Residuum & Sequela
He stared up at the cracked and burning sky that slowly faded into twilight. One leg dangled over the precipice of the crenellation. His back rested against one edge, and the other leg pressed along the opposite. Ravio took a bite of his apple as he peered up at a starless, damaged sky.
"So this is where you got to, my scoundrel," Hilda murmured. She settled herself against the wall next to Ravio's shoulder, unmindful of the grit that would get on her dress.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Ravio asked. He twisted his head to look up at Hilda with a roughish grin across his face.
Hilda's face twisted. "It's broken," she pointed out bitterly.
Ravio sighed and turned back towards the sky, lips pressed together as he drank in every detail. "Still…it's home, your majesty. It's the only sky we've ever known. What could be more beautiful than this?"
"A world that isn't dying."
Ravio looked down, and then glanced back up to Hilda with a frown. He scoured her face, noted the drawn lines and the bruises under her eyes. Ravio shook his head frustratedly, dropped the apple into the abyss below, and shimmied off of the crenellation. Gently he took Hilda by the arm and began to lead her from the cracked and crumbling allure back into the castle itself.
"Come, your majesty, you need to rest," Ravio said lowly. "You won't be any good to your kingdom in this state."
"And what Kingdom is that?" Hilda questioned bitterly, her face twisted with bitterness and fury. Ravio flinched. "This dreg of a society? Filled with villains and thieves? Scoundrels and murderers? What Kingdom do I have, Ravio, but the remains of one?"
Ravio pushed open the door in silence and led Hilda down the hall. They passed tattered pictures and finery, results of the abuse over the years and the madness that had taken the royal family as the decades had passed. The same madness, Ravio was beginning to realize, that would one day consume Hilda as well.
When they reached Hilda's room Ravio finally spoke up. "We may be a kingdom of scoundrels and thieves, of murderers and villains but your majesty…we are still a kingdom, and you are still our majesty."
Hilda turned and pulled her arm from Ravio's grip. She reached out to touch his cheek, peered at him with red eyes that Ravio just couldn't read. She sighed, backed away, and closed her eyes. She turned from him.
"What did I do to deserve you, my scoundrel?" Hilda asked. "Your loyalty? What have I done to deserve any of that?"
Ravio swallowed, but he couldn't answer. He remembered a little girl when the sky wasn't as broken who'd sneak out of the cracked earth around the palace and race in the woods. A girl who gave him apples and fruits that Ravio couldn't otherwise gather himself. A little girl who lost her parents too young, who had no support, whose court even seemed to scorn her. Ravio breathed out heavily, tried to formulate the words, but Hilda shook her hand and turned completely away from him.
"Leave me," she said. The words were cold.
Ravio bowed, mumbled, "As you say, your majesty," and slipped from the room with a grim face.