In Which Liam Returns

            I am still haunted by bloody nightmares of those long, terror-filled days, their clarity eerie.  The most frequent one is this...  It is just after Midwinter.  The large square in the city in the middle of the Temple District seemed as if its snowy ground were painted red, the high scaffold a chilling reminder of our fate.  I watch from my cell as our beautiful Queen Thayet sobs violently as she learns that her son has been proclaimed guilty of treason by the courts.  How can they convict Roald of such a crime when he is heir to the throne?  His father was convicted on the same charges; how can he have been treasonous against himself?  We mutter darkly amongst ourselves, for if the king is not safe, no one is.

            I look up and meet the queen's gaze, and she stops crying immediately.  "Cecila," she whispers in a strangely hoarse voice, "Cecila."  She says my name over and over again.

            I am plagued by such dreams, and I fear the gods are sending me a message.  "Fight back, Cecila," they are telling me.  "Rebel."  I am not the rebellious sort, and I fear the wrath of the scaffold.  Last night, however, the god of dreams sent me the worst of all...I dreamt of how it all came about.

            We were dining in one of the larger banquet halls in the palace, everyone dressed in their finest for the Midwinter feast.  I sat at a table with other young noblewomen such as myself, waiting rather impatiently for the ball that would follow.  We talked about nothing of consequence, fashion, the Tusaine ambassador's handsome son, so-and-so being caught with so-and-so in the library last week.  Lady Katarene of Naxen, the prime minister's third daughter and notorious for flirting unsuccessfully with Marius, was going on and on about her new gown, which looked horrible on her.  Alianne wrinkled her nose and shook her head vehemently, causing the rest of us to laugh.  When Katerene turned to her neighbor to see what was the cause of all the amusement, Aly smiled sweetly and lied, "It's the prettiest dress I've seen all season."

            So the night went on, our table blissfully unaware of the guards who kept running in and whispering urgently in the king's ear.  When Jonathan stood and actually followed the man out of the room, everyone fell silent.  We all had heard about the little pockets of unrest in our country, and I had heard from my brothers about the secret underground movement that preached democracy and equal representation, an end to monarchy and feudalism.  No one had ever thought they would reach Corus.  We were safe here in the palace, safe from whatever evil might be stirring outside.

            The king rushed back in and up to the top table.  He spoke quickly to his prime minister Gareth of Naxen, who then began conferencing with his father the duke and the baron of Pirate's Swoop.  Aly watched her father apprehensively for a few moments before turning back to me and shrugging.  It began to spread slowly through the room that the peasants were marching through the streets of the city towards the palace, aided by soldiers of the army.  Jonathan swept out of the room, followed closely by his advisors and a small retinue of guards, leaving the rest of us to sit and wonder.

            We were given orders to remain in the hall, until further notice for our own safety, and gradually people were starting to panic.  Lady Cythera of Naxen was beginning to show signs of a full-fledged nervous breakdown before her daughters and the queen could calm her down, and even the normally cool-headed Princess Lianne was pacing, muttering nervously to herself.  "What's that?" Aly suddenly asked, causing everyone to stop and look at her.  "Don't you hear it?"

            We strained our ears to listen, and yes, we heard it.  The fervent shouting of the mob advancing on the palace.  We had none but the Palace Guard and the King's Own to defend us against a crowd that was rumored to number over a hundred thousand.  "We're doomed," I whispered.  "They're going to kill us."

            Lady Adalia of Nond, sister to the infamous Keladry of Mindelan, frowned at me.  "Oh, Cecila, it's not like they'll actually be able to get in.  His Majesty will be most busy with all the execution warrants he'll have to sign soon."

            "Oh, could you be any more foolish?" Aly snapped, her famous temper starting to show at last.  "There are a hundred thousand of them, not to mention the servants in here who certainly aren't on our side.  Even the army marches against us.  Do you honestly think we stand a chance?"  Although her voice was steady, fear was apparent in her wide violet eyes.

            She was right.  It was only a matter of minutes before the commoners stormed the palace, heavily armed and ready to kill.  They slaughtered those who fought back, while the rest of us watched, trying not to vomit.  When they cut down my cousin Lucas of Denliev, I used all my strength to keep Aly from running to him.  "Do you want to die?" I hissed.  "He'll live, it's not a fatal wound."  She glared at me for a moment before focusing again on Lucas, the handsome young knight to whom she had lost her heart, and Katerene's fiancé.

            We stayed hidden with several other young ladies until they had taken the castle, and the fighting stopped.  We were found and promptly arrested on the charges of treason against the realm of Tortall.  Our trials would be held at a later, unknown date.

            A week after their arrival, Cecila found herself staring into a mirror, frowning at the familiar reflection.  Long reddish-brown hair, large gray eyes, small nose, corners of her mouth turned slightly upward, pale skin.  So unlike her blue-eyed, dark blond, golden-skinned siblings, she took greatly after her mother.  Behind her, Lianne sat embroidering a tapestry, a project started by one of the Nond ladies, and never finished, cut short by a bloody revolution.  "You always were vain," she remarked without looking up from her work, "staring at yourself for hours on end.  I see poverty hasn't changed that."

            She spun around to face the princess and frowned.  "I'm not vain, it's just it's been so long since I've been able to just look at myself in the mirror.  We didn't exactly have that luxury in prison, and I've spent the previous months living in a hovel.  It was miserable."

            "Gods, don't remind me," Lianne whispered, closing her eyes.  She shuddered and put the tapestry down, looking up at her friend with a strange expression.  "I've been trying for a year now to get those screams out of my head.  I see it in my dreams almost every single night."  She bit her lip and looked away; like Cecila, lost in the memory.

            It was a blustery February day, windy and cold, but at least the snow had finally ceased.  There was a great deal of excitement in the city as people gathered near the site of executions hours in advance, all of them with a morbid sort of curiosity driving them to watch the horrific deaths that were to come.  Several aristocrats had already been executed, including the dowager duchess of Naxen and the earl of Legann, but today was far more eventful.  The scaffold had been dismantled, in its place was a circle of poles, all with a large pile of firewood and tree branches at the base.  Fire would purge the supposed sins of the common people's greatest advocates.

            One side of the square was reserved for the imprisoned aristocrats to witness this act of warning by the National Assembly.  The commoners were cheering and rowdy, the nobles ashen-faced and silent as the condemned were led out under guard and tied securely to the stakes.  Cecila gripped her mother's hand as tears ran down her face; she was witnessing the execution of her king.  The thought was almost absurd.  The charges against them were read again, as they were at the ridiculous excuse for a trial that had taken place earlier in the week.  Roald, the handsome crown prince, stood with his foreign wife, pale-faced and shaking as he watched his mother's stony, unemotional face while the ropes binding her were checked once again.

            Ten men with torches came forward and stood in front of a stake, waiting for the order.  When one of the new government leaders gestured with his hand, they lit the piles in perfect synchronization, giving an ironic full court bow to whomever it was in front of them.  Smoke began to rise almost immediately, although it had been made sure that the wood was very dry so that the deaths would be as painful and drawn-out as possible.  Cecila looked over to where Aly stood, practically leaning on her two brothers.  Katerene of Naxen gripped Alan's other arm, her long nails surely digging unnoticed into his flesh.

            Daine, the Wildmage, let out a fearful cry as her skirt caught on fire.  "Great Mother, what has she done to deserve this?" a woman near them whispered.

           "What have any of them done?" her neighbor replied in a horrified voice.  "Those poor children.  They shouldn't be here, that's just inhumane."

            The commoners, once jubilant, now fell silent as the smell of burning flesh filled the crisp winter air.  Alanna the Lioness bit her lip, trying not to cry out, as many of the others were doing, including her husband and the king.  The duchess of Naxen was blessed by the gods; she had obviously fainted.

            Cecila turned away, burying her face in her father's shoulder, not wanting to watch, but that didn't keep the screams from her ears.  Her brother gasped.  "Mithros, what's she doing?"

            She looked up to the front of the crown where a sobbing Lianne and Roxana of Naxen were trying to hold back Roxana's younger sister Iona.  "No!" she shrieked.  "Nooooo!  Mother!  Papa!  Let them go!" 

            "Princess?"  Cecila and Lianne jumped, both of them returning to the present, where a curious-looking Marius hovered in the doorway.  "They've released your brother Liam."

            She smiled weakly.  "Thank the gods.  Is he here?"

            "In the second-floor parlor with Jasson and the lady Alianne."  Marius was characteristically formal concerning Aly; his parents had been avid conservatives at the court, and political enemies of her parents.  Although his own convictions were much more liberal than their own, somewhat of a chilly aura existed between the two, which made for a good deal of rather uncomfortable situations over the past week.

            The three of them walked silently together down the two flights of stairs, Lianne running down the final hallway and into her older brother's arms.  "Liam!" she squealed.

            Easily the best-looking of the Contés and located in the exact middle of his siblings, the prince was good-natured and witty, with a mischievous streak and a knack for getting into trouble.  Before the Revolution, he had been known as a horrible flirt and an excellent horseman, conquering the hardest of the riding trails with a natural ease and a slightly show-offy attitude.  For all of his amourettes, it was palace legend that the object of his desires was the one girl not interested in him: Aly.

            But things had changed, and this was no casual afternoon gathering of friends to plot out the evening's amusements.  Liam was pale and sickly, frightfully skinny, and dressed in a plain tunic and breeches.  Cecila gave him a swift but firm hug and immediately stepped aside.  Although she had always moved in high-ranking circles, these people had agendas much different than her own.

            "Countess of Bocton," Liam drawled, giving her his signature grin.  "I see things have changed since our last farewell, my dearest Cecila.  How are your wonderfully adorable brother and sisters?"

            She shrugged.  "As well as they can be, I suppose, what with everything transpiring at the moment.  It's hard trying to explain everything to Meris, when she doesn't really understand the gravity of everything.  And Marco is taking our change in station rather hard, I'm afraid."

            "From a celebrated heir to practically an outlaw," he mused.  "Quite a change for a nine-year-old.  And I'm afraid I must bring you even more bad news...your cousin Lucas of Denliev is dead of fever."  His eyes flicked over to Aly for a moment to gauge her reaaction before returning to Cecila.  "I'm sorry I had to be the one to tell you."

            Marius shook his head.  "We already knew about Lucas, and everyone else.  How was Katerene when you left?"

            "Well, she wasn't hallucinating anymore, which is a substantial improvement.  I had it under good authority that they're preparing to release her, along with a few others who've just recovered from the illness."

            "And my brother?" Aly asked suddenly.  "Was he one of them?"

            Liam looked at her sadly.  "There is a slight chance, although it is a slim one.  Speaking of which, we had an interesting conversation before I left."

            Marius pulled on Cecila's sleeve gently and motioned for her and Jasson to step back.  He put a finger to his lips, warning them both to keep their mouths shut.  Lianne was already next to him, her eyes slightly worried.

            "You did, did you?  And, pray tell, does this 'interesting conversation' have anything to do with me?"

            "Alan is greatly concerned for your welfare.  Now that your parents and Thom are dead, gods rest their souls, he is legally responsible for you, and he wants to make sure that you're safe."

            Aly scowled suspiciously, not liking the direction this conversation was going.  "As you can see, I'm quite safe in here with everyone else.  He shouldn't worry so much about me; it's not like I have many chances to endanger myself."

            Liam rolled his eyes to the ceiling.  "I know perfectly well that you are capable of taking care of yourself, but don't be mad.  He asked that I...take care of you."

            "Well," she began slowly, "that statement has two connotations, none of which I particularly like, although one is much more preferable to the other.  I assume he was talking about the more respectable option.  Am I correct?"  She sighed heavily.  "Lucas is dead, what does it matter?  Fine, yes, I concede.  I'll do it, and I promise I won't put up a fight or make it difficult for you.  Or, at least, I'll try not to."

            "You're..."

            "...smarter than you give me credit for?" she finished, her voice slightly dead.  "I get that a lot."  She gave a slightly wry smile.  "If I were stupid and hopelessly romantic, I'd say no, just out of respect for Lucas, but I'm not, and my brother technically can order me to.  I'd rather not give him that satisfaction.  Besides, I've always wanted to be a princess."  With that, she swept out of the room, her head held high.

            "But a princess of what?" Lianne asked no one in particular.  Marius and Jasson exchanged a significant look.

            Liam cleared his throat.  "Ladies, would you excuse us?"

           Crown Prince Liam of Conté was married the next morning in a ceremony that was short and to the point.  His new wife, a frowning Crown Princess Alianne, spent the remainder of the day practically sulking in the count of Bocton's bedchamber, hiding from her husband with the countess and her sister-in-law.

            Evening had fallen.  Cecila and Lianne looked on sympathetically as their once smiling and happy friend curled up on the bed and buried her face in the pillows.  She sat up.  "If my parents were alive, they never would have allowed this."

            Cecila raised her eyebrows.  "Why ever not?"

            "Because Liam's a rake," she whined.  "No offense, Lianne, but your brother really is a womanizer."

            "None taken."

            Gwendolyn and Kassandra burst in, their faces pink from racing up the stairs.  Although flustered, they curtseyed impeccably to the two princesses and their older sister.  "Your Highness," Gwen piped up, "the crown prince demands your presence."

            Aly wrinkled her nose.  "Damn.  Well, it's not like I could avoid him forever, is it?  And so I go, tired and miserable, off to my long-awaited wedding night.  Kill me now."  She followed Gwen and Kassandra out the door and shut it softly behind her.

            Lianne sighed.  "I feel bad.  Not only was she forced into all of this, but now she's got to live with all the perogatives that come with being his wife in a tumultuous time.  I mean, she thinks of Liam as her brother, not someone like..."

            "...Lucas?" Cecila finished quietly.  "This Revolution has caused us all to make sacrifices, and if we ever succeed in regaining the throne, Aly will be a queen.  It's not so horrible of a situation."

            "I suppose."  The princess was silent for a few minutes.  "Well, there's no point in dwelling on it.  What's done is done, and I'm positively starving.  Let's go eat dinner."