Luxa has never cared much for the council. As a child — you are still a child, Luxa, she can almost hear Vikus saying, but she knows far, far better — she found them to be ancient bores, concerned with equally boring matters and fond of challenging her parents' decisions.
Now that she is older, she knows better. She knows that they hold as much, if not more, power than she will once she comes of age. And they are not keen on letting her forget that.
It irritates her. Henry finds the council silly, says that any queen knows more and better than a score of dusty nudniks who have not stepped a foot on a blood-covered battlefield for a decade, but it goes deeper for Luxa. It is more than the nagging and the reprimands and the endless rules. Because she knows, she knows that at the end of the day, the council is not trivial nor useless.
Yet she hates being in their presence. Right now, at least, she is not the one who must suffer their attention — that is the burden of the Overlander. His face is weary and his eyes flighty as the council questions him about what may as well be the story of his life, down to every miniscule detail. How does this make me the warrior? says his gaze, and Luxa can't help but agree with him.
Then comes the time to vote. Luxa keeps her hands on the table — for her "youthful temerity" last night, she has been barred from voting, and regardless, if the boy has no confidence in himself, then who is she to believe in him?
She wonders if she would have thought differently if she had been allowed to lift her hands in his favor.
The council would never have let her, even had she not chased the Overlander last night.
See, that is what angers her; that is what sends fury boiling through her veins, like venom from a twister's fangs — that the council is allowed to pick and choose which burdens fall on her shoulders. That one day they may regard her as too young and the next lay the weight of her world on her shoulders. She may be both child and queen, yet others may decide when and where.
And by the will of the council and her grandparents, the Overlander has now become the warrior. Some small part of her feels for him — she knows the weight he will have to carry, now. The rest of her is numb; she has seen and felt this on her own body before.
Her fingers curl together, and her eyes find the table. She has no say in this. The council will prefer if she keeps her head down. And even as she is loath to bend herself to them, she knows that she must if she wants the chance of standing tall later.
The Overlander speaks. He is indecisive — she thinks he is only speaking into the room. And then she hears her name.
"What would you do if it were your sister, Luxa?"
Silence.
She lifts her gaze from her hands. "I have no sister, Overlander," she says — taciturn, stoic, aloof.
Just like the council likes her — bending her head, distant from whatever matter she has no say in but is forced to watch regardless.
She ought to bend.
Yet hearing the muttered approval from around the table; seeing the slight smiles on unblemished faces; feeling the satisfaction, tangible like smoke in the air, as the snare tightens around the Overlander—
Luxa scowls. Her eyes catch each and everyone around the table, and she sees them freeze in their wake, the sighs form in their mouths.
"But if I did, and I were you," she tells the Overlander, hoping that he sees just as well as she what awaits him, "I would never take my eyes off her!"