Princess Hannah followed duke Eddleston down a curving royal hall. Its brass and bronze walls were similar to the sub-levels, but they were decorated for extravagance with hanging lanterns, gold-framed artwork, and heroic busts on white-stone pedestals. Uniformed guards were posted at every door and they saluted when the duke passed with the princess in tow.
Hannah knew it well; it was the inner hall that wrapped around the royal throne room, and one could traverse the entire palace by following its circle. She had run through it many times to escape from guards, or get away from her father. The busts mounted on pedestals were of her ancestors and when she brushed them in her sprint, they went crashing down. It had been a while since she’d watched the maids sweep up the broken pieces of her grandfather’s face, or her great, great grandfather head when it split in two. Her father would turn red with anger over what he called pride-less hooliganism, and only her mother could calm him down.
One evening, after a particularly important painting of the first ancestor fell to the floor, Queen Mary spent hours in the parlor easing his rage. Afterwards, she told the princess something she never forgot.
“Don’t worry about the art,” Hannah recalled her mother’s voice and the warmth of her embrace. “Sometimes, men can’t tell the difference between people and objects. Between us, I don’t care for them either. Whatever your grandfather, or your great grandfather did should mean nothing to you. What matters is what you can do, what you will do, for everyone. Then they’ll be painting your portrait, for the nice space you’ve cleared on the wall.”
She didn’t think of her mother often, but even seven years after she passed, those memories felt fresh in her mind. All the times she was scolded, all the times she was loved; her mother had such a caring heart, Hannah didn’t understand how she fell the iceberg that was her father.
The princess put those thoughts into the back of her mind when the entryway to the throne room came into view. The tall, brass-framed doors to the court were open and nobles were just departing. She spotted members of every house; their leaders included. Duchess Wensenset stopped to bow in regard for duke Eddleston, who replied with a stiffly raised hand.
“I see the princess has arrived,” Wensenset said with her eyes closed. Hannah knew she had the Sight, but she found the duchess to be strange and alien compared to the lords that saw with their eyes and felt with their hands.
“Duchess Wensenset,” Hannah said and stopped in place. She snapped her heels together and made a soldier’s salute.
The duchess chuckled.
“Princess Hannah,” Vinderberg said and bowed. “I’m happy to see your father has come to his senses.”
The old Vinderberg was one of Hannah’s favorites. He was a war hawk and when Hannah called for action against Atilonia, House Vinderberg became her most vocal support. The rough and tumbled man had been all across Adohas, fought on every continent and had a story for every scar. That was the life of adventure she longed for.
It’s a shame they don’t like each other, the princess thought as she glanced at the back of Duke Eddleston’s head. They could have been good friends, I think.
“Has court concluded?” Eddleston asked Wensenset.
The duchess nodded. “We’re on our way to prepare out estates,” she said.
Eddleston made a firm nod. “That would be best.”
“Where’s your family, Eddleston?” Vinderberg asked.
“Duchess Iona is in Edwindy with Queen Gydia and the prince,” Eddleston answered. “My sons and daughters were abroad, as you’re doubtless aware.”
Hannah flinched at the queen’s name.
“Except for Jessica,” Vinderberg said, “and that other son of yours, what was his name?”
“Anton,” Eddleston said and frowned. “But he’s—”
“Already in Atilonian hands, yes,” Vinderberg spoke over the duke. “But you won’t go easy on them just because they have one blind son under the headsman’s axe.”
Duke Eddleston clenched the hand behind his back. “I’ll act in the manner that best befits my station, Duke Vinderberg.”
Vinderberg nodded and turned to leave. “As you should,” he said.
Wensenset bowed again. “Until next time,” she said to princess Hannah.
The princess strained a smile. “The pleasure will be mine, duchess.”
The lords and ladies of Bastilhas continued on their way, quiet and solemn like a grim procession. When the throne room had emptied, duke Eddleston stepped before the door and gestured inside.
“It’s time,” he said. “Your father is waiting.
The princess approached the duke and looked down the colonnade. Her father was sitting on the stairs to his throne, his arms laid over his knees and head down-turned toward the floor. There were no guards in the hall; he was alone.
Hannah swallowed, glanced at the duke, and stepped forward. Her dress shoes clapped on the floor and her father turned up his head. Those first steps were the hardest, but one foot followed the other and she made her way down the colonnade, past the tapestries of heroic legend. She had met her father in his capacity as a parent and as a king, but both leaned toward cold, brief encounters. Kalen was not a man that enjoyed affection or entertained the wonder of childhood. He did not display weakness, or cry.
As she approached, she wondered which had summoned her: Kalen Darigon the father, or the king? She searched his face for an answer, and saw only the weary expression of a tired man. It was a face she had seen once before, captured in the mind’s eye of a distant memory. When her mother died, he had looked tired on that day too.
“Father?” she asked loudly, her voice echoed throughout the hall.
Kalen stirred from his seat. “Hannah,” he said as he stood. “You look well.”
“I can’t say the same,” she said with a thin smile. “Did you release me just so I could see your tired face?”
He made a slight, brief smile. “No,” he said. “The Atilonians have closed around the city, blocked us by land and sea. Before the shield fails—”
“I’m not leaving,” she interrupted him.
The king’s mouth screwed shut and his brows lowered in a dispassionate glare.
“You wouldn’t have come to me, would you?” she asked. “Come see me in my well-adorned cell?”
The king said nothing.
Hannah frowned. “For months I waited,” she continued, “for you to say anything, or do anything, and now that you’ve deigned to speak to me in person, it’s to offer me escape.”
Again, the king refrained.
“I came to tell you I won’t escape, I won’t run from Atilonia,” she said. “Lady Jessica is downstairs, right beneath our feet in the sub-levels. She’s doing her best to preserve the shield that defends this city. If she is going to risk her life for my people, then how can I turn my back on them?!”
“You’re right,” the king said and closed his eyes. He took a long breath. “That’s why I decided to turn my back in your instead.”
Dress shoes clapped on the floor behind Hanna and the princess turned sharply. Three men walked briskly through the colonnade, their heads shrouded in long black cloaks, and their faces covered by white horned masks.
“W-What is this?” she asked the king. “Who are these people?”
“It is a Darigon’s duty to defend Vultheras to their dying breath,” the king said. “But I have failed, to protect this city, and to hold you to that fate.”
“Father, what are you saying?” Hannah asked, turned to him, before a needle punctured her neck.
The princess lost feeling in her neck, her strength in her limbs, and collapsed into the king’s arms. Her eyes wide with tension, she could only listen as the men drew closer.
“Fate be damned, I will not let you die here,” the king whispered in her ear. “I will not lose both daughters to Atilonia.”
Kalen could have just as easily said ‘my heir’ but in that moment, he called Hannah his daughter. It was as specific word, because although she often called him father, he rarely used such familial affection. Tears welled in Hannah’s shuddering eyes, not because he had referred to her as a daughter, but because there were two.
Who else? she wondered as her father lowered her gently to the floor. Who else… would he call daughter?
The men stopped before the king where he knelt at the princess’ side. “Ghost,” the king said, “I have done as you told me.”
The masked man between the cloaked strangers, stood ahead of the others. He appeared to have white hair and very pale skin, almost like a ghost. “I can see you’re worried,” he answered with a slim smile. “The inhibitor has locked down her major muscles, but her lungs and heart will function normally. Fear not, Daughter Two is in no danger, and I have the antidote on my person.”
Kalen stood. “Once you’ve spirited her from this place, I will consider you forgiven.”
“I’m thankful that you’ve chosen to forgive me,” Ghost said. “But I am curious….”
“Speak,” the king said.
“Let me ask you,” Ghost said. “When I told you that I could save one daughter, what made you decide on Daughter Two instead of Daughter One?”
The king scowled.
Ghost removed his mask and revealed his eyes, one opaque and the other bright blue like Jessica’s own Eyes of the Sorcerer. Hannah recognized him as her father’s mysterious ritualist.
“Daughter One is objectively more powerful,” Ghost continued. “She would make a better queen than Daughter Two, wouldn’t she?”
A better queen? Hannah thought.
“At times I have considered you both friend and enemy, and always strange, but I have never thought you were so stupid as to mistake a good ruler for any other fool,” the king said. “Power is not the only quality that makes a worthy queen.”
“Is that true?” Ghost wondered aloud. “Or, are you hesitant to call yourself an unworthy king?”
King Kalen growled, bristled at the remark. His tired eyes seemed to brighten with youthful anger.
“Power isn’t everything,” Ghost continued. “But it means a great deal when an army is knocking on your door.” He placed his mask somewhere in his cloak and raised his hand; a cuff of light appeared around his wrist. There were words inscribed in the light, but Hannah couldn’t comprehend their alien letters.
“Lift,” Ghost said and Hannah’s body floated stiffly in the air, as if she laid on an invisible floor. He turned and began to lead her away.
“How will I know that she is safe when you are through?” The king asked.
“That’s a strange question,” Ghost said and turned halfback toward the king. “You made the sons and daughters of your subordinate houses swear to fight and die for your city, while you pass off your own daughter to safety. Now my trustworthiness is in question?”
The king swallowed, clenched his hands into fists at his side.
“For that matter, you gave your people over to Mathematzen without so much as a guarantee that your capricious god wouldn’t lock them in a dark closet in the bowels of the earth,” Ghost continued. “Your god gave you nothing to prove that your people would be safe, but I’ll do them one better. I’ll give you my word, and that’s more than you ever got from the divine.”
Ghost turned to continue walking. “Gate, open,” he commanded and a pitch-black portal was torn through the air, between the columns of the colonnade.
“She’s going to live a long life, provided she’s smart about it,” Ghost said. “I wish I could say the same for Daughter One.”
Ghost’s cloaked companions disappeared into the darkness of the portal, but Ghost stopped just short of stepping inside. “This will be goodbye,” he said. “For the final time.”
The king made a rigid nod.
Ghost smiled. “No goodbye? No fond farewell? I’ve known you since you were a boy, my king. Don’t be reticent.”
“Spare Hannah this ignoble death,” Kalen said. “And I will have nothing more to say.”
