Hi! I want to state upfront two things: 1) I'm Italian and therefore English is NOT my mother language and 2) the story is complete.

That said, I'm sorry for the mistakes you WILL find since I have no beta for this story. "The guilty" is a very old story and it sprouts from the very first fanfiction I ever wrote when I was 15. Now I'm a lot older (30somethingIwillnottellyouhowmuch) and I'm a very different person with a different prospective in life. The original story was unfinished, in the 2003 I started to write it again from nothing and the following is what I end up with. I know, after nearly 15 years, that is not much, in fact it is a little childish in some of its parts, but be patient. It is old but it has a special place in my heart since it was the first multichapter story I finished. That is why I'm publishing it as it is without improving it.

Flagg! I was forgetting to rant about him! Ok. I cannot stomach the majority of Stephen King books. I always see with pleasure the movies but the books… no, thank you. So, while I watched "The Stand" I never read it and therefore when I noticed that the "Eyes of Dragon" villain had the same name I chucked it up to a coincidence. The two characters, the one in the movie I saw and the one in the book, were too different. Then this year the movie of the Dark Tower came out so I went to Wikipedia to have some information (I know, I know it is different from the books like the night from the day but I don't know when or if I will read the books) And lo and behold there is a Flagg there too! And wiki says (I know wiki is not the bible) that the three are one and the same. Duh. And Delain was his birthplace! Double duh. Neither Dark Tower nor The Stand will make an appearance in this fanfiction. But it gave me the shivers to know that The Flagg is the same.

Let's move on the story itself.

I am compelled to issue a dire warning. The rating is there for a reason. This is going to touch delicate issues like underage sex (but in the book Sasha married at 15 a man 33 years older than her so the underage will be canon), violence and dubcon boarding on noncon. Flagg is the main character after all so there are not going to be sunshine and puppies.

My idea pivot around the changing of the sex of Roland secondborn from Thomas to Tamara (and aging her because Thomas is like 12 in the book at his crowning).

The characters and main plot belong to Stephen King. I just created Tamara and a couple of situations. I own nothing and I'm making no profit from my fanfictions.

There are going to be 3 chapters made up of many "vignettes" because 5 years ago I was just starting to learn how to write and I still favoured short oneshots.

For now, that's all folks.

Enjoy.

1.I

Tamara was ten when, looking in her mirror, she realized she was not pretty. Her brother Peter was tall, with the dark hair and blue eyes of the western provinces people like their mother, a big boy who made the girls in the court sigh in longing: he was what fairy-tales said a prince should be; everybody thought it was a good thing he looked nothing like his ugly, short and crooked legs father. His father was the first to think so and he often boasted the fact his firstborn was the splitting image of the mother.

Tamara on the other hand, even having her mother's figure, looked like her father: she was brown eyed and her hair were blond and thin and, again like her father, she was not inclined to deep thoughts. She has no coordination which made her clumsy and ungraceful and, even if she had not two left feet, she has a penchant for falling on her face, so much that her dance instructor has given up after a couple of lessons, comparing her unfavourably with her brother.

Therefore the princess was looking in her mirror and seeing a round but not cute face that was covered with brown freckles, mud-coloured eyes and straw-like hair. She tried to stretch the skin of her cheeks with her hands and saw broken and dirty nails at the end of short chubby fingers. She turned her eyes to her dress critically: the velvet dress had food stains on the front and grass stains at knees height. She felt like crying.

Princess Tamara could not even console herself with the knowledge that what she lacked in the look department she made up in another fields. A princess could be ugly but she had to be very well-read, or she had to be a paragon of goodness or at least play a music instrument like an angel. Instead she had no gift: she hated studying and when she thought too much she got headaches; she was not particularly good, on the contrary she was envious of everything the other children had and she had not; and her aptitude for music was the same as her skill in dancing, in which she was a disaster.

To be honest, Tamara was too hard with herself; her bone structure seemed to hide the promise of a pretty but not gorgeous woman if she quitted the honeybuns she was so greedy for and her hair just needed a little care. Alas, nothing could be done about her character nor to make her like culture or anything music related, as dancing for example. He shyness and lack of self-confidence guaranteed her isolation from children her age and her habit of spying on her brother and his friend from under brushes had marked her as a queer and eccentric little girl. Peter had tried to engage her in his games but her incompetence in sports and her clumsiness had always made her refuse and now it was too late: Peter was too old to play with children.

Princess Tamara was a neglected child, overlooked by her father and consumed by envy for her brother who had all their father's attention, but she was not an evil child, she was only a lonely child and if somebody where to stop and think about it they would realize that horrible things could happen to neglected children. Unfortunately nobody worried about her nor for her; the castle was full of servants and if one ignored her there were for sure another one catering to her every whim; if her father didn't speak to her for days even when they sat beside each other for meals there was the head cook who would cheer her up with honeybuns. She had food on her table and cloths on her back, she was the daughter of the king and therefore she lacked nothing.

Moreover she had a friend, a special one because she was, deep down, afraid of him but he was the only one she had and so she kept him close with proud possessiveness since he didn't seem interested in making friends with anybody else. Tamara thought they were well suited to each other because they were the odd ones at the castle: the princess who killed the beloved queen at birth and who nobody wanted and the court wizard who was respected but feared; no one seemed to care for their company.

That day Flagg cached her at the mirror making faces at herself. Tamara didn't hear him approaching because he had come through one of the secret passages he often made use when visiting her and therefore she had a start seeing his shadow moving behind her reflection.

- Tell me wizard, is there a spell or a potion that offers beauty and grace?

Flagg tossed back a little the hood he always kept lowered on his face, enough to uncover his eyes and part of his brow. It was something he did only when they were alone together. The wizard shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

- I'm sorry princess but no magic can make you change into something you are not.

Tamara hid her face in her hands, moaning in desperation.

- What's the meaning of this sudden interest?

- I heard some maids saying how gorgeous Peter is. That is not a new development. But then… she said he will have no trouble finding himself a wife, that every girl would be eager to marry him even if, instead of been the king's son, he was the horse keeper's!

Flagg reached silently her side and placed a bony yet strong hand on her shoulder.

- Why would that matter to you Tammy?

Tamara shivered in pleasure at that nickname. It was something shared only between them. Nobody else had ever bothered considering her so important as to give her a nickname.

- It does matter to me! If Peter marries then in some years it will be my turn. But I will find nobody willing to have me even if I am a princess. I'll never have anybody to love and to be loved by in return.

The wizard's hand moved from her shoulder to her head, ruffling her hair perhaps a little too hard.

- You are only ten, princess. A lot of time will have to pass by before breaching the topic of marriage for you. You will not be pressured into marring anybody until you'll find somebody you like. Moreover love is not required in case of royal marriages, many settle for friendship. We are friends, are you not happy with me?

Their eyes meet on the silver surface of the mirror and the little girl's eyes lightened up.

- I could marry you!

Flagg's eyes widened and his mouth opened a little in astonishment. It had been centuries since anybody surprised him so.

- Believe me, many, many years will pass before it is time for you to marry. Rather, you have yet to ask me why I came to visit you!

§§§

Flagg was sitting on his armchair in his laboratory in the dungeons and he was engrossed in his favourite pastime: plotting. What an idea the princess had that day: marry him! What a madness. Even if she had been merely joking, something he was not all that sure about, he would have to be a complete fool to contemplate sitting on the throne. Especially because the fool sitting on the throne once his plans come into fruition would be missing a head. No: he was going to stay quietly on the sideline watching the reign went up in flames, torn apart by civil war and he was going to come back just in time to witness the lynching of the monarch. He had been planning Delain downfall for centuries and he felt the dark age the kingdom was going to fall into this time would be spectacular and very long indeed.

Nothing had to interfere.

Tamara must become queen in place of her brother. Were Peter to become king, Flagg would have to retreat, perhaps even run away: the young prince made no secret of his dislike for the wizard. But Flagg was reluctant to leave when he was so close to his goal he could taste victory.

Once Tamara become queen he would have to hasten the march toward the kingdom ruin. He would not permit the chit to marry risking a repeat of the "Sasha predicament". He had thought that girl from a lesser noble house totally harmless, instead she had not only undermined his sway on Roland, she had even birthed that worthless whelp, Peter. No, once removed the old man and the boy, the only influence on the new queen had to be him: no family, no friends, no husband; until the forgone conclusion came and the rioting crowd pulled her out of the palace to butcher her. It was somehow a shame, really: Tamara was his creature and seldom he had had somebody so willingly and eager to please him. She would do the job she was born to do, she would die and he would always remember her fondly as his greatest success.