of the back of his fist to the bone of her cheek, the lady fell to the ground, catching her fall on her pink hands. Blood blossoms on her lip as she lands at the feet of the royal guards. The guards that had overseen her and her family for generations. Their white armor with gold accents loomed over her. With a hand over their belt, they simply watched as the queen continued to be struck by her husband. They were keen on her survival, not her wellbeing, only her survival.

The youngest of the knights watched intently as the woman fell to the ground but refused to keep still. He had been appointed less than a year before but knew of the beatings for quite some time and knew of the queen's resilience. She fought to get up, but an ivory boot embroidered with a gold serpent had pressed her into the marble floor.

How dare she not give him a son? He accused her of killing their children. Accused her of sabotaging her pregnancies and forcing herself to bleed and expelling nothing but hollow bloodied shells. White babies wrapped in her blood.

She was tired, so tired. She endured all that he threw at her and she's made it this far. So many times she's felt that she shouldn't have survived this long.

He removed his foot and screamed some more obscenities at her. He spat at her and turned his back and screamed something to the servants, who also dressed in white, rushed to his beck and call before being struck.

The lady on the floor rose to her knees and at eye-level, she set her eyes upon the hilt at the young knight's waist. A black scabbard with a gold spiraling serpent. It was her sigil, but she never had the pleasure to have anything other than expensive robes to adorn her family's mark. Her father bought her some of the finest clothes in the land and most of them had already been tarnished by her husband's horrid temper.

Dresses and gowns made of forgotten silk had been destroyed by many of his fits and bursts of anger and through all the years she has grown exhausted at having to find replacements. Due to the lack of production of such garments she only grew angrier.

She watched the gold serpent on his jacket, and it made her tremble. The blood pulsed in her ears and she darted back between him and the blade at the knight's waist. With her lips pressed together, the thoughts that she contemplated began to scare her but the more they ran through her mind the more she considered it, and before she could stop herself her hand was already grasping the hilt.

At first, she only felt it. There was a mix of metal and leather. It was easy to tell where there was gold and where there was silver. Her father never let her touch the weapons that guarded her. He claimed they were not worthy of her touch and that he could get it, he would gift her a sword of solid gold. He didn't though, he couldn't. He died before he could have it made. The plans sat in the war room for a long time before the doors came down.