Egrariand Chronicles Book 1: The Curse of the Black Stone

Well of Fate

Queen Ylessea of Aspor was on her way to visit the king when she saw the Lord of Lahyrst coming out of her husband's chamber. She watched him from afar as he stood like a statue right in front of the door. From the look on his face and his gestures, something must have been bothering him.

She walked towards him with her maids and guards moving in perfect synchronicity behind her.

"Lord Pierre," the queen called.

The lord was drawn back from his thoughts by the familiar voice he had been longing for. He was a bit surprised when he looked up and saw the queen there in the middle of the night. He had not expected her to visit the king. Actually, she never did. This was the first time.

He humbly and respectfully bowed to the queen. "Your Highness, what can I do for you?" he said.

The Lord of Lahyrst felt her gaze like it was piercing through his soul as the queen looked at him intently.

The Queen of Aspor, she was considered as one of the most powerful and most influential persons in the kingdom. Even the king always listened to her and did everything she wanted. Not because he loved the queen, if there was actual love between them. She came from the royal family of the Kingdom of Zohar, who married out of duty, in order to create a good relationship between the two kingdoms. The Kingdom of Zohar had been its ally since the Great War of Ozvaord up to the present. If it had not been for the alliance, Aspor would not be standing right now.

"I heard the king entrusted you with the safety of the prince," said the queen with so much confidence in her voice.

The lord looked back into her intense green eyes. Her expression was blank, a deceptive blankness. He felt his heart twist in pain upon looking at her. He was half guilty of what the queen had become. Everything about her had changed. The once young, innocent princess who had been full of dreams was gone.

Memories flashed for a moment as he looked at her face. Lord Pierre remembered the first time he had seen the queen when he had saved her from an ogre more than two decades ago as he traversed to the neighboring kingdom to seek an audience with the King of Zohar.

Even if he hadn't known by that time that she was a royal, he had felt his heart beat for her. He loved everything about her, especially her laugh, so genuine as though things around her were so simple. She had once been content. She used to be a free-spirited princess who wished to travel across Egrariand and explore new things. She used to want to see a magical dragon for real and fly with it to the sky. How he wished it had remained that way. He had courted her and successfully won her heart. They shared their love in secret but when Lord Pierre found out that she was a royal, bound to marry his king, it gave them both heartache.

The night before the wedding, Princess Ylessea asked Lord Pierre to meet her in the woods. She wanted them to run away from everyone and live a simple life together. She waited and waited for hours, but the lord didn't show up. His duty to the Kingdom of Aspor came first before their love. The princess went back to her chamber with a shattered heart. Her marriage with the king took place the next day in Zohar. It created an unbreakable bond between the two kingdoms, but since then, the crowned Queen of Aspor had changed completely. She was not as genuine as before. Instead she had become obsessed and greedy for power, especially after she gave birth to Prince Blaine.

"You heard it right, my queen," said Lord Pierre in a respectfully cold voice. "I vowed to protect the heir to the throne with my life." Then he bowed his head before the queen. "If you excuse me, Your Highness."

Queen Ylessea followed Lord Pierre with her eyes, there was a glimpse of bitterness but it faded as quickly as it had appeared. She called for Captain Cullen, her most trusted guard who had come with her from Zohar.