“How did it come to this?”

Raeca was immeasurably sad as she looked up at Calliope. The queen was gowned in white silk that glittered with diamonds like stardust. Her sleeves trailed down on either side of the throne, and her crown shone with its’ own light where it rested in her ornately styled hair.

The woman she taught to spin and laughed with as they sat in the sun and did the mending together. The woman who delighted in fresh honey-cakes, and was exhausted by her court, but still tried so hard to rule them well.

The queen, who was as cold and cruel as a dagger made of ice.

“You dare question your queen?”

Calliope’s captain, the same man who dragged Raeca out of her house and burned it, raised his hand, ready to give her a new bruise to match the others that were his doing. He enjoyed his work, and was completely devoted to his queen, and her Temple.

“Enough,” Calliope stopped him before the blow could land even as Raeca cowered away, aching and terrified. “Leave us.”

“My queen—”

“Now.”

If it was anyone else giving the order, he might have refused, but Calliope was the White Queen. If she gave a command, it was to be followed.

Raeca tried to pull herself together, miserably aware of the deep bruise that colored her face, and the dirt that was ground into her torn dress. Here at Calliope’s feet, with the queen polished down to her perfect fingernails, Raeca felt tattered inside and out.

“You wonder how it came to this,” Calliope said casually, and leaned forward on her throne, the carved gold lighting her dress as the late sun hit it. “How it came that I would have you brought here. How I would demand an explanation for your betrayal of me.”

“I never betrayed you,” Raeca protested, and struggled to her feet, chains around her wrists and ankles clanking heavily as she moved. “We were— we are friends.”

“A friend who consorts with my greatest and most ruthless enemy,” Calliope’s voice snapped like a whip, and she finally stood, haloed by rainbows from the diamonds sewn onto her gown. The white silk pooled around her feet and formed a cascading train behind her as she stepped down off her golden throne. “A friend who seeks to steal what is mine.”

“I don’t—” Raeca started, and Calliope raised a hand. Magic burst forth like rays of the sun and blasted Raeca into a marble pillar so hard that she couldn’t breathe through the pain. “Calliope, please…”

“You will henceforth address me as Your Majesty,” Calliope hissed poisonously, and flicked her hand again. Raeca screamed as magic threw her across the room and into another pillar. “Oh, but I see you do not understand, poor little country wretch. Very well. I will explain.”

She knelt beside Raeca like a falling feather and buried her hand in Raeca’s loose dark hair until Raeca was forced to look up at her.

“You consort with Haroun,” she hissed, and threw Raeca aside like she was nothing more than a bit of trash. “Heal him after I do my best to end his evil. You even learn from him, knowing that he is the Dark Sorcerer, and my enemy. But worst, worst of all, you dare to love Brendis.”

“I’m sorry,” Raeca whispered through tears of pain and fear as she tried to get up. She didn’t think anything was broken, but everything hurt, and she was terribly dizzy. “I didn’t mean to fall in love with him.”

“You confess,” Calliope swept up onto her throne again and draped herself across it, perfect and controlled in everything she did. “You confess to stealing from me. To plotting against me. To the evil that the Dark Sorcerer placed into your heart.”

“There is no evil in my heart,” Raeca tried to defend herself, and struggled to her feet. “But if my crime is giving sanctuary to a man when he came in need of help and loving him for being good despite everything he has lived through, than yes, I confess.”

Anger helped her straighten, proud even though she might die whenever Calliope grew tired of her. At least she would not go to her grave without having defended herself as best she could.

“And if another man came to me,” she continued, glad to see Calliope’s eyes widen ever-so-slightly as she stepped forward, chains dragging behind her. “Beaten down under years of grief, and mourning the brother he lost long ago, and I gave him what peace I could, than I am guilty of that as well.”

“I’m glad to have a confession from you. It makes this easier,” Calliope’s lips curled into a cruel, hard smile and she raised a hand. The air shivered as magic gathered around her fingers like smoke, and condensed into a bright point, so hot that Raeca could feel it on her skin, even paces away. “Do stay strong, Raeca. I want to tell Brendis how brave you were, when I arrived too late to save you from the Dark Sorcerer’s assassins.”

“Haroun will never let him believe your lies,” Raeca said, and blinked back tears. One escaped her control, and fear made her tremble. “I wish you happiness, Calliope. My dear friend. I hope that someday you know peace. I’m only sorry I couldn’t help you find it.”

“You dare to pity me?” Calliope shrieked, and raised her hand, lovely face twisted with hatred. “Burn!”

Fire roared towards Raeca, and she closed her eyes. If it was her fate to die like this, at least she could hold in her heart the knowledge that Haroun and Brendis had each other again. If there was one thing she could die proud of, it was that.

But, although fire burst all around her, so bright she could almost see it through her closed eyelids, it never touched her skin.

When she opened her eyes, confused, it was to a wall of hardened power, holding back the flames, sparking darkly red against Calliope’s white-gold.

“Not today,” Haroun said as he walked through the door, one hand outstretched and dark with his own magic, a match for Calliope’s and just as powerful. His robes whispered around him, and magical charms jingled from his belt.

“Not today,” Brendis echoed as he followed his friend, shield on his arm, and sword bare in his hand. It glowed with runes, and his face was set and serious. He moved like a tree-cat, all controlled grace and power carved into every line of his muscles.

Raeca couldn’t hold back tears of relief as they came to her, one on either side, walls of strength. Haroun forced Calliope’s flames back on her until she had to let them fade or burn herself.

“You came for me,” Raeca whispered, and smiled through her tears as Brendis cut the chains off her with casual ease, blade biting through the hardened steel like it was threads of silk. “How did you know?”

“It wasn’t a hard guess, and we would never leave you to her,” Haroun said, wary eyes on Calliope as the queen rose and tugged once on a long, hanging rope. Soldiers thundered into the hall from every entrance. “Get ready. This is far from over.”