Hidden Majesty, 2/? - Of Antagonists and Lovers
Since LJ won't let me the bulk of this chapter together (for it's quite large), i've broken it up into 10 seperate parts - each part links to the one that follows it for ya'll's reading convenience!
Hidden Majesty
CHAPTER 2 - OF ANTAGONISTS AND LOVERS
CH.2, P.1 (Of Antagonists, P.1)
A/N: Most of these next several chapters is in 'flashback' or 'past events' format, so a lot of the text is italicized. Also, just to be safe, I'm reminding everyone of the R RATING for this story.
(Ignore the cut title below - I obviously had to adjust things b/c of the size of what was SUPPOSE to be chapter 2 by itself)
Of Antagonists, P.1
The bed chambers were cast in the eerie blue glow of the early morning light. There was a chill in the air, the fire in the fireplace having burned out several hours before. In most cases, there was normally a chamber lady to keep it going.
But on nights when Vala knew she wasn't going to bed alone, she would dismiss her ladies. She didn't want them to be responsible for bearing the burden of her secret - and to be quite honest, Vala wasn't too sure of her trust in them.
Fingers threaded into her long, black hair, elbow propping her up on her side, she stared contentedly at the sleeping man next to her. This man that was making her risk everything she had ever worked to keep intact. This man who was causing her to betray an oath she swore she would never break. This man who could be the end of her if the wrong people found out. This Daniel.
Never before had any man found his way so easily into her bed...or her heart. Since her marriage to the King, Vala had been under an obligation to maintain her loyalty to her husband. She had been true to that obligation up until Tomin, her King, had exiled her from court - merely to have the freedom to indulge in his latest young affair.
"You can't do this!" Vala breathed, fighting hard to keep her anger within. Her grey eyes glared at the pacing figure that was the leader of the whole country, her husband. The man who had swore to love and honor her, only her, always.
Tomin lifted his head as he paced, looking at her momentarily. "I can do this, and I am." He looked back to the floor, hands twisting together as if he was nervous. "With the summit coming this year, it is a political fallacy to have you around."
Blue eyes that used to look at her with passion and affection now gave her a look of contempt. "You are a very tempting...mark for foreign delegates. I cannot jeopardize the pending treaty because of your mere effect on men."
She laughed humorlessly. "My effect on...Tomin, my gods, who cares what effect I have on men. I have never been nor will I ever be unfaithful to you. You are my husband and my King, and I will never betray that oath."
"Men have their charms, and you unknowingly have yours." Tomin said, still looking at the floor. "You cannot stay here - I cannot have you here."
Vala couldn't stop the anger from coming forth this time. "And there it is...the real reason. 'You' cannot have me here... It's not because of some treaty or summit, but because of your own selfish needs." She stepped closer to him. "What's the twist this time, Tomin? What won't your latest affair do for you while I'm here?"
He stopped, but she could see his hands shaking. "You're a hindrance to the treaty."
"Which lady is it this time, huh?" Vala kept getting closer to him. "What royal whore was able to use her wiles on you when you were drunk?" She stopped a few steps away from him. "Tell me her name!"
Out of nowhere, his hand came up and hit her hard across her cheek. Vala gasped in shock, her own hand immediately coming to her face as she stepped back.
"You do not speak to me like one of your servants!" Tomin shouted as she sank to the floor. "I am not your husband, I am your King! My life is not your own, and every bit of yours is mine!" He stalked to the doorway, turning back to look at her.
Vala looked up through the hair in front of her eyes.
"You will go to Grover in the morning, and there you will stay until I feel you can be allowed back to court." Without even a goodbye, Tomin left the room, leaving Vala quietly crying on the floor with her hand to her stinging cheek.
Vala breathed in deeply, ignoring the remembered feeling of his hand striking her. Her gaze focused on the soft, handsome features of the man lying next to her. She reached out and brushed her fingers through his brown hair. Daniel stirred a little, but didn't wake up. Bringing her fingers down to stroke over his smooth, bare chest, she let her mind wander back to what had brought them to this moment.
She glared at the pristinely dressed Knight before her - he was one of Tomin's most loyal lackeys. The one who the King always went to for council, and Vala guessed he often helped traffic in the whores every night to her husband's bed.
"I will be your escort for the trip to Grover, and the head of your guard throughout your stay." He spoke calmly, collectedly - almost arrogantly. She hated it. "As of the moment we step foot off these grounds, I am under your command until we return."
Vala rose from the end of her bed, walking slowly over to the Knight that was her watchdog. "So once we leave here, if I ordered you to...take one of my ladies before my very eyes..." She brought her lips close to his ear. "You'd have to do it?"
It was disappointing when he didn't even falter under her gaze. In fact, where she'd expected him to stare straight ahead and answer her simply, he actually turned his deep blue eyes to look at her.
"Your wish..." He whispered, his voice even more cocky then it was before. "Is my command, Majesty."
Vala let out a huff of air in disgust and stalked out of the room, snapping her fingers at her waiting ladies in the hall.
-------
Trotting was ladylike. Trotting was the symbol of royalty, and even more so of a Queen. Vala hated it - a horse was an animal bred for speed and agility, not to flaunt the pompous nature of arrogant assholes. Not to bear the burden of way too much power and even more money.
This ridiculous pace was killing her. They could've been at Grover by now if only they hadn't been so stubborn to fall on ceremony. Every last member of her house were so engrained with the ways of court that merely setting foot outside it was simply just a change in scenery. Well, if they really wanted a change in scenery-
Vala gave a powerful pull on the reins, heeling her horse to crash through the woods just off the overgrown path.
"Dammit!" Daniel growled, already coaxing his horse slowly that direction. The members of the Queen's house yelled uselessly after their Majesty, not bothering to go after her. Panic was evident in their shouts. "Go, go on, keep moving. Continue to Grover Place!" He snapped his fingers, signaling for the front of the party to continue. The knights under his command looked at him expectantly.
He trotted over to his second in command, Simon. "Lead them on, Simon. Surround them, and take them to Grover." With his order given, Daniel spurred his horse, galloping quickly after his escaped charge.
"But what about the Queen?" Simon shouted after his commander.
"Just get them to the Place!" Daniel shouted back, not bothering to glance back. He leaned in close to his horse, muttering to the wind. "I'll catch the Queen."
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The feel of the wind whipping through her undone hair was empowering, and Vala just spurred the horse to go faster. This was freedom, this was what she needed. To get away from everything that reminded her of her life, away from anything that made her think of Tomin.
Her freedom was disappointingly short-lived, however, as a horse and rider came crashing through the trees just up on her left. She yelped, pulling back on the reins with all she had to keep from colliding into him. Her horse skidded to a halt just inches from his own.
"Are you mad?!" Vala shouted, her breath coming in startled gasps.
Daniel glared at her. "I could ask you the same damn question!" He turned his antsy horse around in a circle. "What the hell were you thinking?!"
She tugged on the reins, mentally willing for him to move out of her way. "I was thinking we were moving too slow and I needed a change of scenery and pace. Now get out of my way."
"You risked not only your life, but that of your entire house and my knights!" He shouted.
Vala blinked at him in disbelief. "How did I do that? I didn't tell them to follow me, and they obviously didn't, so how could I-"
"It is my duty to protect you, above all else!" Daniel said like she knew better, which he knew she did. "If you take off, I have to follow you, which means I have to leave behind everyone else who is under my command. If something happens to them between where you took off and Grover, it's on my head."
She shrugged. "Oh, poor Knight of the King, with your head on the line." Vala went to whip the reins, but Daniel quickly moved his horse in front of hers again. "Get out of my way!"
Daniel just met her heated stared.
"I am ordering you to get out of my way..." Vala let her voice rise. "Move now!" When he didn't move, she screamed in a very un-Queenlike fashion. "You told me you must obey my every command, so move!"
"You keep up with that pace you were going, and you will drive your horse right into the ground." Daniel said, his voice now calm and collected. "It hasn't been properly conditioned for rough riding in a long time." He once again moved closer to her. "I'll let you go, if you give me your word you will take it easy."
She looked at him for a moment. "It's just an animal."
His blue eyes looked at her knowingly. "So are you, Majesty."
Vala glared. "Set the pace, Knight." She snapped out, not liking what he had implied with his words.
-------
"That man is infuriating!" Vala practically screamed to the reflection of her long time friend Carolyn. She stood off to the left of the fireplace in her bedchambers at Grover, arms braced against either side of the gold-trimmed mirror as Carolyn continued to lace up her corset.
Brown eyes caught the Queen's grey gaze for a moment. "So you keep shouting."
Vala let out a huff of air, which was quickly cut off as the other woman swiftly pulled the strings tighter. "He kept pace with me the entire ride here - never fell back once. He even moved ahead a couple of times..." She turned slightly to look at Carolyn. "Who does he think he is? What gives him the right to herd a Queen around?"
Sitting back on her heels, Carolyn shrugged. "Perhaps he was only...protecting you, as he says."
"Ha!" Vala pushed off the mirror and stalked across the room, lifting up the fabric of her skirts as she went. "He's a damn watchdog for my husband. You know this Knight is his most trusted advisor, Tomin's closest confidant?" She looked back at Carolyn, who nodded. "That's why he's here - not to protect me, but to trap me like Tomin intends."
She moved over to the window, looking out on the vast greens three stories down. The late afternoon sun was shining out over the exile that would be her home. "Tomin sent this Knight because he knows he will not fall for my...charms." Vala spat the word, her bruised cheek stinging.
"He knows I despise him." She said, her voice turning acidic as her grey eyes saw a figure making his way to the stables. Even his damn walk was cocky - a sure sign of his Knighthood. Knights - how Vala hated them.
There was a rustling of fabric as Carolyn stood and came to stand behind Vala. She went to work finishing lacing up the corset as she spoke.
"Consider it this way - As long as you are banished here, so is he."
Vala let out an impatient huff of air, letting her gaze drift across the landscape.
-------
"You're corrupting my own house against me!" She didn't care if she was once again screaming in a way that was unbecoming to her status - this man had become the bane of Vala's existence since they'd arrived at Grover. And it was only three weeks into her exile.
She had a feeling she was going to kill him before the end.
"I am doing no such thing." He argued back, picking up one of the papers on the table before him. His blue eyes came to gaze at her above the paper. "I'm just being cautious - this place has been untended for some time and I want to be sure-"
Vala tossed her head. "Oh, stop leading me that rehearsed line!" She stepped menacingly close to him. "You forget, Sir, that I am not one of his Majesty's harlots. I have a brain."
A shadow of a smirk flashed across his lips for a moment. "I wasn't implying otherwise, Majesty."
"Of course you weren't." She scoffed, throwing her hand up. The other one went to her hip as she strolled around the small room that really served no purpose. "You're just a Knight following your orders as well as you see fit."
The sound of the paper falling to the table was heard. "As long as the ‘well’ and the ‘fit’ means your safety, then yes." Vala could tell by the tone of his voice that he was growing tired of her nagging, yet again. Good.
She let out a short, sarcastic laugh. "My safety - More like your head on the line if something were to happen to me." Her grey eyes came around to glare at him. "Because despite everything, I know my husband still loves me."
The look in his gaze was unsettling. "I'm sure he does."
"Are you implying he doesn't?" Vala demanded, shaken now.
He shifted, dropping his eyes to another paper he reached for. "It's not my place to offer implications...I am simply here to protect your well-being."
Vala stalked back over to him, getting close once more. "You really are just another one of his lackeys - serving him blindly, like all the rest." Anger burned her cheeks. "Infuriating man." With that, she made her way out of the room, slamming the thick wooden door as she went.
Taking a deep breath, Daniel rolled his eyes.
"I hate duty." He muttered to himself, pilfering through the papers once more to get his mind off the Queen.
Continued in Of Antagonists P.2
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