***“In a time of old and new,***
***when none are told of you,***
***the future will be history’s past,***
***and I, will come around, at last.”***
***What am I?"***
**DAPHNE**
I am surrounded by floral perfume and leering eyes as I step up to the throne. My limbs feel heavy and sluggish, as if I've been wading through quicksand or mud. And unless you count the mosaic of pebbles and burweed lodged into my tender heels, my feet are bare. The footsteps behind me marked in a shadow of blood. The air is humming with malevolent energy, and I am finding it hard to draw breath.
*You can do this, Daphne... You have to do this, Daphne...*
The nobles of our kingdom surround me in a half circle, as if I am their sacrifice. King Hadimere gazes down on me with cold blue eyes, the irises nearing black as his attentions fall to my bosom.
He smirks as I drop to my knees, licking his lips ever so softly, probably to escape notice. In the back of my mind, I’m aware of my long brown hair touching the dust-covered stones of the castle and I restrain the urge to lift the soft tendrils from the ground. It’s *that* moment that I realize, after today, it won’t matter how dirty my hair is. After today, the need to wash it will be a thing of the past.
After all, I will be dead.
“You are the daughter of the Farmer Myrh, correct?” Hadimere asks, and the crowd around me goes silent. Court has begun and as my request was the most *exciting*, I was allowed first audience.
“I am, Your Majesty,” I answer, as proudly as I can without succumbing to tears.
A gasping hush falls over the room, as a footstep shakes the ground from behind the king. Then, a whisper. I glance up just slightly, as not to disrespect, only find the Crown Prince Hayden leaning forward to confer with his father.
The prince is handsome, no doubt, but I have heard tales of his evil from the time I was small up until just yesterday. He is said to be a spoiled, boisterous lout. A man who lives to taunt others outside the palace walls. Over taxing the poor and preying on the weak. But whatever he might have to say about me matters not. For I do not plan to live past this day.
The king is looking thoughtful as his heir steps back into the shadows and my sight falls upon another male at the prince’s side. The man is focused on me so intently that I begin to shake a little with fear. I can feel his eyes, sharp and gray like the steel of a knife. Dark black tendrils fall over his forehead as he looks on, his lush mouth set in a grim line.
He is inhumanly beautiful and severely frightening at the same time.
*Do not stare at him, Daphne. You are here to see the king.*
“Why are you here, girl? Do you seek mercy for your father?” The king bellows out, laughing with the crowd. “He owes me his head. Do not waste your time.”
This is it. I can almost feel my sisters’ fear from two miles away. I close my eyes and I can see Isabel, begging me, the way she was last night, when I told her what I was going to do. She would not go to sleep until I lied to her. I said that I was feeling desperate and afraid. I convinced her that I must have gone momentarily insane when I suggested what I did.
But truly, the only thing I'm entirely afraid of is that my request will be denied, and my sisters’ lives will be as doomed as my father’s is.
So I speak. Loud and as clear as I'm able from my place on the ground. “No, Your Majesty. I have come to take his place.”
The crowd around me begins to murmur. A look of shock falls upon the face of the dark-haired stranger and is only half troubling, as I no longer have room for wonders of the flesh. If I were to live? I might hold this stranger’s face in my dreams, he is that handsome. But, since I am condemning myself to death, fantasies are not in my future.
A moment of complete admiration passes over the king, as if he is touched by my sacrifice, but then just as quickly it is gone. “I see. You would have me behead you in your father’s stead?” He chuckles. “You? A mere girl? A maid who has yet to blossom into womanhood?”
His question confuses me, as I came into my bleeding five summers past.
“I am eighteen years old, Majesty. I am already a woman,” I say.
He laughs, “Ha! But you have not been made a woman, by a man.” Then, curious, he asks, “Or have you? Are you ruined, my dear?”
I gasp, “Ruined? No sir! I am still a maid!” I insist, settling back on my heels for the barest of moments.
He glares at me. “And, what do you think your father will say, should I accept your terms? His head, for yours?”
I gulp, thinking of the man I tried to love. It is not for him that I do this. He has been nothing short of cruel to me in all my years. Blaming me for my mother’s death. For I am the youngest, and the last of her children.
“I believe he shall see it as a befitting punishment for killing my mother,” I say, and again, more gasps.
The prince steps forward, eyeing me. “You? You don’t look as if you could kill a mouse. How did you kill your mother?”
I glance at the king for permission to answer and receive a barely perceptible nod. “I was born Highness. She died in the child bed.”
My eyes find the stranger’s and what I see there looks a lot like pity. My gaze narrows and he smirks at me. Whispering in the prince’s ear, he lifts his chin in my direction. The prince apparently agrees with the secret passed to him and again, he steps toward the throne. This time when he confers with his father, the king’s face breaks out in a grin.
“I am inclined to accept your offer, sweet lady,” he states, and a wave of relief finds me to chase the tears that fall from my eyes. “But I’ll not be taking your head.”