RE: Monarch

Sera had always reveled in the way they looked at her. She would not conform, change to be what they wanted. Instead, she was satisfied to be what they always thought she was. A wild animal. A beast that wielded sword and magic rather than diplomacy and a pen. And no one had ever contested that.

But the time of peace had ended.

Sera rotated with a lithe grace, pulling her foot in for the pivot—and promptly fell directly onto her face. Normally, she would have caught herself, but the gods damn corset restricted her movement to an unnatural degree. Her mistake—if it could be called her mistake—was not lifting the awkward and overly ornate ivory shoe, dragging the stuffy, impossibly hot fabric of the dress beneath her and toppling her as her father had toppled so many powers.

Thwap. There was a sharp crack of a practice sword against her back that radiated up her spine. Sera bit her lip, refusing to cry out, and turned to glare at her uncle, who was intently studying a potted plant in the corner of the room. Luther, her former swords-master, didn’t seem to like this any more than she did, but it wasn’t his call: When Sera had shown resistance to the new direction of her curriculum, the king had brought in his own brother to motivate her.

It wasn’t the corporal punishment that rankled. That was nothing new. It was the strange, and definitively petty application of it. She planted her hand firmly against the marble, nearly slipping as her glove’s frictionless silk failed to gain traction against the ground, and hoisted herself up. She overcompensated and almost fell backward as her traitorous shoes threatened to unseat her again, leaving her wobbling like a child’s top.

Her instructor—if one could call her that—stared at her with open hostility. His hair was fashionably long, black ringlets that came down to his neck, framing a dozen piercings that littered his ears in a manner Sera considered to be distasteful. His name was Darvid, of a minor house she could not be bothered to remember.

“I understand that this is somewhat out of your purview, Princess. It is out of mine as well.” Darvid held a hand up to cup the side of his face, as if to give himself comfort.

“I thought this was your area, Darvid,” Sera snapped.

“Oh no. I am an augmenter of grace. Unlike yourself, princess, I cannot summon something from nothing.”

Sera bore the brunt of the insult, her entire body taut. Quietly, she fantasized about Darvid suddenly keeling over from consumption. Or being pitched off the nearby balcony. Or caught beneath the wheels of a particularly long wagon. She was so caught up in these tantalizing fantasies that she didn’t even notice when he closed the gap between them.

Darvid’s finger flicked bounced painfully off her forehead.

You go too far.

Without even thinking about it, there was a tingling surge as the lightning manifested itself within her, tiny motes of electricity gathering in her palms, begging to be unleashed.

“And therein lies the problem.” Darvid looked down at her, unflinching. “Look at you. You’d tear me to pieces as soon as look at me. You can put a savage into a dress, but you cannot put elegance into a savage.”

Sera burned. He didn’t know the truth of her lineage, couldn’t know, but the words inflamed her just the same. Something touched the top of her hand. Sera glanced down at where the practice sword rested against her wrist. Pit was shaking his head. Unlike the ignorant dance instructor, Luther would know from experience exactly how close she was to breaking. Sera took a deep breath and let the magic flow from her, frustration replacing anger.

“You go too far,” Sera growled at the man who seemed determined to push her limits.

“Not far enough.” Darvid said. “The king has made it the importance of this matter clear, as curious as I was to why, that was ultimately irrelevant. Now. Start again, from the first step.”

Not for the first time, she considered striking the man down. He was like the rest of them. A simple strike to the temple or a flare of electricity through his eye, and it would all be over. But it would do no good. Whatever temporary satisfaction she gained from his demise would be quickly overshadowed by her father’s swift and merciless punishment. No. The dance instructor was not the true source of her situation. And so, Sera danced, awkwardly, and unsteadily, as Luther followed behind her closely.

There was only one person to blame for this situation.

The image of a smug face floated up in her mind, and Sera nearly tripped again with the sudden surge of anger. He was to blame. The worthless sack of flesh she called brother. Everything imperfection, every problem in her life could be traced back to him.

She remembered, vaguely, the scant few years in which Cairn had not existed. They were blurry memories that were only decipherable due to her tainted heritage—and even then, she remembered nothing of her life before the castle. What she did remember was enough. Her mother, holding her. Vivid indigo eyes that stared down through a curtain of golden hair. The tickle of whispered love and appreciation in her ear.

Her father’s visits were rare. But she remembered how they felt. He would lift her from her bed and onto the ground. Slowly, he held her, so her feet barely touched the ground, and paced her through the steps of what she would later recognize as a simple kata in one of the lesser sword forms. Sera hadn’t understood the complexity of what she was being taught, of course, only seeing his satisfaction when she followed his instructions. She remembered, with a surge of saccharine bitterness, the one time she’d seen him smile. It was a month after she had taken her first steps—and in secret, in front of the mirror, she had been practicing.

When the king visited, and lifted her from her crib, he did not have to prompt her. She performed every step of the kata without his support. Normally, he would correct her. Point out small mistakes, misplacements of limbs, where to place her balance. Instead, he just smiled, stroked her head, and uttered the words she would always remember, despite not knowing what they meant.

“You will make for a wonderful queen.”

Her reward for the gift was a tiny wooden sword. The lessons continued. More complex forms. The visits from her father became more sparse as he embarked on a campaign against the lingering sparks of rebellion throughout the kingdom, but he secured teachers for her in his absence.

Then, two years after her birth, Cairn was born. At first, she was delighted. A brother. In the stories her mother read to her, a sibling was someone to share in your struggles, to support you when your heart was heavy, and fight the monsters of the dark alongside you. She would have to help him, of course. Their father was difficult to please. But his happiness was made all the more worthwhile by its rarity.

It took months to realize the truth of things. A dozen visits, watching in confusion, as her father’s footsteps tread down the hall, passing over her for the nursery instead. It dawned slowly, in pieces. Denial came first. Of course, he was transfixed with Cairn. How much attention had she received, while her brother had not yet drawn breath. Eventually, the scales would level and he would return to her, and she could show him all the things she’d learned.

It took far too long to realize that Cairn was her replacement, rather than her companion.

Sera could have gotten over it, if he’d shown any appreciation for the attention. Any appreciation at all. But he hadn’t. If anything, he’d seemed bothered by it. And for that, she could never forgive him.

She still remembered the first day she hurt him. They’d been arguing over something, some toy of his—something Sera hadn’t cared for other than the fact that it was his. The voice of her mother, telling her to be kind, to share.

But why? She’d wondered. He’s so weak. So much less than me, despite being given so much. Why give him anything?

And with that thought, Sera had reached out and shoved him. It had been easy. He had none of her surefootedness and could not catch himself. His heel caught the carpet and his head banged against the floor, and he began to cry. Big, attention-grabbing wails that echoed. She had only moments to revel in the minor victory before her mother grabbed Cairn up into her arms and held him against her neck, glaring daggers at Sera.

What is wrong with you?

Her mother said other things after that. Her words and voice softened, and as was her way, she attempted to turn the incident into a lesson. But Sera would never forget those five words, and what they meant.

What is wrong with you?

The veil had been torn back. The queen was the same as the king, just better at hiding it. They cared only for their son. Their precious prince. And it was this realization that Sera held on to, as her mother tried to repair things between them. She was fastidiously polite, and pretended to listen as her mother read her stories, but the words did not reach her. It didn’t matter if she listened. She was not enough, and would never be enough. Her idle fantasies of being the kind queen of the sort her mother read about died a slow death next to her dreams of being anything other than the spare.

Her hostility towards Cairn escalated over the years. He was cleverer of tongue than she was, and that, combined with their parents favor, meant he always got the better of the exchange. But she could cause him pain in other ways. A well-timed shoved that no one saw. A cutting word after a dressing-down from the king. A shock awake to his back when he fell asleep during tutoring.

Better yet, the only time her father seemed to notice her was for her antagonism. He’d caught her several times. Yet, instead of punishment, all she received was a somber nod. So, she continued her efforts. For whatever reason, it seemed to be the only way she could please him.

This small comfort was torn away from her the day she went too far. They had been sparring in the courtyard. Sera had no idea that anyone was watching, and Cairn had made a comment about playing in the dirt. She hadn’t meant to break his arm. She’d warned him—via painful slaps with the flat of her blade—that he’d consistently left his left side undefended. Sera had merely refused to turn the blade, allowing the narrower edge to smack against the bone of his forearm.

Quickly, their father had rushed into the courtyard. She dropped the sword. The king picked her up by the throat and carried her outside of earshot. Sera clawed at his arm, panic kicking in as her airway constricted. He struck her once, openhanded across the face. Her ears rang even as the darkness closed in around the edges of her vision. The king’s eyes were dark, focused, for once, entirely on her.

”I have overlooked your aggressions because they have been beneficial. Because you have served well for my purposes. A honing steel by which my son may be sharpened. However.” He pulled her closer, inches from his face, and it took everything in her not to fight for air. ”There is no purpose in a whetstone that breaks a blade.”

With that, he dropped her. But Sera would never forget the way his face had twisted up in contempt. Or how he turned away, after, as if she was forgotten the moment she left his sight. She’d never hurt Cairn again, after that. Not knowing what it was all for. Not realizing the purpose of it.

Instead, she bade her time. Threw herself into her training, and her magic, planning for the day she would fight Cairn for the throne.

Or at least, that had been the plan. Until he had disappeared, and she was, for some reason, expected to catch up on all the courtly etiquette she’d been allowed to neglect.

/////

Dressed in a casual light blue dress, Annette stepped around Sera as she opened the door to leave, ignoring Sera’s glower entirely, looking to where her tutor sat at a nearby table, head in his hands. Annette paused at the doorway.

“Can we swap places?” As usual, her younger sister avoided eye contact.

“You want to wake up at the break of dawn to prance around with that clod?” Sera asked.

“No.”

“Then—“

“If I attend before you, I can at least be assured that my lesson will be normal, and not immediately colored by the fresh despair you inevitably invoke.” For something so biting, the delivery was strangely flat.”

Sera blinked. If the explanation hadn’t been delivered quite so pointedly, her answer might have been different. Who actually wanted to get up this early in the morning to dance?

“Fuck you. And no.”

“Color me surprised.” Annette breezed by, entering the room and calling out to Darvid, who seemed to shake himself out of his stupor when he saw her. Sera watched Annette for a few seconds longer, pushing down the irritation. Her sister seemed to always be so indifferent to the attentions of anyone, including their parents. For that, Sera envied her.

She stomped down the hall to their mothers quarters. Thaddeus didn’t bother to bow as he passed by, sweat on his brow, a half-dozen men in unmarked robes following him. His signature waddle had never so closely resembled a run.

“Know what that’s about?” Sera asked.

Luther shook his head. “I suspect it has something to do with our absent prince. Though it has been a pleasure to see our spymaster so thoroughly out of sorts.” He broke into a grin.

Sera smiled with him, and found herself grateful that her uncle had not been executed. She still wasn’t sure how Cairn had managed it—she didn’t know for certain it was him, but Luther had been sitting in the dungeon awaiting execution when a letter had arrived. The King and Queen had shut themselves into chambers for days, during which, the portly spymaster was seen coming and going at all hours, the standstill meeting ending with Luther’s release.

Which was staggering in and of itself.

Her Uncle was quite possibly the only person left who treated her like family, so of course she had hoped, but she had never seen her Father reverse position so quickly. There had been no end to the rumors. Uprisings crushed before they happened. The cure for a plague.

And the peculiarities in her parents' behavior had only grown stranger. The King was constantly lost in thought, distractible to the point that he’d lost his usual dourness. In something of a reversal, her mother had been borderline insufferable as of late, going so far as to question Gil in earshot of others for his inaction to his son’s disappearance. This was made only stranger by the fact that this garnished no explosive response. Gil had patted her on the shoulder, and spoken words that were so thoroughly out of character that Sera had nearly dropped her cup:

“Be patient.”

The silence that had settled over the table was absolute.

Luther followed Sera through the hallways, idly sidestepping the average passerby, whistling a tune idly under his breath.

“You don’t have to follow me around.” Sera said to him finally.

“And here I thought you appreciated the company.”

“I do… but escort duty is beneath you as captain of the guard.”

“Well, my duties have been drastically dialed back as of late. And who said anything about escorting?” Luther grinned. “All I’m doing is enjoying a stroll with my favorite recalcitrant niece.”

“What about Annette?”

“She’s not recalcitrant, just… standoffish.” All of a sudden, his lightheartedness vanished as his eyes flicked to a spot behind his temple. “You’re smudged”

Sera’s hand immediately went to her ear. “How bad? Did anyone see?”

“Probably not. No one paying that close of attention.”

“Very well then, uncle. We shall have to dine another day.”

He gave her a knowing nod and Sera escorted herself to her chamber.

/////

It wasn’t that Sera hated herself. Not that. Never that. She was proud of her skill, of her magic. It was just her reflection that posed the problem. Still, she knew all too well the unnatural pull the mirror held. The moment she looked, she would be helpless in its grasp, her slender fingers poking and prodding at every perceived imperfection.

So, just like always, she told herself that she wouldn’t look. She’d retrieve the concealer from the bottom drawer, keeping her gaze fixed on the dark-red swirling detail patterns of the vanity. Slowly, she dipped her thin fingers in the foul smelling paste, and rubbed it on the section of rough red scar tissue atop her ears, where the pointed length had been clipped and cauterized a lifetime ago.

And then, just by chance, she glanced in the mirror. A face that wasn’t hers stared back, crowning a body that was too tall, too thin for her muscle mass. The contouring between her mouth and nose that looked distinctly alien. And flaring green eyes that were too bright to be anything but human.

Demi.

It was fine. Her cosmetics were the best rods could buy, built to order and imported from a discreet merchant in Panthania. She could fix it. Just a little contouring, a little blush in the right place, and she would be normal. No more than half a bell, if that. Easy fix.

But she didn’t get it quite right. The angle was off. It looked fine in the lighting in front of her mirror, but not quite right when she tilted her head. She hadn’t blended properly. Her foundation was solid, she just needed a little more time to iron out the details.

Sera gave up when the light started to fade. Her fist lashed out subconsciously, striking the mirror. It shattered into a hundred fractals, each showing her a small sliver of imperfection.

Her body racked as she stepped back from the vanity. No. She wouldn’t cry. Why would someone like her cry? She had so much going for her, so much to be proud of.

Sera backed into the edge of her bed and sat down, her jaw tight, staring at the mess she’d made on the floor.

A knock rang out loudly, obliterating the silence of the room and startling her. The door? No, the window.

Sera opened her window to find the second to last person she wanted to see. An elf clad entirely in black, homely, clung tightly to a rope attached to the windowsill with iron hook, swirling back and forth madly from the northern winds.

“The hells are you doing, elf?” Sera hissed.

“Slipping,” Tamara said.

“And you didn’t plan for that?”

“I didn’t think it would take you so long to hear me!”

Sera shushed the elf, listening over her shoulder to see if any of her posted guards had heard the commotion. Tamara grinned up at her.

The nerve. This particular elf was affiliated with her brother, so Sera had naturally ignored her, rejecting her advances. It had been confusing to guess what the elf even wanted. At first, she’d taken the dogged pursuit as potentially scandalous. Which made it all the more disorienting when Sera looked into the new arrivals and found the elf had just married the ranger heading up Cairn’s newly formed regiment.

Still, the thought of learning archery had made for an alluring carrot. Every teacher her father had hired was unimpressive. Eventually, Sera came to the conclusion that since the elf was so eager to teach her, she might as well come out to the barracks and see.

Sera had to grudgingly admit that the elf was an expert in her craft. When she first approached, Tamara had been effortlessly putting arrow after arrow in an exceedingly far away target. Then the elf discovered Sera was watching, began to show off, and admittedly the display became even more impressive.

They didn’t have lessons exactly. Sera showed up, and Tamara would drop what she was doing and teach her. The lessons would last anywhere from a bell to half the day, depending on how lost Sera got in the minutia. Tamara seemed to have an excellent feel for how far exactly she could push Sera, and when it was time to slow things down and discuss theory.

They’d made excellent strides. But that was before.

“I can’t work on archery anymore. Or swordsmanship, until I’ve been brought up to speed.” Sera said.

“Okay, but the part where I’m slipping is still happening.” Tamara shot back, a thin slice of panic in her voice.

“Climb down!”

“I’m going to fall!” Tamara’s hands slipped from the rope, and Sera reached out an arm to grab her, bracing a foot against the window frame and yanking her inside in a single smooth motion.

Then Tamara started to chuckle. Sera’s face blushed bright red as she realized she’d been played.

“You were never in any danger,” Sera said.

“I was in danger of having to climb down.” Tamara shrugged, springing back to her feet. She stretched her arms, then noticed the shattered mirror. “Bad night?” Tamara asked quietly.

“…More like bad afternoon, leading to a worse evening.” Sera said. “And I would like, very much, for you to go.”

“We all have them,” Tamara continued on as if she hadn’t heard the request. “Just sort of have to take it day by day.”

Sera bristled. “What do you mean by we.”

“Elves, humans, half-elves, take your pick.” The line was delivered so nonchalantly that Sera almost believed it.

“Why are you here, Tamara?”

“There’s a security flaw. A gap in the guard pattern, from here to the range. If you time things right, you can slip through every hour. Hell of a hole that needs to be plugged.”

“And that’s what you’ve been doing this evening? Walking perimeters for sake of the kingdom?”

Tamara raised an eyebrow. “Last few evenings, actually. Nothing to worry about. I’ll have Cephur put it in the monthly report.”

“It’s the beginning of the month.” Sera was starting to see the shape of things.

“True.”

“Meaning it will be weeks before anything is done.”

“Also true.” Tamara indicated her thumb to the window. “I kind of want a second opinion on the problem. Got time?”

“Gods yes.”

Tamara pointed to her waist, and Sera looked down at the dress that still clung tightly to her. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re probably going to need to change.”

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