To Come Home

Chapter 2: Coronation Day

*Seven years ago in Yssagar, Phentyllia: Phenra County*

"You have to do this Tyssa. Come on. It'll be over in minutes." My mom said as she tried to pry me out of the closet.

"please Mama, don't make me go out to him! To them!"

"Please Tyssa, don't be difficult!"

"Mama please! I really don't want to see him!"

"Tyssa please, he's your father, you don't mean that!"

"I do mean it, please mama, please!" I screamed through tears. But of course my mom was much stronger than my 13 year old self was, and with one whispered rhyme, my body flew itself out the closet and flung me to my knees. My mom pulled me up and we walked out the room arm in arm. I wiped my tears with my free arm and forced myself to walk. I always struggled to walk in that dress; it was a very long, velvet black dress, encrusted with rubies and diamonds at the collar and rims, and dragging far behind me. The back of the dress was encrusted in sapphire with the kingdom's crest – a tree. It was my Coronation day.

I never wanted to be princess you see. I only ever saw the bad that our government did, the selfishness that they fostered, the hate that they bred within themselves. I always saw this day as the end to my freedom. The day that a lifetime of rules and responsibilities would be imposed upon me with no escape – I would no longer belong to myself, but rather to the kingdom, a kingdom which was starting to fall apart. But, those were blasphemous thoughts to have in the kingdom of Phentyllia. My mom always knew what I was thinking, and tried her very best to protect me and my defiant thoughts from my father. She succeeded for as long as she lived, which wasn't very long after that day.

My mom's fiery auburn hair glistened under the warm firelight of the chandeliers, her grip on my arm was very firm, as if to stop me from trying to run away again, it almost hurt. We walked halfway down the long, marble stairway, the railings made of gold, and adorned with diamonds and sapphires. My father stood strong and bold at the bottom of the staircase, same serious look he always had tattooed onto his face. He was wearing a long, velvet red robe, encrusted with diamonds on all the rims and all the way down the opening, and under he wore a black combination of silk pants and a silk blouse, with sapphire buttons. His tall, diamond wand stood strong beside him, almost as tall as him, and certainly as powerful. Behind him stood all my living blood relatives, all in red, all wearing the sapphire kingdom crest: my elder brother, my aunt and uncles, my nieces and nephews, altogether they must've made 16 in total; as well as pieces of the dead, their ashes had been scattered all over the royal grounds in preparation for the ceremony, as was custom.

I could tell my father was enraged, even from 20 steps above him I could tell. I had delayed the schedule by a couple minutes with my little fit, and it was crucial that our timing lined up with the phases of the moon. But this was a holy ceremony, there was no time for his anger, nor for my doubt. So for the next hour, we both held it in.

I continued to descend down the rest of the staircase, my mother's hand in mine, as my whole family chanted our people's Holy Prayer repeatedly:

Let your worries get wisped away by Her holy winds,

Let your sins burn away in Her holy fire,

Let your soul be cleansed in Her holy waters,

And let your heart be reborn in Her holy earth.

Each family member held a different element: either a jar of wind captured from atop the highest mountain in Phentyllia, a candle lit by the sun's direct light, a golden cup filled with water from the Holy Waterfall, or golden bowls filled with earth from the oldest soil in the kingdom. They kept most of this stuff stocked and locked away in the Coronation Chambers, most of it collected years ago, even before I was born. It was a part of the castle I was never allowed access to.