Post by Rachy on Jan 12, 2015 18:38:07 GMT 10
Title: Pawn
Rating: PG
For: max
Prompt: 2. Sarai stays in the Isles AU
Summary: This is more of a how Sarai stays in the Isles and realises she's a pawn than a Sarai becoming Queen fic, but it does veer into angsty character study. Hope you enjoy, and apologies for it being on the late side!
*
This was what she wanted her last memories of the Isles to be. The sights of her family, happy around her, the glow of Zaimid's eyes when he looked at her, promising with every touch of his hand as they danced that they were beginning the most wonderful future together. She laughs when they sneak out of the hall, visible to all, and they play for privacy in the gardens, young lovers stealing kisses, moving further and further into the quiet as sounds travel closer.
They take a circuitous route back to the pavilion, and she sneaks back in to grab her trunk, pulling a dark overcoat over her dress and wrapping her cloak tightly around her trembling frame. She pushes her trunk across the floor to where Zaimid waits at the door, and with a hand on each side they carry it away. Echoes of laughter and chatter burst across the gardens, distant and close in the sea breeze, and the path to the shore at the cliff edge had never seemed so close and yet so far. Her fingers tremble, sweaty with nerves and excitement and exertion and hope. She looks at Zaimid, her eyes treasuring the curve of his jaw, the grace of his fingers, clenched tight around the handle of her trunk, the long stride of his walk, looking and treasuring all of the things she had noticed but had not let herself appreciate in case someone saw how deeply she cared for him. He carefully looks back at her, reassuring and assessing how she was managing, and there is a soft and shy curve to his lips when he sees her looking back at him. He stops when they arrive at the cliffs, and she steps in front of her trunk, reaching up to kiss him. It's a bright spark of warmth in the chill from the sea breeze, and she leads the way down to the small cove and waiting boat. Sand sinks into her slippers as she walks, but it is of no matter until she notices the ghostly green glow, standing on the shore. She stops, glancing back at Zaimid, but he nods and gestures her forward. The glow resolves into a ghastly figure, and it is only when Zaimid drops the trunk and bows deeply, kneeling, that she realises how accurate the depictions of the Graveyard Hag were. She quickly bows too, and Zaimid takes her hand, twisting their fingers together. He's smiling when he makes small conversation, introducing her and asking if everything is prepared, and the Graveyard Hag holds out her hand. She takes it with a curtesy, a chill spreading down her hand at the icy chill of contact, and the Graveyard Hag looks sad, suddenly.
"Everything is all prepared for us to travel safe to Carthak, isn't it?" Zaimid asks at the halt of conversation, and the Hag reaches out to him.
"I said for you to travel, my boy, and I didn't know I didn't mean her. I can't help how the dice fall, lass, but I can't give you this life of happiness you want. You go on that boat and the seas will swallow it whole and wash you and you alone up in Rajumat's harbour. Your sister's maid's god has plans for you, and good a trick it'd be and as he deserves you're tied here."
"I can't stay here." Sarai insists, staring at the hag. "I won't, and you said"
"I don't lie when humans can catch me. Your dice have rolled and this future's been found wanting, and you've got a tricky walk."
"You owed me a favour." Zaimid said coldly, his hand gripping Sarai's as tightly as her nails had dug into his skin.
"I did and I do, but she's not it."
"Aly. What plans could Mithros have for me?"
"I'd advise against questioning the gods' plans, myself, to begin with, but Mithros is a funny line to be spinning with her Ma. The Goddess, moreso, but it's not important. She's sure as not Mithros's messenger, and you being such a pretty thing should've known better than to laugh at the Twice Promised Queen, because it's not your face that has your people lining up for days to see you."
"I, the Twice-Promised Queen, was just a symbol of hope, I can't, Elsren inherits before I do. Elsren is Dunevon's heir, not me. Not even if we wed."
"Sarai, people look at you for hope." Zaimid said hesistantly, though the look of confusion did not ease across his face.
"It doesn't matter. If what you say is true, my little brother dies for me to get on the throne. How many people have died already just to see me? I've had enough blood shed on my hands and in my name. I won't."
"You don't have a choice. The two of you will never be able to be together again, and near everyone around you is ready to mould you into the Queen they want you to be."
"I know my favour." Zaimid said firmly, and Sarai turns to stare at him.
"You don't believe what she's saying, surely, there must be a way, please, Zaimid, please."
"It makes more sense now. We heard whispers of things changing in the Isles, and arriving and seeing how rebellion was stirring in the lower classes, how people looked to you and their whispers of a Queen. If there's the chance that it's you and a chance you can change things, Sarai, I know you would regret not taking it, and if there's no chance we can be together then I want to do this." He presses a kiss to their linked fingers and turns to the Hag. "You save her brother from dying."
Sarai closes her eyes and the tears flood down her cheeks. Elsren, dear sweet Elsren, and she bites her cheek to stop images of his death in her head, but instead it is her father's face she sees.
"The boy king will still die." The Hag warned, slow and grim.
"He would never have been able to live his own life." Zaimid replied steadily.
"I do not think Imajane and Rubinyan are content to stay his regents forever."
"No. Feel free to give them some words on the wisdom of the raka inheritance, as I think I've given you enough wisdom to get yourself a crown by your own."
"Thank you." Sarai said quietly, and she watches blindly as the Hag farewells Zaimid before disappearing.
"You used your favour for me, again."
"And I plan on calling in another once you have your coronation, if you'll have me. I only wish that"
"We shouldn't waste our wishes. But I would have you at my coronation and I would have you with me always if I could, but we are needed at different things, it seems." She gives him a brave smile, trembling, and he sweeps her into his arms.
*
It is a cold walk back. The cliffs have never dwarfed her so before, the chill in the air matched by the chill in her heart. She carries her cloak and dark coat over her arm, for she does not particularly wish to feel warm again, ever, and the cold brings clarity to her thoughts. All of the things she had noticed and never minded. Everything, bought into a new and harsh light, and twisted and turned through her thoughts until first light breaks.
*
She visits Fesgao at the guardhouse at dawn, guilt sick in her stomach at her tainting of the sambol. Was Boulaj loyal, or a conspirator? His face dawns with surprise and a hope and glee when she tells him she wishes to resume her training with the sword, and perhaps dagger skills as well as any other concealable weapon she may be suited for. He asks, hesitantly, if there is a reason, and she replies that she is quite heartbroken over Zaimid's departure and wishes for something to keep her mind off it.
*
"I heard Zaimid made a sudden departure last night." Aly said as she fiddles with the ties on Sarai's dress, and she meets her eyes in the mirror. "I do hope you parted on good terms?"
"As good as terms as all lovers do." Sarai replied briskly, and her face is calm when Aly starts in almost shock.
*
"I think I will be a lost cause in the marriage market for a while, Winna." Sarai states firmly, and swallows when Winna blanches in reply. Surely her stepmother thought better of her behaviour? "It is only with Zaimid's departure, I feel quite heart sick. And with all of this business with Dunevon and Elsren and, I've just realised the importance of Dove making the very best match. I know she's young, but I want at least one of us to make a love match and if Dove can make a good betrothal, at the least, with someone who shares our views on politics and the raka and has diplomatic connections who isn't part of my set, Winna, because she needs someone who can keep up with her thinking."
"That's a rather sudden concern, Sarai."
"I haven't been the best of sisters, or daughters, but I don't want Dove to be in the position I am in now." Sarai replied, and was startled to feel the warmth of Winna's embrace.
*
"It seems almost silly, doesn't it, talking marriage proposals to a boy of five?" Sarai says with a dazzling smile. Flippancy was the key. "Why, I wonder how he would choose who he favoured? I only think of it from my mother's story, when Lady Dovasary and I were children, about how it was Mother Time who decided when and where we were born, and that I was the older sister and Dove the younger sister. I mean no disrespect at all, Your Highness, it is only that you are older than Dunevon, and even if I were regent I could not even aspire to the levels of wisdom and knowledge of ruling that you and the Prince share. Dunevon could one day still inherit the throne, after all, it makes sense, you as Queen, than just a little boy."
"You are brave, Lady Sarai, but perhaps in his absence Master Zaimid gave you some of his wisdom."
*
"That was treason." Dove said, deathly quiet and drawn upon their return home.
"I only told her what she wanted to hear." Sarai replied calmly. "Or do you not think that if anything happened to Dunevon, a similar accident would befall Elsren?"
Dove calmly hands her the message from the Palace the next morning, emotions tightly in check, and she reads the declaration of an egalitarian inheritance law passed through the Isles by the King, granting the inheritance of the crown to the oldest surviving child of King Oron, with King Dunevon free to resume his princely childhood from his fifth birthday. The next message is an invitation for Elsren to join the Prince's birthday cruise.
*
The afternoon passes quietly, but Winna paces the halls. Sarai has put her on edge, by half accident, and has received the look of an imminent discussion due upon Elsren's return.
At the docks, Taybur Sibigat carries the lifeless body of the King turned Prince.
Another sailor carries Elsren, crying and screaming and bleeding.
Elsren will have trouble walking for the rest of his life, but he is alive. She makes a pilgrimage to the Wave Walker's Temple, and to the Graveyard Hag's, and she cries bitterly in relief. She takes flowers to the Black God's and notices Taybur at the back, cold and silent.
"Your brother was blessed by some god." He says, his voice broken and rough with tears.
"I am truly sorry for your loss of Dunevon. He was clearly fond of you, and you cared for the little boy he was." She rests a hand on his shoulder, and it shakes when he does not brush it off.
*
"What are your plans for me?" Sarai asks Dove, at the end of the afternoon, a week after Dunevon's death. "Why didn't you tell me?"
Dove is quiet, and she sees the anxiousness, the hesitation in her eyes.
"Dove, what sort of Queen do you think I will be?"
Rating: PG
For: max
Prompt: 2. Sarai stays in the Isles AU
Summary: This is more of a how Sarai stays in the Isles and realises she's a pawn than a Sarai becoming Queen fic, but it does veer into angsty character study. Hope you enjoy, and apologies for it being on the late side!
*
This was what she wanted her last memories of the Isles to be. The sights of her family, happy around her, the glow of Zaimid's eyes when he looked at her, promising with every touch of his hand as they danced that they were beginning the most wonderful future together. She laughs when they sneak out of the hall, visible to all, and they play for privacy in the gardens, young lovers stealing kisses, moving further and further into the quiet as sounds travel closer.
They take a circuitous route back to the pavilion, and she sneaks back in to grab her trunk, pulling a dark overcoat over her dress and wrapping her cloak tightly around her trembling frame. She pushes her trunk across the floor to where Zaimid waits at the door, and with a hand on each side they carry it away. Echoes of laughter and chatter burst across the gardens, distant and close in the sea breeze, and the path to the shore at the cliff edge had never seemed so close and yet so far. Her fingers tremble, sweaty with nerves and excitement and exertion and hope. She looks at Zaimid, her eyes treasuring the curve of his jaw, the grace of his fingers, clenched tight around the handle of her trunk, the long stride of his walk, looking and treasuring all of the things she had noticed but had not let herself appreciate in case someone saw how deeply she cared for him. He carefully looks back at her, reassuring and assessing how she was managing, and there is a soft and shy curve to his lips when he sees her looking back at him. He stops when they arrive at the cliffs, and she steps in front of her trunk, reaching up to kiss him. It's a bright spark of warmth in the chill from the sea breeze, and she leads the way down to the small cove and waiting boat. Sand sinks into her slippers as she walks, but it is of no matter until she notices the ghostly green glow, standing on the shore. She stops, glancing back at Zaimid, but he nods and gestures her forward. The glow resolves into a ghastly figure, and it is only when Zaimid drops the trunk and bows deeply, kneeling, that she realises how accurate the depictions of the Graveyard Hag were. She quickly bows too, and Zaimid takes her hand, twisting their fingers together. He's smiling when he makes small conversation, introducing her and asking if everything is prepared, and the Graveyard Hag holds out her hand. She takes it with a curtesy, a chill spreading down her hand at the icy chill of contact, and the Graveyard Hag looks sad, suddenly.
"Everything is all prepared for us to travel safe to Carthak, isn't it?" Zaimid asks at the halt of conversation, and the Hag reaches out to him.
"I said for you to travel, my boy, and I didn't know I didn't mean her. I can't help how the dice fall, lass, but I can't give you this life of happiness you want. You go on that boat and the seas will swallow it whole and wash you and you alone up in Rajumat's harbour. Your sister's maid's god has plans for you, and good a trick it'd be and as he deserves you're tied here."
"I can't stay here." Sarai insists, staring at the hag. "I won't, and you said"
"I don't lie when humans can catch me. Your dice have rolled and this future's been found wanting, and you've got a tricky walk."
"You owed me a favour." Zaimid said coldly, his hand gripping Sarai's as tightly as her nails had dug into his skin.
"I did and I do, but she's not it."
"Aly. What plans could Mithros have for me?"
"I'd advise against questioning the gods' plans, myself, to begin with, but Mithros is a funny line to be spinning with her Ma. The Goddess, moreso, but it's not important. She's sure as not Mithros's messenger, and you being such a pretty thing should've known better than to laugh at the Twice Promised Queen, because it's not your face that has your people lining up for days to see you."
"I, the Twice-Promised Queen, was just a symbol of hope, I can't, Elsren inherits before I do. Elsren is Dunevon's heir, not me. Not even if we wed."
"Sarai, people look at you for hope." Zaimid said hesistantly, though the look of confusion did not ease across his face.
"It doesn't matter. If what you say is true, my little brother dies for me to get on the throne. How many people have died already just to see me? I've had enough blood shed on my hands and in my name. I won't."
"You don't have a choice. The two of you will never be able to be together again, and near everyone around you is ready to mould you into the Queen they want you to be."
"I know my favour." Zaimid said firmly, and Sarai turns to stare at him.
"You don't believe what she's saying, surely, there must be a way, please, Zaimid, please."
"It makes more sense now. We heard whispers of things changing in the Isles, and arriving and seeing how rebellion was stirring in the lower classes, how people looked to you and their whispers of a Queen. If there's the chance that it's you and a chance you can change things, Sarai, I know you would regret not taking it, and if there's no chance we can be together then I want to do this." He presses a kiss to their linked fingers and turns to the Hag. "You save her brother from dying."
Sarai closes her eyes and the tears flood down her cheeks. Elsren, dear sweet Elsren, and she bites her cheek to stop images of his death in her head, but instead it is her father's face she sees.
"The boy king will still die." The Hag warned, slow and grim.
"He would never have been able to live his own life." Zaimid replied steadily.
"I do not think Imajane and Rubinyan are content to stay his regents forever."
"No. Feel free to give them some words on the wisdom of the raka inheritance, as I think I've given you enough wisdom to get yourself a crown by your own."
"Thank you." Sarai said quietly, and she watches blindly as the Hag farewells Zaimid before disappearing.
"You used your favour for me, again."
"And I plan on calling in another once you have your coronation, if you'll have me. I only wish that"
"We shouldn't waste our wishes. But I would have you at my coronation and I would have you with me always if I could, but we are needed at different things, it seems." She gives him a brave smile, trembling, and he sweeps her into his arms.
*
It is a cold walk back. The cliffs have never dwarfed her so before, the chill in the air matched by the chill in her heart. She carries her cloak and dark coat over her arm, for she does not particularly wish to feel warm again, ever, and the cold brings clarity to her thoughts. All of the things she had noticed and never minded. Everything, bought into a new and harsh light, and twisted and turned through her thoughts until first light breaks.
*
She visits Fesgao at the guardhouse at dawn, guilt sick in her stomach at her tainting of the sambol. Was Boulaj loyal, or a conspirator? His face dawns with surprise and a hope and glee when she tells him she wishes to resume her training with the sword, and perhaps dagger skills as well as any other concealable weapon she may be suited for. He asks, hesitantly, if there is a reason, and she replies that she is quite heartbroken over Zaimid's departure and wishes for something to keep her mind off it.
*
"I heard Zaimid made a sudden departure last night." Aly said as she fiddles with the ties on Sarai's dress, and she meets her eyes in the mirror. "I do hope you parted on good terms?"
"As good as terms as all lovers do." Sarai replied briskly, and her face is calm when Aly starts in almost shock.
*
"I think I will be a lost cause in the marriage market for a while, Winna." Sarai states firmly, and swallows when Winna blanches in reply. Surely her stepmother thought better of her behaviour? "It is only with Zaimid's departure, I feel quite heart sick. And with all of this business with Dunevon and Elsren and, I've just realised the importance of Dove making the very best match. I know she's young, but I want at least one of us to make a love match and if Dove can make a good betrothal, at the least, with someone who shares our views on politics and the raka and has diplomatic connections who isn't part of my set, Winna, because she needs someone who can keep up with her thinking."
"That's a rather sudden concern, Sarai."
"I haven't been the best of sisters, or daughters, but I don't want Dove to be in the position I am in now." Sarai replied, and was startled to feel the warmth of Winna's embrace.
*
"It seems almost silly, doesn't it, talking marriage proposals to a boy of five?" Sarai says with a dazzling smile. Flippancy was the key. "Why, I wonder how he would choose who he favoured? I only think of it from my mother's story, when Lady Dovasary and I were children, about how it was Mother Time who decided when and where we were born, and that I was the older sister and Dove the younger sister. I mean no disrespect at all, Your Highness, it is only that you are older than Dunevon, and even if I were regent I could not even aspire to the levels of wisdom and knowledge of ruling that you and the Prince share. Dunevon could one day still inherit the throne, after all, it makes sense, you as Queen, than just a little boy."
"You are brave, Lady Sarai, but perhaps in his absence Master Zaimid gave you some of his wisdom."
*
"That was treason." Dove said, deathly quiet and drawn upon their return home.
"I only told her what she wanted to hear." Sarai replied calmly. "Or do you not think that if anything happened to Dunevon, a similar accident would befall Elsren?"
Dove calmly hands her the message from the Palace the next morning, emotions tightly in check, and she reads the declaration of an egalitarian inheritance law passed through the Isles by the King, granting the inheritance of the crown to the oldest surviving child of King Oron, with King Dunevon free to resume his princely childhood from his fifth birthday. The next message is an invitation for Elsren to join the Prince's birthday cruise.
*
The afternoon passes quietly, but Winna paces the halls. Sarai has put her on edge, by half accident, and has received the look of an imminent discussion due upon Elsren's return.
At the docks, Taybur Sibigat carries the lifeless body of the King turned Prince.
Another sailor carries Elsren, crying and screaming and bleeding.
Elsren will have trouble walking for the rest of his life, but he is alive. She makes a pilgrimage to the Wave Walker's Temple, and to the Graveyard Hag's, and she cries bitterly in relief. She takes flowers to the Black God's and notices Taybur at the back, cold and silent.
"Your brother was blessed by some god." He says, his voice broken and rough with tears.
"I am truly sorry for your loss of Dunevon. He was clearly fond of you, and you cared for the little boy he was." She rests a hand on his shoulder, and it shakes when he does not brush it off.
*
"What are your plans for me?" Sarai asks Dove, at the end of the afternoon, a week after Dunevon's death. "Why didn't you tell me?"
Dove is quiet, and she sees the anxiousness, the hesitation in her eyes.
"Dove, what sort of Queen do you think I will be?"