A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

Indeed, they had survived, she ought to have been grateful for that, but the damage had been extensive, and the fallout was something that she felt to be far beyond her pay grade.

After all, there was, she felt confident in saying, the most beautiful woman she had ever seen sitting across the room from her. Not only was she beautiful, but she was a woman whose standing could not have gotten any higher. She was gentle and polite – even to her, who she knew to be a peasant, and yet Nila could hardly make eye contact with the woman.

She owed Queen Asabel a great debt, but she knew not how to speak with her.

"My General tells me that there are unlikely to be further attacks," the Queen said kindly. "But I shall not hurry our departure until we see your defence in an adequate state, and we see your soldiers properly rested."

"You have already done so much for us, my Queen…" Nila said uncertainly. She knew that a Queen's company was far beyond what she ought to monopolize. When she had sent that message, as Oliver had bid her too, she could not have expected in a million years that the Queen had come herself.

The Queen was one thing, but the man that stood next to her was quite another. The rooms on the lower floor of Oliver's mansion had once felt giant to Nila's, especially when she compared it to the confined space of the roundhouse that she had grown up in. But that space was made to feel tiny with a man of that magnitude in.

General Blackthorn stood like a mountain, his presence extending out from him in several thick tendrils. He bound a man in place, even when he wasn't looking at them. It was as if his very spirit was trying to conquer, even whilst his mind was at rest. And from the look of the maids that came into the room to serve them drinks, he was succeeding.

Never had Nila seen paler creatures, aside from on the faces of the dead. Though she could not say anything to mock them, for she imagined that she would look much the same herself.

Asabel shook her head sadly. "I cannot say that. It was too little, too late. It is my first time coming here, but it saddens me the state that I find it in. I would not leave it as such. Your gate is in need of repair, quite strongly, and your walls are not as sturdy as they might once have been.

Even the number of your men is halved."

"We have other matters to tend to, Queen Asabel," General Blackthorn said firmly, his voice like two rocks grating together. It was not the first time that General Blackthorn had uttered those words, and every time he did, to Nila, it sounded as if they stank of accusation – as if he were blaming her for keeping her Queen indisposed.

'I'm trying to urge her to go too, you old fool!' Nila dared to think, in a split second of indignance, but when her gaze almost lined up with Lord Blackthorn's, she found herself having to look away. 'Your father is terrifying, Lasha…' She thought meekly.

"Indeed we do," Asabel said, smiling, as if they had no other concerns at all. "But we have good Pillars to look after them in my place. The country will not fall apart without me. Surely we can spare a few more days?"

"…A few more days is what you said a few days ago," Blackthorn murmured.

"I promise it shall not be more than a week," Asabel said.

Nila glared at the side of a man's head as if to bear a hole into it, trying to motivate him to speak where she knew that she could not. The merchant was dressed in his typical finery. That day, it was a long green coat, inappropriate for the warm and humid weather, and a pair of high boots. But his face was as stiff as a board. He showed no signs of doing anything other than standing there.

The man to his left in Judas was no better. Judas looked as if he wanted to sink into the shadows.

"I shall only be here a few days longer," Asabel said to Nila, as if to reassure her. "I understand that my presence is growing burdensome, but I must reassure you that you need not go out of the way for my sake, no matter my title. In fact, I would insist that you do not. It would only delay your repairs further."

'This woman has a heart as gold as her hair…' Nila thought. 'And it's terrifying.'

She found Asabel almost as frightening as Blackthorn. When she paused to observe the girl, she could well believe that she was related to the famed Arthur Pendragon. She was righteous in all that she did… and then, once more, she was as beautiful as a woman could possibly be.

That Oliver had somehow managed to make friends with her… Or was friends even the right thing to call it? The woman had crossed half the country just to defend Oliver's tiny little village! Nila didn't understand it one bit. She hadn't believed that the Queen would even send troops. After all, what did a Silver Queen have to do with a mere minor noble?

"I wonder, whilst we wait on the work to be completed, would you engage my curiosity once more, Nila Felder?" Asabel asked.

'Here it comes,' Nila thought. It was happening again that day, just as it had in the few days before. It was the same pattern. They would discuss matters of business, they would make their plans, and then Asabel would relax into her seat – the simple sofa, hardly fit for a nobleman, that Oliver kept in his living room. These were the parts of the day that Nila found all the harder.

She felt as if she was defending herself against the ocean, trying to stop water from infiltrating her, as a great force picked apart her walls. Asabel invited her towards familiarity, but General Blackthorn was the constant warning that familiarity would be fatal for her.