Daughter of the Sea

VI: Foreboding

"I'm fine," she huffed, tossing her napkin to the table, "but all this trouble has me worried, just like mother."

"Is that why you wanted to be up sparring at sunrise?" Elen demanded. "Waking me up and dragging me out just to knock me down a dozen times? You can't beat back plague and earthquakes with a staff, you know." She rubbed her shoulder, wincing.

"No, but it made me feel better," Angharad growled, resisting an urge to throw a hunk of bread at her, as she would have when they were younger. Elen, like all able-bodied Llyrian nobility, was competent at various forms of weaponry and self-defense, but she complained incessantly when Angharad insisted on training together, and rarely extended herself to her full abilities. Angharad herself was not immune to the amusement of the quieter hobbies that Elen preferred, but she found physical activity cathartic. Particularly this morning.

Arianrhod leaned back in her chair, looking at her levelly. "Hm. Finding yourself with a bit of extra energy, are you? Even after your excursions yesterday?"

There she went again. "It's full moon," Angharad pointed out flatly. Elen rolled her eyes, but Arianrhod shrugged, a sly grin playing upon her pretty mouth.

"True enough. And you're young. I remember how that felt," she sighed. "Well, save your strength for tonight. I'll join you both at sundown."

Elen signaled for the servants to clear as Arianrhod departed. "There's something you're not saying," she stated, looking put out. "I can tell. But have it your way. Are you going up?"

Angharad had always confided in Elen, in all things; now she cringed internally with a sense of betrayal. "Yes, but not to sleep. I've got laws to look over. You needn't come up if there're things you'd rather do. Unless you want to hear about the precedence for judgement on pillaging accusations."

"Was that what all the commotion in the Hall was about this morning? As fascinating as it sounds, I think I'd rather be in the kitchens," Elen said, rolling her eyes. "It's pie day tomorrow, you know. I'll sneak some up to you later."

Angharad made her way to her chamber alone, not without a sense of relief. It had been a long morning involving a particularly obstreperous court. Sea-raiding was one of the few capital crimes on the island, condemned both for its own unethical ends and for the the blight it made of them in the sight of the neighboring kingdoms it victimized; it was unnecessary, inflammatory, and had never been tolerated under the rule of the Daughters of Llyr. But once in a generation or so some rogue with a wandering eye tried to make a name for himself and was met with swift justice. The accusations made in this case had, thankfully, turned out to be unsupported. Regat's skillful handling of the matter had been satisfying to watch, but when it came to sentencing the accuser for the serious crime of false accusation, she had turned the task over to Angharad, who had found herself floundering with an unfamiliar and unsettling loss of decisiveness. She had rallied within a few anxious moments, delivering an appropriate outcome, but the queen had been displeased with her hesitation and ordered her to review the relevant law.

Angharad plunked herself onto the seat by her casement, a pile of parchments in hand, and tried to concentrate on the legalities recorded therein, laws dating all the way back to the arrival of the Sea People upon the island from regions hazy and unknown; histories recording the building of their swift, light watercraft and the victories over the larger, clumsy warships of their neighbors; the truces and alliances made and enforced as their power grew; the decrees decrying the practice of plundering and looting and carrying-off of women and children as the barbarism it had been; the laws set in place to prevent and punish such atrocities and the recordings of the cases that had enforced them. History was always bloody, theirs as much as anyone else's; it turned her stomach, and she sighed and looked out the window, frowning.