Young Writers Society

Genevieve’s sobs were the only sound. The two armies stood opposite each other, deathly silent, as her cries tore the world apart.
Astrid swore she could smell smoke. Maybe just from her own burns. Her vision swam, and out of nowhere, she vomited. Even that was better than the taste of death.
No one announced the outcome of the match. The body on the ground made it abundantly clear.
Astrid stepped over the pool she’d made, her feet moving without her consent, and she fell into a run across the dewy field, her gait uneven and messy from all her injuries. She fell to her knees beside Charlie.
His red hair had all fallen back, away from his forehead. He wouldn’t need to push it back the way he and Nathaniel always did. She suddenly wondered which one had picked up the habit from the other. Now that he was so painfully still, she could count every single one of his freckles, clustered tightly like they were telling each other secrets. His eyelashes were so pale against his cheeks. She waited for them to flutter with his next breath, but his next breath never came.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, her voice cracking on every word. “Goddess, Charlie, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.”
Her hand fell on his shoulder, his still-warm, unshaven face. A sob escaped her lips. “I didn’t want to,” she told him. “I would have done anything. I’m so sorry, Charlie, I’m so sorry. I’m so so-“
She couldn't push the words out anymore. They wouldn't come into her throat, her tongue wouldn't form their shapes. All she could do was cry. The tears fell hot and heavy, stinging her face as she pressed it to Charlie’s chest, hoping he could feel the depth of her regret.
Still, no one else was making a sound. Astrid could only hear only her own sobs and those of Genevieve, howling to the sky. She would never forgive Astrid. Who would? Charlie had been innocent and she had...
She felt a hand on her shoulder. "It's alright, Ast," a voice hushed. "It's alright."
Alicia, shaved, bruised, burnt, rubbed her back, kneeling in the grass beside her. Alicia's eyes were not on Charlie, like everyone else's, but on Astrid. And her silver gaze didn't seem angry. "Look at him, Astrid."
Gently, she lifted Charlie's thin linen shirt. It hadn't been singed. Below it, the knuckles of his sternum and ribs peered at her from below sheet-white skin, lightly freckled. There was no burn, no bruise, no sign whatsoever of what she had just done. No one looking at Charlie Ribbon could tell the violence of his death.
"Pure white Gift doesn't leave a mark," Alicia said, and Astrid remembered Madame Hearing's words that she had heard countless times. "It's a pure death, not done in fear or anger, but for the greater good."
"That doesn't make it right."
"No," Alicia said softly. "But it makes it not wrong."
And suddenly, Astrid was filled with a white hot anger, threatening to explode from her in every direction, the intensity of a sun. She could have killed a hundred people with it. "But it was. He shouldn't have died. She should never have let this happen." She began to clamber to her feet. "Where is she?" she hissed.
"She'll stand trial," Alicia said. "She will. For rebellion, and treason, and kidnapping."
"Not if she makes a run for it before we get to her," Astrid said. She raised her gaze to the ranks of Anneliese's army, all of them stock still, no one quite sure what to do next. Genevieve’s howling continued to the sky.
And then, a new sound joined it. It was a scream, high and blood-curdling, and it did not stop. Astrid shuddered before she understood the reason why: that was the sound that the Queen had made in the ballroom.
A plume of black smoke began to rise to the sky. She and Alicia gripped each other’s arms, as the plume became thicker and darker and bigger until all of a sudden, it was a dragon.
The soldiers broke ranks then, getting out of its way. It swooped around the camp, over the field and where Charlie Ribbon lay like a crumpled piece of white paper on the grass. There were soldiers running every direction, and Astrid found herself clinging to Alicia, a pillar of strength against the storm. The dragon’s wings were like black clouds.
Astrid wanted to stop. She wanted to give up. Wasn’t all of this someone else’s job now? Hadn’t she done enough? She had murdered Charlie Ribbon in cold blood. She deserved to die, to not be here, to be somewhere else.
And then there were more hands on her, Antonia hugging her head, Setter’s fingers interlaced in hers.
“You did what you had to do,” said Setter, before Astrid could say anything.
“Gen will never forgive me.” It was all she could say. She tried to see Genevieve, but the sea of soldiers had swallowed her up.
“She will,” Setter assured her. “She’ll understand.”
Astrid turned around to turn their embrace into a full circle, and for a moment the four of them just held each other, tremulous and frightened and grief-stricken, as the world fell apart around them.
“Come on,” Alicia told them all, gripping Astrid’s arm tightly. “Let’s find my mother.”
They walked, stumbled, marched, ran their way through the chaos. The dragon still loomed large above them. Most of the soldiers were running any way they could to get away from the thing. Astrid glanced back, and saw someone in gleaming armour standing over Charlie Ribbon’s body, sword raised, protecting his best friend’s body from attack from above. She shivered, and wanted to laugh and cry at the same time.
They half-dragged each other through the maze of tents. No one seemed interested in stopping them. It was not because they held themselves with aristocratic pride or purpose, but because no one knew what was going on anymore, and this bedraggled set of girls could not make things much worse.
The closer they got, the more high ranking the people around them. Generals and decorated military men shouting, a spattering of lords and ladies that Astrid was sure she could have named if she cared, but she realised she didn’t.
On horseback rode three boys who glanced their way, and for a second she thought she recognised the boy with green eyes, who she thought for a moment half-raised a hand in greeting, before galloping on.
The Queen’s tent had a limp red and white flag on the top, its entrance marked with silver trees. Alicia led them there, where they met their first obstacle. A burly guard held his spear out.
“I can’t let you in there.”
Antonia held a hand out and in a shower of pink sparks, the spear snapped in two. “We’re just having a word with the Queen,” she said, as she stepped over the broken pieces.
There were only two people inside. Prince Sebastian and Laurel Sigrid were sitting in the corner, their knees drawn up to their chests. They looked like scared children. It struck Astrid that that was what they were, what she would have been a year or two ago, how she would have felt in their position. Sebastian looked up, his eyes sad and soulful and Astrid imagined how he must feel, trapped in the Wilde family the way it stood currently.
Laurel Sigrid jumped to her feet. Her long brown plait hung over a shoulder and Astrid was sure she’d been chewing at the end of it. She looked as if she hadn’t bathed in a week.
"Where's the Queen, Laurel?" asked Antonia. Of course Laurel was here. Of course at the first moment Astrid took her eyes off her, she had sided with the Queen.
“I-I don’t know,” Laurel stammered.
“What are you doing here?” Setter asked. “I thought you hated her.”
“She forced me to come – I don’t know why-“
“Laurel’s here to keep me safe,” Sebastian said, but the ice in Laurel’s eyes did not resemble anything like safety.
“Has she run?” Alicia asked. “Are we already too late?”
“I don’t think so,” said Sebastian. “Her seal is here, and everything else.”
“So where is she?” Astrid muttered.
"I'm here. But I don't quite know what you're doing here, Duchess Race."
Astrid spun and stumbled a few steps forward, so that again she faced Anneliese ahead of all the others, ahead of even Alicia, who seemed too frightened of her mother to confront her.
Anneliese was still wearing the Wilde colours, a brilliantly scarlet gown. It was the colour of fresh blood. She had a small coronet pinned into her hair, just in case anybody had forgotten she was queen. She had gauntlets on, and a small belt with a knife on it around her hips. Astrid found it laughable – were they to suggest that she would do battle? They would not be her weapon of choice and even then, she had proven she was too cowardly to face even Astrid on the field.
With a deep, cool breath, Astrid called a ball of perfect, pure, white Gift into her hand. “You need to stop the dragon, Your Majesty.”
Anneliese laughed, and Astrid’s Gift rippled, veined with red.
“You sweet little child. What makes you think that I will do that?”
“You lost the duel,” said Antonia. “A duel you agreed to.”
“I lost through a ridiculous loophole. And can’t you see? Nobles like Charlie Ribbon weren’t born to rule. The boy was weak. The Gift left his family for a reason.”
Astrid let the ball of Gift fizzle out before Annelise could see it was turning black.
“We’re here to administer the King’s justice,” said Alicia.
“The four of you?” Anneliese raked her eyes over them and laughed as if she had never heard anything so preposterous. "Gods. Cordelia did well in some regards but she really did give the lot of you some airs, didn't she?"
No one knew what to say to that. The Queen rolled her eyes. “Did you think that Avery’s and Barton’s opened of their own accord? No, of course they didn’t. Cordelia and I are old friends, in fact, rather like the lot of you. It was our idea – to train you all, to be the perfect next generation, and to all be Gifted. Who would take away your birthright now?”
Astrid was beginning to feel like someone had cracked her bones and scraped all the marrow out of them, that she was built out of tunnels. There was nothing left of her. Nothing. Even her education, her training, her pride in what a good duchess she could be – what a good duchess she was – was a lie. A player in someone else’s game. The King’s Champion. The Queen’s pawn.
“Honestly, you’ve all done every well. Astrid, you have done the Hazel Peninsula proud, and don’t you think you should continue to do so? Do you really think you could have won that duel if it weren’t for the Ribbon boy? Hardly a fair fight – you killed him in cold blood. I don’t think Cordelia taught you that.”
“Maybe she did,” Astrid said, almost to herself. “Maybe she taught us to be rulers in your image.”
The Queen’s tone, her whole demeanour, suddenly changed. “Don’t assume you know anything, Race. You have no idea the plans that Cordelia and I had for this country. What we will make it. Gifted rulers, as it should be, and at my right hand, an army of the Gifted commoners, who have been raised up by God for reasons unknown. They are for a higher purpose.”
“The slum children?” Astrid asked, almost surprised.
Anneliese gestured. “They’re here somewhere. When the dragon is done, they’ll enter the fray. They’ll show Samina that Gift is power.” And there it was, the crazed glint in her eye, the glint that was not silver or steel but something else altogether.
“You’re going to use child soldiers to prove your point?” Antonia asked. “Little boys and girls?”
“They were Gifted for a reason, and that reason is to aid the governance of this country. And if they die…” she shrugged, one shoulder more than the other. “What of it? They haven’t been trained. They haven’t been made remarkable like the four of you. Why, without Cordelia, you wouldn’t be much better than them. You’d be like Laurel Sigrid here,” she said, gesturing. “A girl not pretty enough to be interesting, with an empty head and a heart she gives away too easily. But Avery’s has made you strong. And Samina will be strong again, with you and your generation at the helm.”
She was maddened by it, by the vision she had in her head, that she had so close that she could taste it.
“Stop the dragon,” Astrid said softly. “Stop the dragon, Anneliese, and this can all end peacefully. You’ll stand trial.”
“I will not stand trial for anything. I will regroup. I will use the dragon, and my secret army, and we will defeat Sinclair, and you will all see: this is how Samina should be. Strong, imperial, undefeated.”
“Then if you refuse to stand trial…” Astrid breathed again, and there it shimmered: a ball of Gift, almost transparent like gossamer, glittering like diamonds in the light. Everybody held its breath at its beauty.
“Go on, then,” said Anneliese. “Shoot me.” She raised her hands, cocked an eyebrow, daring Astrid to do it, knowing that she wouldn’t.
Then there was a thunk. Anneliese screamed. Astrid’s Gift vanished in shock.
Anneliese stared down at the crossbow bolt, sticking right out of her heart. With a gasp, she toppled like a statue to the ground.
Astrid stared, not quite able to believe what had just happened, and when she had had her fill of the Queen’s body, she turned.
Laurel Sigrid’s lip was trembling, but her crossbow was steady in her hands, her eyes wide.
“Sorry, Your Majesty,” she said. “But I felt you should know just how remarkable a girl like Laurel Sigrid can be.”