I'D THOUGHT IT WOULD be my brother who would kill me.
Honestly, as the confusion, betrayal, and despair rippled across his face, as his knees gave out and his entire world imploded, I would have preferred the rage, even if he had hurled a blade at my chest.
But my father...
He had not even looked at me as he clamped the shackles over my wrists.
"What shall we do? A woman is not capable of wielding such a power, let alone leading an army!" one man shouts. "You cannot lead lions with a lamb!"
"Worse than a lamb—hers is the mind of a child."
The council chamber is cold, the metal chair biting through my dress. I shiver. Their words, sharp like knives, ricochet off the stone walls, echoing up into the archway high above me where they dangle, taunting me, just waiting to impale me.
"Indeed, a lamb with powers only makes her more dangerous," another says. "They could overwhelm her. Her composition is too fragile to handle the stresses of war, let alone the powers within her. God knows how she has survived on her own this long."
They pause, turning the brunt of their focus to me. I keep my eyes down but my chin up, my spine straight as a cane. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Focusing on my posture is the only thing keeping me from passing out where I sit.
"Should we kill her?"
My composure breaks at that voice. My father. The General. My face pales, and as my eyes meet his, every word he does not say makes me thankful for the stiff chair beneath me, because my legs turn to cotton. The world begins to spin.
"We would have to wait for the next generation--it would take almost two decades!" someone argues.
"I am willing to wait," another pipes in.
"Aye, me too," yet another says.
My cheeks burn hot with shame and I this time duck my head, letting their words rain down upon me at last. Each one cleaves through me, the full force of the rage of the most powerful men in the kingdom. Fire swirls in my gut and I swallow hard, trying to rein in the panic jittering in my veins, reaching towards my hands, towards release.
"The prophecy specifically spoke of this generation," another says, more gentle. "We cannot take the risk of killing her."
"Are you seriously implying it spoke of her?" The man's voice—I recognize him as the master of ships—bleeds incredulity. "What do you propose? That we unveil our battle plans to her? Our intel? As if she would know what to do with it." He laughs, and the others laugh with him. My face burns.
"To let her live and lead us would be an even greater suicide!"
"This woman is a scourge on our kingdom. An abomination."
"We would lose our empire on embarrassment alone."
"It does not matter," that same gentle voice says, defending me. "We must train her."
"She will crumble in our hands, Alderon!"
"We must still try," Alderon says. "It is our only real option left. Perhaps supervised, guided, her mind could be trained to execute the orders—"
The debate spins around me, too fast for me to keep up. Alderon is my own real ally. Tall, thin but not for lack of muscle, black hair spotted with grey, he bears a face that has seen many battles, and likely much worse. When I linger on him long enough, he almost looks tired. He glances at me only once, and the lack of anger in his eyes becomes my lifeline.
YOU ARE READING
Daughter of the Sword
FantasyWomen have no place... Except in the hands of fate. As the firstborn son of General Calloway, Mera's twin brother, Luke, has trained his entire life to inherit the magic in his bloodline and serve his kingdom in a vicious, century-long war. In a so...
