Prologue

Summer meadows are filled with dampening shadows at dusk
Roses bloom with perennial fragrances and briars
Since creation they have been forced apart
Separating beauty from pain
And forever fighting to stay to their nature
The perpetual union only ending in a winter frost

         

Willow trees sway and bend in wind never falling
They never break so animals hide in the shelter
The appendages sting on contact
Their caresses are soft
To the rye fields that grow around
Thriving in sunlight in winter and summertime
The meadows flourish, filled with dampened shadows at dawn
-Raisa Crevan







Prologue

         


         The night was still but for the usual chirping of crickets and the short flashes of light as lightning bugs flaunted their radiance. A blanket of snow covered the earth and a sense of pristine stillness hung above the air. Wil sat alone in her room, a single candlelight on her bed stand. The candle was a light shade of purple and sent the smell of lavender throughout the room. Wil watched the counting-candle slowly burn down, shortening the time until the sky began to turn a slight shade of blue-gray announcing the day of her birth. Her twin brother Wyatt pretended to sleep, too old for the anticipation of a birthday, but secretly fighting the heaviness of his eyelids.
         Wil held tightly to a book her mother had given her the year before. Soon she would be able to read it. This year’s gift would be to learn. She had memorized the dull green color leaving it on a tiny shelf in her room as a constant reminder that that was her first book.
         Usually her mother would have been there with her, excitedly waiting to celebrate. Her dark hair and light brown eyes smiling and laughing with her all the way. However her mother had fallen ill a couple of days before and a headache still lingered with her. Wil had promised her that at midnight she would wake her mother and the two would spend an hour together so as not to break tradition. Wil's heart pounded loudly in her chest. Every year as a secret her mother gave her an extra gift, a secret one. She couldn't help but wonder what this year’s gift would be.
         Suddenly the room darkened losing a yellow glow, and only the soft, white moonlight remained gliding steadily through the window. She had lit the candle at midnight of the day before and midnight had arrived once more with the burning out of the candle. Before running to her mother’s room she jumped out of her bed, the book momentarily forgotten as she tugged a chest out from under her bed and found another candle. This one had a slight hue of red and as she lit it up the smell of roses wafted off. Smiling Wil hopped to her feet and raced out of her room as quickly as she could without making a sound.
         Wil quickly made her way down the hallway, her feet fluttering gently against the wood flooring. She made her way to her mother’s room. Years before her father had attached his bedroom with his office and Tamil, her mother, had stayed in their old bedroom to be closer to Wil and Wyatt. The rose candle was held out in front of her in a fake gold candlestick. She was seven. She could hardly believe it. This was the year all the boys began to learn how to be men, training with weapons and horses and archery. Her plan was to join them, though she told no one knowing they would disagree. Still, her birthday brought one wish, one dream, and she would have it.
          She clung tightly to a red shawl draped around her shoulders adding extra warmth from the winter chill that passed through the house. She hesitated at the door. Her mother never left it open but tonight there was a stream of light shining down on the floor before her. Slowing her pace she crept up to the door and peeked in. Her heart skipped a beat as she held back as scream. Her father Maralk knelt above her mother, his hands at her throat, her eyes begging him to stop from the pain, yet with a touch of defiance. Her mother’s hands scratched into her father’s face leaving behind stick red blood. Suddenly, her hands dropped and her eyes shone only with lifeless reflections.
         Wil took a step back her head shaking, her voice whispering, "no, no, no." Maralk’s head turned at the small noise, eyes fearful at first, then angry. Wil froze, terror rising in her lungs and suffocating her. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t move as her father’s bloodied face and clenched hands moved towards her. Wil took another step back shrinking in size as he pulled her mothers door open all the way. Wil opened her mouth to scream but no sound came. And her feet refused to budge despite how much she wanted them to move.
         Her father bent down to her height and gripped her shoulders forcefully, shaking her. “You will never say or THINK of this again, you little freak! Understand?!” Wil swallowed and forced a nod. Maralk straightened and closed the door to her mother’s room.

         Rose awoke to the sound of hushed voices and hurried, erratic footsteps across the wood floor a room over. Loath to leave the comfort of a warm bed she turned her head up and to the right to peer out her window. The fact that she could see the moon meant that it was late. Her fire was long out, but the coals in the fireplace still hung on to life with tiny pulses of life.
         The sharp, grinding sound of chair against wood brought her out of her ruminations quickly, and the loud, thudding footsteps of her father began to make their way towards her door. The habit of all children caught in the act of being awake long past their sanctioned hours took over, though sense provided her with the knowledge she was doing nothing wrong, and she quickly threw her blanket over her head, turned on her side, and closed her eyes. The door opened and Rose looked left towards the end of her bed through the pinprick holes in her blanket where the unnatural light of the oil lamp flickered into her room from that of the one directly down the hall. Her fathers figure moving towards her bed obstructed her sight for a moment, appearing as a gigantic darkness, but only for a moment. Then she felt his weight sink the side of the bed behind her when he sat down. Simultaneously to the hall reappearing in her sight, Rose saw her mother cross the room to from and to a place where she could no longer see her. She was crying.

         Rose sat up angrily at the news her father attempted to explain. Now she understood the tears she had witness her mother shed earlier.
         “War is for the innocent to suffer; for the young to die long before their time! Why must the young men fight and die for the old man's cause while they sit behind the cavalry in their tents talking?! By the end, no one will have remained untouched by the atrocities of mankind their constant pursuits for power!”
         “Maybe not my dearest” her father conceded “But although war is never a good thing, it can sometimes be the necessary step. It CAN lead towards peace.”
         “And yet children are taught that violence brings nothing but pain, and no attack should bring about a reaction from the victim who wishes to discontinue the faction?!”
         “We are no longer discussing the actions of a few, but of an entire nation,” her father pointed out.
          “Do things change when they are altered in proportion? I was taught otherwise.” Rose was indignant. Her sadness gave way by her distraction with her anger. How could it be that a bad can bring out a good? It did not make sense. It could not be true. Her father sighed. Sadly, Rose thought; and with a look of an old man on his worry ridden face. She had never seen him so tired and his expression seemed out of place on his normally young and strong face. But she would not be moved from her evaluations.
         “The problems in this world are created by the missed marks of man.” Her father continued. “We cannot change the nature of man from his daily failures into perfection. Even the most saintly commit heinous offenses as each day passes. Our inability to be blameless does not justify our actions. But it means that in our constant attempt to fix the world we will fail. I fight not because of any anger towards those I will fight, but to protect this nation, and my family from falling into a path that will destroy us."
          “No one wants to live in a dictatorship” he continued his point. “Though it is our ultimate destiny and it feels good in times of prosperity, the realization of self-rule and power will slowly creep into the system. And if it is in a time of failure, one man cannot stand against all the cries of the people. Only God in His perfection can rule a perfect dictatorship. But the production of a complete democracy will too fall. As I said before, the people are the problem with the government if it is them that run it. If the people are corrupt, the government will be corrupt, and the nation will become corrupt.”
         “Self-rule?” Rose was, at the time, stuck on this point. “There is no nation run by the people. The confusion of the mob and the separations into opposite viewpoints would ruin and such country!” The impossibilities in this concept were more than she could fathom at her young age.
         “Yes” her father accepted “But this is back to the failures of man. If man were perfect, a society of no separate classes and equal rights to all contributions and ideas would be perfect.”
          “You are so morbid!” Rose was surprised.
         “Life is filled with morbidity.” Her father almost laughed as he said this, and his face had a glimpse of its’ old self. “No one ever makes it through this world alive.” He smiled and chuckled to himself at the small truth, however silly his point. More seriously he said, “Consider life. Every story, every life, as I said before, ends in death: every plant and every last breathing individual. Cultures are reflections of the people. If the people are corrupt, as I previously exemplified are, then the culture will be corrupt. And if all relations to life have either the slow or abrupt end in death, then all the cultures are inevitably dying through their corruption. That is true death I suppose” he mused to himself. “Complete corruption. We just always consider it the complete corruption of the body until it can no longer hold the soul.”
          Rose shook her head in confusion. “I do not always understand you Father! But I do love you.” She kissed his cheek and they embraced tightly, but both with heavy hearts filled with the knowledge that this might be their last embrace.

         The King sat back in his couch in his antechamber, breathing heavily. The room was lit dimly. Though there were many candelabras the room was spacious with high ceilings and the shadows were large and oppressive. The contrasts and flickering of the light made the King appear many years past his actual age. His sister, close beside his shoulder, watched with tightly pursed lips as he struggled for air.
         “Sister, I am dying.” She made as if to contradict him but his eyes met hers to silence her. “I am.” He continued, “I can no longer fabricate any refutation to this. It has happened so quickly, at such a strange time in my life…I did not prepare-“ He was cut short by the pain in his abdomen. Clutching his stomach, he ceased to breathe for a moment. The princess stood quietly and made her way to the desk across the room. On it lay an amber bottle, one of several he had finished in the last few weeks, it’s lid askew from frequent use. Softly return to her brother’s shoulder she helped him ease the bitter liquid into his mouth. The pain was lessened by then, but his hands still shook.
         “You should sleep, brother”. She said softly. “No” he replied weakly, then a stronger “No! Not until I have finished!” Nodding she allowed him her silence. “Tomorrow, I will meet with my council and announce that I will be relinquishing my power. Or dying. Whichever comes first. Our primary focus must be to find my successor.” At this, his sister raised her brow. “Raina.” He looked at her. “My queen, so far without child, is my natural successor. Then you. But I will leave the decision to the council who will decide whom they believe is best for our country. We have not had a Queen in over five generations of this family, and I do not believe the council will see it best to appoint a woman”.
         “My Lord.” The princess said after a moment of silence.
         “Raina, you will be taken care of”, her brother said with loving encouragement. “Even if you want more than that, I cannot give it to you. But I can give you the freedom to live as you please. You can marry, or travel, or waste away in this castle if you so desire.” He offered a weak smile, which she matched. Taking her hand in his he kissed it and dismissed her.