Wake of Devastation, Lost in Desperation

I nodded as Flora, Eurydice's maid in waiting, told me to meet her in the dining hall. There was time until noon, and there was someone I needed to see. Mayora, Flora's younger sister and my own maid in waiting, helped me into my dress and followed me down the annoying spiral steps and out into the court yard.

"M'lady, I don't think you should be doing this so secretly..." I threw her a sharp look.

"You know what Father thinks of Micheal?" She shook her head. "He doesn't trust him. He never has. I don't know why, nor am I close to finding out. Until then, things will be the same." I spotted him then, and I felt happier by ten fold.

He smiled at me and I made a waving motion at Mayora, who stopped in her tracks and turned away.

Micheal handed me my dagger and gestured at the target in front of us. I cocked my eyebrow at him and turned, throwing the dagger and hitting the middle of the target.

"Childsplay," I sighed as a familiar figure grabbed the knife and brought it back to us. "Thank you, Robert," I sighed, but instead of taking my dagger I pulled Robert's sword from his belt and swung at Micheal, who was so shocked he barely dodged the blow.

"Watch it!" he exclaimed, pulling his own sword from his belt and backing away. "So, Princess, feeling cocky enough to fight without armor?"

"Stop calling me that!" I exclaimed, sending another blow towards his neck, which he parried instantly.

"Why, it's your title," he replied, smiling. He knew I hated for him to call me that. The others all called me Sayer; Micheal was too fond of calling me princess and riling my nerves.

"Would you like me to go around calling you 'sir' all the time?" He shook his head, his eyes laughing. He aimed a blow for my knees but I blocked and thrust it away.

Both men had a preference for long swords, whereas the others went for short swords. Eurydice prefered long swords as well, but when it came to weapons I was more likely to fight with my bow and arrows, and my trusty dagger.

Either way, I was lethal with a sword, and I planned my fight rather than rushing right into it, like Eurydice. I waited for a chance to strike, but never got it.

"M'lady, it's almost noon!" I sighed and let my- Robert's sword drop and handed it to it's rightful owner, taking my dagger and walking away.

"Too afraid, Princess?" Micheal called. I turned, threw my dagger, and walked backwards to watch as it sailed by his hair covered ear and hit the center of the target. Both men stared at it, wide eyed.

I grinned and let Mayora take me away, ready to tell my adopted sister about what had happened.

She immediately had me seated in the large, mahogany colored hall filled with dark purple items. We began eating and I asked her what brought us here.

"Father and I were talking last night," she began. "He wanted to discuss marriage. He said we had two choices, to marry outside of the kingdom, and leave."

"And our second choice?"

"To marry one of the new, ah, bachelors. The boys. The knights," she corrected, screwing up her face in a look of annoyance.

"He won again, didn't he?" She just nodded. "Well, 'snot so bad. We grew up with them-"

"There's something else," she said. "We don't get to pick, either way." I just stared at her.

Marriage was not our forte. Eurydice stubbornly believed that she needed no husband, but as we grew closer to age twenty and our father grew closer to "that age" we had no choice. As for me, there was only one man I could envision my life with, and Father didn't trust him.

"Your majestys," someone said. "His Majesty, the King requests your presence in the throne room." We followed the speaker to our father's throne room. Off to the side stood Sir Dylan's footman, but no one could find Sir Dylan.

The knights entered behind us, and when the footman caught sight of them he cringed away. My father did not notice and gestured for the man to begin his story.

"We reached the trees with feelings of safety. The West Northern kingdom is being ravaged by fights between vampires and shape shifters, and the forest was calm. Sir Dylan sent me ahead, and when I came back, elves were converging on them, mutilating before my eyes. I ran away."

The knights behind me, Micheal, Chester, Robert, David, Joseph, and Bradley, looked more aggravated by his story than anyone else in the room.

"Can you take us there?" Father asked. The footman's eyes bulged. Father sighed and told Micheal and Robert to take him away to see the psychic, but when they moved toward him the man fell and crawled backwards, a startled cry rising to his lips.

Father hardly noticed and had two gaurds take the man away. I could see the psychic in the corner of the room, watching Eurydice and I intently.

"Sayer, King Ronald wants you to go back to the Western Kingdom. The decision is yours, but you must know, should you decide to go, you must leave us, all of us, behind. Now go, I have matters to attend to."

The psychic stepped up and began leading Eurydice away, but she sent Bradley to me with a message.

"Meet me in the courtyard at nightfall."

And then Micheal pulled me away, with the singular wish of wanting to talk to me.