Red Queen Fan Fiction - Red Huntress

Chapter 2

Deep in thoughts, Diana almost botched her handshake ritual with Madeline when her little sister arrived. Madeline smiled off her irritation, so Diana returned to her pondering, even as she chewed on her bread.

It was one of the rare truly hot and sunny days in the northern Lakelands, and it had rained the days before. So, were the Silver storms and nymphs even needed to prepare the soil for the corvee, or would the plants grow with the powers of the greenies just as well?

Finished with her meal, Diana glanced at her mother to mention her doubts. Maybe they were seeing this too negatively? But the words died on her tongue as she saw Mama occupied with chatting and giggling with Madeline.

Typical. Her mother – both her parents – freely shared their worries with Diana, the elder, while they continued to pamper Madeline. When Diana had been seven, as Madeline was now, she had already taken care of her baby sister, on her own, when their parents were at work.

So it was still, when Mama had a double workload for herself. Even last winter, after the evening Mama miscarried the baby they couldn't afford. She'd left Diana and Madeline behind to go hunting again at the next dawn.

Although that night, all three of them had fallen asleep arm in arm, hugging each other and holding tight. Not only Mama and Madeline ...

Diana sighed, taking a sip and using another splash to moist her face. She got up, looking for Giselle or another friend when her mother spoke.

"Diana, please help Madeline carry the baskets back to the village," Mama told her.

Taking a breath, she prepared to argue. Madeline stood at their mother's side, holding her hand, just like Diana had little time before. Jealousy added itself to this day's general frustration.

But when Mama grabbed her shoulder, Diana could only nod. No wonder. Clara Farley was too formidable to be denied.

"Sure," Diana agreed.

Madeline didn't stop talking on their way back to the village. It was one way to pass the long road home by listening to Madeline's stories about their aunt Heather's kids, who Madeline was closer to as they shared an age.

That still did little about Diana's dim mood, though. Everything became clearer to her today. It had always been a burden how distant everything was, yet she only realized its weight right now. The vastness of the fields, to provide for the village just the needed amount of crop, cost its habitants a lot, in labour, time and energy. It was like they were always working or walking somewhere, with no time for anything else that the lords – or the villagers themselves, probably – would call "unnecessary".

Diana hated she didn't have even the option to try it out, whatever, "it" could be.

"And?" Madeline inquired. "Any Silvers showed up already?"

Diana snorted.

"Oh please!" Madeline insisted. "I can't believe you saw nothing. Was it the queen? Tell me it was the queen!"

Diana stopped dead. "The what?!"

"Queen Cenra, the nymph?"

Diana laughed, but Madeline wouldn't let her curiosity die. "You know, I kinda imagined ..."

"What?" Diana said sharply. Couldn't she be spared this? "Why do you have to be like this? So ... so ..." But she didn't know like what. There had to be a word, Diana was sure, but no one had bothered to tell her, and likely the new queen didn't want her to learn it. The Cygnets had never shown themselves interested in the northern Red peasants, even less in their education.