Chapter 8 (Part IV): Regret

I used to believe there was no such thing as a bad king or a bad queen. I thought there were only bad people or good people, who happened to have become a king or a queen. I have learned, though, that a bad king can be a good person, and I think that, perhaps, a bad person can be a good king. That is why I always try to judge my predecessor’s actions, rather than their characters. I didn’t know the men and women who came before me; I cannot understand all of the challenges which they faced, or the doubts and fears they harbored within their hearts. It is not for me to say if he or she was a good person or a bad person. All I can hope is that the consequences of my actions will be regarded favorably by those who reap their rewards and carry their burdens.

-          Queen Azraea I, in a public address on Monarchy Day

The next morning, Azraea stood in the street outside the mansion, the hood of her cloak pulled up to offer some measure of concealment from the guards and fanatics now roaming the streets. She looked at the charred remains decorating the scorched and buckled iron fences and thought about who must have been in the mansion when it burned. She hummed a mournful dirge. She wanted to show some respect, but being too loud about it could get a woman killed right now.

“I don’t believe we ever met,” a voice said.

Azraea turned to find an apparition with a familiar face.

“They used to call me the ‘Lead King’ because my face was on every lead coin in the country. I thought it was a bit depressing, but at least it was novel. Now they’re just calling me the ‘Dead King’, as if it’s clever because it rhymes. It’s not clever, though, it’s just descriptive. I am a king that’s dead. Well, I suppose actually, now I’m just dead.”

“I’m afraid I’m the one that killed you,” Azraea said sadly.

“Really?” Hylas’s apparition asked, “I must say, you looked much taller and scalier last night.”

“No,” Azraea said, “I mean, I had a run in with Syliva a while back and I insulted her, and that’s why she went after you. Why she did all of this.”

“Oh,” the ghost said, “I see. Well, I wish I’d been there to see what you said to that old suitcase. It must have been good to get that sort of a reaction out of her.”

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” Azraea said, “We were working a plan to get rid of her and she had us in a corner, so I just started talking. At first I was just trying to stall so we could find a way to escape, but then I saw a gap in her armor and I just went after it as hard as I could. I bated her into turning on you without giving any thought to your life, let alone the lives of all the people here with you.”

Hylas’s ghost nodded, and beckoned for Azraea to follow him into the scorched courtyard, away from people who might be listening to their one-sided conversation.

“I was not a good king,” he said, “I was raised to understand that the real power in the kingdom was up there in that castle. That dragon and her hoard of gold. And I was raised to believe that if we played along and did as we were told then the dragon would ensure we were provided for. We would keep our big house, our nice clothes, our lavish meals, and our decadent parties. In the entirety of my life, I never questioned this, and more importantly, I never questioned whether, as king, I had responsibilities beyond keeping my family in a big house, wearing nice clothes, eating lavish meals, and enjoying decadent parties.

“I never questioned that until last night when I saw those guards burning, one-by-one on the fences I climbed as a child. I knew then that I had had a responsibility to them. I had always thought it was the other way around but no. I had a duty to protect their welfare, the welfare of this whole kingdom, but I shirked that duty my entire life so that I could raise a family in the lap of luxury. This is how it was for my entire line and this terrible ending was the inevitable result. If it hadn’t been me on that balcony begging the dragon for mercy it would have been my son or my son’s son.

“I’m not happy to be dead,” Hylas’s ghost said, “Please don’t mistake my demeanor for one of contentment. Even though they are finally reunited with their mother, and I will join them soon to beg their forgiveness for my failings as a father, I grieve the loss of my children. Their last moments were so terrible and they were robbed of so much, being taken from this world so young.” 

Azraea felt that like a punch to the gut, “I’m so sorry…”

“A part of me appreciates that, because a part of me wants to blame you for setting the dragon on this course. But you should think carefully about what you’re saying. You are sorry because you chose to enrage the dragon, which then chose to murder me and my family. But Syliva, I believe, does have free will, just as you or I do, so does it really make sense for you to apologize to me for what she did? In doing so, aren’t you accepting responsibility for her choices? Even abrogating Syliva’s responsibility for her own actions?”

Azraea looked at the ghost and blinked in disbelief.

“You aren’t the only one who went to college,” the ghost said, “But I apologize if I’ve wandered. I’m feeling a bit ungrounded.”

“I don’t think I understand,” Azraea said, “You were chastising yourself for not taking responsibility for the harm the dragon was doing to our country and yet, now you are chastising me for taking responsibility for the harm the dragon did to your family.”

“Because I was the king,” he said, “And you were simply a woman in a market. In a moment you will have to make a choice. An ordinary person is responsible only for their own actions, their own welfare and, if they have them, perhaps the welfare of their children. But a king, regardless of who he was before the crown passed to him, is responsible for the lives of all those under his rule, be they young or old, man or woman, short or tall, white or black. Or even green. He should be an advocate for the people, and do everything within his power to protect the people, often from each other, and sometimes from themselves.

“What you need to decide is whether you’re prepared to shoulder that responsibility, to endure that burden. A woman could walk away from this carnage,” the ghost gestured to the blackened corpses, “and live her life knowing she was in no way responsible for this tragedy. A queen, however, will walk away from this place, knowing this is only the first tragedy she will be responsible for.”

“I don’t believe anyone is responsible only for themselves, regardless of what their title may be,” Azraea said, “Every person is responsible for the welfare of their neighbors. I am responsible for the people of this kingdom, simply because I live in it.”

“Well then,” Hylas’s ghost said, “Might I suggest that, if the crown fits, you should wear it.”

“You’re telling me I should claim your throne?”

“If you would claim it for yourself, no,” the apparition answered, “But if you would take the throne for the sake of the people, then yes.” He began to fade from Azraea’s sight, “One last piece of advice: in the halls of the king no soul rests well.”
Azraea was still contemplating his words when she heard shouting back out in the street. Armed men were dragging people out of a nice coffee shop across from the courtyard. There were two men in full guard gear, painted black with the red details of the dragon’s hired security force, and three more in civilian clothes decorated with ostentatious red and orange sashes, armed with clubs. The professionals stood watch, while the ‘volunteer militia’ handled the violence, dragging people out into the street with their hands bound and pushing them down onto the cobblestone.

“What’d you expect?” One of the volunteers said loudly, “They hang out here, right next to the king’s mansion? They musta been buddies,” The man kicked a pregnant woman he’d thrown to the ground, “How about it homely girl, whose baby is that you’re carrying? You one of the king’s syphilitic lovers? Or just a groupie?” She rolled onto her side and spat on his boot.

“Oh, assaulting a citizen volunteer of the Firebrands, then is it?” He looked at the others, “You all saw that right?” The black armored men nodded and laughed, and the angry man began beating the pregnant woman with his club. There was no indication he was going to stop until she was dead.

Azraea felt herself moving forward, but then thought about the math. Five on one. Kaira might be able to do it, but Azraea wasn’t Kaira, was she? The woman screamed in pain, but the man stomped on her face and broke her jaw to silence her. Azraea’s stomach churned, and she thought about what she’d said to the king’s ghost. She was responsible for everyone, just because she was here.

She clenched her fists and marched towards the fracas. Some of the people lying on the ground saw her coming, but every one of the thugs had their backs turned to her. She had an advantage in that, but she’d have to be fast. Take out the professionals, first. That’s what Kaira would do.

Azraea walked behind one of the armored men, dropped her blade into her hand, and ducked as she passed behind him to slash the unprotected ligaments behind his knees. She’d seen enough corpses to know what that would do. He screamed and toppled to the ground, his armor clattering against the cobblestone. The ruckus grabbed everyone’s attention. The second armored man turned to see Azraea, but she was already in his face – literally. His armor and padding protected him well from the front, but off-brand rent-a-cops like these didn’t wear enclosed helmets. Azraea grabbed his face with her free hand and cast the fireball spell she’d been relentlessly practicing since they left Defiance. He screamed and started to fight back, but his brain cooked quickly as the temperature in his skull climbed. He was effectively dead well before his head burst into flames.

Azraea grabbed the burning guard’s sword as she casually allowed his body to fall aside. The man who’d been beating the pregnant woman had stopped, and now stared back at her in terror – it was ‘Jake,’ her attacker from the marketplace. His two friends came running out of the coffee shop and were baffled by the situation. One of their backup team was flopping on the ground screaming like a tortured mermaid, and the other one was face down on the cobblestone, burning like an overturned candle.

When they registered that Azraea was their opponent, they charged forward. One of the people on the ground, a very tall dark-haired man shot his long legs out and tangled them around the feet of one of the thugs. The second guard was distracted for an instant, which was enough for Azraea to light his ridiculous sash on fire with a thrown fireball. He dropped his club and tried to get the sash off, but the fire spread quickly to the rest of his clothes. He began to panic and thrash about wildly, but running on adrenaline, Azraea hefted the sword in her hand and skewered the man with it. It wasn’t a graceful move, given she had absolutely no training with the weapon, but it was enough.

Azraea twisted the blade, and pulled it away as his body dropped to the side and continued burning. She started another fire spell, but this time she started it in the tang of the sword she held and moved it up the blade, focusing the heat there. The other man finally got up from the ground and away from his prisoner, and ran towards Azraea. Her blade glowed red hot as the fire spell reached full power, and the blood on the blade burst into flames. Azraea swung the blade up at the man as he got in arm’s length of her and sliced through his left hip and up into his gut with a smoking sizzle. He screamed, and rather than attack her he instinctively dropped his club and grabbed for the sword, trying to prevent her from doing more damage. It was too late for him, though, in a matter of heartbeats, he was dead where he stood. She let him fall to the ground with the sword still in him, and ignited a green fireball in each hand.

Jake started backing away, “Who… who are you?”

“A woman who’s showing you mercy,” Azraea said, “Don’t squander the opportunity.” Jake dropped his club and ran, shrieking.

The dark haired man had gotten back up onto his knees despite his wrists being bound and watched the man run away. He turned back to Azraea as she snuffed out her fire spells.

“I don’t suppose you’re also a woman who unties knots?” he asked in a deep voice.

Azraea tried not to laugh as she picked up her razor sharp little knife and flicked the blood off the blade, “Thanks for the help there.”

“Oh, no thanks necessary,” he said, “You’re not exactly a damsel in distress.”

Azraea smiled, “Don’t move.” She cut the ropes off the man’s wrists, and he helped her free the others, starting with the pregnant woman.

“Why did they come here?” She asked, “Did you do something?”

The tall man picked up the woman with the broken jaw, who was trying not to cry from the pain, “She ran into my shop to get away from the mob last night,” he said, “so I let her sleep on one of the couches rather than send her back out. Apparently, she’s an enemy of the state.”

The woman tried to talk, and made a sound like it was an apology. She broke into tears.

“Don’t be sorry,” he said, “You didn’t smash your way into my shop with a weapon drawn. We need to get you to a doctor.”

“I know where we can get her a healing potion,” a balding man said, “but we’ll need to find someone to set the bone. Follow me, son.”

Another one of the customers went with them and most others simply scrambled to get away from the scene of the violence, but one man, an elf, stopped to talk to Azraea.

“You, you’re a hero,” the blonde man said, “Thank you, thank you! I promise you, me and my friends, we won’t forget this!” The elf took off running.

Azraea smiled. That felt good. But she’d like to avoid going into a fight like that alone in the future. She’d have to ask Vinny if he wanted to go out and play hero with her tonight.