Legacy
Chapter 1 - Spark
"Father, look!"
Lotor glanced over to the young Drule dancing across the floor. Tarla was nearly eight, but she was vaulting, fencing and debating like a grandmaster. She posed, pleased, after a successful back handspring. He applauded her politely.
"Very well done, Tarla. At this rate, you will defeat many warriors in combat," he said. He felt a swell of pride for her aptitude. His child was magnificent.
"I can fight, too!" The small Drule punched at thin air, arousing a smile from her father. "I shall conquer many planets; I will make our Empire proud!"
He tossed his head back and laughed deeply.
"Yes, my darling, you shall," he promised, embracing the young girl.
Her hair was silver like many Drules, but it held a hint of pink from her mother. It shimmered nearly-iridescent in the artificial light as she posed happily before the Ruler of the entire Drule Empire. He felt a strange warmth in his chest he had never experienced before. Pride fired his passion, but for once it was for another entity and not himself.
He continued to watch as his daughter bounced around the large study, performing gymnastic feats on the plush carpeting before he sat back down in the hefty chair behind his mahogany desk. The stack of paperwork in front of him wasn't getting any smaller.
The marriage arrangement with Queen Merla had not come without its drawbacks. While it was an enormous boon to unite both Empires under one reign and sovereign house, it did complicate some matters politically.
Zarkon's unexpected abdication had set into motion a strange chain of events from which effects still rippled out twenty years later. Nearly all conquering and invading had ceased as the Empire scrambled to get Lotor crowned before anyone else dared lay claim. Within two days, the castle had managed to throw together a rudimentary coronation. It lacked most of the finery that Lotor would have preferred, but the political push was more important.
Perhaps that was my first indication I was ready for this, he reminisced. That was the very first time Crown came before Self. His lips pursed slightly and he glanced to the antique mirror hanging on the wall across from his desk. In many ways, twenty years had hardly changed the rugged Drule physically. His cheekbone was still as chiseled and his jaw still as tense. In other ways, he barely recognized the face looking back at him. He had always wanted to rule the Empire and even attempted to take it by force with several failed assassination attempts on his father. Having the entirety of his people thrust into his care had made him realize that there was more to ruling than conquering and celebrating. It was taxing, tiring and politically exhausting to do it properly.
Within the same week of the abdication and coronation, Zarkon's failing health had become public. He still remembered watching the old man on his deathbed, eyes half closed, lips half-parted as he struggled to breathe. Lotor could still hear the painful wheeze in his mind. The memory continued to haunt him, decades past. How did I not know, he thought. The moment when Zarkon took his last breath was the first and last time the ancient king had ever shown any weakness or frailty. He had clung to the throne proudly and defied death until his very last days. The illness had surprised everyone - except Zarkon's personal physician, from whom he had bid silence.
"Careful, Tarla," he warned, snapped from his trance as the feisty heiress somersaulted across the carpet. He leaped from the desk to catch the child before she careened into one of his heavy bookshelves. His arms caught her abdomen and pulled her away before she collided with the heavy furniture. He whisked her into the air, eliciting giggles of delight from the child. Never in his life had he felt more protective of another individual. He understood now why there had been reports of Drule warriors who allegedly ripped the limbs off a thief attempting to break into their domicile. Their children had been home.
He glanced down as Tarla wiggled in his arms and he set the child back on her feet carefully. He could easily see himself doing the same to anyone who ever dared lay a hand on her. Drules weren't particularly renowned for their gentle nature, and anyone coming between a parent and a child was liable to experience a fate worse than death.
"Mother!"
Lotor glanced up from his daughter as Queen Merla strolled into the office regally. Her hair was wound elegantly in her usual tightly braided coil atop her head, the tail swishing behind her with each stride.
"Now Tarla, we've talked about this. What's the proper way to greet a queen?" Her cold eyes glanced down to the child. Tarla stopped and sighed. She straightened her back and folded one hand across her waist in front of her, the other laying across her back. She bent forward in a near-perfect bow before the woman.
"Good afternoon, Your Highness," she said. Lotor felt an annoyed exhale leave his chest as he watched the exchange between mother and child. Merla nodded once and patted the girl on the head.
"That's a good girl," she acknowledged the child as Tarla straightened from her bow before fixing her husband with a look. Lotor scowled back. After a moment the serpent queen glanced to the child.
"Why don't you run along and play, Mommy and Daddy need to talk." Lotor groaned inwardly.
"I'll see you later, Tarla," he said as the child left the office dejectedly. He eased himself into the chair behind his desk again and made no effort to hide his displeasure.
"What," she snapped at him as she pulled a chair up to sit across from him.
"You treat her like a servant, not a princess," he commented, crossing his arms over his chest. His jaw ticked when Merla leaned back in her chair and kicked her high heels atop his desk.
"And I'm the queen," she commented dryly, her violet-colored lips curling into a smile. "I don't treat her like a servant – she doesn't fetch things for me or polish my boots."
"You're cold to her."
"You're one to talk. Is King Lotor getting a case of the fuzzies now?" She rolled her eyes at him.
"What did you wish to discuss," he redirected the conversation pointedly.
"Remember a few years back when those riots broke out in the Vega system? They're rioting again. How do you want to handle it this time?"
Lotor just cursed in response under his breath.
"They're your people, how would you like it handled?"
"Our people now, need I remind you, darling husband? We both have a share in this," she snapped at him.
"And your share seems to have been continually causing problems for everyone else involved." He trailed off, sighing and pinched the bridge of his nose. "What do they want this time," he asked with resignation. Getting into another fight with Merla wouldn't actually solve the crisis looming on the horizon.
Their wedding had been a formal, political maneuver. Neither had been particularly interested in the courtship, but neither could they deny the appeal. As Merla had pointed out; Lotor wasn't getting anywhere with the princess of Arus. Once Zarkon had passed away, Merla had been quick to move in and propose an alliance through marriage. It took the better part of a year for him to agree. They had tried betrothal once before but quickly annulled the vows when they couldn't stand each other's company. Lotor couldn't fathom what made him think he could tolerate her now.
His second wedding had been the last time he had seen Allura. Nearly nineteen years had passed since she had accepted the invitation with the rest of the entire galaxy. He still remembered her standing quietly in the back, watching the ceremony with an unreadable expression on her face. The entire procession had been lavish and showy. All the planets had been invited - Human, Drule and everyone in between.
His one regret was not finding a moment of freedom from the rituals and rites to speak with her. The fair princess had left before the ceremony concluded and the expression on her face haunted him to the day.
He glanced to his inkwell. Right next to it, never out of his immediate sight, sat a pure gold lion statuette. It was a perfect miniature recreation of the statue in front of the Castle of Lions. Her wedding gift had been unmarked, save his name written in an elegant script on the tag. On the bottom of the small ornament, the phrase Auŗos was carved into the gold. A little research revealed the word meant 'For Peace' in Old Arusian.
"Something about fair wages now that they aren't slaves, or something like that," she said dismissively. "You'll handle it, right? We need to shut this protest down quickly before the rest of the planets follow suit."
"They're your constituents, Merla," he said, blinking as his mind returned to the present time. The little statue always had a way of triggering nostalgic and even painful memories for him. Sometimes he thought he kept it near as punishment or a reminder for what he lost. At other times, he wondered if he was afraid he would somehow forget her.
"Yes, yes, but what the hell am I going to say to them?"
"They're your damn people," he snapped back, growing irritated.
"But they listen to you," she insisted.
"...that's because I'm the only one speaking to them," he said through clenched teeth. "They would listen to you if you didn't ignore them."
"They used to be slaves, now they're free, what do I care what they want?"
Lotor just exhaled and rested his face in his palm. He wondered vaguely if that was how he had sounded to his father in his youth.
"I'll deal with it," he ground out, eager to get the woman out of his study before he completely lost his temper altogether. He tolerated Merla purely for Tarla. His daughter was his pride and joy and he would move mountains for her – including stomaching Merla's incessant irritation.
"Excellent!" She clapped her hands together and swung her feet off the top of his desk. Her heel caught his ink well and some of the papers he had set aside, flinging them all to the floor in a flourish. He snarled out a cry as he lunged to catch the tiny gold lion caught in the line of fire.
"Be. Careful," he growled dangerously at her as he returned it back to his desk. He stared dangerously at the queen as the spilled ink well bled unheeded over the carpet, his concern centered entirely on the small statue.
"You still have that stupid thing?" Merla's eyes widened at the lethality she read on Lotor's face. "Alright, I'm leaving, whatever. I'm going out tonight, don't wait up," she said sarcastically. The two could hardly stand to be in the same room with each other: the three times they had shared a bed had been a violent struggle for power. Neither had been engaged in the act for pleasure - only to dominate the other. Once Merla was with child, all activity had blessedly ceased. An heir was conceived and their duty to each other completed.
He didn't exhale the breath he was holding until the door swung closed behind her. He let his forehead come to rest in the palm of his hand, elbow propped on the hardwood desktop. He continued to sit in the desk chair, face in palm, as the ink seeped into the expensive flooring. He didn't care. Lotor looked to the tiny lion staring back at him. Everything that mattered was safe.
"Why does Mother dislike me? I've only ever tried to please her," Tarla asked her father. Lotor sat next to his daughter in the spectator seats of the Arena. A glorious battle between a six-armed beetle and a snake-like humanoid was going on down below, but both of the royals seemed preoccupied with their thoughts.
"She doesn't dislike you, Tarla," he said, turning to look at the girl sitting on the throne next to him.
"She does though; I see it in her eyes. At least - she doesn't like me," she conceded. Lotor's lips pursed. He had known it would be only a matter of time before she had grown old enough to see the distance from her mother.
"Merla is a complicated woman," he lied. "She comes across cold, like most Drules." Tarla just quirked an eyebrow at her father.
"Do you love her?"
The unexpected question surprised the king.
"Why do you ask that?"
Tarla shrugged in response before answering.
"I just… I was reading some stuff in the library the other day," she explained. Her hands clasped tightly together in her lap. She wore black pants, small boots and a blue and black tunic. When she had been very young, she had been dressed in gowns and other finery, but with time, she had articulated a preference for pants.
"What did you find?" Lotor glanced up suddenly as the crash of metal sounded from the arena. The serpent had impaled the other warrior on a spiked limb, cracking the bug-like shell in the process. The wounded creature bellowed loudly and thrashed as it fought back. Tarla cheered loudly from her chair with the rest of the stadium.
"I found a book on humans, like from Earth," she explained, still eagerly watching, as the battle grew more vicious. "They're very different from us, aren't they?" Lotor studied his daughter's profile for a moment before looking back to the carnage.
"In some ways. In others, they're very similar," he said carefully. He contemplated his words carefully before answering her prior question. "I've only ever loved one woman in my life, Tarla," he admitted. "And now you, too." He glanced back to her and smiled.
"So you do love Mother!" Her expression shifted to awe and Lotor only smirked in response. He looked away from her again, his lips still curled up arrogantly.
"I never said that," he murmured, more to himself than his daughter, a haunted look etched deeply into his features.
Tarla watched him curiously for a moment, but when he didn't elaborate further, she dropped the subject. Her eyes returned to the arena as the snake-like combatant was announced the champion.
"Come, let's go to dinner," he said, rising up and beckoning the young princess to do the same. She obliged and followed him as he made his way back to the castle.
Five Years Later
The explosion that rocked the castle sent the servants scurrying through the halls in a frantic, panicked state. Lotor burst from his study and looked around wildly.
"Tarla!" He bellowed at the top of his lungs before breaking into a dead run. "Where are you?" He glanced into each room he went by as he sprinted down the corridor. He knew he was going in the right direction as he passed the fleeing staff.
He banked around a corner and felt his breath catch in his lungs. The library double doors were open and smoke poured out. Rushing inside, he found an inferno. Stacks of books, shelves, tables and chairs were aflame, the fire roaring as it devoured the wood-based materials.
He glanced around feverishly before he found what he was looking for.
"Tarla," he whispered, rushing to where the young princess was slumped against a wall. He scooped his daughter into his arms and quickly carried her out of the library just as guards rushed to the scene with water and extinguishers.
"Get it out, contain it!" He snapped at them before ducking down the hallway, cradling the teenage Drule against his chest. He sprinted toward the medical facilities and didn't slow until she was safely passed into a doctor's care.
"What happened?" The doctor laid the unconscious girl down on the examination table before beginning to look over her. Lotor's panicked eyes never left Tarla's body.
"I don't know yet," he murmured tensely. "There was an explosion, and the library was on fire when I found her. How is she?"
"Just unconscious," the doctor responded after a moment. "The explosion probably did it – whatever caused it. She seems to be breathing fine," he mentioned, listening to the air in her lungs with a stethoscope. "Likely minimal smoke inhalation if any at all. No burns. She'll have some slight bruising," he finished his examination. "Let her rest, she should wake soon." He patted the young princess' hand before looking back to her father as he exhaled in relief.
"She'll be fine?" Lotor's voice strained as he looked over her. Tarla's light purple skin was paler than usual and her rare iridescent hair was singed at the edges, but she looked otherwise safe.
"She'll be fine," the doctor repeated comfortingly. Lotor glanced from his daughter to the door, then back to his daughter before cursing under his breath.
"I need to go investigate that explosion and make sure our defenses weren't breached somehow," he muttered. He wanted to stay near her while she rested but with the entire castle - perhaps planet - in potential danger, he knew he needed to look into the source of the destruction.
"Of course, Sire," the doctor nodded. "I will watch over her."
With one last look over the sleeping princess, Lotor turned and left the medic's office.
Lotor frowned. The flames had been extinguished, but at least half the library had been destroyed by the fire. Pieces of tables and chairs were scattered across the floor. Bookcases were scorched beyond recognition and the smell of soaking wet books mingled with the lingering smoke. Two guards stood behind him in the doorway, ready to be dispatched with orders at a moment's notice while the king surveyed the wreckage.
"Sire," one spoke up. "We could find no trace of an exterior element - it appears to have originated from inside this room. Perhaps whatever caused the explosion then triggered the fire," the guard suggested. Lotor paced uneasily. It was a massive shockwave and he could tell precisely where it originated from. Deep gouges were ground into the marble floor where the tables and chairs - and incidentally, his daughter - were flung away from the origin.
"Could an enemy have planted an explosive device in this room? Why this room? Why here? The throne room would have caused more damage and destruction. ...Unless someone is targeting my daughter." His eyes swiveled to look to the guards. Both men shifted uncomfortably under the brutally lethal look their ruler was giving them.
"Sire...?"
"Is it possible someone is trying to harm Tarla?" His voice was low and controlled, articulating each word slowly. The two guards glanced between each other. King Lotor was not nearly as prone to violent outbursts as he had been in his youth, but the malevolence in his voice did not go unnoticed.
"It's... possible, yes, Sire. By whom, or why, I cannot speculate at this time without more research. Shall I look into it?"
"Yes, and make sure Tarla has at least one guard near her at all times until we know exactly what happened."
"Yes, your highness," both guards said in unison, bowing before the king before leaving the room. Lotor turned back to survey the desecrated library. He shook his head once. If someone had broken into the castle and managed to trigger an explosion near his daughter, they were gone now and there was no trace of the origin.
When he found out who it was, there would be hell to pay.
He snorted and left the room, easing the warped and damaged doors closed carefully. He wanted to preserve the room as best he could until he got to the bottom of it all. As it stood, only one person was a potential witness. Once satisfied the room was secure, he turned and made his way back to the infirmary.
He needed Tarla's account of what happened.
New story! Happy for critiques, comments and questions!