Greenhorn: The Judge

Prologue

The storm raged throughout the mountains. The icy winds threatening to topple the severe and jagged castle nestled in the stony heights. Its sturdy towers completely obscured by the snow. The only signs of life being the faint glow of torches through the thick stone-trimmed window panels... and the screams.

They rang out through the palace halls with no escape. The King listened as his wife cried for him, his body was tense and sweaty from the agony of not being able to run to her side.

"It will be over soon," his mother said as she entered the room. "This is the worst part, but soon you'll have a beautiful baby. An heir."

"Did you ever-" another scream came through the halls. "Did you ever want father with you?"

The Queen Mother paused for a moment, an almost dream-like look on her face as she lingered on the thought. "Not in the beginning. I didn't want anything to do with your father early in our marriage, but when your younger siblings were born I always wanted him there. He never came in the room, but I knew he was just outside, waiting for the instant our baby came into the world."

"What if it's..." the King faded off, his mind going to the worst. He'd been warned, told stories of what happened to children of that kind. He shook his head in denial. That wasn't going to be his fate. Not now.

Kestrel looked at her son, still just a child to her, only a young man of twenty-three. She saw his brows clench together just like her recently deceased husband. Fit and handsome, now he looked like a man in his fifties, aged with worry for his young bride, for his child. The Queen Mother was about to speak some words of comfort, things others said to her husband when she was in labour, but her words were to be too late.

The door opened with haste as one of the servants entered, head hung low.

"Your Majesty, the Queen has given birth to a son."

The King rapidly stood up and ran to the birthing room. His mother was not so quick. She took her time getting up. Though she was a woman of forty-two, still ripe and beautiful as any young woman, she now had to move with quiet reserve. She let her gaze burrow into the servant, before asking them what she suspected.

"How is the child?"

The servant, a young woman, hesitated. "It is not my place to say, Your Majesty."

"Look at me." The girl remained still. "I am the mother of your King, I was your Queen not long ago, you will look at me when I tell you to." Slowly, the servant raised her head, eyes ready to dart away in an instant. "How is the child? Be truthful, I will know of it soon enough."

The servant opened and closed her mouth multiple times before finally deciding what to say.

"He is of Gareth, your Majesty."

Kestrel nodded mournfully and left the room swiftly.

Her palace halls seemed darkened. There was no light through the vast windows, no tears of joy or laughs of congratulations. There were only hanging faces and lowered eyes as she approached her daughter-in-law's birthing suite. That room seemed darkest of all, the air was thick with the smell of blood. The shadows danced in the candlelight, almost joyous at the scene they witness. The silence was heaviest of all.

The King was slumped against the nearest wall to his wife, blue eyes dead from shock, legs ready to give in and collapse. The physicians congregated in one corner, making busy with blood-soaked sheets and dirtied tools, not wanting to acknowledge what Kestrel already knew. Then there was the Queen, a girl of just seventeen, a frail beauty in every way, fine of bone and countenance, who now clung to a small, wriggling bundle, tears uncontrollably running down her cheeks.

The Queen Mother walked over to the new mother and child.

"May I see him," The elder Queen asked kindly. She was met with wide, watery eyes. The young Queen looked down at her newborn child and let his little hand grasp her finger. "Sara... let me see him," she said and held out her hands. Sara nodded slowly before handing the bundle over.

Kestrel took a breath before looking down. Into green eyes, she looked. Green, toxic, unnatural eyes surrounded by a sleepless deep purple. Eyes to be feared. Eyes that would fade. Eyes that would return. Eyes of horror. She started to walk away. She could not let her son face what had to be done.

"No, no," Sara yelled, as she weakly tried to crawl out of the bed after her baby whose cries had started to fill the room. The King awakened for this and instantly went to his bride, and pulled her close, his own face still as stone. All the young girl could say was, "No."

"I do this for the world," The Queen Mother said with her back turned. "But more importantly, I do this for you. I do this so that you will not have to live with the guilt of what must be done. As no parent should."

Then she left, Queen Sara's last agonizing cry of "No!" following her as she went.

Up the stairs, she climbed, her grandchild in her arms. To the tallest tower, at the edge of the mountains, to a place where no soul would go, unless for this purpose. Kestrel dared not look at the child, even with its eyes, it was still a child, her grandchild, her blood. The staircase got colder the higher she climbed, nature telling her of the horror of her act.

When she, at last, reached the top, the frigid wind went through her thick garments, no amount of clothing could protect her from this sin and sacrifice. She walked to the edge, feet struggling to take each step, her instincts screaming at her to turn back.

She held up the babe, dangling over the abyss. The Queen Mother looked into the child's eyes and watched as the shadows left them, as the rosiness flooded into his cheeks, as his little face smiled at her, and she knew she could not do it. How could something so small, so sweet and warm bring such chaos to the world, such suffering? She held the child close and thought only of her own son, how he had been even smaller, how he had cooed at her in just the same way. How could it be true?

She held it tight she pressed her lips to his warm forehead.

"Forgive me," she said.

She threw the babe over the edge, to be embraced by the rocks below.