Enthroned Chapter 3, a sailor moon fanfic

Title: Enthroned

Chapter: 3

Date: 6.12.11

Disclaimer:Naoko Takeuchi owns Sailor Moon.

Author's Notes: Thanks to everyone for the feedback! Lots of love and thanks to Jade!

To Daydreamishly, the LnL sequel is definitely still in the works! It's just that every time I start working on it, I feel guilty about writing it instead of STC, so I stop and work on STC instead. Since this story is kind of already done, it takes less time to finish up chapters and post, so I don't feel as bad working on it.

The journey to Andalusia was less exciting than Rei had imagined.

For one thing, it was terribly hot. Having spent her whole life next to the sea, where there was always a breeze blowing your hair into your eyes, Rei had never realized that it was possible for air to be so still. Traveling across the hot, hilly farmland east of the coast, where the only relief from the sun came from the handful of oak trees that hadn't been chopped down to make room for more fields, was like being trapped inside a sauna. A sheen of sweat continuously covered Rei's body, making her traveling dresses stick to her as stubbornly and uncomfortably as sand to wet skin.

As they got closer to Elysion's border with Andalusia, the farmland giving way to scrub and then to full-on desert, the humidity evaporated, and tiny breezes began to kick up now and then. But Rei was prevented from enjoying even this reprieve, as Luna insisted that it was not lady-like to ride astride a horse; they must stay inside the stuffy carriage.

Luna was the other reason the journey fell short of Rei's expectations. It had never occurred to her that Endy would send the uptight noblewoman along with her; she had thought she would go alone with an escort of royal guards and a servant or perhaps two. Instead, when she woke the day of her departure six days ago to Luna's impatient, "Wake up, Princess, we are already late!" she found Luna wearing a brand-new traveling gown.

"Surely you didn't think His Majesty was sending you without supervision?" Luna had said impatiently at Rei's yowl of protest. "We are already on war's doorstep with three other countries; we can hardly afford for your deplorable lack of political finesse to antagonize Andalusia's king against us as well! I will be accompanying you to make sure you don't stick your foot in our collective mouth."

To that end, she had spent the entirety of the journey drilling Rei on Andalusian customs and culture – "though it is perhaps a stretch to call it culture," she had sniffed, for everyone knew the Andalusians were, for the most part, barbarians. Even the Nemisians lived in houses, at least; most Andalusians wandered across the desert living in tents.

Today, the day before they were due to reach the Andalusian palace, Luna was quizzing Rei on how to properly address Andalusia's various levels of officials. "No, no, no!" she was saying now in response to Rei's latest response, her nostrils flaring. "The king's vizier is to be addressed as Your Excellency! The title of 'Your Honor' is only used for village judges – to use it to address the vizier would be a grave insult!"

Rei peeled her sweaty hair from the back of her neck. She was wearing it in a delicately woven, pearl-studded net that was supposed to keep her long hair out of her face but just ended up leaving it in a heavy mass atop her neck. "Sorry, Luna," she mumbled, for what had to be the fifteenth time that day. She no longer even had the energy to make a cheeky response.

Luna sighed a bit tiredly herself and sat back in her cushion, dabbing her glistening neck with a filmy handkerchief. It was a little strange to see her sweating and looking uncomfortable like a real human being; Rei was so used to seeing her unfailingly composed, like a life-sized version of the porcelain dolls they made in Nehelene.

"All right," the older woman said. "One more, and if you get it right, we can stop."

Rei sighed, unexcited. The chances of her giving the right answer were about as great as a thunderstorm suddenly appearing and drenching them in beautiful, delicious rain. "All right."

"How is the Andalusian king to be addressed?"

Rei perked up. She knew that one, if only because it was so ridiculously pompous for a man who wasn't even of true royal blood. "Lord of Kentak, Emperor of Muhassin, Head of House Itto, One and Only True King…" She took a pause to drag in a deep breath and also to snicker, "of Andalusia, His Most Exalted and Benevolent Highness Assan al-Numa."

She waited eagerly for Luna to confirm that she was right – but before Luna could say anything, shouts erupted outside the carriage.

Luna seized Rei's arm in fear. She whimpered as the carriage lurched to a stop.

Rei's heart and mind raced. At least one of the shouts had been Andalusian, a guttural cry. Warrior tribes roamed the Andalusian desert, especially its borders, unchecked by their ineffective kind; that was why Endy had sent not just two but eight guards with Rei. Had they been found by one of these tribes? With Luna still clinging to her arm, Rei pulled a bit of the carriage window's curtains aside, peering out.

She had to squint against the fierce late afternoon glare, but she saw that the carriage, and the mounted Elysian guards that encircled it in a loose formation, had in turn been surrounded by a group of Andalusians astride beastly creatures that looked like malformed horses. She recognized them from the drawing in one of the palace library's scrolls: camels. Some of these men had knives in their hands, resting along their legs, and that gave her the courage to twitch the curtain open a little wider.

One of the Andalusians was riding a fine, tall stallion, not a camel, and he slid down from it as Rei's chief guard (she did not know him by name, only by the blue badge of command he wore at his chest) did the same.

The Andalusian was dark, like most Andalusians were, his skin the color of wet sand. His hair was dark and reddish, like dried blood, and he wore wide, flowing trousers and a surcoat. He was smiling, metal glinting on the side of his nose and in his smile. He said something to her guard, inclining his head and handing him something as he did so.

Rei could only see her guard's back, but something about his shoulders seemed to relax as he took the object from the Andalusian. Suddenly, the memory of her father telling Endymion that danger came from within one's own ranks jumped into Rei's mind. Like a minnow, it nipped at her – suppose the object the Andalusian had handed her guards was money? Suppose her guards had betrayed her, had been bought off to hand her over to some Andalusian warlord so he could hold her ransom?

"Luna," she said under her breath, easing the carriage door open. "Come on."

"Princess!" Luna whispered back, and Rei turned to hiss at her to be quiet. But the men, both Andalusian and her own, had turned toward them. Her chief guard and the head Andalusian stepped toward her.

"Your Royal Highness!" exclaimed the latter. His Elysian was nearly flawless; only a ghost of the guttural Andalusian accent touched his consonants. "We are honored by your arrival in our humble country!"

Rei narrowed her eyes as he stopped before her and sank into an Andalusian-style bow, his knees and palms flat to the ground and his head bowed. It would be very easy to kick him while he was in that position, but even if she did incapacitate him, there were still his men – and possibly her own guards – to contend with.

So she just stepped to the side so that she was shielding Luna and gritted out, "What do you want?"

The white-clad Andalusian blinked, revealing that his eyelids were painted red beneath his pierced brows. "I–"

"Before you answer," she continued, taking a step toward him, "know that my brother will have you fed to sharks if you dare to touch so much as a hair on my head. In fact, he will string you up in a pool of jellyfish, wait until they have stung you beyond recognition, expose you to the gulls for your soft parts to be pecked away, and then give the sharks your remains."

The Andalusian blinked. Again. His lips rolled up, then in, as though he were about to smile and suppressed it, and then he lifted his hands, palm up. "I think there has been a misunderstanding, Your Highness. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Kentar al-Mikai, First Steward to the Lord of Kentak, Emperor of Muhassin, Head of House Itto, One and Only True King of Andalusia, His Most Exalted and Benevolent Highness Assan al-Numa."

Rei's face had gone progressively paler as the litany of titles progressed, and now she was white as Luna's petticoat. "Oh. Oh."

Luna stepped around Rei. "Our deepest apologies, Lord Steward." Her hand still gripped Rei's tightly. "I implore you to take no offense at our reaction. Surely you can understand how, based on our knowledge of the unrest in Andalusia's borderlands, your sudden appearance made us jump to an unsavory conclusion–"

The steward lifted his hand to stop her. "No offense is taken, my lady. The unsavory elements in our borderlands worry us as much as they do you, and that is precisely the reason His Majesty send me with a guard to escort you."

Luna's hand twitched a little in Rei's. "I had not thought we were such important guests as to merit an honor guard."

"Then you have underestimated Andalusian hospitality, my lady, and for that I am insulted." With a smile, the steward brushed a kiss across Luna's knuckles, not taking his eyes from hers. And Rei saw Luna do something she hadn't thought the prickly governess capable of – blushing.

The steward's eyes returned to Rei's, then, and they were serious. "Do we have Her Highness's permission to escort her to His Majesty's palace?" He let the hint of a smile soften his serious expression. "I hope we do, for although his kingdom is not blessed with jellyfish, our king would have us fed to camels if we left one of his honored guests to the mercies of the borderlands."

Rei forced a smile and mumbled an assent. Her face was hot; she was more embarrassed than she could remember ever having been in her life, even more than the time Sapphire witnessed Luna scolding her for leaving her worn petticoat and underthings on the floor in her room. What would Endymion say if he found out about this?

"I thought camels weren't carnivorous," said Luna, thankfully directing the steward's attention away from Rei.

"I wish you would tell ours that," he said, holding up a hand to show a half-healed bite mark on his knuckle and gesturing behind him at the group of camels strung together behind the Andalusians' horses.

He dismissed himself, then, returning to his own horse, and Rei's chief guard assisted her and Luna back up into their carriage. He did not meet Rei's eyes as he lifted her up, and nor did she meet his. On top of the embarrassment, she had a terrible feeling that she wasn't used to feeling toward anyone but Endy – a feeling like she had done something wrong. Like she should apologize.

But that was ridiculous. What was she supposed to have thought, when she saw her head guard taking something from a strange foreigner? It wasn't as though she knew him, or any of her guards, well enough to trust that they wouldn't betray her for some gold. Furthermore, it wasn't her job to know her guards that well; they were common men, and she was a princess. She nodded her head decisively to herself. She had done absolutely nothing wrong by reacting the way she had…except maybe the bit where she threatened to have the Andalusian king's chief steward fed to sharks.

She made a sound of dismay, pressing her hands over her eyes as though she could push the memory of her foolishness out of her head. A hand touched her shoulder once, carefully, then patted it, and she looked out between her fingers to see that Luna – Luna! – was wearing a sympathetic expression.

"I thought they were bandits, too," she said softly, and the way she was biting her lip as she looked out the window made her look younger, suddenly, and Rei, remembering the way she had flushed when the steward kissed her hand, also remembered that even though Luna was older than her, it was actually only by a few years. She couldn't be much more than twenty or twenty-one, like the laughing, flirting noblewomen's daughters in Endy's throne room who were usually already engaged.

"Thank you," Luna said, still quietly.

Rei blinked, pulled from her realization. "For what?"

Luna met her eyes. "For when we thought they were – well, bandits, you put yourself in front of me. Although–" She paused and straightened up, her face hardening into a much more Luna-like expression as she began her usual that-was-not-proper-princess-behavior bristle, "you should not have done so, as the princess's life is more important than that of her lady in waiting!"

Rei made a face, more in response to Luna's scolding tone than anything. Then, after a minute of silence, she said uncertainly, "Do you know the men my brother assigned to guard us?"

Instead of Luna tsk-ing that of course a nobleman's daughter like her did not know lowly guards, her face fell into that young, vulnerable expression again. "To be honest, Princess, I do not. I recognize none of them from the palace training yards."

"Same," Rei said. And she knew most of the palace guards by sight, thanks to Chad. The only ones she didn't know… Ah! She perked up. The only ones she didn't know by sight were the King's Own guards who attended her brother, for they wore helmets and masks that concealed their identities. Probably Endy had taken some of them off King's Own duty to guard her on this all-important espionage mission!

She reached out impulsively and grabbed Luna's cold hand. "I think that we are important enough guests for an honor guard after all, Luna."

Luna gave her a strange look that clearly asked what she was on about, but Rei only grinned and shook her head, unfolding the blanket on the bench beside her and spreading it over herself to catch some sleep before they reached the Andalusian palace.

They must have arrived there sometime while she was sleeping, for one moment Rei was drowsily watching the small square of dusky sky in the bouncing carriage, and the next she was sitting up in a pitch-black room lit only by two fat candles.

Before she could panic – not that she would have – Luna sat forward, out of the dancing shadows. "Princess."

Rei rubbed her eyes, as though it would make it easier to see in the darkness. "Where are we?"

"In the…palace. The Lord Steward carried you indoors himself when we arrived. They were loath to wake you."

Rei did not miss the delicate disdain in Luna's voice as she said "palace," which this place most certainly did not qualify as. She wrinkled her nose herself, looking around, squinting to try to see through the darkness. She had heard that the Andalusians were nomadic, pitching tents while they traveled, and living in strongholds carved out of the al-And mountains when they were not traveling, but she had thought the king, at least, would have a proper residence. Clearly she had been mistaken.

"I imagine you're rather desperate for a bath," Luna said, and Rei became abruptly aware of how stiff and grimy she felt. There was gritty sand in her hair and a few other uncomfortable places. It wasn't so unlike she usually felt after a few hours spent on the beach except that she felt so terribly dry.

"My kingdom for a bath," she said dramatically, and she saw an almost-smile curve Luna's lips for a second before disappearing. It was only the deep, dramatic shadows cast by the candlelight that let her see it; otherwise she probably would have missed the subtle, fleeting smile.

They were, Rei found, housed in the guest wing of the cave-composed residence. Outside her suite of rooms, each of which were lit only by a faintly luminescent lichen with candles waiting to be lit beside them, was a long, much better-lit but cramped hallway with wall sconces every few feet. A young Andalusian girl waited outside the room and led them quietly down the hallway to an echoing, cavernous room. It was somehow lighter, and Rei, blinking as her eyes slowly adjusted, realized that the cavern was not really a cavern but rather was the bottom of a very deep canyon, a strip of blue sky just visible far, far above them between the walls of rock that rose up around them. The canyon must have been cut through the stone by some tremendous river, of which now there only remained what filled the huge space the servant had led them into. Its water glowed faintly, a beautiful, almost ghostly blue the likes of which Rei had never seen before, even when she and Endy once came across a jellyfish stuck in a tide pool one night when they had sneaked out of the castle. It had made the water glow in the darkness, but not as brightly as this.

"Is it…safe?" she asked Luna as the servant girl motioned Rei toward a slightly more private bathing pool that had been created by carving a channel to the river. A stack of towels and bathing supplies sat beside it.

"The Lord Stewart assured me it was." Luna pinched the skin on her own arm. "I bathed in it, and I have not begun to glow yet, if that is any reassurance."

"In that case…" Rei began to unbutton her dress, then remembered that she was supposed to be acting properly. She lowered her hands to her side and motioned airily to the servant girl to begin undressing her. She finished quickly and stepped back, allowing Rei to step to the lip of the pool.

Rei felt a pang of homesickness as she lowered first her foot, then the rest of her body, into the pool. Its water was softer than Elysion's salt- and sand-laced sea water, and colder, too, and it made her miss her own water, her own ocean. Her bright, open palace, her high, airy room.

Her grumpy, loving brother.

The pool was deep, its surface level with her shoulders when she stood with her feet on the hard stone bottom. She went under, scrubbing her face and then her scalp with her fingers. Then she came up, her stinging eyes now properly camouflaged, and perched on the lip carved midway up the pool's wall so that the servant girl could begin to rub soap into her hair.

Kentar al-Mikai was waiting outside their rooms when they returned from the baths. Rei was fully dressed in a day gown, and her skin had been scrubbed so hard she felt like she was glowing, but she felt like a grimy little idiot again as soon as she saw him standing there. How stupid she had been!

But she jutted her chin up and out like the princess she was (and would act like if it killed her!), eyeing him expectantly as he swept into a bow, Elysian-style this time, before her.

"Your Highness," he said, and when he straightened again, his eyes were dancing as though to remind her of their encounter the day before. She lifted her chin higher, willing herself not to flush with shame. Perhaps in all these stupid shadows her blush wouldn't be visible. "The king extends his pleasure at your arrival and bids me ask you to save him a dance at the celebration tonight."

Tonight? Rei's eyes widened. For the first time since they had encountered Kentar and his men, she remembered why she had come to Andalusia. Endy's message!

"Luna!" She spun, grabbing the woman's sleeve. "My dress, the one I was wearing – where is it?"

Luna regarded her, her expression a mixture of curiosity and disapproval. "The servant took it to be washed, Princess. What is the problem?"

"I – I forgot something in it! I need it!"

Luna pursed her lips and sighed. "I'm sure you can live a few hours without it, Your Highness – "

"No!" What if she encountered her contact before then? She couldn't give him the scroll if it was hidden in a secret sleeve pocket in a dress she didn't have. Not to mention that it would be ruined if the dress was washed before she could get the scroll out! And even worse, what if someone noticed the lump in the dress's sleeve and found the scroll themselves? "I need it now!"

She tried to infuse her voice with royal authority. Instead, Luna and Kentar exchanged looks above her head as though they were dealing with a child throwing a tantrum. Rei flushed.

Soothingly, Kentar said, "Peace, Princess. I will find the dress and have it returned to you immediately."

"In the meantime," Luna said, her lips pursed in a way that said she did not approve of Rei's insistence, "we must begin preparing you for this evening."

Rei took a deep breath. "Luna," she said, more calmly and, she thought, regally. "It is only morning. There is plenty of time."

Luna's face softened, as though she noticed and appreciated Rei's effort at decorum. "But it isn't morning, Princess. You slept well into the afternoon."

Behind her came a sound like a muffled chuckle. Rei stiffened, her neck hot, but did not turn to look at Kentar. First Steward he may be, she thought in outrage, but that does not give him the right to laugh at a princess. She didn't feel bad any longer about having threatened to have him fed to the sharks. He was as bad as the council members back home, laughing at her brother behind his back! Her fists clenched. Non-royals needed to learn their place!

"I wish my gown returned immediately," she said, voice hard again. "Untouched. Or I will let the king know my displeasure."

She swept into her suite.

The servant girl who had attended Rei in the bath appeared a scant five minutes after Kentar left, holding Rei's neatly-folded dress, and fairly crying apologies in broken Elysian. Rei took it and dismissed the girl with an impatient wave, then fairly dived back into her innermost chamber and fumbling through the voluminous sleeves of the dress for the hidden pocket. The scroll was there, sending a wave of relief through her madly racing veins, and she managed to shove it into her slip just as Luna slipped through the curtain that separated Rei's chamber from the outer suite.

Two hours, three corset re-lacings, and an eternity of torture later, Rei was dressed in her pearl-stitched ball gown and being led by a footman through the twisting halls. Luna followed a few steps behind, as etiquette dictated for a lady-in-waiting, and before and behind them, other nobles were making their way to the celebration. Rei lost track of all the twists and turns they took through the dark, cramped tunnels. Honestly, weren't the Andalusian ashamed to house royals in this shabby place?

Eventually the tunnel they were in widened out, and the mouth of a huge cavern, no doubt the ballroom, or what passed for one in this hole, became visible. Rei remembered from Luna's instructions that they would now wait in the reception line to be formally presented to the king. Rei shifted surreptitiously, already feeling her diamond-stitched slippers begin to pinch, and wondered how lady-like it would be to crane her neck to try to see into the ballroom. Would she recognize her contact when she saw him? Was he already inside? Had he already seen her?

Kentar al-Mikai suddenly appeared at her elbow, dressed in the loose, almost informal clothing the Andalusians favored so much. A gold streak had been dyed in his dark red hair, and some of the metal hoops in his ears and brow had been exchanged for ruby studs.

His single gold canine gleamed as he smiled and presented his arm to her. "His Exalted Majesty is most eager to make your acquaintance, Princess." Without waiting for a reply, he led her forward, the crowd parting before him. They were nobles, all of the members of the crowd, waiting to be presented to the king in their jewel-stitched finery, and their eyes were all on her as Kentar led her toward the ballroom's entrance. Rei had to swallow; it was less exhilarating than she had thought it would be, the weight of all those eyes on her, some admiring, some disdainful, all curious. She suddenly wished she hadn't eaten all that buttery flatbread a kitchen servant had presented with her and Luna's tea an hour ago.

Then they were inside the ballroom, and it was simultaneously more and less than she had expected. It was huge not only from side to side but upward: its ceiling stretched so high above them that she could not make out much more than darkness; only the parts where huge slabs of rock seemed to drip down from the ceiling were any hint that there was a ceiling at all. Some of these slabs of rock glittered with veins of gold, catching the light from the fireplaces set at various intervals along the wall, and the same glitter shown in the dark rock of the walls that stretched up above them. It was a fevered, heady appearance for Rei, who was used to the coolly gleaming mother-of-pearl walls of her brother's palace, not hot glitter that winked and snatched at her eyes, making her blink.

But for all of that glittering splendor, the ball room was also primitive. The main sources of light were the sooty fires and strange patches of light that glowed on the rock walls themselves – they looked like some sort of lichen, Rei realized in awe and a little disgust. The uneven placement of the fires around the room – too many, and it would be choked with smoke even though there seemed to be ventilation carrying the majority of it up out of the cavern – made the spots directly near them feel uncomfortably hot, like ovens, and the spots farther from them were chilly, untouched by the fires' warmth. The nobles present were alternating between shivering and sweating in their delicate silks, and, beginning to sweat herself in her delicate gown, Rei found herself looking balefully at Kentar, who seemed perfectly comfortable in his flowing trousers and tunic.

The steward's arm suddenly dropped from under hers, though, and Rei yanked her attention ahead, realizing that during her study of the ball room, Kentar had led them to the head of the presentation line, directly before the king's dais.

Distantly, she heard a voice announce, "Her Royal Highness the Princess Rei Belledawn of Elysion." But it was only distantly, for her attention was on the man who sprawled in the throne before her, dangling his arms over the armrests.

He wore the same loose tunic and breeches as Kentar and the other Andalusians in the ballroom, but his were stitched with gold. He fairly dripped gold; it glinted on his fingers, at his neck, on the shells of his ears. A few studs even dotted the skin above one of his eyebrows, which were half hidden by messy, sun-bleached hair.

This was Andalusia's King Assan al-Numa.

He was actually younger than Endy, Rei knew, but looking at him now, she would have thought he was ten years older. There were lines carved at the corners of his mouth and dark-circled eyes, and his hands trembled like an old man's as he put them on his armrests to push himself out of his throne and walk down the dais's steps to her.

"Princess," he said in halting Elysian. He took her hand and lifted it to his lips, not taking his eyes from hers. His were bright blue, almost the color of the glowing bathing pool, but the whites looked dirty, yellowed, and the smell of wine wafted from his mouth to her nose as he hiccoughed after kissing her hand. "At last we – hic – meet."

Rei withdrew her hand from his. Her jangling nerves had gone quite calm. What did she have to fear from a man who couldn't stay sober even an hour into a celebration attended by numerous important dignitaries? This man was a fool, and she would take pleasure in helping the subjects who were working to overthrow him.

"The pleasure is all mine, Your Majesty," she said clearly, and took a step back to curtsy. "I wish you many happy returns of this joyous occasion." She curtsied again and took a step back to leave.

Assan caught her arm. "Wait." Again the smell of wine washed into Rei's nose as he stepped closer, letting his hand slide up her arm to her shoulder, which her gown left bare. "You promised me a dance."

Rei stiffened. Her skin had puckered uncomfortably at his touch; she felt flushed and hot. She was a princess, and this drunken idiot was pawing at her like she was a scullery maid he could take to bed!

Her brother would never stand for her to be thus treated. She stepped swiftly backward, snatching her shoulder out of Assan's reach. "You forget yourself, King," she hissed so lowly that only he could hear. Then she spun and clipped away from the throne in her diamond-stitched slippers.

"Shit," he muttered beneath his breath.

His accomplice bent closer to hear him. "Sir?"

"What the hell does she think she's doing?"

The other shrugged, his eyes following the black-haired girl as she trotted angrily through the knots of people, away from the king. "Your guess is as good as mine."

"Well." He drained a goblet and shoved to his feet. "Let's pray she hasn't just ruined everything."