Throne of Power: Ascendance

2. When Diplomacy Fails...

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.