[WordFlower]: 689.Heroes

Heroes

   Boom.
   The princess flinched, cradling the two halves of the Bowl in her lap. Frightened tears trickled down her cheeks, smearing her makeup and dripping off her chin.
   If this had been a fairy tale, the tears of the Crown Princess, heir to the throne, would have healed the break. But fairy tales were for children, and lovesick teenagers, and to give direction to the frantic whirring of the desperate and hopeless. Fairy tales were not real.
   Boom.
   Her father put his arm around her shoulders and held her close. They were dressed as common folk – a plain brown dress for her, a grey jerkin and leggings for him. The only thing that set them apart from all the other men, women, and children huddled in the great hall was the golden Bowl held in the young teenager’s arms.
   The King kissed her forehead, and his beard tickled her skin, but she didn’t smile. She tried to think about all the times he let her braid flowers in his beard and hair, the times a flower crown replaced the gold. She tried to think about playing in the garden with her younger brother, who now lay dead somewhere outside, with his stomach cut open and his insides spilling out. But no matter how hard she tried, all that filled her mind was utter impossibility and hopelessness of the situation, and the death waiting on the other side of the Grand Hall’s double doors, and the terrified murmurings and cries of the townspeople milling about them in a confused swirl of faces and–
   Boom.
   She buried her face in her father’s shoulder and held back the sobs she desperately wanted to let loose.
   Boom.
   For centuries out of memory, the golden Bowl had held the pearly-white waters of Magic and Healing. It sat in the great temple in the royal palace, and every holy day the people passed before it and the priests blessed them. Days… weeks… months… years… decades…
   Centuries… Centuries… Beyond thought, beyond memory… For so many years, so many lifetimes, it protected the lands and the people from the destruction of the wild Beyond, the trolls and the dragons and the rebellious warriors of the Outlands…
   Boom.
   Such a thing should be destroyed from afar by a powerful wizard out to take over the kingdom, if destroyed it must be. And from the people a hero should arise, one with the powers of magic, if only untrained magic – one with the powers to, if it must come to that, learn the ancient magicks and heal the split in the fabric of protective enchantments.
   Drunken soldiers with play on their minds should not be able to cleave such a thing with mere swords. Magic should not die out and be forgotten in such a careless manner, never to be revived again.
   This was not a fairy tale. There were no knights in shining armor. There were no hidden heroes coming to the rescue.
   Boom.
   There were only the man-eating trolls and the battering rams and the murderous rebels guiding them on the other side of those doors. And there was the King, unwilling to watch his only remaining child suffer such horrors as they would inflict upon her. There was the knife in his hand, and her tears soaking his shirt - tears that would soon turn to blood.
   There were no heroes.

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A/N: ...I've been feeling a little tetchy today. I apologize for any undue feelings of cynicism or depression this causes - although on the other hand, misery loves company, so come join the club. We've got jackets.