Disclaimer: I own neither the show Reign nor its characters, and receive no compensation for borrowing them for the tune my Muse has played me…enjoy!
'You are great and powerful, you are a Medici'
'You are a worthless orphan, a girl'
'You're blood is as cold as ice, your heart as black as coal'
'Such beauty and poise found in a single soul, you are an angel in red'
'So many years barren, what is wrong with you'
'Majesty there can be no more children, it will be your end'
'Mother I love you'
'You must stop this, I know you love me but you cannot protect me forever'
Words, words, words…carefully crafted, carelessly crafted, each and every one slicing like a dagger through her.
Who was she, what was she?
Caterina the little Dutchessina to some, Catherine de Medici the cold and foreign Queen to others.
To a precious few she was mother, and to one fickle husband and King she was a wife.
She was a woman in a man's world.
She was the child who was heedlessly left by her beloved family to the tender mercies of her captors.
She was a powerful Queen, yet precariously stayed in her auspicious position by her wits and machinations…and sometimes just barely.
She was a beloved mother who never had enough time for her children, children whom she moved around like chess pieces in the name of politics.
She was desired and unloved.
She was despised and coveted.
She was needy and hungry for acceptance and assurance, but none would ever come except by the satisfaction of her own success.
She was alone in a crowd which both hated her and worshiped her.
She was an orphan.
She was a woman.
She was a Queen.
She was a mother.
She was many things to many people, but her titles didn't give her purpose and her character didn't give her strength.
Some days she didn't know how she even went on.
But the morning still came, and the burden never left.
Some days she was granted just the measure of strength that was needed to see the day through.
Perhaps there was a God.
Perhaps He cared even for her.
Perhaps one day she might meet Him.
Perhaps He would know who she was and why she had been put here and now.
Most days she couldn't have answered that if she tried.
Most days she dared not even try.
It was a terrifying question when everything made sense.
It was a mortifying question when nothing did.
And yet here she was.
And here she would stay.
Catherine de Medici, Queen of France.