Red Queen One-Shots

The Necklace II - King's Cage

II

He'd only stopped to take a breath in the rush of evacuation after Mare Barrow's capture when Diana sidled along the corridor and caught his gaze. He opened his mouth but didn't know what to say. His daughter looked severe, as usual, but also frail, as heart-broken as at their last meeting.

"Glad you weren't on your way to the Choke yet, Colonel?" she jeered at him in passing, before he could make up his mind.

"And you must be relieved to have stayed behind, too, Captain?" he called after her.

She stopped and turned to him. "Are you calling me a coward, sir?" she jeered, coming closer. "Preferring you had ordered me out of your sight, sir? Or even more to see me failing and getting captured again, sir?"

"Diana – "

"I am sorry for my comrades and I'll do my best to support and to save them, but I'm not sorry to have kept my child out of dan – " she blinked, but the words were already said. Her child. Even her palm had went up, close to touching her abdomen. Almost. She let it drop once she realized, biting her lip and blushing, but balling her fists.

His own shock reverberated in the back of his mind, but he understood how her recent behaviour made sense now, and yet it was hard to believe. Diana ... and the deceased Newblood Barrow boy? He remembered the way she'd talked about him, praising him in death. That wasn't only out of respect, apparently.

"Take it easy then," he said, aghast. She frowned, and his disbelief grew only stronger. What has she gotten herself into with this? He shook his head. "Diana. I expected better. I thought you were too smart to make yet another bad decision, that you would be an asset for the Guard."

For a second, she froze, taken aback. Hurt flashed over her face, joined by red spots, then icy, blazing anger replaced it.

She broke out of it in an instant. She rushed at him, fast and aggressive. He outstretched his arm in defense, but she was too quick, smacked it away. Her left hand took hold of his right, and taking full advantage of his blind left side, she evaded his other hand trying to grab her, so she was about to slap him on the cheek –

She stopped. Her hand was millimetres away from his throat and with her cold and searing glare, it was a threat as intense as if she was holding a weapon. Without looking down, she bent back the fingers of his right hand and squeezed, all of it becoming a warning at him, a demand not to pamper her, not to underestimate how dangerous she continued to be, when she wanted to be.

Her blue eyes were unforgiving, full of despise for him. He remembered the time when they'd looked at the world, even at him, in a completely different way. Now he doubted he would ever see her like that again. She had left behind the girl she had been, back at their home, long ago.

The captain let go, knowing she'd bested him. But her demeanour remained antagonistic and alert, only thinly veiled by forced calm.

"Maybe," she began, "that isn't a bad decision at all. Maybe it's exactly what I want." She stepped back. "A family. And more than ... this," she almost spat, and it was a blow harder than any slap would've been, it was the confirmation that in her eyes, he'd done something unforgivable. But then, she'd never forgiven him for the deaths of Clara and Madeline in the first place.

The corners of her mouth twitched without any amusement. "I'm sorry I lost my temper, sir," she said. "It won't happen again. We're professionals working together for the Scarlet Guard, aren't we?"

And with that, she'd made perfectly clear they'd never again be more than that, more than comrades. He nodded. He'd respect her that much. "Captain," he grunted, "see to the evacuation."

She didn't salute; she merely turned on her heel and left, to rouse the evacuees, including the Barrows, the family she must've chosen in his stead. Already there was something lighter in her step, once the father she'd rejected was out of her sight.