Grey Oaks

Chapter 1: March 19th, 1971

The day that the crown princess of Gwynival and her unborn daughter were assassinated, the country fell into panic.

Parliament scrambled to enact protocols set with this exact occurrence in mind. The members of the royal family were notified of a threat to national security and were scattered to the four corners of the kingdom. All with their own personal security and military details.

Of course, the elderly and ailing Queen was the last to be notified of her daughter's death.

Some may think it cruel, but her topmost trusted advisers would say otherwise. Matters as delicate as this were to be treated as ten times as delicate when relayed to Her Majesty. Especially with her in her 90's.

Queen Regina Edwina Managwald would say to hell with them all. However, her opinion hardly mattered these days.

Outwardly she sobbed and broke and railed against her daughter's assassins. She ordered those involved to be found and killed on sight- though she knew they would be arrested and tried and inevitably found guilty and be put to death. She raged against her maids and threw handmade silver and fine china to shatter against the hand painted walls of her chambers decorated with hand painted portraits. It all meant nothing. It meant everything.

Inwardly she recognized the pros and cons of having the line of succession so uprooted. It was a cold and calculated thought, but as queen, she was accustomed to having them and, more importantly, enacting them. It was her duty to find a way forward through everything. Even this nightmare.

Her daughter wasn't the strongest in the family. Not by a long shot. After the Queen's son-in-law had passed to lung cancer just a few short months prior, the middle-aged Princess Josephine had stepped up to the plate even while pregnant. Still, she failed to see the complexities of the job she would inherit. She was a strong idealist but a weak politician. Ill-equipped to handle scandal or to, more importantly, stand to the side and stay silent when required.

Regina's nephew, Bernard Managwald the Earl of Glynpwll, was the perfect heir. He would now be her heir due to succession laws. All his children were now subjected to the same heavy weight of the crown that, for the time, lay on Regina's head.

Bernard Managwald was a strong politician and was well liked by the country for his work in humanitarian efforts- specifically for his work with the homeless and hungry. His marriage to an Indian aristocrat strengthened the countries' bond and strengthened a long-since desegregated Gwynival.

Regina often bristled at her nephew's obvious disregard for decorum and his own place above society, but Regina admired her nephew's bravery at defying the status quo in the family. He represented the new generation. He thought the same way as the growing majority of the country. He knew how to communicate with them. To relate to them. Even though his dead father's sister was the Queen of their kingdom.

To Bernard, he recognized that 1971 Gwynival couldn't be the same as the Gwynival of centuries past. Regina respected that, although she didn't often respect his views.

After destroying nearly every material object in her chambers, Regina, chest still heaving with sobs, stood to her full height. She shoved away hands that tried to push a cane towards her. At 93 years old, Her Majesty Queen Regina walked out of her palace unsupported for the first time in years.

She declined to wipe her tears away as she stepped towards her motorcade. Her chin stood high. Her shoulders drew themselves back. Not a hair nor wrinkle were out of place. Whatever cameras were present would see humanity through her tears and her role as Queen through her stance.

She was the last royal left in the city.

Almost the last.

"Take me to her," the Queen told her head of security who squeezed himself into the backseat of the nondescript car alongside Regina.