Imagine Sun & Sorrows

Vera's letter came with no warning.
She should have expected it, really, but these things weren't supposed to happen to her. Vera had been eight when High King Alaric was elected president of Periculum. She'd been too young to understand why her mother cried at the announcement.
The people who voted him into office had quickly begun to realize their mistake when during his third year in office President Alaric proclaimed himself High King of Periculum.
Other countries had tried to get involved and had tried to defend them. The army began to run out of members by Alaric's fifth year of presidency and the drafts came quickly. She'd still been too young then to understand why first her brother, and then her father had left and hadn't come back.
Periculum's numbers continued to dwindle, and King Alaric had taken to drafting men of all demographics. The old, the young, the disabled, it didn't seem to matter that those men's chances of returning were slim to none.
Now with no other option, the High King had begun to draft the women, and Vera was in the first round.