A Kind Of Bravery: A Mulan Retelling [1st Draft]

4. A Plan

Chapter Four:

A Plan

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"I'm sorry, Harriet, but you can't go," Clara said as she absentmindedly turned the pages on her newest book on raising children.

"What do you mean I can't go?" Harriet asked her face covered in a scowl as she took in the relaxed form of her sister on one of the yellow settees in the East Tower sitting room. "I have been waiting to have my chance at being a knight since I was ten! I've earned this! I've worked hard for over seven years, and now that I have the chance you are saying I can't go?"

"Harriet, if it was anything else you know I would be more than happy to let you go, but this isn't a tea party you are asking to go to. You are asking for permission to enlist as a soldier. You are not even old enough to enlist."

"Oh so it has nothing to do with the fact that I'm not a male then?" Harriet said, sarcasm covering each word thoroughly. Clara let out an audible sigh while Harriet kept her arms crossed tightly over her chest.

What was one year extra of age, of time? She had been training to be a knight since she was thirteen years old. She had more training than probably over a half of the soldiers already enlisted, and yet, all the same, because she was twenty and a female she wasn't allowed to fight for her country.

"Harriet, I will admit that is part of the problem, but not because Frederick and I think that you, as a young woman, are not good enough. It has more to do with the fact that as the lone female in the military you would need special quarters, special armor, clothing, weapons, even a different bathing station. Not to mention, how would we explain to everyone why it is that the only woman allowed to participate in the war just happens to be the sister-in-law to the king?"

"That sounds like a load of sh-"

"Harriet, please!" Clara cut in before Harriet could swear, using one of the words that she had learned from being around the other knights.

"Come on! It has everything to with the fact that you are worried of what the other members of court will say! Not to mention, the fact you are needlessly worried! I'll be fine!"

"Oh really? Are you all-knowing now?" Clara said, her grey eyes zeroing in on Harriet's matching pair. "Can you promise me, right this instant, that you won't get hurt? You're not exactly going to be stitching embroidery and picking daisies. You will be killing other people, other human beings. Are you ready for that?"

The room plunged into silence and as a cloud passed over the sun outside, the sitting room they were in was darkened to reflect the mood and tension. Harriet had no answer to that. She had absolutely nothing to say, because right at that moment, she knew as soon as the words left Clara's mouth that she wasn't ready to kill another person. However, that wasn't to say she wanted to give up on her crusade to join the war effort.

"No, I'm not," Harriet answered, her voice stiff, before turning on her heel and slamming the door of the sitting room with as much as strength as she could.

Her jaw clenched and unclenched periodically as she weaved around numerous servants, her eyes narrowed as her head spun with the after-effects of her discussion with her sister.

She might not be ready to be end someone's life, but a part of her told her that maybe she would get used to it. Maybe she would get used to the idea of taking another's life, but as she remembered how just the night before she had witnessed the final moments of Daniel Martin, the messenger with a wife and two children, she wondered if she could ever become so cold-hearted as to not care.

Every man would have someone waiting for them at home. A best-friend, a mother, a sister, a wife, a son, every man, highborn or peasant, would have someone hoping for their return. She wanted to be a knight, to protect her country, her home, but was she brave enough to kill another person to allow for her people to live?