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tendertenebrosity · 4 years

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Ruler and Empress part 14

Masterpost here! Even the first few paragraphs of this is gonna contain spoilers for part 13, so if you haven’t read that bit yet, you probably should before going further!

Lian sat, numbly, expecting to hear the sound of guards rushing in at any moment to drag them away.

What have I done? I killed her. I never thought - I needed to stop her, but I didn’t think -

Lian could not believe what had happened. That the Empress had allowed the opportunity to arise, or that Lian had taken it. Any second now, this brief moment of stillness in which they understood exactly what they’d done would break apart, into terror and violence and inevitable consequences.

But there was… nothing. Incredibly, whatever noise Lian had made when they killed Elisandre, it had been slight enough that nobody outside this room had heard it. Hadn’t the guard that had brought them here stayed outside the door? Surely not, or he would be in here by now.

Lian sat there on the ground, surrounded by broken glass, beside the cooling, bloody body of the Empress. The curtain danced in the light of the softly glowing candles. And nobody came.

An unknowable amount of time passed before the pain of the cuts on their fingers brought them back to themselves.

I have to hide this, Lian thought, their first coherent thought in what felt like a very long time but must have been only minutes. Nobody knows - yet. If they find out - the guards, the Empress’ court - If they find out what I’ve done, what will they do in retribution?

Their breathing was harsh, ragged, filling their ears, as they carefully, haltingly started down the trail of thought. Lian wouldn’t have been so afraid if it was only themself who would pay the price - or at least, they liked to think they wouldn’t have been afraid. It would still be worth it, if Lian died but nobody ever heard that last order that the Empress had been planning to give out. But the Empress’ court was made in the image of its monarch - or the other way around, perhaps - so Lian didn’t dare hope things would stop there.

Far more likely that the penalty would fall on their country as a whole.

Lian raised their hands up to the candlelight, trying to gulp back their breathing to something resembling calm. No glass fragments remained; underneath the blood - oh gods, so much blood - the cuts didn’t seem serious. Their fingers stung fiercely, but they still moved.

It was astonishing that nobody had come for Lian already. But since they hadn’t… maybe there was still time for Lian to fix this.

No more time to sit here in a horror-struck daze; time to think. The breeze that pushed past the curtain still smelled of smoke. Lian had a thought of climbing down from the open window, but dismissed it; they could never make such a climb without rope, and what good would it do to flee and leave evidence of their guilt? Their people could not escape through a window.

It’s the middle of the night, and she called you out of bed. Who knows you’re here? Only that one guard?

Once the Empress retired to her bedchamber, Lian knew, she usually wasn’t disturbed until she emerged on her own. Only the most urgent of messages would be brought to her. So if the guards truly had not heard… and if Lian could return this little sitting-room to normal… her absence probably would not be discovered until long past dawn.

Lian took one final deep breath, and let it out as slowly as they could. Then they pushed themself to their feet, and into feverish activity.

The table was easy enough to right, the unbroken glassware set aside. But after that it was no longer avoidable; they needed to deal with the body.

As they lifted one of her arms - terribly warm and terribly heavy - they were appalled all over again at the blood. The smell of it clogged their nose, thick and metallic and nauseating. They’d seen this much blood before, of course, but if anything those memories made their stomach flip even more.

Wait. I shouldn’t get any more of it on me. Lian looked down at themself. Their right hand was already sodden, of course, and there was rather a lot on their chest, but amazingly, the rest of their nightclothes had only flecks. They tried to breathe through their mouth and let themself be consumed by the practical problems the body and the blood posed.

They went to her bedroom, holding their hands carefully away from their clothing. The bed, as before, was covered in silk and velvet; they hauled one of the covers free. They wiped their trembling hands and their face with a corner, then bundled it up in their arms to take it back to the sitting room.

It took them… gods, they weren’t sure, perhaps as much as half an hour and what felt like most of the fabric in the Empress’ room. But they mopped up the blood and the spilled water. Swept up the shards of glass, all but the tiniest pieces, with shaking hands and rapid, panicked breathing. Nobody knocked on the door as they worked.

Lian wasn’t particularly strong. Elisandre’s body was both extremely heavy, and nowhere near as heavy as it felt like it should be as they wrapped it up in the covers. The golden braid and the embroidered silk almost overwhelming the slight body with richness and heaviness. All of this. All of everything they’d been through, the power this woman had held over so many lives, all the damage that had been done… and in the end she was so small.

No, you idiot, Lian thought, a touch hysterically, as they managed to roll the fabric-swathed bundle over for the final time and tuck in the edges. It’s not all her, it’s not just her. Do you think the entire Empire will evaporate into dust just because you killed the person at the top of it? Was that what you thought? Idiot, idiot, idiot. You didn’t think. You should have thought! Their heart pounded so hard, and they were so clumsy, it seemed incredible nobody could hear the noise they were making. Any moment, the door could fly open, and everything would be ruined.

You should have thought this through. What have you done?

The edge of the window hadn’t seemed particularly high before, but it did now. Arms around one end of the bundle, heave upwards, find the tipping point and…

The terrible velvet roll slid over the windowsill and was gone, out of their arms in an instant, and Lian heard the flap and rustle as it fell, long moments of falling until it hit the garden bed several stories below.

Surely someone had heard that. Lian stood there, in the stifling candlelit dimness, and gulped for breath.

I’ve ruined everything. I’ve killed everyone.

They stuffed that thought away as unhelpful. They closed their eyes and made themselves take several more deep breaths.

They opened their eyes and surveyed the room. Did it look like it had before? Not perfect, but better.

They ended up rearranging the tiny tables and dragging a rug three feet to the left, to cover the places where blood was caught in wood grain. Tided the bedroom and rearranged the silken pillows.

Then they stood, out of breath, in the centre of the room, and realised that was all they could do. Part of them couldn’t believe they’d even got this far in their frantic, barely-thought out attempt to hide what they’d done. They would almost certainly be discovered as soon as they stepped out the door…

But that didn’t mean they could stay here.

Lian blew out the candles one by one. They rolled their sleeves up, retrieved their wrap from the floor where it had fallen so long ago, and arranged it around themself with exacting care, so that not a fleck of blood showed.

On their way to the door, they examined their own reflection in the glass front of one of the cabinets. Fine lacquerware and silver glittered in the dimness behind their washed-out face.

No blood showed. Their hair, still pulled back in its braid for sleep; the wrap tucked close under their chin; their eyes shadowed with tiredness and red-rimmed, but nothing more than that. They looked like they’d been crying, but as long as they didn’t look like they’d been frantically covering up a murder, Lian could live with that. They practiced dropping their gaze and looking only miserable.

Tense as a harpstring, as a bowstring, they opened the doors and padded out into the corridor on cold bare feet.

There was a guard at the end of the hall; less than a hundred metres away. Oh, gods, oh, gods. Lian swallowed back their heart, beating fit to burst in their chest, and approached him.

It was, they realised, the same one that had pulled them out of bed. An age ago.

“Her Majesty’s done with you, then?” he said, as Lian stopped a few feet away.

“Yes,” Lian whispered. They clutched their wrap tight with numb fingers, gaze fixed on the floor. Oh gods, was there blood on their feet? They had not thought to check… “T-take me back to my room, please.”

The guard stepped closer, intimidatingly close; he seemed to want to see Lian cringe, so they obliged, shrinking back. “That what her Majesty’s orders are?” he asked - was it suspicion, or just the guards’ usual heavy-handedness than made him press Lian?

“For now,” Lian stammered. “I’m to - uh - her Majesty will want me back when, when it’s light, but I…” Their voice dried up into a croak.

The guard looked them up and down, and Lian felt like their guilt was plain to be read on their face, in their shaking hands, the sweat that beaded their temple and their neck. The Empress’ blood was cold and sodden against their chest under the wrap. But they stood there, silent, and prayed he would take their stammering and trembling for distress at whatever the Empress had said or done.

Eventually he nodded, and they nearly collapsed from relief. He took them firmly by the shoulder and guided them back towards the darkened cavity that was the staircase downwards.

Lian sniffled, quietly, as they walked, and didn’t try to dislodge the hand on their arm, for fear of disturbing the careful arrangement of their wrap. Their head was spinning, and if they stumbled a few times on the stairs, the guard didn’t seem to find it odd.

How much does he know of what’s happened? Lian wondered. Of what she had planned for the morning?

If the Empress had told anybody else of her intentions, all that Lian had done tonight might not be enough. The cataclysm they had tried to avoid, a third of the city to be burned, could still occur.

The guard made an impatient noise as Lian stumbled, taking a step too quickly. They clutched their wrap desperately and held their body away from him as he supported them down the next few steps.

Once the corpse was found, Lian thought shakily, glancing over at him, this man would point the finger at Lian. Was possibly the only person who could, given that he’d escorted them there and back alone. If Lian was a different person, they might have been thinking of ways to make sure he couldn’t do that.

Impossible, even if Lian had wanted to.

The guard was mercifully silent as he escorted Lian down the stairs and through the silent, dim corridors. The sound of their bedroom door closing behind them was muted, soft, somehow definitive; footsteps followed as the guard walked away.

Alone inside the dubious haven of their bedroom, Lian cast off the wrap and their bloody nightclothes.

They could scarcely summon the energy, but after a long moment sitting on their bed and just breathing, they pulled it together enough to put the bloodstained clothes somewhere out of immediate sight, before they cleaned the blood from their chest and hands. This done, they crawled to huddle under their blankets.

I need to get rid of those, they thought, numbly, wrapping their arms around their shoulders in the darkness, trying to keep from shaking. Someone will find them. I can’t endanger the cleaning staff. Tomorrow, I’ll get rid of them. How can I get rid of them where nobody will see?

What do I do in the morning?

The Empress must not have given any orders for punishment of the city. Lian clung to that thought, using it as an anchor to pull themselves together. It had been a spontaneous decision, while Lian was there; she had been wild with anger, nothing she said had been calculated to her usual standards. So surely she hadn’t told anybody else yet.

In the morning, Lian would see to the aftermath of the fires. They would act as if nothing untoward had happened. Should they pretend the Empress had not even summoned them? Could they pretend to shock when someone told them of the fires?

Please, gods. Let me not have brought ruin on us all.

#Lian #Empress Elisandre #ruler and empress #royal whumpee #whump drabble #my stuff #violence tw #blood tw #death tw #royalty whump #emotional whump #subterfuge

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tendertenebrosity · 4 years

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Ruler and Empress part 13. Masterpost here.

For the next week, Lian went about their duties as best they could. They pushed it to the back of their mind - the elven ambassador and his baffling, tantalising, useless offer of help, along with their guilt over the palace servants. Nothing could be done; it did nobody any good to think of it. Not when the Empress’ eyes were on Lian at all times.

For Lian had erred, gravely; and it would be a long time before the silken ropes of Elisandre’s control over them had any give at all.

Their every moment seemed to be scheduled now, and they were grateful if they had a few minutes of work that wasn’t overseen by one of the empress’ staff. They were still required at meetings and functions; but increasingly only to sign documents. Sometimes they didn’t speak a single word. They coped. They had no choice. Time slid by, and if Lian thought about it, it was almost upsetting how easy it was to keep going like this. They tried not to think about it.

Night had fallen, and it had been a very long day, tedious and tiring enough to overcome even the way their mind turned itself over and over in the only silence and solitude they had anymore. So it was that Lian was deeply, dreamlessly asleep when their bedroom door crashed open, hitting the wall with a thud and making the objects on their dressing table rattle.

They jolted upright, hands grasping at their bedsheets, wincing and blinking in the light of the lamp that was suddenly being brandished in their face. Their heart was beating like a rabbit’s in their chest as they shaded their eyes and discerned the shape of one of their guards.

“Get up.”

Lian blinked spots from their vision, waiting for their eyesight to adjust. A guard? They usually stayed outside of Lian’s bedroom, since the wedding. Lian hadn’t expected that boundary to be respected forever, but...

The guard continued to hold the lantern up, shining the light critically over Lian.

They pulled their nightclothes down to cover their bare legs and drew themself up, doing their best to project cool, aloof dignity. “What,” they said, their voice hardly trembling at all, “Is the meaning of this?”

“The Empress wants you,” the guard said curtly.

Well, I could have figured that out myself, Lian thought. Who else? They took a deep breath, determined not to panic before they knew what had happened. “Very well,” they said. “If you will give me a moment of privacy, I will dress and - ”

“No,” the guard said. “She wants you now. Come on.” He jerked his head towards the door.

Lian ran their lower lip over their teeth. They knew there was no point in protesting this treatment, so rather than wasting more words they eased themself off the bed, trying to keep distance between them and the guard. They grabbed a discarded wrap from their dresser and pulled it around their shoulders.

There was no time for anything else, apparently; the guard put a hand on the back of Lian’s shoulder and shoved them towards the door.

The halls of the palace were dark. Lian rubbed sleep from their eyes and wondered what time it was - it felt like the early hours of the morning, but they couldn’t be sure. They looked down at their toes, bare against the polished wood of the floor. “Do you know why Her Majesty the empress wants to see me?” they asked the guard as they walked.

He glanced at them, his expression unreadable in the lamplight. “Doubtless you’ll find out.”

Lian sighed. “What time is it?”

The guard was silent, and Lian let out a little huff of breath. Surely she didn’t tell you not to give me the time. Well, fine.

As they approached a stairwell, Lian’s steps slowed. They could hear sounds drifting up from the lower levels of the palace - raised voices, commotion. They anticipated that the guard would lead them down, and started to angle their strides in that direction, worry starting to turn over and over in the pit of their stomach. There was too much noise for this late at night. This was more than a game the Empress was playing.

But the guard caught Lian rudely by the elbow, pulling them roughly to a stop, and jerked his head towards the stairs that led up. Which meant that, regardless of what was happening downstairs, Lian was going to the Empress’ private chambers.

Lian reminded themself of their resolution not to panic before they knew the facts. Once the guard had let go of their arm, they straightened their shoulders, resettled the wrap where the guard had pulled it out of place, and began to climb the stairs. They quickened the pace a little, and lifted their chin as if the guard wasn’t even there just a step behind them, as if they had chosen to climb these stairs in the middle of the night in bare feet and their thin nightclothes.

Eventually they came to a stop in front of the door to the Empress’ chambers. Before Lian could even catch their breath the door was opening and they had no choice but to step through it alone, heart pounding.

The little sitting room was better lit than the hallways, but it was still clear the Empress hadn’t been up for very long. The room was half-lit, deep velvety shadows and the glitter of gold and glass within them, the dining table a dim, bare shape off to the side. Over near the window and the lounge, one delicate side table bore several candles; another bore an angular, faceted glass decanter of water and a pair of untouched glass goblets.

Empress Elisandre had her back to the door, standing beside the window with the curtains pulled wide. She, too, was dressed for sleeping, her shift an elegant construction of silk and lace, her hair gathered up at the back of her neck and falling to her waist in a heavy golden rope. Lian shivered as a gust of wind came through the opened window, cold and smelling strongly of something Lian noticed but couldn’t spare time to identify. It swept past them, and died away as the door clicked shut behind them. They pulled their wrap closer around their shoulders instinctively.

They swallowed, trying to work moisture into their mouth.

“Your majesty. Y-you - you sent for me?” they said softly, deferentially.

The Empress turned her head, the curve of her cheek coming into view, candlelight shining on it and giving her the illusion of warmth. Then she spoke, her voice low and somehow flat.

“Come here.”

Lian stepped forward, obediently. The carpet was soft under their toes as they went to join the empress at the window. “Is… is there something that you need of me?” they ventured as they approached. “I’m sure I…”

Elisandre watched them approach, her only other movement to take hold of a fold of curtain to stop it fluttering. She spoke over Lian, as if she hadn’t even heard them. “Tell me, Ruler, what do you see?”

That flatness was still there, grating against Lian’s nerves. Lian’s eyes darted, from her face, to her pale graceful hand holding the curtain still, to the window. The wind hit their face, pushing their hair aside, and bringing with it the smell of… smoke? Loath as they were to turn their back to her, they looked out from the window obediently.

This part of the palace was high enough that they could see over the gardens, over the walls and past some of the highest buildings in the city. Lian knew that, in the sunlight and a clear day, you could see the sea glittering silver and turquoise through the buildings.

They didn’t see that this time. They saw a red-orange glow, reflecting off the clouds and painting the night sky with lurid, unsettling greys and reds.

And in place of the shining sea… flickers of bright flame.

“Is that the docks?” Lian exclaimed. Forgetting themself, they leaned out the window, craning to see better. “They’re - they’re on fire!”

“Are they?” Elisandre asked, her flat voice curling up in brutal sarcasm. “I hadn’t noticed. Yes, the docks. And every ship in the western side of the harbour.” She moved beside Lian, her hand drifting out languidly to indicate to her right. “And also the eastern gate and its bridge, although you can’t see that from here.”

Lian gaped for a moment, uselessly, their fingers curling on the windowsill. Then they stumbled back, clutched their wrap closer about their shoulders and plunged for the door on the other side of the room, skirting the lounge and the decorative tables.

They would be needed. Parts of the city had burned before - not that long ago, when the city had been taken - but this looked worse even than that. Lian no longer questioned why they had been dragged out of bed, they questioned why they’d been taken here. Every minute was precious! They knew - or hoped - that everybody important had been woken before them and was already heading down there. Bucket chains. Bands of people to pull survivors out of the water, the dock officials have hopefully… who is in charge there now? I don’t even know. Oh gods, there’ll be so many wounded, can we house them in the temple - no, they took the temple - what about here? Where are my shoes?

“Stay right where you are, Lian.”

Lian stumbled. They had almost reached the door, only another few feet between them and it.

“But..!” they protested. Their hand lifted for the door, fell back down, lifted again. The Empress’s command was like a chain around their waist, pulling them up with a painful jerk. They could not disobey her, could not - but -

“If you take one more step, I’ll make sure you regret it.”

“But, you - your majesty, I need to go there,” Lian insisted. “I need - there’ll be so much to….”

No. Calm. Be calm. They forced themselves to put their arm down, turn back to face the Empress, hands folded in front of them neatly even though they felt shaky with adrenaline. This would go faster if they did it her way. They bowed low. “Your majesty. M-may I have leave to go to the docks? I’ll be needed.”

The empress gave a little laugh, all bright sharp glittering edges. “Needed? Hardly. Really, Lian, what do you imagine you’re going to be able to do? Cry on the flames, perhaps? Prettily beg and reason with the boats not to burn?”

Lian flinched. “I…”

“Everything is already being done, did you really think I was waiting for your input?”

Lian swallowed. Well, that’s good, then, they told themself fiercely. See, all isn’t lost, people are working on it. We’ll get through this. They shifted from foot to foot, aching with their need to go to their people. They should not be here watching the fires from the empress’ sitting room. Even if nobody had need of Lian’s direction, they should be with them in this disaster. What did Lian need to say to be allowed to do that?

“I’m sure… I’m sure everything possible is being done,” they said, feeling their way forward carefully. “What… what do you wish me to do?”

“Do?” The empress turned away from the window, letting the curtain fall from her fingers to billow into the room with the next gust of wind. Her lip curled. Her voice sounded odd - was she drunk? Had she just woken up? Surely not. “What do I want you to do, Lian? Nothing. There is nothing constructive that you can do.”

“Then why did you send for me?” Lian asked, their voice small.

“Because you should know, of course!” She stabbed one hand towards the window, a sharp movement without her usual control. Her voice rose, and Lian realised what was different about it. She was furious, past the point of hiding it, past the point of masking it under sweet little barbs and cool smiles and practiced stillness. Angry enough to warp the mask, her face twisted. “You should know what the latest piece of idiocy your people have done is!”

Their stomach dropped.

Oh. Of course. They should have realised as soon as they’d seen it. This isn’t a spontaneous disaster - someone set my city on fire on purpose.

It had to be the resistance movement, the one Lian had heard whispered rumours and hints about. Nothing more than those, and Lian hadn’t pushed to hear more, but it made sense. The docks and the eastern gate; if Lian had considered sabotage before this, those were the targets they probably would have banked on.

“My people?” they managed to say. “You mean… the rebels?”

Elisandre made a savage noise of amusement and annoyance. “As if there is a meaningful distinction between those! Coincidentally, I’m sure, all the ships that are burning right now are mine, or those of my allies. Since all the native ships were moved to the other side of the harbour late last night.” She gripped the curtain tightly, the fabric bunching in her fingers. “Oh, no, Lian, this operation wasn’t carried out by a handful of rebels. This was aided and abetted at every turn by your citizens.”

“I - no, please,” Lian protested weakly. Should they be upset? Angry? Betrayed? I spent so much time on getting the harbour repaired… if we don’t have it how will we trade, how will we bring in food? How many of our people will be ruined? This hurts us as much as it hurts the Empire, probably more. Could their people really have seen it as worthwhile?

Yes, they realised, and it made their heart throb with pride and sorrow and fear. If it hurt the Empire, if it set them back in their plans by even a few months, if it told them that Lian’s people were still here and still fighting… Yes, Lian understood how the resistance could do it, and how the ordinary people could let them. It wasn’t the way Lian would have chosen to respond, but they couldn’t say it was wrong.

But Lian would need to find a way to navigate them through the consequences. Including Elisandre’s anger, uncharacteristically out of control.

They took a few more steps into the room, giving up on the door and the idea of going to the docks in person. “My Empress,” they said shakily. “I am… I am appalled. I am s-so sorry, on behalf of those of my people who… Please, I know this can be only a tiny minority. We will find them. Don’t punish the innocent along with the guilty…”

“Innocent?” She whirled, setting the heavy golden braid swinging in the candlelight. Her voice climbed. “If I could find an innocent person in this city, perhaps that would give me some pause, but I have yet to see any evidence that such exists! The rebels warned your people to move their ships! Your supposed guards allowed them past and directed them to which ships to burn! Your people provided the materials and tools! Your people sheltered and hid them!”

They tried to speak, but she cut them off. Her eyes were fixed on them, alight with fury.

“Lian, dear,” she said, and the word was almost a snarl, “We both know that your people have been more trouble than they’re worth. You are a primitive little backwater that nobody cares about, with neither two coins to rub together nor a standing army worth spitting on, and you run your nation like it’s a village council - and yet! This collection of peasants and drudges that you call your people occasionally has this delusion that they can defy me and not suffer the consequences!”

“No,” Lian protested. They had thought they were already as afraid as they could be; they had been wrong. They had never seen her so angry. “Please, your majesty - my empress - we are - ”

They weren’t sure she heard them.

“It makes me ask myself, why bother?” she asked rhetorically. She turned again, with a swirl of white silk, and strode across the room to the table with its glass decanter. Her neck was a graceful curve as she bent her head over it; seed pearls shook slightly on the sleeves of her nightdress as she poured herself a goblet of water.

She paused a moment. When she turned back around, she seemed more composed; face smooth, the stem of the goblet held in steady elegant fingers. Her eyes were bright, cool and clear as water, as she watched Lian where they stood, clutching at their wrap with nerveless fingers, half-dressed and trembling in the middle of the room.

“I need your country, the fields, your harbour and your waterways, Lian, but it’s not as though I have any particular attachment to its inhabitants.” Her voice was low and sweet again, the raw anger pushed beneath to glint and flash under the surface. “I’m starting to think it would be a lot more efficient if I just cleared this whole little rats’ nest out and filled it with loyal countrymen instead. The people of this city would rather burn than allow us the use of your harbour? Very well. Never let it be said I don’t listen to my subjects.”

Lian tried to take a breath and couldn’t. They dropped to the ground, heedless of the pain as their knees hit the floor, only the thin fabric of their nightshirt to cushion them. Their palms were jarred against the floor.

“No,” they choked. “Don’t. Please. You can’t!”

She looked down at them, her lip raised in a sneer. “Can’t? Can’t? I think you’ll find there’s nothing I can’t do.”

Lian clasped their shaking hands and raised them, hardly knowing why. “Please, I’ll beg - whatever you want, I will, I, what do you need, I can…”

“Whatever I want? Yes.” She tilted her head. “Do you know, Lian dear, I think you’re going to get what you wanted after all.”

Lian’s hands faltered, and they pressed one to their mouth, muffling their words. “I… I’m… please…”

The empress put the goblet down on the table with a soft click, not a drop spilling. She smiled, under control again but just as angry, razor-sharp and glittering behind the soft curve of her lips. “You wanted to go down to the docks, didn’t you? If there is to be punishment, my dear, of course you shall be there to help me administer it.”

“No…”

“Of course, it’s true that I can’t eliminate the entire city,” she said, thoughtfully. “Not on such short notice, anyway, as much as I’d like to. It would be inconvenient. I’m thinking perhaps… One in three? Do you think the city could still function with that workforce? We must devise a fair way to make the selection, of course - you can help me with that, Lian. I’m sure you’d prefer that, wouldn’t you?”

Lian couldn’t help a strangled noise. One in three? Of the whole city? “No!”

“Come, now, you love that kind of thing. An opportunity to mitigate the damage?” She laughed. “You don’t want me to set one of my officials the task, do you? Why, he wouldn’t try to spare anybody at all.”

“No - your majesty, don’t, please,” Lian pleaded. “You don’t need to - you wouldn’t, it can’t be…” Their breathing was coming fast, catching in their throat with every word. They swallowed. No. No, I can’t let this happen, how do I stop this from happening? They caught their breath and shuffled forward on their knees, reaching out a hand and looking beseechingly upwards at her. “El, Elisandre, my empress, please -”

Elisandre looked down at the hand. She said nothing, but arched one perfect eyebrow, and gave a little huffing breath of amusement. Gathering a fold of silk with one hand, she pulled her skirts away out of Lian’s reach, and turned away to walk back across the room to the window. Idly, she pulled back the curtain with one hand to watch the fires.

Lian didn’t try to follow her. They crumpled where they were, feeling like the floor ought to be tipping under them, but it wasn’t. They laid their hands flat on the polished wood of the floor, feeling it firm and steady underneath them, panic coursing through every part of their body. They were aware of their knees against the floor and their ankles crossed and aching underneath them, their heart beating oddly slowly, the touch of the cold night air against their throat and chest and the smell of smoke.

I can’t let this happen. I can’t.

How can I stop it? I need to stop it. It can’t happen.

They gazed at Elisandre, at the thick golden braid falling down her back, at her slim shoulders set like granite in the soft candlelight as she looked out the window.

They hadn’t said anything to stop her so far, they’d barely had the chance to even try. Hopeless; everything they’d said today was nothing to her, she wasn’t listening, they had never seen her this angry before. Sometimes the empress entertained Lian’s arguments and let them make their case; at other times she gave nothing.

She wasn’t interested in playing games with them tonight. She meant every word.

What do I do, what do I do, how do I stop this… what do I DO?

Lian’s eyes searched the room, desperately, as if deliverance could be found in the smoky air outside the window, in the soft candlelit shadows, in the folds of Elisandre’s shift. They couldn’t stop it. In a few hours Lian was going to go down to the docks and pick out people to die. This was going to happen, the way so many things that Lian thought were unendurable had happened, when they weren’t quick enough, clever enough, persistent enough to stop it. Is there anything I could do to stop her, when she’s like this? They knew in their heart there wasn’t.

Their eyes skated past the glass decanter on the side table, half empty, light glinting off the sharp edges. And there it caught, and held.

The world seemed to pause, one stomach-turning weightless moment like being at the zenith of a swing or the instant after you jumped from a height.

Lian chose.

“Get up,” Elisandre said distantly. She didn’t turn to look at them; her attention was still focused outside, on the orange glow of Lian’s city as it burned. “Come over here.”

Lian pushed themselves up, fingers splayed against the floor, the white of their nightshirt fluttering at the edges of their vision. They let the wrap fall from their shoulders as they stood, and the air was cold across their back and against their ankles.

One step, then another. They reached out and took hold of the glass decanter, and the facets of the glass were cold and hard as their slim fingers closed around its neck.

Elisandre hadn’t turned around to look at Lian. Their bare feet were soundless as they took another step forward, resettling their grip. They registered the soft glugging noise and the cold on their hand as they raised the decanter, and water rushed over their hand and wrist. They knew a moment of fear that their grip might slip, and then there was no more thought because they’d already chosen and there was no going back.

Lian swung the decanter with all the strength their arm could muster, and brought it down across the beautiful shining gold of the empress’ head.

The decanter shuddered and leapt in Lian’s hand like a live thing as it came apart. The empress had been starting to turn; she staggered instead, the momentum spinning her as she dropped. Her outflung hand brushed against Lian’s arm as she fell and they stumbled backwards, the impact of the decanter still rebounding up their wrist.

The empress’ body, small, white and gold and tawny in the light, hit the little table, sending it and the rest of the glassware crashing to the floor with a shocking noise.

And then there was silence, and stillness, save for the curtain blowing gently in the smoke-scented wind.

Lian clutched their hand to their chest. Their fingers were stinging, distantly. They stared down at the motionless frame of the Empress Elisandre, twisted into an ungraceful sprawl over the upturned table, head tipped back at an awkward angle.

Thought rushed back, and they staggered and fell to their hands and knees with the buzzing, rushing weight of it.

What have I done? Is she dead? Oh, gods, if she isn’t - what if she’s not -

Instantly fulfilling the fear that had only just bloomed in Lian’s heart… the empress stirred. The tiniest, protesting noise through her nose, her head shifting and back arching.

No. No! Oh gods, what will she do? What will she do to us? No, no, no, she has to be dead, she has to be…

Lian’s fingers stung, and they looked down to see red on the floor. Their hands were welling up with drops of blood, bright against their brown skin. Shards of glass glittered, bright razor-thin edges, amongst their blood-daubed fingers.

She has to be dead. She has to die. I can’t have tried this and failed, I can’t, I can’t, what will she do…

Their fingers closed on the biggest shard of glass.

The empress stirred again, a slow breath out, her pale fingers moving against the silk of her shift. Terror brought Lian back up onto one knee and lunging towards the empress. Don’t think, don’t think, just do it, you have to. They pushed her chin back with their free hand, positioned the trembling bloody piece of glass. I can’t let her get up from this. They squeezed their eyes closed, and stabbed.

There was, once Lian summoned the courage to open their eyes, a lot of blood.

They made their trembling fingers open up to drop the piece of glass, which immediately became lost in the confusion of blood and silk and broken glass.

Lian fell back onto their rump on the floor, and shuffled themselves away backwards with little scuffling movements of their hands and feet, their chest heaving as if they’d run for miles.

Elisandre didn’t move. Her body lay there, a graceless bloody heap, and nothing about her moved.

What have I done?

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tendertenebrosity · 4 years

Photo

So, this weekend, with lots of advice from others, I have been experimenting with moodboards!

So here are Lian and Elisandre, the hero and villain of my ongoing series, Ruler and Empress!

#ruler and empress #Lian #Empress Elisandre #moodboard #my stuff #MY OCs

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tendertenebrosity · 5 years

Text

Ruler and Empress Masterpost

As promised, a masterpost of my Ruler and Empress series. In hindsight I should’ve titled/labelled these better from the start, but at the start I thought it was a oneshot...

Summary: An Empress takes a cruel interest in the leader of a defeated nation while she occupies their capital.

The plot/canon

Part One - Dinner

Part Two - Dinner and new clothes

Part Three - Negotiations

Part Four - Trying the rebels

Part Five - A proposal

Part Six - Wedding clothes

Part Seven - The wedding part 1

Part Eight - The wedding part 2

Part Nine - The ambassador

Part Ten - Indecision

Part Eleven - Punishment

Part Twelve - Bathing

Part Thirteen - Tipping point

Part Fourteen - Coverup

Extras

Bad Future Au, too sad for canon

Facemakers and picrews: 1, 2

Commissioned art: By Luinquesse

Moodboards: A pair by me and one by ComfyWhumpee!

Asks, tag games, and other little things: 1, 2, 3 , 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

11, 12

Updated as of 26/10/2020!

#Lian #ruler and empress #Masterpost #Empress Elisandre

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tendertenebrosity · 5 years

Text

Part eight! Parts one, two, three, four, five, sad au, six, and seven).

By the time Lian and the empress took their leave of their guests, Lian felt hot all over, aching and exhausted. The wedding gown constricted their movements and made them queasy every time they caught sight of it.

As the dining hall door clicked shut behind them, Lian’s head drooped slightly, their smile faltering, before they pulled themselves upright. The servants could still see, they weren’t alone yet. The night wasn’t over.

“Come,” was all the empress said - the first word she had spoken directly to Lian, rather than about them or past them, in hours.

Lian followed her in silence up the stairs, down the hallways to her rooms. Into the little sitting room that was now horribly familiar, the setting of countless nightmares, where they had sat down to that first meal with her. Through the doors into her private chambers.

And then Lian was, after an evening of festivities that had worn them down to a light-headed, threadbare exhaustion where nothing seemed quite real anymore, alone with the empress. With their… wife.

I didn’t cry, they thought, numbly. I held it together. I got through it and I didn’t cry. The seamstress and her staff won’t be hurt.

The room was quiet, dimly lit - a relief to Lian, after the brightness and noise of the festivities. They looked around, tense in anticipation of criticism or punishment. A bed, on the other side of the room, draped with silks and adorned with cushions - they averted their eyes from that with an twist in their stomach. Closer at hand there was a dressing table, complete with a mirror that glimmered with reflected candlelight on velvet and silk.

The empress sighed, and lifted their joined hands. A flicker of distaste crossed her expression. “If one is to judge wedding traditions by how inconvenient they are,” she said, her tone dry and flat. “I must say, yours wins out over ours. I think this has served its purpose. Take it off.”

Lian shivered and followed their empress to the dressing table and its ornate chair, which she sank into with a sigh of silk.

There were no other chairs. Lian understood what they were supposed to do. They knelt beside the chair, their knees and elbows brushing the edges of her skirts, and began to pluck nervously at the elaborate knots of the wedding tie with their left hand.

“It would be easier to cut it,” the empress observed, holding her hand on her knee and looking down at Lian.

Lian hunched their shoulders. “That’s, um, that’s considered very bad luck,” they mumbled. “Not a good omen for the marriage. At all.” They weren’t sure why they were telling her that, because she didn’t care and Lian didn’t think they did either. They forced a noise back down their throat before it could escape.

Bad luck? Lian didn’t want this marriage to have good luck, what would that even involve? What was Lian supposed to hope for? For it to last a long time or be fruitful or make its participants happy? They paused for a moment, feeling sick and dizzy as the magnitude of what had just happened hit them all over again.

The empress rolled her eyes and sat back. “Well, get on with it, then.”

Lian took a deep breath, let it out slowly. They could smell the empress’ perfume and it made them feel sicker. Just get it off and then you can leave. She said she didn’t want to bed you. Please, if there is any mercy in the heavens to be found… this night will be over soon.

Sitting back in the chair, she watched Lian struggling to unravel the knots for a long minute.

“And what if you can’t get it undone?” she said witheringly. “Are we supposed to wander the halls looking for somebody to help? Or just stay like this until morning?”

“Um,” Lian whimpered. “M-maybe?” Needing help wasn’t as bad luck as cutting it, but it wasn’t a good omen, either.

She was supposed to be helping - it was supposed to be the first task the newlywed couple did as a team - but Lian would have been happy to cut it at that point. They would have been happy to cut their hand off. They were shaking. They felt that if they were in skin-to-skin contact with her for one more instant they would faint.

Finally, enough of the cloth loosened to allow Lian to slip their hand out from under it. They snatched the hand to their chest and sat back on their heels, unable to stifle a small gasp of relief.

They knelt there, clutching their hot right hand to their chest, breathing like they’d been running. Head bowed, hunched over it like it was a mortal wound. It felt like that was what it was. Their chest hurt. They had their hand back, but nothing would ever be the same again. The empress had taken something out of them when she held them up in front of all the world and demonstrated how deeply she owned them, and they would never get it back. What was it? Their heart? Their self-respect? They didn’t know. But they hurt deep inside like whatever it was had been bodily torn out.

Silks rustled beside Lian’s head. A hand brushed past their hair, touch feather-light, and they shuddered.

The empress pulled the blue and gold ornament out of Lian’s hair. A sweaty hank of their dark locks, freed of its bindings, fell down in front of their eyes, and they fixed their gaze on it so as not to have to look at anything else. They wanted to ask if they could leave now, but they didn’t dare. You managed to get this far without any missteps, without anybody else needing to suffer. Don’t ruin it now.

“My servants won’t be here tonight,” she announced. “I will require your help before you retire to your own chambers.”

Lian nodded, pushed their hair back out of their eyes, and got to their feet. “Of course,” they whispered. “Your majesty.”

She shifted in the chair to face towards the dressing table and the mirror. She smiled at Lian in the mirror, her eyes glittering underneath the curls and ornamentation of her own wedding headdress. “So formal, beloved,” she teased. “You could call me Elisandre, if you wished.”

Lian blinked dumbly at their reflections. The dark-eyed person in the mirror looked like a stranger. Softly lit by the candlelight, perfectly applied makeup, the gorgeous blue silk gown. That person looked tired, but that was all.

“I… if you want me to,” they said dully.

She laughed. “Such enthusiasm.” She put her hand up, and gestured at her hair, arching her eyebrows. “Well? Am I supposed to take all this down myself?”

Lian flinched. “Oh, um, your pardon.”

They stared at the empress’ - Elisandre’s? - hairstyle, tired beyond anything they’d ever imagined.

They gently brushed aside a lock of hair, dreading what might happen if they were rough or clumsy in their exhaustion. They removed a jeweled pin, laid it on the dressing table with a quiet clink. Slowly, with great care, they started removing the blue and gold fabric, unpinning braids and freeing locks of hair.

The empress watched them in the mirror, face unreadable.

“You seem composed,” she remarked. “I suppose your seamstress is safe. As is the rest of your palace staff. That was a terrible display from the crowd after the ceremony, but…”

Lian’s hands shook. “Please,” they begged, all their barriers and resistance worn away. “Oh, please…”

She raised her hand to hush their protests, impatiently. “Oh, well, you were composed. Enough. I don’t see any purpose in bloodshed right now. Before the sun rises, if you don’t mind,” she said pointedly.

“Sorry. Sorry.” Lian put the headdress aside on the table and continued their work.

She examined Lian’s face critically in the mirror. “You think I do all that purely for spite, don’t you?” she asked. “All you see is the cruelty. But the truth is that almost everything I do to your people is calculated to effect.”

You told me once that you kept me around for entertainment. What purpose does calling me ‘beloved’ serve? I can think of a dozen little things you do purely to be cruel.

“Your people, my people, every one of those nobles mingling down there in the dancing hall right now,” she said. “They’re all playing pieces. Some more valuable than others, of course, some dangerous or unpredictable, some almost worthless… but playing pieces all the same. One moves them around the board with purpose, towards a larger aim. I don’t do anything without considering its effects on all the other pieces in play.”

Lian kept their eyes lowered, their fingers working slowly to unwind a braid. “I see,” they whispered.

Lian worked in silence for long minutes, finding yet another and another pin in the Empress’ hair. They ached to be finished with this; they wanted to be alone, they wanted quiet and sleep and to huddle around the aching wound in their heart. They lifted down a long, heavy coil of pale hair.

The empress shifted, and gave a tiny sigh. Lian glanced up at the mirror, startled. The empress’ eyes were closed. There was a line between her brows, and she rolled her neck slightly.

“Don’t you get tired?” Lian said softly, without really knowing why. Except that this crack in the empress’ glittering, bright facade had surprised them. It had been a long day for her, too, surely. But they were surprised she could do anything so human as be relieved to take off uncomfortable finery.

The crack disappeared as soon as they had noticed it. The eyes opened, and the empress was giving them a look of cultured, polished disbelief in the mirror. She chuckled. “By what, Lian? A little ceremony? You are dreadfully rural and unsophisticated out here, aren’t you, if you think today was an ordeal for me.”

Lian’s hand, which had frozen, slowly resumed its movement. Another pin clinked into the growing pile.

“By all the posturing,” Lian whispered. They hadn’t understood three quarters of the empress’ interactions with other members of her court today. “It’s not leadership or governing, it’s… something else. Pretending and maneuvering and having to look strong. Calculating when and how to kill people for effect. Watching everybody, all the time, and not trusting any of them. Taking bigger and bigger pieces of territory and keeping everything under control. Why? What purpose does it serve? What is the goal?”

She sat back, narrowing her eyes at Lian, and gave a cat-like smile.

“Ah,” she said. “That’s a telling question for you to ask, Lian. This is why, left to your own devices, you will always be nothing but a playing-piece. No power, no control. Just a pawn for other people to move around the board as it suits them. You lack… Vision. Ambition. You wouldn’t last two weeks in my court back home.”

“…probably not, your majesty.” Clink. Another pin.

“Honestly, this is why your people fell, you know. If your parents - or at least your ancestors - were more skillful players of the game, you could have avoided all of this.”

“How?” Lian whispered. They weren’t sure what they were doing. They knew every sentence they exchanged with the empress was inviting disaster, another opportunity for her to find fault or offense in something they said and enact punishment on somebody else for it. They didn’t want to be here a second longer than they had to be. But they found they couldn’t stop themselves. “What amount of ambition could have stopped your armies, when they came? We’re small. We don’t have your might.”

She shrugged. “You could have done. If you’d made different decisions as a country, in your past.”

“And my people would be safe, then?” Lian said, dully. They were so tired. “If we were cleverer and had played the game better, we would be safe?”

She laughed delightedly. “Hmmm. Perhaps! That is indeed one way of playing the game! But there are no guarantees. And playing it safe doesn’t make you successful. The game rewards boldness and risk-taking.”

“Successful at what?” Lian put down the last few pins. “What do you get if you win?”

She shook her head, smiling to herself, as if Lian were so very stupid. “Ah, that’s the thing, my dear. You don’t ever really win. The chief reward of playing well is a bigger, more dangerous board.”

Lian picked up a hairbrush, biting their lip. Why had they thought there would be any sort of answer at the end of this conversation? “It sounds exhausting,” they whispered. “And I don’t see what the point is.”

“No?”

The Empress Elisandre should have looked softer, with her hair down around her shoulders. But she didn’t. She met Lian’s eyes in the mirror, as polished and hard as any of the diamonds littering the dressing table in front of her. Her voice was soft and mock-tender. “Then I suppose you’ll remain nothing but a little playing-piece, won’t you?”

She turned, took the brush out of Lian’s unresisting fingers, gently, and smiled up at them. “And I? I get to do whatever I want with you.”

#whump drabble #angst #my stuff #Lian #Empress Elisandre #ruler and empress #forced marriage #uncomfortable intimacy #this is probably where the empress starts to steer Lian towards the bad future AU #implied threat of noncon

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tendertenebrosity · 5 years

Text

Part 9! Previous parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight)

The night air was blessedly clear. A gentle breeze stirred the trees and cooled the sweat on the back of Lian’s neck.

Their feet were soundless on the grass as they slipped further into the garden, and away from the noise and bright lights of the festivities. Guilt squirmed in their stomach and they squashed it down with an uncharacteristic flare of defiance.

I’m just catching a breath of air, they told themself. If I don’t take a break I’m going to say something stupid, and that would be worse.

It had been over a week since the wedding, and Lian was beginning to wonder if any of these people were ever going to go away. The palace seemed full to bursting with foreign nobles as well as foreign soldiers. Lian was quietly proud of how well the palace staff were handling things - nothing bad had happened this week, no disasters to draw the Empress’ attention or ire.

Lian leaned back against the bole of the nearest tree, careful not to snag any of their finery, and let out a deep, slow, controlled breath, trying to relax their shoulders. The one blessing of the evening was that Empress Elisandre - my wife, and they shuddered minutely - was not here at this gathering.

I’ll just stand here for a minute, they thought. The moonlight shone dappled through the branches, moving with the wind. They could still hear the music drifting across the garden from the palace, but they did their best to tune it out and listen to the wind shushing in the trees. Then I’ll go back inside, and probably dance with the Empress’ horrible cousin, and go sit in the corner where they put me and smile for the rest of the evening. In a minute. Just a minute of cool breeze, and solitude, and the soft smells of greenery, to centre themself and allow them to bear the things that they had to.

“Hello?”

Lian flinched, eyes springing open.

“Your highness? Is that you?”

The voice wasn’t the steel veiled under politeness that Lian had come to expect from the Empress’ soldiers when in the presence of guests. Neither was it the naked harshness to be expected when not in the presence of guests. So, not guards, but who?

Lian could see whoever it was, silhouetted against the lights from the party, holding aside a spray of flowering vines while they peered around. Initially Lian was at a loss, but after a moment they placed his accent. The elven ambassador.

Apparently unimpeded by the dimness of the garden, he had seen Lian - his head rose and he made for Lian’s refuge with a purposeful stride.

Lian allowed themself to sag against the tree trunk for a bare moment. You can’t even let me have thirty seconds of peace? Then they pulled themself together, straightened their shoulders, and dredged through sharp-edged memories of their wedding feast to find a name.

“Ambassador Silverquill,” they said, hoping the darkness hid how thin and unconvincing their smile was. They pushed themself away from the tree and went out into the moonlight to meet him. “I’m so sorry to be rude. I had just… come out for some air.”

The ambassador took their hand, surprising them. His fingers were as warm as his voice, their touch the perfect amount of pressure, and Lian winced at how inelegant and clumsy they must seem to him. The moonlight glimmered on his silver hair-clasp when he bowed over their hand.

“Oh, think nothing of it, your highness, I beg you,” he said earnestly. “Indeed, I should be the one apologising to you for my rudeness. I noticed you had stepped out and thought I would follow.”

“You - oh,” Lian said dubiously, as they took their hand back. You followed me? They constructed a self-deprecating smile. “There was no need to do that, ambassador, there isn’t anything of interest out here. I just wanted a moment to think, that’s all.”

Their gaze went over the ambassador’s shoulder, towards the gathering they were shirking. They could not see any of their guards. Anxiety began to itch at the inside of their breastbone. They really shouldn’t have come out here.

“There is something of interest, actually,” Silverquill said. His gaze was firmly, unwaveringly, fixed on Lian. “You see, your highness, you are out here. And I’ve been trying to talk to you all week.”

Lian’s heart skipped. “We’ve all been - very busy,” they said, their voice smooth despite their sudden conviction that they were on dangerous ground. The Empress’ voice echoed in their head for a moment. Nothing but a little pawn for other people to move around as it suits them. What game was the elven ambassador playing? “I’m sorry if you have felt neglected, it hasn’t been our intention to…”

Silverquill shook his head with a wry smile. He looked suddenly roguish, again, in the moonlight. “To give me the run-around? Fob me off? Maybe not your intention, but your new bride hasn’t been at all opaque in her efforts to give me as little time and information as she possibly can.”

Lian looked around the garden for guards again. They must have noticed Lian was missing by now. “Perhaps we should go inside,” they suggested. “I would be glad to - ”

Silverquill held up his hands in gentle admonishment. “Ah! Forgive me again, Esteemed Ruler, I am babbling. The entire purpose of me following you tonight was to get to speak with you alone, where the Empress can’t hear us.”

“The - my guards,” Lian stammered, and caught their breath. They felt - jarred, like a discordant note had played in the music that drifted out through the palace’s open windows. They should not have responded like that. It wasn’t in keeping with the charade they had upheld, at the Empress’ deadly insistence.

The ambassador took Lian’s stumbling response in his stride.

“It’s all right,” he assured them, his voice soft and warm. “My partner is very close nearby, she’ll make sure we aren’t disturbed and that nobody is listening in. It’s safe for us to talk.”

His eyes crinkled at the corners with sincerity as he inclined his head towards Lian, waiting for a response. Lian blinked up into them, feeling that their tongue was frozen.

When nothing was forthcoming, Silverquill sighed. “Your highness, I want to help you. I know that you’re in a very awkward situation - it seems clear that you thought this was the best path you could take for your country, and I won’t presume to judge. Even so… it can’t be easy to balance your responsibilities. There must be things you wouldn’t say if you thought it would get back to Elisandre’s ear. If you have anything you want us to know, rest assured, she’ll never know you were the source.”

“I - I can’t,” Lian managed to squeeze out. They stepped away, back into the shadows of the tree, and steadied themself against it with a hand. They were trembling. Beyond their fear, hope danced, cruelly just out of their reach. If someone wanted to help - if someone else could help - Lian had been alone for so long. The thought of letting somebody else into their nightmare was a breathtaking, impossible mirage of relief. Lian cursed their own selfishness.

What would I tell him? I’m being held captive? Please, rescue me? You’re a child, Lian.

Rescue wasn’t important. Lian wasn’t important. The only thing that was important was Lian’s people, and what the consequences would be if Lian blundered here. What if it was a trap? The elven nations were a great power. What was more likely - that their ambassador came to offer Lian help out of the goodness of the elves’ hearts? Or that they were, once again, a pawn in someone else’s game?

Silverquill followed them into its shade. He watched them, his forehead creased.

“Is there anything that you need?” he probed. “What would help your country the most? I’m authorised to offer you aid, in secret if necessary…”

“In secret?” they repeated, their voice climbing in pitch. How are you supposed to do that? You’re talking to the worst person in the country if you want to do anything in secret! “I - I -”

What would the Empress do if - when - she found out that Lian had had this conversation with the ambassador? Lian’s blood went cold to think of it. They had already been out here for several minutes alone with him, the guards would tell her Lian had been out here with him, oh, they might have doomed so many people already just by being out here.

They pulled themself upright, smoothing hands down their clothes and raising their chin regally. “I’m sorry, Ambassador,” they said woodenly. “If you wish to discuss anything with me, we will have to make a… a more appropriate time. I need to get back to my court.”

He looked disappointed. “Oh, but - ”

Lian side-stepped so that they could sweep past him, out from under the sheltering embrace of the tree and into the light. Their heart was beating lightly and rapidly under their finery. They worried, for an instant, that he might put a hand out to stop them, or grab their clothing, but he didn’t. They set their gaze firmly on the glow of the palace lights. Why had they come out here? They were such a fool.

Silverquill followed, catching up to Lian quickly. “Look, I understand you have to be very careful, but it really is - ”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” they said, some of the stress bleeding through, making them snap. They lengthened their stride, the constricting robe catching at their legs. “You go too far.”

He put a hand out to touch their sleeve. “You can trust - ”

Lian snatched their arm back. “No, I can’t,” they hissed. “Leave me alone.”

They fled, back to the bright lights and the suffocating gaze of the the nobles and the guards.

Rylior Silverquill watched the young Ruler walk away. They stumbled and nearly tripped on their robe, cast what looked like a frightened glance back at Rylior, and disappeared into the shadows.

Quiet and stillness settled over the garden again. The nodding vines filled the air with subtle fragrance.

“Damn,” he muttered, folding his arms. “That went well, O Ambassador. My shining wit and charisma claims another victim.”

He had pushed too hard. All he had intended to do was offer some quiet support, and open a channel of communication that wasn’t routed through the Empress. He supposed he shouldn’t have pressed the issue when they had turned him down the first time, but this was the only opportunity he’d had in days, and he hadn’t known when there would be another.

Normally Rylior was a defter touch than this. He sighed, blowing out his cheeks, and leaned one hand against the tree.

A slender, long-nosed elven woman stepped out of the ornamental shrubs beside him, without producing the tiniest out-of-place rustle.

“She didn’t want to hear it,” Syllea Dawncloak said. “Did she?”

The ambassador frowned. “Not she, they. Don’t you even read the cultural briefings?” He rubbed a hand over his face ruefully. “But no. They did not.”

Syllea leaned silently against the tree beside him. “Right, they,” she amended. “Anyway, if they didn’t listen, I don’t think you’ll get a chance to try again for quite a while, unless we break into the private quarters of the palace. The guards mostly stick to them like burrs any time they’re out in public.”

“Hmm,” he said in agreement.

She paused, cocked her head to look at him. “I was being flippant, by the way,” she said tartly. “I’m not going anywhere near the private quarters. I don’t think we’ve reached the part of the mission where Her Excellency is comfortable with us breaking into the bedrooms of foreign heads of state.”

Rylior grinned. “Oh, Her Excellency knows me very well, Lea, she wouldn’t have sent us if she didn’t at least want it on the table. She trusts our judgment.”

He didn’t have to look at her to know that she was rolling her eyes, but he was only partially joking. He hadn’t misled the Ruler; he answered directly to his Queen, and she had given her agents quite a lot of latitude on this mission. She did trust his judgment.

“Why do you think they wouldn’t talk to you?” Syllea asked after a few moments.

Rylior tilted his head thoughtfully. “Afraid, I think.”

“Tell you what,” Syllea muttered. “They’re probably right to be, imperial consort or not. Some of the things I saw in the city today… Ry, this place is gutted.”

“Yes,” Rylior said, his lips thinning. Flippant he might be, but he knew the stakes were high here. “This self-styled Empress has all the humanity of a winter storm on the Boreal Seas. I think the Queen was fully justified in sending us; if we don’t keep this region under our eyes she’ll be after half the continent. People like that can never stop at one brutal war of acquisition.”

Syllea inclined her head in agreement. “Back to it, then? They’ll be missing you. Whistle if you need me.”

She melted back into the dappled shadows of the garden so completely that even Rylior couldn’t see how she did it.

He would give Ruler Lian space and not attempt to approach them again tonight, even with the buffer of other people nearby. Better to show that he could respect their boundaries, at least for now.

It was possible he was reading too much into it. Possibly they were just making the best of extremely bad luck and didn’t want the Elven Nation’s help. Quite possibly they had no idea what they were doing and had been honestly confused by his offer of help.

But there was something desperate about the Ruler’s poise, under the makeup and watchful eyes. Rylior could feel it.

Hopefully they’ll remember my words, reconsider once they have time and space. I’ll need to find a way they can discreetly get in contact with me, if they change their mind. He straightened the cuffs on his jacket, preparing to wade back into the elegance and artifice of the Empress’ hospitality.

#ruler and empress #Lian #Rylior #Syllea #misgendering #it is very brief though #political intrigue #my stuff

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tendertenebrosity · 5 years

Text

Part 12. Previous: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven)

Lian lost track of some time after that.

They didn’t really know how they had made it from the gardens back into the private areas of the palace. Nevertheless, there they were, sitting in what seemed to be one of the private bathing rooms. The blood was slowly drying against their skin, tacky clumps on their forearms, their hands, sticking their hair to their neck and face. It made them feel dizzy and shaky to think about that, so they tried to stop.

They heard whispering around them, servants conferring. Perhaps they thought that Lian couldn’t hear, or wasn’t listening. They were mostly right. It would have taken effort to turn the murmuring into words and follow who was saying what, and Lian just couldn’t summon it.

Lian hadn’t needed or wanted help bathing and dressing themselves since they were small. But they sat there, on a small stool, and allowed people to divest them of the blood-soaked robe, and sponge the worst of the blood from their skin, and rinse their long dark hair in a basin of warm water. They knew they ought to be doing something, saying something, but it was all just so hard.

After a while the murmuring died down and the room seemed less crowded. Lian was, faintly and tiredly, glad of that.

The room smelled of blood. Lian didn’t like it but it didn’t occur to them to try and move away or make it stop. They sat there, inhaling the coppery smell, feeling light and empty. Empty except for the miserable knowledge that they had made a huge, horrible mistake, and it could never, ever be made right. What was the point of doing anything?

What murmuring was left seemed to be only two people, and some of it resolved into words.

“There. Lean forward, child.” Hands gently pressed against Lian’s shoulders and they let themself be moved.

They would regret being this quiet soon, they knew. There was always something Lian needed to be doing, and currently they weren’t doing anything, and that meant they had to be neglecting something important. They thought they could feel some core of themselves yelling and crying at them to get up, move, do something - but that urgency felt very far away and they were, selfishly, a little glad of that.

“That’s it. Bring me the towel, they’re shivering. ”

Somebody was shivering? Lian considered that while their hair and shoulders were patted dry. Odd, because it wasn’t cold. They looked down and realised that their hands, newly clean, were trembling. Oh. It’s me.

“Here we go,” the voice prompted them, gentle but very firm. “You’re going to put this on, now. You’ll catch your death sitting around like this.”

“Grandmother, should you - ”

“Hush. I know what I’m doing.” The voice was almost sing-song, slightly cracked. “Come on, what did I say? Sit up, now, here’s your robe. Help me get this onto them, yes, that one. Moving on, child, let’s get you dressed.”

Cloth met Lian’s hands, soft and dry against their fingertips. They closed their hand in it vaguely, looking down at their lap. A robe, yes, they should put something on. They could probably just about manage to do that, since the person who’d helped them bathe wanted them to, and it was a good idea anyway. They really couldn’t sit around unclothed.

“There now,” the cracked voice said, and for the first time it registered with Lian that she hadn’t addressed them as Ruler or your highness. “Lift your arms, child. Over your head. That’s it.”

Lian blinked, lifted their arms obediently. Nobody had spoken to them like this in… over a year, probably much longer. Not since they had taken the throne, certainly. The softness of the material went over their head.

Once they had emerged from the neck hole of the garment, they looked around properly for the first time since being brought inside. A bathing room, yes, with tubs of water and the smells of herbs and soap, and two women in the clothing of palace servants. The woman helping them dress was old, her greying hair pulled up with flowers and her eyes bracketed by laugh-lines.

“There you are,” she said.

“I… yes,” Lian whispered, understanding what she meant. “Thank you.” They stood up, slowly and shakily, and their hands automatically went about the movements of wrapping and tying the robe securely around themself. It was one of their old ones - well-made but simple, in the traditional style that Lian wasn’t allowed to wear around the Empress.

Of course. That was right. The…

“The Empress,” Lian exclaimed. “Aren’t I - oh, I’m supposed to be somewhere!” Slowly, sluggishly, panic started to rise in their throat. They fussed with the clothing, not sure if they had to time to change it or if they should rush off now. Would the time it took to change make her angrier than seeing them dressed like this? “I need to - oh, she’ll be angry if I - ”

“Sit down, child,” the old woman said sternly. “It’s all right. She is not here. And good riddance!”

Lian turned a wild look on her. “But - But -”

“Sit down. Or stay standing if you like, but no rushing anywhere!” The old woman shook her head. “Young folk, dashing hither and thither. No cause for it. Sit a while.”

“She’s meeting with her generals,” the other woman in the room interjected softly. When Lian turned to look at her, she blushed and dropped her gaze. “It’s true, highness, she’ll be gone for several hours. She didn’t want you to be there. She said she expected you at the dinner this evening.”

Lian looked between them, confused, guilty, desperately wanting to believe that it was true, that they didn’t have to rush back to the Empress’ side. They sank back down onto the closest dry surface they could see, the wooden bench by the side of the room.

“I have a few hours,” they echoed. They folded their arms, hugging them against their body. They were still shivering, they noticed, and their heart seemed to be doing something strange, caught between rapid panicky racing and the same lassitude that had gripped them earlier. They felt like each beat was shaking their chest. The images from earlier resurfaced in their mind: a body folding and hitting the floor, not even time to scream or beg or comprehend what had happened. The ease, even satisfaction, in the line of the soldier’s arm as he raised the whip. Their fingers, pressing and grasping uselessly at the blood-soaked ruin of a stranger’s throat. They propped their head up on their hands, wet hair falling about their face.

“Now,” the old woman said, hopping up to sit beside Lian. “You aren’t silly enough to believe her, are you? About it being your fault.”

Lian frowned, pulled away. But they found it surprisingly difficult to be offended. She was talking to Lian like they were her own child, or grandchild, and part of Lian soaked it up like parched sand.

“It is my… my responsibility,” they said eventually. “That’s what being Ruler means. It means I need to… to…” They found their throat drying up. They curled up on themselves, arms folded around their stomach. They thought about the servant’s face as he’d looked to Lian, eyes alight with devotion. Had Lian ever done anything in their life to deserve that? It wasn’t enough to simply be born and inherit the title. It needed to be part of you, it needed to be everything to you, or you had no right to claim anybody’s loyalty. Rulers did not whine about things not being their fault, they took the responsibility of fixing it.

“I’m all people have,” they croaked eventually. “I’m the only one that can make a difference. And when I don’t, people die.”

This was far from the first death Lian had witnessed since the invasion started. It wasn’t even the most horrible. So why…

They dragged in a long breath, and lowered their head to their knees, making a long, low, miserable noise.

They felt a small, strong hand on their back, rubbing in slow circles. They felt like they didn’t deserve it - they were not the one who had died today, or lost loved ones, or been tortured. This old woman wasn’t even family, that Lian had the right to expect comfort from her. But they would take it, if she wanted to give it. Simple human contact, their familiar clothes, the chance to cry where nobody could see them - these little things wouldn’t make things better in any real sense, but Lian would take them.

“It isn’t your fault,” she said brusquely, “And it isn’t the fault of those poor folks who died, and it isn’t the elf’s fault. Leave all of the blame where it belongs. With them, and her.” She patted Lian on the shoulder one last time.

Lian sniffled. They wanted to say, I’ll try, or maybe it’s not that simple. But talking was, just then, too difficult.

The old woman had left when Lian next looked around. They hadn’t the faintest idea who she was - and that, they thought bleakly, was probably for the best. Being known and valued by Lian wasn’t very good for anybody’s wellbeing.

Even though it was the middle of the day, the rest of the staff Lian seemed to have gathered shepherded them to their bedroom. They didn’t object. They curled up under clean covers, running their hands over and over the smooth cotton and their arms, and slept.

Rylior sat up, blearily, at the sound of someone moving around in his rooms. He swore he had only lain down for a moment to rest his eyes, and yet he could tell it was hours later. His rooms were finely appointed enough not to be offensive, but Rylior was pretty sure they had been placed in a side wing of the palace in order to make it as inconvenient as possible to get to official functions. Elisandre had shot herself in the foot if so, because it made it a lot easier for Syllea to sneak in and out.

He made his way out to the sitting room to see Syllea making herself a mug of tea.

“Guerrilla freedom fighters keep late hours, I take it,” he said, leaning in the doorway and picking sleep crust from his eyes.

She glanced upwards. “I told you you shouldn’t wait up. You’ll ruin your nice going-to-concerts-with-mass-murdering-despots outfit.”

Rylior plucked at an artful ruffle with two fingers. It was sadly rumpled. “Oh, this? Nothing, just a little something I threw together,” he said archly. “Good taste would be wasted here in any case.”

Syllea said nothing, but proceeded to add another mug to her preparations.

“So?” Rylior prompted her. “Any success?”

She handed him the mug. “You first.”

Rylior sighed. “Nothing,” he said. “No book. No message. No Ruler.”

She nodded, taking the news with equanimity. Rylior himself tried not to be too disappointed. He had hoped that Ruler Lian might bring him the book back at the concert tonight, but he hadn’t banked on it. The important thing was that they had the book, and the knowledge that they could send a message to Rylior any time they wanted to.

He took a long swallow of tea. “Yours?”

She dropped gracefully onto the lounge without so much as stirring the surface of her tea. “I managed to get a meeting with this Black Kite.” She stifled a yawn. “Took long enough, but you can’t blame them for paranoia.”

“You think he’s the real deal, then?” Rylior asked.

She nodded slowly. “Yeah,” she said. “I think he is. He’s got… how do you put it? Presence?”

“Hmm.” If I was a resistance leader meeting with a foreigner I didn’t trust, he thought, I might ask a suitably imposing-looking underling to pretend to be me for a while.

“You know, like the Queen,” Syllea added, and Rylior understood what she meant. Not all great leaders had that spark, but if they did, he wasn’t sure it could be faked by someone else.

“Anyway, he’s interested in further talks,” Syllea said. “Cautiously, of course. These people haven’t survived this long by making rash decisions.”

“Excellent,” Rylior said. “I’ll send my report to Her Excellency tomorrow.”

Syllea sipped her tea. “I did overhear some interesting comments,” she said. “Sounds like they’re planning something. For next week, before all of these officials from the motherland head back home.”

Rylior considered that, and hissed gently. “Could be interesting,” he said.

“Could be a bloodbath,” Syllea corrected. “Obviously the Black Kite didn’t let me see the extent of his people, but I highly doubt he can be hiding enough to make a serious dent in the Imperial army.”

“Hmm. See what you can find out.”

She gave him a lazy salute, then tipped back on the lounge, throwing an arm over her eyes. “Tomorrow. Blow out the light on your way back to bed.”

#ruler and empress #Lian #Rylior #Syllea #comfort #angst #bathing #dissociation #trauma #aand some plotty stuff as well #self-doubt #guilt #self-loathing #my stuff

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tendertenebrosity · 5 years

Text

A short introspective bit before we get to the next part.

Previous parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine)

Lian curled up among their pillows, in their nightshirt, and stared at the book sitting at the foot of their bed as if it was a wild animal that might do something unpredictable.

The hour was late, and Lian was alone in their finely appointed bedchamber. If they opened the door and looked down the hall, they would doubtless see a guard; they didn’t look. The light of a single candle made shadows leap and flicker around the bright colours of their furnishings, the windows shut and curtains drawn closed against the night air.

They reached out with one bare slender arm, drew the book towards themself, and took out the letter that had been inside it. They could probably have already recited it from memory at this point, but they read it again as if it would say something different this time.

Esteemed Ruler,

I hope you will forgive my forwardness once again, but I have taken the liberty of selecting for you this small collection of poetry and songs from my personal library. Art has ever been a bridge of shared humanity across national divides, don’t you agree?

If you enjoy any of the pieces in this volume, I would honoured if you might return it to me in person, and we could speak further. I never tire of re-reading books, there is always something new to be found between old pages. Perhaps at the concert next week - although of course, you’re also welcome to keep the book until you have need of it.

Yours faithfully,

Rylior Silverquill

It was written in bold, forceful handwriting, on thin paper that had been scarcely noticeable tucked inside the front cover.

When Lian had returned to their bedroom after a long day, made no shorter but much calmer by the Empress’ absence, the book had been lying on their freshly made bed. Lian had flipped through it and it seemed to be exactly what it looked like, a slim volume of Elven poetry. Small enough that Lian could probably tuck it into the lining of their clothing and leave nobody the wiser, until it was time to hand it back to Silverquill.

Lian put the letter down and covered their face with their hands.

After they had fled the ambassador and returned to the gathering, Lian had felt sick over the magnitude of what they had done without even really thinking about it. Wasn’t this what they had prayed for? A lifeline? For somebody else, anybody else, to step in and oppose the Empress so that she didn’t have free reign to do whatever she wanted to Lian’s people?

And Lian had turned it down. They had run away. That might have been the right decision or might not, and they had agonised over that, but they would never know for sure because it had been made, it couldn’t be taken back.

Then tonight, this book had appeared.

And now the decision was back, they could make it over again, with as much time as they could want to think it over - and they were still just as frozen as they had been in the garden.

It was too much to hope for that Silverquill could get Lian out - not even worth considering. It wasn’t possible for him any more than it was for the resistance movement. But he had offered…

Lian played back his words in their mind. What do you need? What would help your people the most?

Lian had answers for those questions. The glaringly obvious and impossible, of course: we need the Empire to not be here anymore. Can you give us that? But real answers, too. We need to import more grain. We need to rebuild the bridges and docks that were destroyed in the fighting. We need the army to stop conscripting people for the work gangs, but I don’t know how you could help with that… the list went on.

Those problems were killing their people just as surely as the Empress’ soldiers. If Lian had any hope of achieving even one of those things with the ambassador’s help, they had to at least consider it, didn’t they? Otherwise they might as well not even be trying. They would be letting people die through their own inability to act.

Even if the elves were just playing some sort of political game, if it meant getting what they needed, Lian couldn’t afford to be picky.

Empress Elisandre was not back yet. She would be here tomorrow morning, and part of Lian thought they were an idiot to even be thinking about sending Silverquill a message when they didn’t know how she was going to react to Lian sneaking away from the dinner. They should be trying to come up with a plan for what they were going to say to her, instead. Not that plans would do much good.

If Lian wrote Silverquill a message and the Empress found out… They shuddered, wrapping their arms around themselves for comfort. She wouldn’t be above making whatever problem Lian asked for help with ten times worse. She would kill, torment, mutilate Lian’s palace staff. She had done it before, when all Lian had done was say a word in the wrong place or fail to achieve something. What would she do for outright trying to defy her?

“Nothing seems to motivate you quite like other people screaming, Lian dear,” she had said once, quite pleasantly. “It is admirable.”

Lian had no frame of reference for their own judgment anymore. Were they being overcautious, allowing their fear to rule them, letting their only precious chance of help slip through their fingers because they were a coward?

Or were they being reckless, moving too fast, too blinded by how bitterly lonely and overburdened they were to take the care they should with the great responsibility that they held in their hands?

Either possibility seemed plausible. Maybe even both at once. Lian wished they had someone else they could turn to for their opinion.

Resolutely they put the book and its letter under their pillow, blew out the candle, and lay back among embroidery and goose-down that didn’t feel like home, or safety, or comfort. They would keep the book close and see what tomorrow brought.

#ruler and empress #Lian #my stuff #not much happens in this one #just some worrying and wavering and wondering #Rylior

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