Kingdoms are born from a single cause, uniting the people, and the upper-class. Kings and Queens fall if there is an imbalance. Revolutions, uprisings, usurpations. All are a result of a shaky monarchy, a throne not assured. If one falls, so does the other. This is the mighty scale that balances the country named Daire. The peasants lived in peace with the king, it was, however, impossible to convert the lower class people, fully from paganism, to the 'rightful Christian belief'. That is not to say that the people of Daire did not believe in the new religion, but rather, they preferred the old.
The common peoples were content however, to include a few new things into their own practices, but the forests still held their souls. Within these tall tales, lurked beasts that rose from the deeps, in the form of a beautiful horse. A maiden with hair as gold as the sun, beguiling and innocent, can turn quickly into a hag, withered and ugly as a rotten apple. Or a hideous wasted hag, demanding a kiss, would change to a beauteous maiden.
Throughout Daire, many kings had ruled, yet the kind, generous, noble king was said to be the most worthy. Niall had risen to the challenge of uniting the people, and keeping them so. He was a tall pillar which everyone looked to for guidance. He gave alms to the poor, and he fed the hungry. His son however was not so.
King Niall and Queen Merris bore Prince Phalen. Phalen was a spoiled selfish child, who grew into a spoiled selfish man. He married a strange princess, from a neighboring land, and did away with her when she gave him a mere daughter. The wait to ascend the throne, was not a long trial for him, for by his twenties, his father fell ill and died.
The mourning was short in the palace, while it lasted many years outside. Taxes were raised, people starved, diseases spread, and life moved on. That is not to say that Phalen did nothing for his kingdom. It is to say that he did very little. It was a bearable misfortune, rather like a curable cold.
It may also be said that many came forth to fight for the throne, and none could beat
Phalen. The king was vain and self-centered, but he had grown up a prince, with the suitable training as one. As such, the day that Phalen inherited the throne, he drew into his own room for a day of reflection, emerged that night to be kinged, and slept that evening, as the embodiment of the country. Nor, as a husband was he a total failure. He had, to his credit, fathered the girl child, and, when he did away with his first wife, he kept the girl, and gave the woman a pension. Three wives later, a boy was born, and the throne secured for his family once more.
The daughters of the king Phalen were brought up with manners, grace, and the art of Needlepoint, embedded in their minds. That was, until his third wife bore his seventh daughter.
A stout old woman breathed heavily as she bustled around a rioting garden courtyard.
"When I get my hands on that wench…Oh she'll nay sit for a fortnight!" Cheeks red from anger, and mottled with the exercise she was apparently used to, but still resented, the woman stomped bad temperedly back to a cobbled path, and into a wide set stone arch door.
After the woman was out of sight, a giggle erupted from a dense crowd of bushes. A girl with a foxy look on her face, climbed from behind the thick branches and vegetation. Brown hair flashed gold in the sun, as she took a deep breath an smiled. Making sure she was out of sight to the stout, fiery woman, the girl stepped onto a winding path. It took the girl past emerald hues that competed for sun, and pale flowers which shied from busy bees. The path led her along an ivy covered wall, stretching high into the warm, unmoving air. She brushed past the roughly hewn stones, idly trailing her hand behind her. Gentle lilies and wild roses rioted along the wall, claiming what space they could, with a contented eagerness.
She followed the trail until another grand arch was in front of her. Irish roses nodded at her, as the breeze slowly picked, strewing some of their delicate pink and white petals across the path. Walking past them, the girl nodded back regally, acknowledging their good nature, and moved on. Slippered feet tapped along the path lightly, and soon the cobbles changed to a polished marbled floor. Hesitating only slightly, the mischievous girl stepped onto a foot carpet the colour of spilt wine. The Red carpet split into two directions, and upon another surreptitious glance around her, the girl followed the second. Large, foreboding doors of a dark mahogany, stood at attention, glowering with silent disapproval. Pushing the door open, the girl slipped inside, holding the door so it closed quietly.
Tall rows of books met her vision, as she weaved through many of the stacks, to a dark corner. The books that lay there were covered in dust, and clearly had not been used for a long time. Spiders scurried away frantically as she extended her hand, and selected a green leather bound book, with vellum script. Opening it, as if it were some great secret, the girl leaned over, and moved her fingers lovingly over the page, before closing it, and putting it down beside her. A smaller book, of tan, the girl slipped into a pocked in her skirt. She reached for another, but the sound of a shriek dragged her away from the heaven she had found herself in.
"Aisling Caellie Athair, so help me, by the goddess if I find you, I'll wring your neck!"
Starting, the brown-haired girl cast around for an escape desperately, and grabbed the green book, and started from the spot she had settled. With the final thoughts she possessed, she ran from her spot, and dashed to a section marked clearly for women, by the sprigs of rosemary attached to the shelves. Some of the women believed it helped fertility. With blind chance, she grasped a book on needlework, with pictures only, and fell to her knees, assuming a position that looked as if she had been reading quite a long time. Seconds later the doors flew open, and an enraged shrew of a woman entered, eyes blazing, and face splotchy. With a cry of a triumphant vulture, she lighted upon the girl named Aisling.
"A appealing sigh' you be! Sittin' pretty as you please, readin, whilst I search for her royal highness for the third time this morn!" The woman accused shrilly.
"Mrs. Mcquillan, please!" Aisling protested, turning the page to the needlework book.
"I merely wandered away from lessons. Tis nothing to be upset about."
Mrs.Mcqullian showed she did not feel the same, when she growled and raised her finger warningly.
"It wouldn't be, if it weren't the fifth lesson in three days! Your teachers despair at you, you know that? You can not dance, your needlework is horrible-" Aisling turned the book towards the woman, and pointed to the diagrams.
"I'm studying." she said, injured.
"-not to mention the fact that you couldn't manage a household if your life depended on it." "But it doesn't!" Aisling replied grumpily.
"But it will!" The shrewish woman countered.
"One day, you will be a bride, and you will have to manage your husbands estate. You may have a fine dowry, but no man will take you if you can't do anything." With a sniff, Erin Mcquillan half turned from Aisling, and with a deep, resentful sigh, the young girl rose to stand. Even though Aisling stood a few feet taller then Eirinn, the old woman towered over her, beady eyes suspicious. Bending down, the girl collected the needlework book, and put it over the green bound book, without drawing attention to them.
Walking in the tracks of Mrs.Mcquillan, Aisling kept her head bent low, looking at her feet, as she thought about the green book. So much in fact, that when Mrs.Mcquillan stopped, she walked right into her, and dropped the two tomes she held. With an apology, she dived to pick them up before the older woman turned around. Locating the red one, Aisling clutched it to her chest, and scanned for the other.
"Ah! There you are!" the girl breathed. Her triumph was short lived however, when she saw the booted foot that rested on it. Traveling the length of the leg unto the burly body of her father, Aisling recoiled.
"Thank you father, I should need that book for my studies." The girl said, a sinking feeling in her stomach. Ignoring what his daughter said, the man reached down, and
retrieved the book, looking at it curiously.
"This book I have not seen in the class rooms." He rumbled, as she opened the cover, and thumbed the pages. His face paled considerably, then darkened to a deep red.
"What do you mean by this? Learning witchcraft?" He hissed.
"No father! It's stories, simply fairy stories!" Aisling protested, hand outstretched, and spread. Scrambling to stand, the girl faced her father, her own face white as a midnight Lilly.
"Fairy stories, witchcraft. Both the same. Besides, you are too old to be concerning yourself with this rubbish. A daughter of the King is to be well mannered, good tempered, and meek! Not some gypsy who runs about and reads whatever she wants." Disgusted, the King pocketed the green book.
"If I catch you reading this refuse again, I will beat you soundly." He promised, storming away then, heading to his chambers, Aisling surmised.
While she had been berated, Mrs.Mcquillan had withdrawn from Aisling's side. Now that the King had left, Eirinn took her place by the girls side, and mimicked her fathers own lecture, with more embellishments, including the place her eternal soul would burn. Rolling her eyes, Aisling bore it as patiently as she could, until she could take the harangue no more.
"Leave me be Eirinn Mcquillan. I have no wish to hear you nag me all day. Tell the kitchen to bring my food to my room, and be down with you." Aisling cried with a weary voice.
The woman turned with a sniff, and left her mistresses side, showing she was very offended. Not caring, Aisling made her fatigued way to her room.
A high, heavily engraved four-poster rose from the floor in a marvelous array of silks and woodwork. Without a second look at the beautiful bed, Aisling trudged to the apartments next door, and rung for hot water. It was brought a short while later, along with her food. Undressing, and stepping into the lavender scented water, the Princess picked at her meal, appetite lost. She pushed the tray away from her and with a groan, sank her head beneath the water.
'I've done it again. Disappointed Father. Of course, if you were born with breasts, you already have…I wonder what my punishment will be. Belike I will be forced to darn the royal guards socks…again. Or…I might-' Aisling's thoughts interrupted by a loud knock on the door.
"Highness?" A voice called inward tentatively.
"Enter." Was Aisling's reply.
"Your Father has sent you a note."A servant came in bearing the letter, as if it were gold.
"Very well." Sighing, she accepted the note, Stretching her hand from the bath water, her gold eyes keen.
' Aisling,
You will not be able to attend the gala held tomorrow night. You will instead be ill. Try not to destroy any other change of marriage.
The King.'
A growl emitted from Aislings throat.
"No one knows I was reading! How could I destroy my marriage chances with a book?" Incredulous, the Princess cast the letter from her. The servant smiled wryly.
"Your father isn't the sort of man to keep anything quiet is he? I heard him yelling from the kitchens." Not waiting for a flippant reply, the maid left, later to tell the kitchen of the Princess's reaction. "She would be prettier if she didn't scowl half so much." She would say to the laughing Page.
The Princess meanwhile, sent the bath water away, and grabbing her clothes from the floor, carried them to her dressing chambers herself. She glared at the dress that hung waiting for the ball, and the elegant slippers beneath it.
Needing something to do, she shook out her skirt, and was hit in the head by a flying green book. Glaring at the book that lay on the ground, it took her a moment to realize what it was.
'Of course! I took two books out today! I put this one in my pocket!'
Thoughtfully, she reached for a night gown, and dressed one handed, still staring at the book in wonderment. Accomplished dressing with one hand, Aisling took an unlighted candle, and set it to blaze from the fire in her the hearth of a large fireplace. She lit twelve candles all around her and settled into a comfortable chair.
She had barely opened the page, when a candle behind her blew out. Growling she ignored the one less light and read on, grimacing at the misspelling that marred the page.
'The Fae are a rase of misterious, and mischevious faeries. There are diffrent tipes, each as unice as a flower. Many are playfule to the pointe of harm, and some case harme deliberatlye.
Of all Fae, Queene Mariae rules. Her mother, Mab was moste of famos, but she was a kinder queen-'
The eleven other candles blew out successively, and Aisling rose from her chair with a growl. A sound arrested her, though. It was the sound of a bird outsider her window. The equivalent to the Irish Nightingale, the Princess shuddered.
At night, it was said that when the bird sang, it as truly the voice of a thousand dead children, crying to their mother, hoping to comfort them.
Aisling crawled into her bed, tucking the little green book beneath her pillow, and closed her eyes, unaware of the laughter that mingled with the bird outside her waking mind.