Tempest

Chapter 4

The days passed slowly, each bringing further deterioration to her father's condition. By the final week of the month, he was bedridden and incapable of moving about. Dasha hated to see him in such a way. He'd always been so strong, but now he could hardly eat.

She looked down at the tray of food in her hand. On it was an array of broths and biscuits, fresh from the kitchens. She'd picked it up only a moment before and carried it now into the room where her parents rested.

She and her mother had been advised to distance themselves from the king so as not to catch the illness themselves, and Dasha tried her best to do so, but her mother dismissed the notion. Gods be damned if they kept her from her husband. Not even Dasha could stop her from visiting him. Even now, she sat in a chair beside him, holding his hand in her slumber.

Looking at their interlocking hands, Dasha noticed something off. Her heart skipped a beat, and cruel realization settled in. His fingers were stiff and seemed almost transparent. The discoloration had been common in recent days due to the illness' tendency to slowly kill the pigmentation in one's skin, but something was different now. An unsettling aura radiated off him, and he lay eerily still.

"Mother..." Dasha said, worry cracking her voice. His face was ghostly white, and his features looked as if they'd been chiseled from stone. "Mother!" she screamed. The Medic ran into the room at the sound of her shout, a Necromancer trailing behind.

Her mother's eyes flew open, startled into waking. The look of confusion on her face suddenly morphed into a deep horror when she looked towards her husband. She leapt to her feet, eyes wide and mouth agape, tearing her hand from his hold. "No," she whispered. It was a silent cry, a mournful kind that came with crippling pain, one that echoed in Dasha's own soul. "No," she repeated, as if it would make his death untrue. "Wake up. Please, wake up." Tears streamed from her eyes, leaving lines like rivers down the terrain of her skin.

Dasha dropped to her knees, wanting to wipe away her mother's tears and comfort her, but despair and shock held her frozen in place. The tray she once held lay on the floor with its contents strewn around her, steaming soup spilling into the wooden boards.

Through waterlogged eyes, she watched the Medic cross the room to her father, trying numerous things to revive him, but the attempts were in vain. With one last apologetic glance to Dasha and her mother, the Medic stepped aside so the Necromancer could prepare the king's soul for the journey to the underworld.

The door slowly pressed open, and a guard stepped inside to inquire over the commotion. Dasha hardly paid him any mind, lost to her own thoughts of grieving, but his presence comforted her. She knew he'd bring others to the scene, and when they came, she wouldn't feel quite so alone. Her mother had the Medic's aid, but Dasha had been left with only her sorrows.

Several minutes passed before the other guards arrived, and she was summoned back to the harsh truth of reality by the clanging of the metal tray she'd dropped a moment before. One of the guards had taken to collecting the contents of it from the floor. He set the stack of bowls and cups aside and waved down another guard that'd entered with fresh food and drink.

"Are you okay?" asked a voice from behind her. Dasha turned her head, eyes locking with those of the squire boy, Prince. She couldn't find an answer in her grief, but the tears that welled in her eyes told plenty.

Warm cloth touched her skin. He'd wrapped something around her shoulders. Familiarity of the action drew recognition to her mind. Draped around her body was the same cloak he'd given her the month before when she'd left the castle to study in the city.

"Something's coming," he whispered, handing her a cup of water from the tray the guard had carried in. "Trust nothing."

Dasha looked cautiously down at the liquid in her cup, wondering if Prince had meant for her not to drink it. She held the cup tightly in her hand, finding comfort in the simplicity of holding something. Her eyes danced around the room, trying to foresee what was coming.