Lily of the valley

31

Queen Thea lounged in her private quarters, she was slouched in a velvet chaise lounge, her mind and body were weighty and sullen from the previous night of drinking. She sipped at lemon water, listened to the gentle melody of a music box and waited for the hangover to subside. A merciful breeze danced its way through the window and shifted Thea's loose sweaty roots. She was a far cry from the fierce and glamorous creature she had been the night before. 

Ixia and Agathe let themselves in together, Thea simply nodded to them in greeting, unable to respond with anything else.

"How are you feeling your majesty?" Agathe asked the Queen, her loyal handmaidens sank into arm chairs opposite the Queen's chaise lounge.

"As expected." Thea mumbled, she was not in the mood to be disturbed but too kind a soul to be rude to her loved ones. She could sense that they came to her with urgency.

"Is there anything we can bring you?" Ixia followed up, taking the queen's clammy hand in hers.

"Nothing that would help." Agathe stood to close the window, there was a balcony below it and she could not risk being overheard.

"I was enjoying that breeze." The Queen grumbled, she poared herself another glass of water.

"I'm sorry, but there's something that we must tell you." Thea sat upright and stretched her back, to prepare for what she was about to hear.

"I guessed so, it had better be important."

"It is." Ixia confirmed with a stony expression. Queen Thea gestured for them to continue.

"Then speak." Agathe was pacing quietly with her hands folded behind her back, she was nervous to act. In case she was wrong, it was too late now she supposed. She believed in Katherine with every ounce of her being, everything about the princess was perfect.

"There is a prophecy, 'from deep snow will rise the light. Weaponised innocence will wash away corruption. Freedom and peace will follow', we believe it speaks of Katherine." Agathe recited the words in both dryadic and the common language, the phrase in its true tongue was charged enough to cause goosebumps. Even in those that could not understand it.

"There is no doubt that the girl is special, but how can you be certain she is the prophesied one?" Thea questioned, though she felt it to be true. She had noticed since Katherine had arrived that there was a certain aura about her, the girl radiated an indescribable sense of calm.

"The flowers." Spoke the dryad, "They have been singing it since she arrived." Thea's expression was grave, her cheeks were sullen and grey.

"Then there can be no doubt." Thea took a sip of her water while she considered her next move. "We must rally behind her, Ixia, my dear, you must summon the grovekeeper."

"I already have you majesty." Thea nursed her throbbing headache by pressing the cold glass against her skull.

"So what is our next move?" Their gazes fell to the elf, they looked to her with hope. Her knowledge was vast, some libraries struggled to match her great mind. Agathe sat again, rifling through the tomes in her head, she flitted from thought to thought and wisdom to wisdom. The elven artist began to spit words from her mouth in abstract formations, as if creating notes in thin air.

"Snow... the mountain... ancient dryads... corruption... It must have something to do with Mora, the elves have long speculated those words may have come from her." The leaves upon Ixia's body bristled at the mention of their forgotten Queen.

"Who is Mora?" Thea asked, she had never been educated in history, only the art of the feminine.

"A dryad, she suffered the most during the fall of the seat of Kings. She commanded the dryads to go into hiding." Agathe paused, lost in thought. She was pulling a thousand conclusions and facts together, to pave the path that they must follow. "I believe our goals are simple, we must reunite the seat of Kings and bring the dryads out of hiding." Thea laughed with sarcastic disbelief,

"Simple!" Agathe smiled at her Queen,

"The task may be more complex." Thea nodded, soon she would have an army at her feet but first she must decide how to wield it.

"We must write to our allies, we need monarchs for the council." Agathe nodded and Ixia rushed to retrieve some parchment, a quill and a pot of black ink. Agathe dragged over a small writing desk for the Queen to lean on. "I... I don't know what to say." Thea tapped the dry quill against the desk, absentmindedly poking holes in its painted surface, while she thought.

Thea addressed the first letter to her younger brother, King of the meadow, she described the situation as best she could. The king of the meadow had long been a sceptic, but she had faith that he would at least sympathise with her end goal and help her anyway. Thea instructed him not to act on the information until Katherine had settled in Maequil, the wedding going ahead undisturbed was vital.

Thea copied the body of her letter to send to the King of the mountain, the King in the deep north and to the warring dwarves. Though she knew not of their plight with the spider Queen.

The letters were sent with riders, she selected a group of her most trustworthy and strong knights.

"Let no-one know that you have left, let no-one know to where to ride, let no-one know what cargo you carry. If you are to die the letter must be destroyed. You carry with you my hope. Ride fast, ride hard, do not fail me." Thea whispered these words into the ear of each rider, before placing a kiss upon their visors and slapping their stallions upon the rump. They raced north, their hooves created a sand bowl through the canyons and erased their footsteps. They were gone in moments, the wheels were turning, fate was set in motion. There was nothing even the Gods above could do then, to stop the geyser from erupting across the land.