Decisions Made, Confessions Given

The throne room was packed. Everyone wanted to see Logan's trial, and almost everyone wanted the same outcome.

But did she?

Milena hadn't been able to sleep after the ball, the trial having been placed as the first thing to do after the celebrations, which would, of course, be the next morning. She had lain on her bed, staring up at the ceiling, waiting for the night to end, listening to the ticking of the clock on her mantelpiece as she let her mind mull over the decision she would have to make.

When morning had finally dawned, she was already fully dressed and pacing at the foot of her bed. It wasn't until around nine that someone came to escort her to her throne, by which time she was practically gnawing her fingers off from her nerves.

When she had entered, everyone was already waiting for her; Walter, Page, Sabine, Kalin, Ben… and Logan.

As she sat down, a guard drew the rope across the gap which she had entered through, sealing off her exit, and Walter moved to stand in front of her brother.

"Logan, former king of Albion," he said, making his voice loud enough for everyone in the room to hear, "you stand accused today of crimes against the kingdom and its people. Those who brought you to justice will now speak."

Sabine wasted no time to speak his mind, stepping forward even as the knight was still talking, "There's not a soul in the kingdom who hasn't suffered for his glory. And plenty who have died for it," the dweller king turned to face her, "I says, let him have some death of his own!"

A cheer started to rise up from the crowd.

"But aren't we better than that?" Page asked, moving into Milena's view, "Isn't that why we fought to be here now? I've seen what Logan has done to this city. People starving to death, children forced to work… but killing him now won't solve anything."

A murmur replaced the cheers, one or two booing and hissing the rebel leader's words.

Kalin moved next to her, constantly casting deadly looks at the man at the foot of the stairs. "It is not my place to decide his fate. But his betrayal condemned many of my people to death. He promised us salvation and he left us to face the darkness alone."

Several people gasped, though most just whispered to one another, not entirely sure how to act from what the Auroran leader had said. Even though everyone in the kingdom had been told of this threat, they still didn't… couldn't understand how powerful it was.

"I had good reason to break that promise," Logan argued, "And had good reason for the crimes you claim I committed. The day I returned to Albion, I received a visit from a blind seer. Theresa, our mother's guide."

What? How could this be? Had she lied to her? Had she been the reason why her brother had changed so much?

"She showed me the future of this kingdom: the darkness in Aurora is coming here, bringing death, destruction, the end to our way of life. The sacrifices I had to make. I did them to protect Albion. If a few had to suffer, it was to build an army. If a few had to die, it was to save a country."

Milena looked over to the captain on her right, remembering what he had told her. Everything he did, all the wrongs he's committed against the people, they were to protect us from what he knew was coming.

Ben looked as though he wasn't entirely there, his eyes unfocused and his brow furrowed, but as soon as Logan started talking again, he blinked, and it was as if it had never happened.

Milena couldn't help but wonder where he'd gone for those brief moments.

"I have spent years preparing for this attack. Let me stand by your side now and all my soldiers will be yours to command. Let us face the coming darkness together."

The room fell silent at his final words.

Leaning back, she pressed her hands together and touched her mouth with the tips of her fingers.

There was still one person who hadn't spoken though.

"Captain Finn," she said, turning to face him, "what is your verdict?"

He shrugged nonchalantly. "He's your brother…"

To others, that might have sounded like he didn't care, or that he didn't want to interfere with her judgement. But to Milena, those three words reminded her of the loss that had shown in his eyes as he'd spoken to her on the ship, of the value of the bond between siblings, of the brother she once cherished and adored.

"You have the power over life and death, sister. Now choose." Using those words that had haunted her for so many nights, the words that had condemned Elliot to death, Logan gave her his consent and acceptance of her decision, whatever it may be.

Closing her eyes, she blocked out all the outside distractions, and made her choice.

As the Queen stood, Ben could see her release a deep breath.

It didn't really surprise him. A decision like this could break your average man, and yet she had to make it within a few minutes.

The crowd became silent as they waited for her answer.

"This is not the time for revenge," she said, "We need your help, Logan."

The captain supressed a smile as Walter proclaimed that her decision had been made, the look of pride and relief of Logan's features already upsetting the rabble that were threatening to jump over the rope.

As the two siblings moved out of the room, speaking quietly to one another, Ben glanced at the others stood with him.

Neither Sabine nor Kalin looked overly happy at the prospects of having to work with the man who had wronged them, but Page and Walter looked pleased, almost proud, of the decision the Queen had made.

After most of the audience had filtered out of the room, Ben slipped through the door and escaped to the garden, wanting to breathe fresh air before he was dragged off somewhere by someone or other.

The way there was relatively empty, only a servant or two dusting a suit of armour or polishing a table. As he exited the building, the guards at the door stood to attention, and he inhaled the fresh, clean air.

He could get used to this.

Once he'd reached the bottom of the stairs, he paused, taking in his new environment.

The garden had surprisingly not been neglected in Logan's rule, all of the bushes carefully sculpted and formed to make the perfect shapes, the flower beds only held the flowers they were supposed to hold, and the structures were not over-ridden by moss. But there was one building that caught his attention the most.

Right in the centre of the garden, a large structure rose out of the ground, its domed roof luring him in. The closer he got, the more he realised what this place was; a tomb.

Ben could remember the day when the news of the previous Hero Queen's untimely death had reached Gunk. Her husband had died of an illness that had struck the country some years before, but the Queen had lost her life from sheer exhaustion. Right until the end, she was always fighting for her people in one way or another, constantly travelling across the land when word reached her of troubled places, but she would always return for her children, spending every waking moment with them when she was home.

It had been a blow to Albion when she died, and Logan, barely seventeen years old, was forced to sit on the throne, Milena still only a child who hadn't even celebrated her tenth birthday.

Since that day, just over a decade ago, so much had happened, and she was no longer that young girl, mourning for the loss of her parents. And he was no longer a shop boy, mourning the loss of his family. No. Milena was the Queen of Albion, and Ben was the captain of the Swift brigade in the Imperial army. They had duties to perform, and responsibilities to take care of.

"Um… Captain?"

Blinking, Ben removed himself from his thoughts and turned to find a guard stood looking expectantly at him.

He coughed. "Yes?"

"The Queen would like you in the war room sir," the guard said, standing to attention.

The captain nodded, "Thanks. I'll be there in a jiffy."

As the guard led the way, he couldn't help but wonder why she would want to see him.

Milena was studying the map on the table when the Ben arrived. All the other leaders were already stood waiting for her to speak, even Logan was there, much to some of the others' disgust, but she needed everyone there before she told them of what Theresa had shown her. She could still see the oily darkness that had consumed Albion in her mind.

Sighing, she pulled herself up straight and looked at each of the faces around her.

"I have been visited by Theresa," she explained, "and she has told me that what my brother says is true. The darkness is coming to Albion."

Kalin frowned, "But how is this possible? It can only travel at night."

Milena shook her head, "And yet it was able to black out the sun when Ben and I had to travel through your desert to escape it. No. It has grown stronger than any of us could have imagined. It will be here in a year, and there is no way we can stop it."

Logan glanced at Ben briefly, a curious frown on his face, before turning back to his sister, "If that is how much time we have then the army needs to be ready."

"It would cost a lot of money to find the resources we need," Walter explained.

Milena nodded. "I will find a way to make sure the treasury remains full," she looked at the people she had come to call friends, "I know that in order to keep the promises I made to you, it will make my task even harder, but I do not intend to break my word."

They smiled at her, but remained silent.

"I will need your help during the coming months," she continued, "and I only hope that we will be ready for the dangers that we will face."

"My people will try to help in any way that they can, your majesty," Kalin said with a bow.

Sabine's staff struck the ground, "Aye. As long as you keep your promise to us, we will try to help you to protect your kingdom."

"We will do whatever it takes to keep this country safe, your majesty," Page swore, crossing her arms.

Ben nodded. "Whatever it takes."

Milena smiled. As long as she had these people behind her, there was no way she could possibly fail.

So the final battle was within sight, but was it too close to da anything about?

Ben stared up into the night sky as he leaned on the banister overlooking the city, the stars blinking innocently down at him. Had he not experienced what the darkness could do himself, it would have been inconceivably to imagine what the Crawler would do, but as it was, that creature had taken him into the very depths of its darkness, had seen into the very depths of his soul and left its mark.

Even if he didn't show it on the surface, he was a changed man. He could feel it inside of him, and he was afraid to go to sleep at night, for fear of what it would show him in his dreams.

It terrified him to think that what had happened to him could happen to every single person in Albion, every man, woman and child, stuck in a place of nightmares, unable to run or cry for help.

"May I join you?"

Pulling himself out of his thoughts, he turned to find Logan stood next to his parents' tomb.

This sort of thing seemed to be happening a lot recently. He really ought to do something about it.

"Sure."

Logan moved to stand next to him, keeping his hands behind his back and his back straight, keeping the air of nobility about him.

For a while, they stood in silence, just looking out at the landscape before them; the lights of the lamps, the smoke from Reaver's industrial towers, the dark line of the river that ran through it, almost splitting it in two.

"When Milena said both of you travelled through the desert…?"

Ben nodded. He had a right to know. "When we arrived in Aurora, we were on the wrong side of the Crawler's cave. We had to go through it to find Kalin and her people, though we had no idea what was inside."

Logan glanced at him, "What happened?"

The captain looked up at the sky again, thinking back to that day. "At first nothing happened. We got through quite a bit of the place before… it started to taunt us, sending wave after wave of its 'children' at us. I thought Walter drove it away but…"

"It was just waiting."

Ben let his head drop and his eyes close. "I'd fallen behind a bit, and Milena had jumped down from a small ridge, but Walter was making a run up. I could see it, right behind him, and…" He stopped, afraid to live through those memories again, but Logan took it the wrong way.

"It took him?"

Ben shook his head. "When it attacked you, it touched your soul, didn't it," the other man nodded, "When I pushed Walter over the edge, it took me instead. But it didn't just give me a 'once over', it swallowed me whole. It stole my sight, showed me things, used me to lure Milena in…"

Logan's eyes widened and he took an involuntary step away, making the soldier smirk.

"After we escaped, it almost took her too, but I wouldn't let it. I've had nightmares almost every night since Kalin and the Auroran priestess took what they could out of me. But I can still feel it. It's still inside me somewhere, hiding, waiting to catch me off guard."

Sighing, he stood up straight and looked Logan in the eye. "Just because the Queen loves you enough to keep you alive, it doesn't mean she doesn't hate you. Help her as much as you can, but don't press your ideas down her throat. She's decided to keep her promises, and she will keep them. I'm sure you know how stubborn she is," Logan smiled, confirming this, "Just… be her brother."

With that, he turned and walked back towards the castle, wondering why he'd told him all of this, why he'd defended Milena like that, and hoped that his dreams wouldn't be plagued by the darkness again.

AN - I wasn't too sure about this chapter when I started it, but it all turned out okay in the end...

For anyone who doesn't understand the whole 'he's your brother' thing, have a look at chapter 4.

The next few chapters should be interesting to write, and it might take me a little longer than these past few to upload, so don't expect anything soon (unless I end up writing furiously for the next few hours...).

Until next time! (which will hopefully be soon!)