Fight

Prologue - A Humble Beginning

A/N: To the side is the trailer that @HippeLove123 made for me! It's showing my profile pic as the thumbnail, but it's not in it. It's like a movie trailer. Check it out!

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October, 1418

There was the whiz of an arrow and a pause, and then a piercing scream. Liliana heard her mother, Clara, sobbing over her father's tunic, now covered in blood.

"Peter! Peter, don't leave me!" Clara cried. Then there was the sickening smell of death after another arrow flew, lodging itself into her mother's back. Then there was the fear and panic that Liliana felt as she hunched motionless with her back pressed against the wagon seat, lest she see the horrid images matching the grotesque sounds.

Liliana crouched in a state of panic. She covered her ears, willing herself to block out any more. She shivered as the October wind blew her black locks across her face, sticking to her cheeks by the tears that fell.

She thought she felt a hand brush her arm, and she yelped, startling herself back. As she peered through her messy hair into the driver's seat, she saw something red, rising and lowering. She pushed the hair out of her face and found herself staring at her dying father. His arm was flopped over the back of the bench, thus brushing her arm. He looked at her with strained eyes. But for some reason, though blood was still spurting out of the gaping wound in his neck, his eyes still held the warmth Liliana had been accustomed to. When she looked into her father's eyes, she felt all fear vanish. Between painful breaths, he spoke.

"Go to....the castle...safe there..." He rasped.

Liliana took his hand. "Father...what do you mean?" She was sobbing now. "Papa, what's happening?"

"Go," he whispered. "We...love...you."

A horrible shudder overcame his body, and his next gurgling breath became his last.

Liliana felt her stomach weaken as she stared in shock at her father, with his handsome face and capable hands, now gone. She remembered how he would spin her up in the air after a long day of work at the castle, and carry her inside their home on his shoulders. Her numb gaze shifted to her mother; her beautiful mother, with long, jet black curls and loving, nurturing personality.

Liliana shrank back into the corner of the wooden wagon in shock and slumped numbly against the seat, unaware of the roll of thunder and sudden downpour of rain. She could have sat there for minutes, hours, days; she would not have known the difference. But suddenly she felt the need to run. She needed to get away, out of the terrifying grips of death.

With clumsy movements, she threw herself out of the wagon, stumbling on to the rocky dirt path. Her hands and knees stung after catching herself, and mud flew into her eyes. Liliana pushed her self up, studying her surroundings to gather her bearings. All around her stood shops and bakeries. To her left was a run down inn that had been empty and gathering cob webs for years; to her right was the city wall that rose a hundred feet above her head. She could hear the roar of the Cretian Sea tossing waves to shore. Ahead continued the roundabout path to the castle. Although the sky was dark, Liliana had traveled this road many times in her ten years of living and knew her way to the castle like the back of her hand. Castle Creed stood majestically on the tallest cliff overlooking the ocean. With its tall spires and beautiful gardens, it was a palace fit for a queen.

King Edmund and Queen Isabella were now much like family. Liliana remembered how her father, a common garden tender, and his family had become close to the king and queen of Creed. Her father had one day managed to defend the king against a small band of raiders; they called themselves the Rogues. As the memory came to her, her foot caught on a brick, nearly tripping her. She took a breath to focus, but the event was one she would never forget. It came back, and she was lost in thought.