The Wishing Stones
Originally published on October 01, 2005
The sun shone brightly down upon the guards’ armor, glinting its rays into the unlucky visitors eyes. The guards couldn’t have cared less. The acres of orchards were still covered with dew and the pink flowers that covered the trees were starting to open again. They could hear above them the queen moving about for the day, but the two guards at the gate were more interested in the cart coming down the road to the castle. It obviously wasn’t one of the locals because the top was covered in canvas. The funeral-black horses were restless as a young man got out from the wagon and approached the gate.
“What is your business here?” one of the guards asked.
“Let’s just say I need to see the queen for an important matter.” the visitor shoved ten pence into the guard’s hand. “Let me in.”
The visitor and two other people, a woman and a small child, from the wagon entered into the central throne room. The queen’s face looked grave and worried as she confronted the visitors.
“What do you want?”
“Just a little present and caution from you,” the man said
“I have nothing of importance.”
“Are you married?”
“No.”
“Do you have an heir?”
The queen hesitated.
“Speak! Do you have an heir?”
“No,” the queen said at last.
The young boy flinched slightly. He knew she was lying, just the way she was reluctant to say that she didn’t, gave her away beyond his gift.
“She lying, papa…”
“Shut up, boy,” the woman said fingering her knife under her cloak, “let your father speak”
“I need that jewel; that one thing!”
The queen smiled. “I haven’t got it.”
“But you know exactly where it is! You even have a map! Just tell us!” a sharp blow across the boy’s mouth made him fly backwards, unconscious.
“Fine you don’t have to tell us, but you can take that secret to the grave. We’ll search the castle, tonight.”
The man unsheathed his sword and brought it at lightning speed to the queen’s neck. “I’m giving you one last chance to tell me. And I think that’s damn nice of me, don’t you think?”
The queen hesitated in the awkward silence. “I hope your son, is a better man then you will ever dream of being.”
The second woman screamed and lay writhing on the floor.
“What have you done to my wife?” the man dropped his sword and ran to his wife’s side trying to calm her down.
A blinding silver falcon soared in through the window and delivered a parchment scroll into the queen’s lap. She had scarcely any time to read it before the man’s sword was at her neck, again. The last thing the queen did was to fling the parchment to the side of her throne and look out of the window to see the spring day just awakening. A single tear rolled down her cheek, before it was stopped by the biting blow of the sword cutting clean through her neck.
There were no witnesses to the queen’s death, save one. The queen’s most trusted servant girl, only sixteen at the time, stood at the crack of the servant’s door with the queen’s own child in her arms. She watched the whole thing in horror. She saw the spell flying into the window and hitting the new woman in the chest with full force. She saw the falcon fly into the window and the queen’s pained smile as she read the note it had. She walked forward after the man had left and picked up the parchment the queen had thrown to the side. On it lay and intricate map of the castle and on the back were the words: Don’t let this get into the wrong hands. -Marcumus
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 1st, 2006 at 2:28 pm and is filed under Fantasy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.