The Hands of Fate

Chapter 3

From then on, Caspian and Farah met briefly. And by that, he meant that in the hallway as she walked down with the other maids, she would wave at him. She always seemed happy and cheerful, and he wondered where she got such enthusiasm from.

Their next encounter, though, was unlike any other. Caspian sat in the library that morning, reading a book on previous Kings and Queens of the kingdom. This type of thing was a normality for him, seeing as he was to be King and all. His mother and father made sure that he studied the history of the kingdom, so that when it was his turn to take over the throne, he was ready. They didn't seem to mind that he was eight years old. It was always good to start early, that's what they told him at least.

The Prince sat on a soft velvet seat as he read. A window was next to him, providing a view beyond the palace and into the horizon. The library was a very old, yet grand place. It bore loads of books, all about different Kings and Queens of the lands. If one was lucky, they'd land upon a fantasy book about a heroic Prince who rescued a Princess. Caspian himself always thought the adventure novels were fun to flip through, but if he was ever caught reading one it was looked down upon.

The library was such a tall room that ladders were necessary in order to reach the shelves. This way, people could reach the top of the 7-foot bookshelves. The ceilings had intricate designs on them, all displaying forms of the mighty Kings and Queens before protecting their lands. It was interesting, though, since the pictures almost seemed to tell a story.

As Caspian flipped the page in utter boredom, he came across an even more lifeless excerpt. The surface was filled with small imprinted words about how King Rupert IV dealt with a terrible famine that came across the country. It would've been interesting had Caspian not read about a million other stories discussing famines that struck the kingdom beforehand.

That was when he heard a thud come from the other side of the room. Caspian looked up towards the source of the noise, eager to escape his studies. Seeing a pile of books on the ground he raised an eyebrow. He stood, leaving his book on the seat as he walked over towards the messed up stack that lay on the carpeted ground. The pile was pretty large, nearly a foot tall, and many books had fallen off of the large wooden shelves.

Caspian felt a jolt of terror flood through him as an arm emerged from the pile of books. He fell backwards from the shock, horrified by the jump scare. The hand did not try to attack, however. It merely felt its surroundings before trying to push upwards towards the top of the pile. Caspian watched in surprise, his heart beating wildly. Was this the day he was going to die? Was this some sort of monstrous creature, coming to kill him? Another arm shot out, and both of the hands pressed against the stacks of books, pulling something, or someone, upwards.

In a matter of seconds, Caspian watched Farah emerge from the pile of books. Her curly black hair was all around in frizz, and her eyes looked downwards, concentrated on the task at hand. She shimmied her way out of the large book pile before she stepped out onto the rug. Farah then proceeded to brush off her dirty outfit. Today she wore a deep olive colored dress which was tattered at the ends, with bits of dirt on the bottom part of the apparel. The sleeves were short, making her arms fully visible, which according to his mother, wasn't very attractive for a lady. On Farah's feet were worn out leather flats that he swore had small holes in them.

He felt pity for her, for he couldn't imagine wearing such a horrible thing every single day. He remembered on their first encounter she had worn a different dress that was a shade of light brown, so she certainly had more than one item of clothing. But could she, perhaps, have only two outfit choices? He blinked at the very thought. He had a whole closet with different types of clothes in all different royal colors; yet here poor Farah was without even one clean dress.