Fallen Queen (Mariposa Book 1)

by Y. R. Shin

  When she could not hold it in any longer, she spoke first. “Did he die?”

  “No, no, no, he didn’t.” He believed honesty was the best policy in all situations, but right now, he was trying to choose his words wisely to explain the situation.

  Today, Seisen had run around himself and searched all the registers of volunteers for the main camp and Camp Anf. He found the name Sidan. There was a dead soldier by the name of Eivan Detua as well. At the very least, all of her claims were true.

  Once they’d verified that, Jacalrin couldn’t deny that he did feel a little bit of sympathy for her. The eldest son of a family had volunteered for war and lost his life. His brother had also volunteered and risked his life on the battlefield, which was…an admirable but pitiful deed.

  After checking the dead soldier’s name, Eivan, and searching for the whereabouts of Sidan, Jacalrin had sent Sir Seisen Verohan to Camp Anf in person. There, Seisen had verified the woman’s features with the young man. And asked if he desired to be discharged at all.

  The response, Jacalrin heard, had been quite aggressive. It must have been true that he was enraged by his brother’s death.

  “First…”

  Then again, it made no sense to order administrative separation for a man who offered up his life to save his country with such fierce patriotism, just because his guardian had arrived.

  “…I asked him about your features, verified your identity, and asked him about his intentions. Isn’t there another son in your family?”

  Reuyen gave an empty laugh, for though it was an inconsiderate question, it sounded quite careful and unlike Jacalrin. He didn’t explicitly say anything, but she could imagine. It was a relief to hear that Sidan was still alive. But…

  Sidan Detua. You little immature baby brother. You clueless bastard. You lunatic.

  “He said he’d stay. There’s nothing more to be done, so you should go back to your town. A battlefield is not a safe place for a woman to go around as she pleases. It’s your fault you came all the way here with your crazy obsession, but I don’t want to be hated any more than I am now, so I’ll send two knights to escort you back to your town tomorrow.”

  “I’ll go to Sidan myself, sir,” Reuyen replied before Jacalrin even finished his sentence. She had left with firm determination. She had turned her back on her anguished parents and born their wails. She couldn’t bear another burden when this was already heavy enough.

  “How are you going to take him when he doesn’t want to go?”

  “Well, you can order an administrative separation.”

  “We don’t throw out volunteers by force unless there is a good reason. Haven’t you thought about what would happen if their families all came after them and protested for an administrative separation for their sons? I get that you can’t understand the inner workings of an army, but this is common sense.”

  “Say what you desire, sir. But I’m going to see my brother.”

  Jacalrin’s face started to stiffen. Who did she think she was, refusing the orders of the man next in command to the commander-in-chief in the middle of a battlefield without even a hint of concern? It made no sense.

  “Orders are orders, and you’ll go home if you’re told to go home. What on earth are you thinking?”

  Reuyen’s rounded fists started to shake slightly at his scolding.

  Who dares to force an order on me on a battlefield?

  A fierce burst of fury flashed in her light brown eyes, then disappeared. Even if she censured this feeling of outrage, if Jacalrin decided so, it would be so.

  Outside the tent, she heard the sound of Den tied to the fence, snorting in the night, permeating the camp like a fog. Reuyen calmed her blazing mind with great effort. Then, she looked up at the young Chesa. She, of course, did not miss the pity in his eyes.

  Even that annoyingly unperturbable Hansen had seemed a little contrite when she’d climbed the scaffold. He’d most likely thought it frustrating that the queen had been forced to kneel as a loser and let them take away her life in silence, without even a last word. She’d known that, but she’d just looked at them one by one, for she knew that she could not make them understand with all the words in the world. Just like now.

  Reuyen silently returned his gaze and slowly cooled down. She had no intentions to obediently comply with his order, but she didn’t need to let him know about that. Jacalrin would fulfill his duties, and she hers.

  To change the subject, Reuyen asked a question that had been nagging at her. “I understand what you mean, sir. For now. But I had one…” Her voice trailed off. “…Question.”

  “What?”

  “The Royal House Brionake and the Noble House Brionake are…”

  There was something about the man she’d seen today that she could not grasp. Paseid Calandok Brionake. It was pathetic of her to look for Belbarote in his looks, but there certainly was a reason for that mistake.

  Two hundred years ago, Duke Brionake, Belbarote, in her last memory had overthrown her and taken the throne instead. A king cannot hold a dukedom, so it must have been bestowed on another Brionake. A man similar enough for her to mistake for a man from the past should not have been born in the present. How probable was the spontaneous expression of a blood relative from a long time ago? If this were a coincidence, it certainly was a nasty one.

  “Does not the noble House Brionake…have a long history of dukedom?”

  A quizzical expression appeared on Jacalrin’s face. “They were granted dukedom two hundred years ago, so I’d say it’s been a while.”

  “After the duke re…” She stopped herself right before she pronounced the words duke regent in full. “I mean, after the founder Brionake became the king, who succeeded the dukedom?”

  Jacalrin frowned slightly, for a different reason. Unlike his expectations that she would insist that she take her brother with her, she’d started asking weird questions.

  He had an uneasy hunch about this, but acquiesced.

  “Seems like you’re not as well-read in the history of the military laws you so like to refer to. Isn’t this well known amongst common people too? Of the two sons King Belbarote Paseid had, the first, Prince Peogran, succeeded the throne.”

  Oh… Oh.

  “The second, Prince Tejis, succeeded the dukedom.”

  She had children she didn’t even recognize the names of. Peogran and Tejis. Just hearing the names of those whose faces she didn’t know broke her heart.

  Suddenly, the memory of the day her wifeless husband had smiled bitterly shattered and pierced her heart.

  Even if it’s a son, if you name our child the heir…

  The mind she was barely holding together collapsed in that one moment.

  Her eyes, which had remained dry even in the face of death, started to pour down tears. Something hot boiled in her guts. Belbarote had protected her woman’s honor, and now, two hundred years later, it was thrown at her face. Bearing the faults of a wife for a lifetime…

  “Wha—what’s wrong?” Jacalrin’s mouth gaped slightly with surprise.

  Not realizing it, Reuyen laughed out loud at the tears flowing out of her open eyes. Behold the foolishness of bequeathing the finest throne ever in existence to the son of a tyrant, whom he cannot call a son at all. Until the last of his last moments, Belbarote had still been a humble country man.

  Belbarote. Oh, Belbarote.

  “There wasn’t much atop the bay tree, was there…”

  Hollow chuckles escaped her lips. She covered her face with trembling hands at last, unable to control the burst of emotions.

  “Belbi…” Her dry lips whispered that name she so dearly longed for.

  She knew that caring voice would not return; she knew the smile he smiled in his own kindness, too, remained in the past from two hundred years ago. The image of him kneeling before her was as clear as a framed painting.

  Reach him.

  Swan Sekalrid Rarkalia.

  Reach him.


  I loved you.

  A foolish woman’s forgiveness asked far too late.

  Please reach him.

  Reuyen stayed crouching there for a long while.

  What’s wrong with this one? Not knowing what to do, Jacalrin stood there and looked down at her. The cries of the woman somehow resonated in him. She had coiled into herself like a porcupine with its quills down. Jacalrin of Chesa was quite talented at joking around and hiding his intentions, but he had no skills in consoling a woman crying like that. His light-green eyes started to look annoyed.

  Thankfully, before his worries intensified, Reuyen stopped crying. “What happened to Sir Peijak Dollehan?”

  It was quiet and calm, like she hadn’t been crying at all.

  Not even noticing that she had once again forgotten to add the “sir,” Jacalrin stared down at her, then slowly changed his expression. Disdain and hatred flashed in his light-green eyes.

  “Dollehan? I do not wish to dirty my tongue by speaking about him, so do not ask. I don’t want to lose my dignity with dishonorable words and actions.”

  Flustered with the plain contempt, Reuyen could not dare to ask any more questions and mumbled in a low voice. “You already don’t talk that much like a noble.”

  “How would a country girl know?”

  “I can at least tell that you’re not very noble-like.”

  “Ha. And just what do you know about the duties and virtues of a noble?”

  “They think that sophisticated roundabout expressions are virtuous, and they proudly sneer at others as a habit. The young and the old both pretend to be sages and, hence, are headaches.”

  “Yeah, you’re so right. That was so frustrating, so…” Jacalrin cackled at her straightforward answer, waving his hand, then stopped. Realizing the woman had stopped addressing him with respect. But the more shocking thing was that though he had noticed now, she spoke so naturally that it didn’t feel strange at all.

  Reuyen Detua, the daughter of a horse dealer. Her identity was verified.

  Jacalrin felt a chill go down his spine. She was gazing him questioningly, with those light-brown eyes hidden under lashes as long as a camel’s.

  How dare she not address the second son of Chesa with respect? Her eyes were imposing enough to make him swallow his indignant words.

  “Umm…” Jacalrin stared down at her with a dumb expression on his face, then aggressively removed it, turning back to his usual self. “I’m sending the knights at first light tomorrow, and that’s that. And for your own good, if you come back again, I will punish you for sure.” His stern, coercive voice, unlike his usual tone, resounded.

  Reuyen closed her eyes, listening to the sound of his footsteps fade away.

  After organizing her thoughts alone for a little bit, she looked at her bandaged feet. She had spent enough time wallowing in sadness, grieving, asking for forgiveness, and crying tears of longing.

  Jacalrin had said that Sidan was at the camp near the cliffs, Camp Anf.

  She limped across the tent and moved the drape to find that the guard in front of the tent was nodding off. Reuyen stared at the sword lying next to him, then grabbed it, and slunk back inside. She went straight to the back of the tent, stuck the sword under the post holding down the fabric, and used it as a lever to remove the post.

  She crawled out of the tent through the narrow opening and limped as silently as she could toward Den.

  Poof! Neigh!

  Shushing Den to stop him from jumping around with joy, she stepped on the stirrup and mounted with great effort.

  “Let’s go see Sidan, Den.”

  There was nothing to be afraid of.

  The night on the battlefield, the smell of the battlefield, and the memories on the battlefield were all as soothing as a cradle to her.

  She knew the location of the front, Anf. Assuming that the continent had not changed much since her death, she could estimate the direction and distance quite well too. She tiptoed away from the main camp, studied the sky for a while, then carefully led Den in what she hoped was the right direction.

  When she was fairly far away from the main camp, she spurred Den to move faster. It would take at least an hour, even on horseback. Her still-ailing body ached, but the most painful of all were her feet, pushing down on the stirrups.

  After riding and riding for some time, she suddenly heard horses galloping her way and hurriedly hid herself in the dark. Two riders were coming toward her, most likely sent from Camp Anf. They did not notice her, and flashed by.

  A drum pounded somewhere in the distance. When the riders were completely out of sight, Reuyen lashed her whip as hard as she could to get Den moving again.

  Chapter Nine

  “Report, sir!”

  At the base at the entrance of the road between the cliffs of Anf, torches lit the dawn and moved around like will-o’-the-wisps. Chaos pervaded as people alternated between shouting and gasping.

  Paseid, who had arrived there in the afternoon and stayed to patrol the camp and relay orders related to the new plan, stayed calm amid the sudden ambush and listened to the knight’s report.

  “There are about a thousand soldiers and regular knights in metal armor, sir! We have verified fifty or so archers in full-plate armor positioned halfway up the cliff.”

  “Why were the guards and patrols so late with the report?” asked Paseid.

  “Seems like they were killed in the night. They were found dead, sir.”

  The enemy had dared an ambush in the dark of the night and was pushing in from the entrance at the Anf cliffs to the Rarkian camp like a hot knife through butter. Rovantis’s cruel trick of placing the archers in heavy armor high up in the middle of the cliffs had already baffled the Rarkian army.

  The common soldiers, their shields positioned to defend the soldiers and knights in metal armor, were confused about whether they should block arrows showering down from the sky or the sharp swords pummeling toward them from the front. Even if they tried to shoot the archers in return, if they could not pierce the neck and the face at once, the arrows would just bounce off the thick armor. Of course, there were those who fell because they couldn’t hold all the weight of the armor, but that was only a handful.

  After the chaos subsided, the disorganized Rarkian defense line started to come back into formation again, but the enemy’s goal had already been attained. Reaching the side of the force where the arrows were out of range, Paseid’s eyes turned cold.

  He was unsure if the enemy had undertaken the ambush because they knew that he, the commander-in-chief, was here, or if they’d simply chosen today out of luck. Considering how they’d attacked about five thousand Rarkians stationed here with only a little more than a thousand, this most likely was another provocation. But that did not mean he could react in a dismissive manner. Defeat was unacceptable, but casualties were inevitable.

  Neigh!

  Paseid’s black horse, Rotsa, who had remained unperturbed at the cries of other excited horses, the clashing of metal swords, the yelling, screaming, and such, snorted at the smell of blood in the passing wind and kicked the ground with his hind leg.

  “Place the cavalry in the rear, and order the infantry to drop their swords and hold their shields,” the commander ordered. “Two men with shields and one archer as one team. Position the men in the front for defense.”

  Paseid took out his sword, Rionac, that had been hidden in a snow-white sheath. It had been passed down from one generation of House Brionake to the next; the noble sword made a sharp noise, gleaming silver in the middle of the chaotic battlefield.

  “Sir…”

  “Follow.”

  Paseid rode Rotsa to the front. A portion of the knights behind him sheathed their swords, picked up the shields from the rack, and followed him.

  The entire area around the entrance to the cliffs was complete mayhem, a battlefield where the only lights shining in the pitch-dark night were torches and fire burning at the points of the arrows.
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  The soldiers were fighting desperately, barely distinguishing their enemies from friends by the black lion, rose, and wolf ingrained on the armor.

  Paseid struck the chest of a knight who had broken through the line of shields and was riding his way, and pierced his neck once he fell on the ground. Blood reeking of metal sprang up, but Paseid remained calm and looked around as soon as he confirmed the enemy’s death.

  Who is the commander leading them?

  An arrow aimed for him hit the shield of a knight following behind and fell. With a thunk, the arrow hit Rotsa’s chanfron and bounced off.

  Unaffected, Paseid swung his sword and cut through a mantle with the figure of a lion holding a rose in his mouth. The knight fell to the ground.

  “Aaaaaaaah!”

  An enemy soldier was running to attack a Rarkian soldier far away from the defense line. Paseid reared his horse and struck the enemy with Rotsa’s hooves. The fierce horseshoe crushed the soldier’s face. The Rarkian soldier panted from barely escaping the grasp of death, then shot back up as trained and joined the formation.

  A knight was swinging the heavy shield as if it were his own arm at the enemy’s helmet. “Sir, perhaps you should stay in the rear…”

  “Sir Ranu, find the enemy’s commander.”

  They will soon retreat on their own.

  The repeated ambushes at nighttime were exasperatingly cunning. A skirmish with Rovantis was an exhausting battle of attrition. The only difference was that the south had an advantage in reinforcing their losses, for they were more affluent than Rarke.

  Amidst all the malicious shouts and exclamations, the particularly vindictive voice of a soldier caught his attention.

  “Come at meeeeee! I’ll kill you allllllll! You bastards of Morgana!”

  A young man in a tattered armor, covered from his helmet to breastplate to metal boots in blood, was aimlessly swinging his sword among a group of enemies.

  All the malevolence on the battlefield was the bitter grief of those who had lost their human natures.

  Paseid’s eyes moved in search of a larger, rational malevolence. None of the knights of Rovantis, riding through the chaos, looked like a leader.