Chapter I - Kara
From the day I was born I was promised...betrothed. My entire life had been a preparation for that betrothal-a lesson in duty. My name is Kara Zor-El of Krypton, daughter to the head of the science guild and, therefore, a member of Kryton's leading noble family. Other societies, I have learned, would call my family royalty, but Krypton never had any such thing. In our past, there have been coups to place a monarch on the throne, of course, or in any case an emperor at the very least (royalty without the heredity necessity). These had been smashing failures. Turns out, in a fiercely aristocratic society, nobles do not want to be under the thumb of a ruler who could reign in their wildly wide-reaching power and influence. Why should they? The caste-based society meant that those in power always remained in power and the working force never had a chance to reach higher than their means.
When I was younger, I'd never seen any of this as a problem. I couldn't fully comprehend what it all meant. However, all of that changed when my studies began. I was subjected to dual lessons-those of my homeland and those teaching me of the etiquettes or histories of the land that would be my home when I was of marrying age-the kingdom of Earth. Earth bordered our nation to the south-west and was diplomatically important to us because without a treaty with them we were cut off in totality from the southern lands. Our allegiance with the kingdom to the south-east, Terres-Interdites, had recently been crumbling beyond repair. Not that a true alliance was ever formed between our two nations. More simply, Terres-Interdites was a land without rulers, without structure. Filled with various city-states that ruled themselves and could be easily bought off through trade of goods and natural resources they didn't have in that god-forsaken desert land. It had been like this for years, since long before I was born, but tensions had shifted. Not enough to change the arrangements, of course, but enough to cause Krypton to look towards other allies. Krypton had always prided itself on being thirty steps ahead of everywhere else, of course. "Prior planning prevents piss poor execution," is what my father would always tell me-and it might as well have been Krypton's official motto.
It is these circumstances that led to my betrothal. The Queen and King of the Earth Kingdom, the dynastic monarchy of the Luthors, had a son born a few years before me. When my mother became pregnant, my family began negotiations with the Luthors for a betrothal that would unite our kingdoms for generations to come. Thus, I had been born betrothed to Alexander Luthor, the future king of the kingdom of Earth and the duty had weighed heavily on my shoulders my entire twenty-four years. Marriages in Krypton always occurred by one's twenty-fifth trip around Rao, our sun, and, thus, this was my final journey around the sun in freedom, and my time in Krypton was drawing rapidly near finality. My freedom sold in duty to the kingdom I'd seen very little of. The harsh winters up in our crowning city, flanked by mountains, meant for over a fourth of a year one couldn't even leave Argo City or the surrounding villages. However, that's not what prevented me from traveling. How could I find the time when I was constantly with tutors preparing for a life of duty? In my mind, these lessons were more akin to preparing a pig for the slaughter.
It was, through these lessons, however, that I learned something important. The Earth kingdom had no caste system. People were free to move up based on their own merit and hard work. The capacity for human treatment, at least in these books, seemed better than the subjugation Krypton placed on its lower classes. While this aspect of Earth society seemed great, there were also many troubling things I'd learned about the kingdom. They considered any use of "magic" terrifying and anyone that had magic "cursed". In Krypton, however, these abilities were considered gifts, as it was incredibly rare that a person was blessed with such things and we believed a person who was touched by Rao. When the gift was bestowed upon a member of the nobility, there was always a celebration feast in the family's honour welcoming the gifted child. These events were grand and lavish affairs and granted an automatic induction into the Magic Guild. When a member of the proletariat was gifted, I'd read they held a similar feast in their village on a much smaller scale.
I found it strange, then, that my own gift was never celebrated nor did word of it leave the confines of my family. It was our best-kept secret, the needle in the haystack of secrets kept by the Zor-Els. My family was said to be descended from Rao, yet we hadn't ever had a member touched by his gift until me and instead of a celebration there was denial and cover-up.
I was never taught to properly use it, nor how to truly control it. Members of my family simply acted as if it didn't exist at all. If they saw my eyes glow orange in anger, I was simply told to settle down. I was assigned one tutor, in the guise of a physical education tutor, whose sole job was to teach me different ways to calm myself, through meditation and other means, and that is as far as any training I received went. It wasn't until I learned about the Earth kingdom's aversion to magic that any of it made sense.
Throughout my lessons, I had always wondered why Earth could not see the importance of these gifts. It was explained to me that the Earth kingdom worshipped many gods, a pantheon, and it was taught there that if a person was gifted by one god it would anger the others and throw off the balance of the kingdom. All gifts had affinities, of course: fire, water, and air. It was very rare for any individual to be granted more than one gift. However, if the Earth kingdom learned of such a person, rumour had it they were executed under the name of "safety" and "balance". Many members of the Earth Kingdom that presented with these gifts were swiftly sent away by their families to Terres-Interdites. There was no execution penalty for simple magic users, however, they were not welcome to practice magic freely within the confines of the Earth Kingdom. The city-states in Terres-Interdites were created as small bands of different affinities. In this land, people were safe to learn and practice magics openly. The Earth kingdom counted on this freedom outside their borders, and the notion that the temperaments of the different affinities would most likely prevent the various city-states from uniting under one banner.
However, things were slowly shifting in Terres-Interdites. The city-states grew restless and irritated with the harsh conditions and the constant need to purchase basic necessities and resources from their neighbouring kingdoms. Earth conscripted more legions for their army and sent a full one-third of the legionaries to the border with Terres-Interdites. The growing unrest, while slow, caused them to create a treaty of open borders and friendship with Krypton. Krypton, in return, would send members of the science guild to improve the Earth kingdom's weapons and enhance the rudimentary science the Earthlings possessed. They would also place a Kryptonian noble on the seat of the wealthiest throne as the Earthen queen-me.
What would a kingdom that loathed magic users do if they found out their soon-to-be princess and future Queen was gifted with the same magic they sanctioned as evil because it terrified them? Days before I was set to leave the towering spires of Argo City to begin my journey towards my life in Earth I walked through a garden with my Aunt Astra, General of the Kryptonian army. We talked about the recurring dream I had dealt with since childhood. In the dream, my eyes were operated on to stop my gift from presenting itself. The features of her angular and beautiful face softened, clearly resolute on giving me answers to a nightmare she knew had plagued me my entire life, consequences be damned.
"Little one, you never lost control. Never once has fiery heat shot from your eyes. It is why your mother and father thought you strong enough to hide it without training."
"How did they learn of my gift then?" I asked, but the answer was clear in my mind-the nightmare wasn't exactly that, it was a memory.
My aunt looked uncomfortable and at a loss, something I'd never seen from our stalwart general and my closest ally.
"You were born with orange eyes. They were the most beautiful amber colour I'd ever seen, with flecks of red the exact colour of Rao. I pleaded with your parents...but it was for your own safety. They altered the colour, I picked a sky blue. The surgery of your nightmares was the colour altering. But you must understand, Kara. This alliance has to happen. It must. For the safety of our kingdom and our way of life."
The safety of our kingdom and way of life.
I pondered those words in silence wondering what exactly it was that wasn't being told to me. I tried pressing my aunt for more answers, but she just brushed me off saying she'd already said too much.
It was with this heavy conversation plaguing my conscience that I began my journey to Earth. I spent a good portion of the journey refreshing myself on things I had known for years. They had always been a distant idea, not a present reality, however. So I studied as if my very life and duty depended on it, which I suppose in a way, it did.
The Luthors had been on the throne of Earth for over ten generations. They had taken the throne from the then royal family in a bloody war that stained Earth's beautiful grass fields red. However, before they rose to the throne, the kingdom had been in tumult and they restored order. Earth was an incredibly natural resource-laden kingdom and the Luthors were wealthy beyond imagining due to this. The current King and Queen were Lionel and Lillian Luthor. All reports indicated that Lionel was as magnanimous as Lillian was cold. The information on them and on Alexander was quite prolific. Yet Alexander's sister and their daughter seemed to be a separate entity. The information on her was sparse, and from the many portraits I had seen of the Luthors over the years, Lady Lena had only ever been present in one. The Luthor clan were a fair-haired lot, Lillian with a light brown, Lionel with his sandy blonde hair and Alexander with his red locks-all of them sharing the same shining blue eyes. But I remembered Lena the best, raven hair and green eyes that didn't quite fit in. A smile that, while beautiful, seemed broken. This, of course, could have simply been an artist's rendering that did not reflect the true nature of her smile. However, I also recalled that Lillian, Lionel and Alexander were clustered so closely together and Lena was just a little too far off to the side to really seem a part of the group.
I knew I should be most excited to meet Alexander, the person who I was going to have to share my life with. But the information on him was ample and he seemed like far less of a mystery than Lena. Mysteries had always intrigued me and, thus, I found myself drawn to the mystery sister and decided to make it my mission to befriend her upon my arrival. After all, I could certainly use all the friends I could find in this new place. The most information I had on Lena was a notion that she was wild and didn't follow the rules. Also, I had heard a piece of rumoured information from a guard at the outside the science guild once, talking gossip about a recent scandal Alexander had been wrapped up in, an entanglement with a lady-in-waiting at court, about Lena's parentage. The guardsmen postulated that Alexander was just like his father and would take a mistress, after all, that is evidently how Lena came about. It was just a rumour, of course, possibly preposterous, but I was haunted by the broken smile in the painting and thought, privately, that this particular rumour was probably rooted in truth.
The carriage ride to Krypton took a fortnight, and I was cramped and stir-crazy upon my arrival. My entourage was, thankfully, quite small. My aunt rode with me for protection, the two drivers sat in front, and otherwise, that was all. I was to receive a maid from provided by the royal family when I arrived.
Fifteen minutes before my arrival, my aunt again warned me of the dangers of letting loose my gift (which no longer felt like a gift to me, but a curse) and reminded me that Krypton's future depended on this alliance. With the hopes of a nation saddled to me, I stepped out of the carriage and onto the uneven cobblestone and into the throng of the entire royal household of the kingdom of Earth.
As my driver presented me, I felt woefully underdressed. The royal family looked astonishing in finely tailored and pressed suits and dresses, each trimmed with gold thread. Meanwhile, I donned a rumpled dress that had seen eight hours in a carriage that day. It was a simple affair, even, as I did not have my maid with me to put on a dress properly and Astra was more than useless in such occasion. My blue and red seemed inelegant compared to their bright whites and golds. I curtsied low, nonetheless, my head slowly angling to see if I could see Princess Lena. I did not, and began rising from my low curtsy when a figure crashed into me pushing me over and knocking me underneath one of the horses drawing my carriage.
Chaos broke out all around us, which startled the horse I was underneath and its hoof was within an inch of kicking me in the ribs when I was deftly rolled out of the way by the person who had crashed into me. I ended up on top of the person, breathing heavily from the startle, the heat prickled the back of my eyes but not enough to show through. When I finally caught my breath enough, I turned my face to look at the person who had both endangered me and saved me and found myself looking into the most beautiful eyes I had ever seen. Suddenly, it was as if the magic swirling within me was too large for my person and wanted to explode forth to crash into her. I slammed my eyes shut to quell the burning urge and before long she was pushing herself off me and grabbing my hand to pull me up. I felt the lack of her warmth against me immediately and kept my eyes closed as the burning intensified.
I ran my ring and middle fingers against my palm back and forth repeatedly, a calming motion I had utilized since childhood and began a slow count in my head until the burning behind my eyes subsided enough that I felt safe opening them. Princess Lena leaned in and whispered into my ear, "Welcome to Earth, Kara," breaking all protocol by not addressing me by my title and, further, by winking at me as a slow mischievous smile broke across her face, lighting up her features in a way that wasn't present in that portrait I'd seen of her all those years ago. King Lionel came forward in an attempt to salvage the situation.
"Good evening and well met, Lady Kara of Krypton. Please allow me to apologize for my perpetually late, and evidently recently clumsy, daughter Lady Lena and may I present you my wife, Queen of Earth, Lillian and our son Prince Alexander." Alexander stepped forward, wearing all white with golden embroidery. He looked elegant and comfortable in his royal attire, a charming smile hung on his face as if he was born with it there. He knelt down on one knee, and took my hand to kiss the top of it softly.
"A pleasure to finally meet you, my lady."
"And you, my lord,"
I murmured back to him whilst shifting my eyes over to look at Lena. She looked uncomfortable in her black velvet dress as if she were unused to it, and her face held an air of impassiveness far removed from the playful wink and mischievous smile present only moments ago. My eyes burned at the sight of her and I had to close them again.
Queen Lillian did not deem me worthy to step forth and greet and stayed silent, looking warily at me from behind her husband and son. Her coldness sent shivers through me and I found myself wishing I was anywhere but standing in front of my carriage paraded like a prized offering. I met Lena's eyes once more a small and sympathetic smile flashed quickly across her face before her face reverted into the well-practiced impassivity she must have learned from Queen Lillian.
"Well, my lady, shall we show you to your rooms so that you may have time to freshen up and get acquainted with your surroundings before the feast?"
It was Alexander speaking again, his voice dutiful, but not necessarily unkind. I had trouble finding my words, the numbers counting in my head growing higher and higher, so I merely nodded at him and hoped the thankful smile on my face would convey how grateful I felt to be removed from the fanfare.
The castle walls were made of large sturdy stone covered with tapestries and paintings to help insulate the castle against the cold nights. In Krypton, our residences were made of marble and intricately laid metalworks that made this stone dwelling beautiful in its own way, but also primitive to me. The hearth in my chamber was large and sitting beside it was a girl poking at the fire. She jumped up quickly when she heard me enter, spinning around as if she was surprised I'd arrived so quickly.
"Hi, I'm Alex I'll be your maid," she said quickly a self-satisfied smirk on her face.
This girl did not look like a maid at all, however, she had the arms and stature of a warrior. She was a little shorter than me but beneath her black riding outfit, you could see the definition in her muscles.
"Kara," I replied.
"I heard you met Lady Lena in a quite the glorious manner," Alex replied, as a means of an ice-breaker.
"Oh, quite," my eyes burned at the thought of Lena. "She sure is something else," I said, for lack of any better way to describe her.
"Well, don't worry miss, you probably won't run into her too often," Alex grinned, amused at her wording, "she rarely bothers to show up for any royal events she is supposed to attend, including dinner. In fact, I'm surprised she even showed up to greet you."
Alex began making herself busy putting away the items in my trunk and she and my aunt exchanged nods as if they knew one another. Afterward Astra quietly dismissed herself to go to her quarters down the hall. Alex and I readied me for the feast. As far as maids go, however, Alex didn't seem to have any clue what she was doing and I found myself handling clothing myself. Alex's response to this whole endeavour was to simply say she wasn't used to this whole "maid business" and she'd "get better". I found I liked her instantly despite her abysmal skills at tying my corset. She was funny and relatable and, hopefully, she'd be an ally to me through these trying times.
When it was time to go down to the feast, Alex and Aunt Astra followed me down the stairs. The great hall was a large room with, possibly, the largest wooden table I'd ever seen. The entire length was laid out with more food than it would ever be possible for this group to eat and I found myself resenting them for their wastefulness. My eyes scanned the table for Lena, as the chatter around me was overwhelmingly loud. I couldn't explain what drew me to her, only that I was totally drawn and my magic seemed to sizzle powerfully within me when she was near which could be dangerous. All-in-all, I knew this was enough reason to stay away from her. I'd spend my whole life hiding my gift for this moment, for this alliance, and having it flare up by mere closeness to another person whilst in a kingdom that loathed magic was incredibly dangerous. Yet, having only met her for a moment, I found myself disappointed in my resolve to stay away from her. Before I knew it, I'd downed the entirety of the wine glass in front of me.
I felt a nudge of an elbow to my rib, my aunt reminding me to have some sense of decorum, but the entirety of the feast was overwhelming. The royal family asked me questions so rapidly it could almost be seen as an interrogation. Their advisors spoke with my aunt, trying to get a better sense of Kryptonian military customs. The wine was really beginning to dull my senses, which I was certainly thankful for. Despite being trained for this my entire life, I felt myself falling short. I knew after a few days I'd adjust and be fine, but for now, I felt as if I was drowning. As nice as Alexander seemed, I couldn't imagine a life with him. From our brief conversations, when we could talk quietly at the table without interruption, it was clear we had nothing in common but our sense of duty to our kingdoms. Of course, that could change, after all one doesn't learn everything about a person in an evening. To be honest, though, he did not seem very interested in me, either. Considering I'd spent my entire life in preparation for this moment and the future in this nation, I knew his rebuke should affect me more, but it doesn't. Mostly I just find myself exhausted.
We were on the final of seven courses and I'd barely touched my food. My aunt would quickly sweep it away to a servant so that nobody would notice. As dessert was being served, the large wooden doors to the great hall thudded open and Lena ran in. Next to me, Alexander was grumbled, "late as always," but nobody else paid Lena any attention, clearly showing these very late and headstrong entrances were quite commonplace around here. She dashed across the floor and slid on her bare-stockinged feet into the chair, immediately piling desserts onto her plate as if she'd been there for the entire dinner.
Beside me, Alexander's face stretched into an ominous grin directed across the table at his sister.
"So, Lena, Kara here will be needing some archery and horsemanship lessons to prepare herself for the wedding ceremony."
"Uh huh…" Lena responded slowly. "And why, perchance, is this information I must ve privy to, dearest brother?" She said this with a bite of peach cobbler stuffed in her mouth, Lillian glaring at her totally unamused.
"Well, because who better to teach her than you? After all, you are the best rider we have," he gave her a cheeky grin, clearly understanding that she'd be displeased with having her afternoons commandeered by a scheduled lesson.
The look on Lena's face changed as she was clearly trying to figure out how to get herself out of instructing me. However, her father and mother picked up on the conversation from the head of the table and decided this was a fabulous idea.
"It's decided, then!" Alexander clapped, glee evident in his tone of voice when he noticed his sister's eyes staring daggers back at him. "Guess you'll have to stay within the castle walls for a while, dear sister." He shot a wink at her, totally ignoring her glare. I chanced a look up at her face and felt the fire burn behind my eyes again.
She stood up quickly from the table, her chair scraping against the stone floor sounding much louder to my ears than it probably was to everyone else. Within a blink of an eye, she was behind my hair, hand burning an imprint on my shoulder I am certain I won't forget for some time. She leaned in, breath tickling my ear.
"Well, looks like you've expropriated my afternoons, buttercup, so you better be damn good damn quick so I can get them back, you'll find I don't do well within the confines of any set schedule. I appreciate my freedom above anything else, especially for the likes of training some spoiled lady how to ride a horse."
Her proximity to me forced me to close my eyes, the magic swimming in me boiling to the top. I slammed my eyes closed and asked to be excused from the table. Astra took my hand, gave some excuse for my sudden departure and lead me up to my rooms.
Later in the night, when I was alone in my bed and the fire had burned down to embers I contemplated the predicament I found myself in. I was so drawn to her, for reasons I could not fathom nor explain. The magic within me roared for release whenever I so much as looked upon her face. Yet, she seemed to loathe me. I was stripping her of her freedom, which she seemed to have ample amounts of for someone in her station. It seemed as if her family had just totally written her off as a wild card and left her wholly unchecked, expecting nothing from her but the behaviour she exhibited. I both envied her for that freedom and seethed that she possessed it when I was bound so thoroughly by the chains of duty. Worse, though, was that I was unsure I could control my magic around her and now I was bound to spend my afternoons for at least the next few months alone with just her.
She hated me for taking away her freedom.
I'd probably end up setting her on fire.
But still, I was drawn to her.
And this was going to end in a disaster.