Nomad {Editing}

::Epilogue ii:: Monster Hunt

"You have to be kidding me." The queen's voice was like stone, unwavering and firm. Yet fury seemed to light her every movement. She sat at her desk, arms crossed and staring darkly at the man across the room.

Her husband, fresh from a long journey north. The purpose of which she had believed had been to negotiate some sort of peace with the people who currently held a group of their men hostage.

Now it was apparent that the truth was quite the opposite. The truth was much more terrifying.

This was war for worse than anything she'd seen or heard of, even the stories she'd been told in her youth, that of the evil men in fairytales seemed like charming princes in comparison. This was a war of children.

Her children.

The idea that someone could turn her darling sweet Charlie into a monster, killer, though errified her.

What had war done to them that this had become one of their options.

They were becoming worse than the enemy the king had sworn were so horrific destruction was there only option. Somehow Lucy couldn't find herself believing that they would have done something so horrible to one of their own.

Let alone a child of not even ten.

Only now did she realise as to why he had been so insistent that she did not come with him.

Were she to have been there, she would have ripped the man who suggested it limb from limb.

Even now she was highly considering following her husbands scent north and finding where it ended. Killing everyone in sight if that's what it took to ensure that this never came to premonition.

The Queen stopped herself, realising how much she sounded like her husband even in her head, and hating herself just a little bit because of it. She shook herself, trying to rid herself of the thoughts which now plagued her.

Despite his wife's tone, the King's only response was a grim chuckle. She had to resist the urge to personally wipe the smile from his face. Her jaw locked as she bit back the growl which was all too eager to slip from her lips.

"My dear, have you ever known me to joke?" His eyebrow was arched a smile split open his face.

Lucy dragged her gaze across her husband, judging him in silence as she saw a side of him even she rarely been able to see. Exhausted from the journey, despite his attempts to seem unaffected by it all.

Even a blind man would have been able to tell how pained he was. Scars from battles long over but had left the after effects on his mind. Not that it gave him an excuse for everything he had done since.

Sometimes she forgot how much his life of battle had effected the King. Were it through choice or how selectively she now regarded her husband. He was beginning to show his age, even though his numbers only just breached forty-five.

Sarcasm lit Veronica's tone in that moment, it practically dripped from her tongue as her eyes narrowed a shade. "Most of the Kingdom regard our marriage as a joke." It was a low blow, but right now she couldn't have cared less.

His fingers clenched into a fist, but the Queen didn't flinch as most would have. Even if the King hated to admit it, she was his equal, and the odds of winning a fight with her had no clear outcome.

She stood up but moved no further, making it apparent she wasn't going to stand down without a fight if that's what it came to. A growl tearing from her throat, but otherwise she said nothing.

When she moved, the King slipped behind her and took what had been her chair.

It was a power play, no matter how small, and it made her blood boil.