Crossroads

Violets Are Blue

One key trait about power is how it is exchanged. Certain classes of people have very little power; peasants and servants, while others like royalty are given a majority.

Exchanges of power between royalty mainly come in two different ways. A king can have a son, to which he passes on his crown, thereby keeping the family power intact. Or, a queen can only have daughters, in which the kingdom must bring in new blood to continue having power.

There is one outlier however. The Fae do not exchange power. They are born with it, they make their power stronger, and they like to trick humans out of having power.

One such instance of this is the story of the Lindworm's Bride. And it begins, as most good tales do, on a cloudy and dismal day.

The Queen, lovely creature that she is, felt as the sky looked. Perhaps it was due to a lack of duties that day, perhaps it was from having to walk in the muck and gloom. Or, maybe it was from the news that her womb was barren.

Ordinarily, the kingdom could get by just fine if a woman found out she was infertile. Unfortunately, there were only two options for royal women: bear healthy children, or be tossed aside for one who could perform the first option.

Now, our dear Queen Rhea was as gentle as she was lovely. But her gentle heart could only bear so much, and this seemed to be her limit. Being presented with the option of leaving her home, her beloved husband, and the kingdom that was hers through blood, she could not hold back the tears.

The kingdom in question, Werufn, was neighbor to a lovely forest filled with warbling brooks, bubbling creeks, and a Fae court made up of Undine. Now these water elementals were rather neutral towards humans in general, but Werufn was a special case. The two sides ensured that peace and prosperity came to both, and so feeling the emotional waterworks that the Queen was experiencing, called for their most trusted midwife to help.

While tears don't form a particularly large puddle from which a human sized being could emerge, they do make a large enough area for a small flower sized being to pop into existence. Which, while not usually terrible, is often unexpected.

So with a small shriek and a hiccup, the good Queen Rhea fell back and landed in a bush at the sight of a small Undine Fae.