The Art Of Queens

SAMWELL

SAMWELL

Samwell Fyrstone awoke with his wife watching over him. As he peeked through his blurry eyelashes, he saw her restless face relax from worrying. He reached out and touched it. It was so soft, softer than anything he could remember and even more beautiful than the last time he saw her. Her long straight blonde hair shimmered in the evening sun the way polished gold shimmered to the eyes of thieves. She was no more than thirty and eight, no taller than almost six feet, and Samwell felt she was perfect.
Sometimes he wondered if it was wrong to love a woman so much after what had happened with Duragoseth and Kereen and he feared that Nyreter would take Erica away from him as he once did when Duragoseth burned her to ashes. Samwell was an honest man who tried his best in every way possible to live in peace with everyone especially the gods. He built a Vaunt outside his castle where he would often go to worship them, and they rewarded him with peace that was coming to an end his advisors told him earlier this morning. Erica took his hand and brushed it against her cheek, then she kissed it. Tears streamed down her face and she smiled.
“They said you were going this time, but I prayed…I prayed to Nyreter to not take you as yet and he answered.” She whispered. Samwell wiped the tears from her pink face.
“I will not leave until our son has come to know us.” He whispered back with more air than words. He knew that his time was near, he could feel it in his soul but somewhere in his heart he felt as if it was not his time as yet. Erica kissed his lips.
“And he will love us, you will teach him to ride horses, walk bows and fight…you will teach him to rule.” She had a dream. Samwell knew she was hoping for the best and he understood, but what worried him most was that if he died and left no sons behind, the savaged east would stand a greater chance of destroying this continent if the Rushaydes leading the attack failed for now. The eastern world was a reluctant people and Samwell knew their abilities well from tales men carried here with them.
The thought of his daughters being raped and killed pained his heart more than any man or god could imagine, and he did not want other fathers to share the pain of this thought. A better plan to save his kingdom and his family always sat at the bottom of his mind but he never actually thought he would need to use it. He decided to take Medicinel Tennant’s personal advice and give the order.
“Yes we will share those memories when we are old.” He lied.
“My heart, I need your opinion on this matter before I share it with my council.” He told her.
“What is it?” Erica asked with willing eyes.
“We are not sure if you are carrying a son and if I die then I will just leave many daughters behind and a woman cannot rule…not alone at least.” He explained.
“No you will not die and if this child is not a boy then you can keep putting more children inside me until one is born, and even after…you will not die Sam do not say these things, please.” She pleaded. She raised his sheets and moved into his bed to cuddle with him.
“Erica listen to me, I am dying whether or not we accept it. I need to ensure you and the girls are safe just in case I die sooner than expected. Send riders to the five divisions inviting my wardens and their first true born sons to court, they must wed my daughters and if I die before they arrive please ensure they marry. Kings like Evvan Rushayde might show up soon after I am gone.” He explained. He could see this was the last thing Erica expected to hear and it worried her heart, but he thought it was for the best. King Evvan Rushayde had already destroyed the royal house of the Surranathaynes that ruled Bezaly. His savage armies raped the women of the lands and murdered the men and children who refused to convert their faith from The Three to Aspyranity. If these men sailed here, it would bring chaos and an end for millions.
“Sam, we have never met the current…versions, of your wardens’ children, you cannot be sure this will turn out good for your children and mine?” She told him.
“I have known the wardens since I was a slave child Erica, I almost grew up with them, they are the only friends I have, that’s why I named them wardens of the divisions. I think they should produce fine sons…” He did not finish.
“That was a long time ago Sam people can change.”
“We haven’t. Please Erica it’s the only way.” Samwell told her.
“Most of them are my daughters too Sam and I will not approve of this.” Before Erica could finish, Samwell coughed blood. Her heart almost hopped out of her, Sam saw it in the way she panicked and cried for help.
“Please Erica.” He begged her on breaths that felt like his last.
“Alright.” Erica told him as tears bled down her red cheeks.
“They have my blessings.” She assured him.
Tennant whisked into the room making haste as he searched through the medicine box. He poured a powdered herb into some water and fed it to his king.
“Essence of the moon plant.” Samwell whispered and quickly Erica pulled a tiny bottle from her pocket to feed him, but Tennant stopped her.
“No need my queen I will give mine, it is fresh.” He turned her down with a smile.
“But I made it today myself.” Erica told him but Tennant had already dripped a single drop in Sam’s mouth.
“You are blessed with a good queen your grace, she prepares your food and your medicines, she is a rare kind you found.” He chuckled. Samwell saw the disappointment on her face as she watched Tennant and his eyes closed softly as the medicine relaxed his mind. The chamber grew quiet after Tennant had left. In his hand was Erica’s, it felt like love, a weakness that was his strength.
“He is a better advisor than he is at making jokes Erica.” He whispered. Her fingers interlocked with his and she kissed his hand.
“There is something I should have told you since it happened…” Samwell listened, it was easy to do, but no words followed after those. He peeked through his eyes to see her breaking face, and the deep sleep from his medicine flowed through his veins carrying his consciousness away into darkness.















KORYANN
Koryann was a bright one they always said, ever since she was a small girl, but no one was as smart as Hashardeths. They were too clever for their own good and ended up being murdered by the lesser intelligent people. Books, rumors and stories told by her handmaid Ganisa spoke tales of how hideous Hashardeths were. Scrawny marked skinned women forbidden to wear any form of clothing with teeth like knives, eyes like black holes, tongues like a snake’s with hair like wool. They were monstrous creatures that lived in caves, but clever. They read everything there was. Stones, trees, animals, everything that carried wisdom or experience and she wanted to be like them, just not as ugly, but what was beauty compared to wisdom; she thought. Koryann would spend days and nights locked away in the library or her room reading just about everything that held keys for the doors of the outside world. Knowledge was power, and power was control. If she had enough power one day, she could contact the gods and use their help to set the world straight.
She could find out the truths of life and may even find ways to cure sicknesses, end hunger and may even raise the dead. She could even bring Sauna’s mother back in to the world if she became as wise as the Hashardeths. She was dedicated to becoming one, she even taught herself six different languages before she was twelve. Koryann was remarkable in truth. Most of her sisters were excited that they would be married soon to the sons of the wardens but Koryann had no interest in those things. All she needed was a book to hold to keep her happy.
The east sails for the west she heard, her mother assured her and her sisters to not worry for they would be safe, but the safety of the people beyond the castle walls worried her. The men going to battle would die, maybe not all of them, but some would die all the same. If she was a Hashardeth this could have been avoided and the people on both sides would be united as one at the end of the day. History proved that humans lived to fight for it was the only way they got anywhere in the world. The victors of war achieved power, the kings at the top, the lords after him, then the soldiers and their weapons. If there was just one thing to understand from this chain, it was the way power was achieved through war. No man wanted to die, and for their lives they fought, life is power, and power is blood. Like her father Samwell in his younger days, but he fought for the lives of his people.
Whenever Koryann read strange books and learnt from them, everyone else would tell her to read facts and not let paper deceive her childish mind. She stopped trying to explain why she believed in what she did a long time ago and now she just kept her thoughts to herself. No one asked her anything, and she said nothing to anyone…Except the shadows. She knew what she was meant to do, who she was to become and she was going to fulfil her destiny on her own, or with the shadows at least.
Inside her room she sat on her bed. It resembled a library Ganisa would say, but to her it resembled power, but not enough.
Hundreds of books were scattered and stacked everywhere, she would have taken some of them back to the castle library, but sometimes she found linked information in multiple books, sometimes stories from completely opposite sources were found and they all spoke the same tales, most in different tongues and some in hieroglyphics. Like common tales of the dragons of Grithantis before her father eradicated them and renamed the continent to Volryvansys, the legend of the Bezalyn Phoenix, the myth of the White Phoenix of hell and the greatest myth of all, the ghosts of the Hashardeths. The ghosts of the Hashardeths was the biggest myth of all, all the others were more likely to be true they said, but Koryann believed in that one more than all, for the ghosts of the Hashardeths spoke to her through the shadows, she could not understand them, but she knew they were there and they were telling her something.
A knock played her chamber door before it opened. It was her handmaid Ganisa, a fat woman of forty and few, she herself knew not her proper age. She was a former slave somewhere in division Norath, she knew not her parents or family before she came here. Erica chose Ganisa for Koryann sometime ago to help her earn a living honestly to feed her grandchildren. Ganisa’s son became a pirate to plunder the eight seas seven years ago, and he left his four young children in her care. She had not seen or heard from him since…He was probably dead.
“You must eat young lady, look at you, you’re merely skin and bones.” She whisked over by Koryann’s bed. If only she had a copper for every time she heard that. Koryann barely noticed her still. The shadows were moving over each other the way the clouds spooled in the gray skies before a storm. They were trying to show her something, but the chamber was just not dark enough.
“Your mother took precious time away from her day to make you breakfast, the least you should do is have it.”
“Men sacrificed their lives to write these books, the least anyone should do is read them.” Koryann replied without seeing away. Ganisa sat by her and stared at the shadowy corner.
“You must eat child.”
“Because I am hungry or because I am too skinny?” Koryann looked at her.
“Because you will die if you don’t and I will lose my head if that happens, now eat please.” Ganisa told her.
She folded her page and closed the book. The shadows stood still now, because of Ganisa. Ganisa unveiled the waiter she had laid on the bed. Breakfast today was a fruit salad with a side of cabbage. She did not like the idea of eating food that once lived and bled, it was disgusting.
A few mouthfuls of it, and Koryann was filled. She had no more space, not even for the drink. Ganisa begged her to have more but she did not. After she left the chamber with the tray, Koryann closed the window and door, and sat there in the dark staring at blackness for hours. She was sure she was not alone, she could just tell. Sauna called her a witch for doing these things, and told her she would burn alive at the stake someday, hopefully by her hand. But Koryann knew what Sauna’s problem was, she was motherless since birth and father was hardly around when she needed him as a child. That’s what made her this way, but Koryann would fix it someday, someday when she became a shadow queen.
Someone else came knocking…it was Mera. Koryann could not see through walls or doors but she was certain it was her. Who else would bang her door so hard in an endless annoying manner? She fled to open it. She could see through the dark perfectly fine, it was weird but only more proof that Hashardeths were real. Unlocking the door, Mera walked in excited without an invitation. In her right hand she carried a long well wrapped item of some sort.
“This explains you always being locked up in here, you always think its bed time.” Mera found the window and opened it. The bright sun of midday poured through brightly burning the darkness away. Koryann could not get mad at her, she was just another average minded person.
“That’s called the sun, it is good, Flayten’s promise, and it means we should be up and everywhere that is not a bed chamber.” Mera told her.
“Yes that is entirely what it means.” Koryann replied feeling pity for her shadows.
“Why are you here Mera?” She asked and walked back to her bed where it was not so bright and cruel.
“I thought you would be expecting me, with this.” Mera whispered as she unwrapped the long roll of cloth she carried, revealing a cruel looking double bladed axe.
From the heels to the toes of the blades were genuine black Durasteel and from the beards and cheeks to the eye was of common ore boasting a haft of dragon bone. It was at least more than half of Mera’s height and it was the first axe she had seen of a demonic design such as this. It was a weapon crafted for the worst wars indeed, and it needed a brave and strong soldier to wield it. It was of no good here, no good to princesses and ladies Lily would say. Mera’s dark eyes were in love with the dreadful thing, Excitement and thrill glared upon her face.
“He told me you would know what I must do with it.” Mera told her.
“What?”
“The gambler told...” Mera sighed. She placed the axe across Koryann’s lap and sat by her to explain.
“A gambler in Cavery market this morning. I went there with Barry and Grem and then I met him. He was making a lot of money from a game he invented. An easy game I thought, before I played, but I lost six times in a row, and he gave me this axe. Told me it was my reward for losing. When I asked him why I was rewarded for failure, he said your sister Koryann will tell you what you should do with it.”
“He sounds very specific.” Koryann said on the thought. This was a strange thing indeed, but father once had a strange experience before…when he heard he was to become the slayer of dragons.
“He was. So what must I do with it?” Mera asked.
Koryann looked at the well-crafted thing. It was as if she could see the ghosts of the people it killed before, and those whose fates awaited it. She looked to the shadows for an answer, but they forsook her for allowing the light to hurt them. Certain of her words now, she spoke.
“I don’t know…This was meant to kill, and it has killed. The gambler rewarded you with death.”
Mera’s eyes wondered into the thought for a moment. It was the only sense making thought Koryann could agree to.
“Axes weren’t meant to split wood alone, of course it killed. And they say a war is coming, rewarding us the death of our enemies has a nice ring to it. Mera said. She was being too optimistic now, spending too much time with Dyara; Koryann thought.
“Maybe…You should ask father when he awakes, he will know what you should do about it.”
“Wait…You and I are a part of a great plan. Father was merely a boy when a corpse told him what he was to become and he did fulfill the prophecy. What if this is our time after him, his children?” Mera asked. She pulled the axe from Koryann’s lap and stood to wield it. It suited her well enough.
“Our destinies are made by us, not by what they tell us to do. It was father’s choice the road he chose.”
“And this is mine.” Mera replied glaring upon the head of the thing.
“I have a name for it, a name for both blades.” She was excited still. Koryann had a bad feeling about this, there was knowledge to be gained before proceeding. The axe was attached to someone before, a killer, and that killer already named the thing; the Shadows whispered…it is written there; they told her.
“This blade is Questions, and the other is Answers.” Mera said as her index finger followed the edges of the burnt Durasteel blades. What do you think?” She asked. Koryann looked at her with still eyes.
“The shadows say it was already named, by another. By the original owner from hell.”
Mera’s amuse crept from her face. Her eyes wanted to not believe Koryann, but somewhere inside her she did.
“It is engraved beneath the haft.” Koryann told her.
Mera turned the axe down to see the bottom of the handle. She walked over by the window for more light to see well. Her eyes narrowed and shrunk then opened and narrowed again.
“Something is written here.”
“Shadows never lie.” Koryann whispered.
“It says…” Mera’s face opened up from surprise.
“What does it say?”
“The same name I have given it…Questions, and Answers.”