Fighting for a Crown

Chapter Thirty One

"No." I shouted. "No you can't be dying. I won't let you. I won't let you go. I have so much to learn." Mother pulled me into her embrace and stroked my ear.

I watched father over her shoulder, he put his glass down and spared me a sympathetic glance. "I wasn't going to tell you until I knew if you were fit to succeed me."

"I am." I cried. "I am I swear. It's all I know."

Mother shook her head and pulled me back so she could face me. "No you're so much more than an heir." She shushed me, her thumbs running over my fingers. "You're our little fighter, our warrior. You have a beautiful heart and a bright future. You're just not a king."

"It would break you, son." Father looked me in the eye for the first time of this whole meeting. "It would take everything good about you and crush it until only the shell was left, a figurehead with a mind devoid of care. It would turn you into me. Every day you would be unhappy, waiting for the disease to hurry up and finish you." I shook my head. Father was a great man, an incredible man. He was my hero.

Mother squeezed my hands again. "We'd like you to abdicate." She spoke softly. "Then you'd be free to do as you pleased, you could marry Bence if you'd like, you could return to the war, live here, or in the villages, you'd be free."

I turned to see that Farall was setting out a short bit of paper on the table. It was such a small document. Signing off my future was not even worthy of something significant.

"So you get my future then." I stood up to glare at Fana. "You get everything I've worked towards, my whole life?" I spat.

"He is well suited to the position." Tristan murmured from next to me, my brother still stared into the fire.

"I know he bloody is." I snapped. "He's already proved what a good liar he is. I'm sure the whole country will die under your reign, King Afanasy."

"Gavrila enough." Father shouted. "I hate having to do this. But it is for your own good. Afanasy is a politian. You are a warrior. This is what's best for the country, and what's best for you two. Please. For a dying man's sake please sign that paper. I want to die knowing my sons will be safe, knowing my sons will live happy."

I pressed a shaking hand to my forehead, falling on numb feet over to the pen. I dipped it in the ink and watched the excess drip off, the unworthy droplets lost to the uniform black sea.

My signature looked callous on the paper, childish, a toddlers scrawl. Fana's was bold and swilrling on the line underneath it, it could almost be mistaken for father's if father's hand hadn't been shaking so much when he'd signed.

Mother dismissed Farall, Tristan and Fenester, but Fenester caught my shoulder as he left, patting it gently. "Maybe you can go back to the front and live it out with Tommy." He smiled warmly. "I expect he's missed you."

Fenester's gaze cowed to my glare. "Tommy is fucking dead." I spat, before shoving my general off.

The fall to my seat was a long one, I was unconscious of the action of movement but knew I was not standing still any more. I fell into the cushions and they would've swallowed me whole, had mother not been there to rearrange them.

"I don't have long." Father murmured. It was too quiet in the room now that the other three had gone, and the wheezing from my father's chest rang like a knell. "I'm going to go soon. I only ever wanted the best for the two of you. I believe this is the best I can do for you. Fana you must be strong, you must trust your heart but use your brain. You have good ideas but you need your brother there to form them. Ganechka you must be the rock your brother needs. It is true you can't have the weight of the kingdom on your shoulders but you must bear some of Fana's weight instead. Anya, you have my heart even now, when it's cold and withered. You've raised our sons into beautiful people, capable of everything I never could do. It has been a true honour to spend my life with you, and I look forward to spending eternity with you too when your time comes."

Mother had gravitated to father's side, Fana stood on the other side, looking the picture of regality. A chair only has two sides.

"Boys." Father wheezed, a hint of urgency in his tone. "You must be with the people you love. You must find people to make you happy. I cannot stress this enough. You have between you the makings of a great empire, but a great empire takes a soul who knows his match. Find someone who matches you as well as your mother matches me. You must promise me that."

Fana looked bewildered. He was still sixteen, I doubt he had any concept of love. But I did. I knew what it was to have your soul meet its match.

"I did, father." I murmured from across the room. "I met my match." Looking up to gauge their reactions, I let the acid dissolve into my tongue. "He's dead. He died on Gringle Field."

Fana gasped, so did mother. Father just nodded solemnly, a small smile of knowing on his face.

"I thought that was him." Father wheezed again.

I stood up, in shock that he knew. "You mean you knew that I... You know how I felt about him? That I like men?"

Father nodded quietly. "Why else do you think I would let my fifteen year old son off into war? I know the power of love, son, and I am so pleased to be able to have seen you experience it. I cannot be more sorry your experience was brief, but cherish the memories you shared." His wheezing became more and more prominent. "I cherish the memories we've shared, Anya."

Mother leaned forward and kissed father, and for a moment the wheezing stopped, and silence blanketed the room. And then mother stood back up and the silence continued.

And it continued.

And it didn't go away.