Can I have Your Daughter?

Chapter 19

Margret sobbed softly, Gilthunder standing next to her with his head hung. Veronica stood not far away with tears streaking her face.

The throne room was quiet aside from the soft crying of the first and second princess' of Lyoness. A quiet that stifled out hope. The light that poured through the glass paned windows was cold even with the warm summer air blowing in from outside.

King Bartra sat stock-still, his face pale, jaw slack from the pure shock of it all. This couldn't be true.

The Seven Deadly Sins knelt in front of him on their knees in the presence of the kind of Lyoness, heads all hung, eyes cast across the ground. The knights he had cast out had come back for a single purpose...

Bartra broke his gaze of the heads of the sins to look in his palm at the little box. Inside, cradled by soft white cloth was a blue earring bearing the royal crest. His fingers reached for it but hesitated. He couldn't touch the little earing; he just couldn't bring himself to do it.

Merlin looked up at him, her usual molten gaze filled with mischief, was now cold and mournful, "We did everything we could but..." she paused unable to say it out loud.

Gowther was the next to raise his head, "We were never able to recover their bodies."

The sins all flinched at the words spoken so carelessly, and Margret's sobs grew in volume before Gilthunder pulled her into his arms.

The sins rose from their place on the ground, looking between each other. There were not seven of them standing in front of king Bartra. There were five. The sins were captain-less. Diane had streaks down her cheeks from crying, King and Ban both looking more defeated than they ever had before.

"And what of the Prince from Direneth?"

Merlin offered what little of a smile she could under the circumstances, "You do not need to fear war, your highness." Is all she offered him. But it did little to brighten the situation. His daughter was gone. "Our sincerest condolences..." She offered then, knowing how little it meant.

"How did they...?" He asked, but no one in the throne room wanted the answer.

Merlin hesitated, and the other sins avoided all eye contact. It was again Gowther who spoke up, "We believe that they drowned. After being thrown from-" He was suddenly elbowed roughly by Ban, as Elizabeth's sisters gasped to the side. A warning passed over Ban's face for the pink haired man to shut his mouth.

King Bartra's eyes fell to the earing in the box, and finally, he dumped the little trinket into his palm. His heart had been breaking since the moment the sins had announced their return from the north. Now all he had was this little orb.

His daughter was really gone...

The sins all bowed to him and the princesses again, and everyone but Merlin turned to leave. "We have made a grave in her memory on the hill over-looking the lake just south of the capital. You should visit it, your highness. It might... help ease your mourning. The Boar Hat has settled there for the time being." With that, she too turned and left the throne room.

The walk out of the castle and capital back to the Boar Hat was quiet. There was nothing left to say. They had done what they needed to, and now they were free...

It was a few days before Bartra could muster enough strength to leave the castle to visit the lake just south of the capital, his daughters hadn't had the heart to come pay their respects yet, so he was alone.

The carriage ride was lovely as he passed through the countryside vibrant with wildflowers in full bloom. That beauty did not reach him, though. His world had been shaken to its core, and had it not been for Margret and Veronica, he would have lost sight of his sanity already.