~I wonder~

"Don't go. Don't go. Don't go."

"Big sister, don't go."

Oris looked up from the two little girls tugging at her skirts to look at her mother and father. She watched them pull each other close and stare at her with solemn expressions.

They did not cry despite the pain visible behind their frowns.

Maybe they knew that one day this day would come. Maybe they didn't. She wished she could hate them for giving her up so easily, for not fighting, for not telling her earlier that she was royalty, but she knew better.

How could they resist an order from the king? How could they fight against the armoured men that now stood at their doorstep? How could they refuse when asked to raise the baby the king and queen no longer wanted?

The truth was, she was glad that they treated her as their own. She had never felt abandoned or out of place despite knowing that she was not their child. They had given her all the love her real parents couldn't. . . No, they were her real parents.

And now they were about to lose her.

Oris shook her hear head at then then knelt down to wipe the tears spilling down her sisters' cheeks. She pulled them into a hug and stroked their hair like she always did when they cried. She wished she could tell them that she would come back soon, but she knew that children took lies to heart. She didn't want them to grow up bitter and hateful, so instead she told them that she would always love them and never forget them.

When she looked up again, her mother had her face pressed in her father's shoulder. It was obvious by her shaking shoulders that now she was crying. Her father's eyes had gotten red but still he kept his gaze fixed on her. It was as though he was afraid of looking away.

She wished she didn't love them so much, then this wouldn't be so painful. If they didn't love her, maybe right now would have been a happy moment. The beginning of the life she always dreamed of living.

But she didn't want that life. She didn't want to be a princess. She wanted to go out to the farm and pick fruits whenever she was hungry. She wanted to throw rotten apples at her brothers while running through the streets. She wanted to go the markets with her mother and haggle over the prices of vegetables. She wanted to sneak her needlework assignments to her father and make him do them for her in exchange for a dance.

The last thing she wanted was to spend the rest of her life trapped in a castle but Oris ignored all those thoughts and offered her family a wide smile before turning to walk out of the house. She burned their images in her mind and that helped keep her tears from falling.

Just as she was about to put a foot over the threshold and embrace her new life, a hand caught hers and she was pulled hard against a familiar chest.

When she raised her gaze, her eyes met the determined ones of her lover. With a trembling hand, she touched the bruise blooming under his eye, the bruise their father had given him early this morning when the two men had dueled.

She was the reason they had fought. She regretted it now.

"I won," Bren took her hand and pressed it to his lips. "Father said that I can court you. He said that he could trust me to protect you and give my life for you. So why. . ."

Oris tried to pull away. "I cannot stay."

Bren wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her closer. He kissed her neck once then held her face in his hand. "Then take me with you."

"No." Despite the warmth flooding her cheeks, Oris refused. She glanced back at their parents. "If you leave, what will become of them?"

"Children," drying her tears with the back of her sleeve, their mother hobbled towards them and took both their hands in hers. "I would feel safer if you two were together. Your father and I just talked about this. Oris, it is best if Bren goes with you. We will feel better knowing that he would protect you. Always."

Oris woke up to a wet cloth on her forehead and a hand around her wrist. When she tried to sit up, the hand moved to her chest to push her down. Disorientated, she begin to struggle but stilled to a stop when she heard the commanding tone of a voice she had grown familiar with.

"Don't move," it said and the hand grew stronger, pushing her back until she was once again lying down.

Beneath her fingers, Oris felt hay. She folded her fists over it as pain made its way through her body.

She knew now that she was on the metal bed in the cell, but she didn't remember getting there. When she tried to open her eyes, she discovered that she didn't have the strength to. She let them stayed closed.

"What. . .happened?" she croaked. Her throat hurt badly and it itched. She coughed a few times, hoping to clear her throat but that only made pain flare through her chest.

"You passed out," her cellmate explained. Her voice had a different quality to it now. It was softer, less damaged, more feminine.

"You. . .are out of your chains?" Oris was yet to hear any of the familiar rattling and last she saw the shackles kept a prisoner's wrist fixed together. There was no way they were still on right now if only one hand was holding her down.

"You didn't expect me to help you whilst being chained to the farthest side of the room, did you?"

"How?" Oris was answered by the sound of keys jostling against each other. Her mind immediately conjured an image of a rusty keyring in loose grip. "You could have escaped all along."

"I wouldn't have made it far," the hand returned to Oris' wrist and she felt two fingers press gently against her pulse. "I stole these keys from a guard two years ago. I was beaten everyday for a week but I never spoke a word about it. When they searched my cell top to bottom and couldn't find it, the guards had no choice to move me. This was the only free cell back then."

"Why," Oris shifted her shoulders against the hay. There was no position she could put her body in that didn't result in pain, "are you telling me all this?"

"The fact that we are in this cell together means something," the cloth was taken off her forehead and replaced with a cooler one. "I do not believe in coincidences."

"Neither do I."

"Then you know that all this must have been preordained. We have met for a reason. Even if the reason is to die together."

"We will not die," Oris shook her head, worsening the throbbing ache beneath her skull. She gritted her teeth and hissed her next words with what she hoped was a smile on her lips. "But if we do, it will be fitting."

Two queens forced from their kingdoms and locked away by a stubborn Empress Dowager. It would be a good plot for a song.

Maybe a legend would spread after their deaths and everyone would know their story. In Oris' opinion, that was a much better end than being set up to slay a dragon that did not exist.

"Girl, why did you come to the palace?"

"To save a life."

"Is that all?"

Oris paused for a moment before answering. There was no harm in saying it if it was a whisper. "I might have had some intention. . . to kill your son."

Hermes' mother sighed. "At least you are honest."

"You are not worried?" Oris frowned. "I expected you to be a little more. . . angry? Betrayed? Murderous? I don't know. . . You love him so much, after all."

"There is a reason why kings seek Naritan princesses as their wives and it is not only because of their beauty or wisdom. Our sons are blessed by Sūn, they gravitate towards battlefields and excel in their art. They are the perfect heirs.

"I know that Hermes has done horrible things in the name of conquest. I know this without ever having a chance to witness it because I am his mother. It is in this way that I also know that despite his actions, he is not a horrible man. I know that he must have done a terrible thing to you for you to think that he deserves death but I would rather have an enemy like you beside him than that woman he calls mother."

"You are not going to stop me?"

"You are the only ally I have, why would I?"

Oris didn't know what to say to that. This conversation only served to remind her of how much she didn't miss being a queen. It was too much work making yourself seem magnanimous, wise and stern at the same time. Even in a prison cell, you couldn't take a break. "You must really hate the Empress Dowager for what she did to you."

"If she was a good and honest mother to my son, I wouldn't mind spending the rest of my life in this cell. After all, I am not the first Naritan queen to be disposed of after birthing a powerful son. But she loves power more than she loves him and that is something I cannot tolerate. It is only a matter of time before she tires of motherhood and decides to rule the world in his stead."

"Even now, you think for him."

"When you are a mother, you will understand."

"I. . . am not pregnant," when Oris said this now, she was overcome by a different feeling than before. Even though she had always suspected her cellmate's identity, having it confirmed gave the words a lot more weight. Who wanted to admit to a mother that they had laid with her son?

It was horrifying just thinking about it, especially when said mother happened to be a queen.

"I know," the queen chuckled and patted Oris' cheek. "I have checked."

"Can I. . ." Oris began after a decent moment had passed, "ask for your name?"

"May I ask for yours?"

Now, it was Oris' turn to laugh, or at least attempt to. Her coughs cut her amusement short.

"Names are powerful things, you are smart not to give yours out," Hermes' mother said. "On the night of my maidenhood ceremony, my father bestowed upon me the style name Aella."

"I never met my birth parents and I have only heard of such ceremonies in folk tales. In your son's palace I am nameless. I am addressed simply as The Lady of Inqa."

"How mysterious."

"Not as mysterious as you, Your Majesty."

Aella clicked her tongue and took Oris' hands in hers. "There shall be no formalities between us. If your plan truly works, then I will owe you a debt of gratitude."

"I should be thanking you," Oris pulled away to press her fingers over her lips as she coughed. "I thought I had to spend my married life with a mother-in-law that hated me."

"You can open your eyes now, the spell has lifted," Aella told Oris suddenly. "You should be feeling better now."

Despite her confusion, Oris did as she was told. Her eyelids parted easily this time around and she was faced with the familiar darkness of the cell.

Her gaze landed on Aella. "You. . ."

"Yes?" The woman raised a brow.

"You are beautiful," Oris reached out towards Aella. All the wrinkles had vanished from her face, though the dirt remained. She looked decades younger now. "Your hair is a cloud."

"It is also filled with soil and oil," Aella patted her hair as well. "The spell on you has been lifted. You can now see my true appearance."

"Spell?"

"It is better to be beaten than raped," Aella said by way of explanation. Her words didn't reveal much but they were enough.

"You do want to escape. Or you wouldn't have cared so much for what happened to you," Oris pointed out. "If you truly wanted to die, you wouldn't take such precautions."

"To be truthful, I have been waiting for an opportunity." Aella explained and Oris' gaze drifted to the keyring in her hand. "I have the keys but no safe way out."

"I am that opportunity."

"I know," Aella said softly and tucked the bundle of keys beneath Oris' dress, into the strips of cloth wrapped around her chest. "You must survive. If you die, I would need to steal another set of keys and I might be beaten to death for it."

Oris laid her hand over the scarred one laying on her chest. "Why do you trust me? I have told you that I want your son dead. You know that my plan to escape depends on your identity. So why. . ."

"Your eyes do not lie, child. Looking at you, as strange as it may sound, is like looking at myself. Everything you do now, I might have done the same if I had been in your position," Aella said as their gazes met. "And your plan does not depend on me, you changed it because you want to take me with you. If I was not in this cell with you, you would still have a plan, would you not?"

"You are so kind." Oris shook his head, overwhelmed by the woman's nonchalance. "Hermes doesn't deserve a mother like you."

"Oh, don't get me wrong. I am not kind. I just have a feeling that by crossing you the Empress Dowager has finally found her match," Aella chuckled and snatched Oris' veil from where it was tied on the chain holding the bed frame to the wall. "I wonder how she will explain how all this poison got into you."

"I wonder how she will explain how you ended up in my cell." Oris took the veil when it was handed to her. "Thank you."

Aella nodded and got off the bed to walk back to her corner. "You are welcome, child."

~

Yay! I need to sleep now and prepare my fingers to write the next chapter (which will be tomorrow!). You guys know that I write on my phone right?. . . No? Whatever :')

What do you think about this chapter?

I had to slip in a little piece of Bren in there so you wouldn't forget him. I can't let you guys forget who you're supposed to be shipping, am I?

As you guys can see, in this story men don't just throw themselves at my main character/always help her when she's in trouble! We've already seen the reason why Magnus has helped her those two times! And we know why Bren helps her too!

If anyone is helping someone, there's going to be a clear reason.

And I'm not going to pull that card where somehow Oris and Hermes were playmates as children and then they were separated, or that they met once in their youth, fell in love and somehow forgot each other (because they look different/amnesia). That's just so ugh. . . clichè. (No shade at all the wonderful Chinese Dramas out there though)...

Those sort of troupes are the sort I avoid because it dampens the intensity and the genuineness of relationships.

Thanks for reading!