A/N :Hi Everyone!! So like I said, I was going to post my first story on here and: Tada!! Here it is! I'm so excited to share this with you guys and I've never actually let anyone outside of my close group of trusted friends read my writing so this is all kind new for me. Also, I'd like to give a special shoutout to my friend Elly (a.k.a DreamCatcher789 here on Wattpad) We sort of helped each other through this publishing process and she has a story on here called Silver which is amazing!! You guys definitely need to go and check it out!
Let me just say that this story is nowhere near perfect, I haven't even properly edited it yet so please don't critique it too harshly. But please vote, comment, and favorite and feel free to voice your opinions, I will be glad to hear them. So, without further ado, I give you the first chapter of my new story: The Spoils of War.
Athens, Greece
The night was pitch dark. A half crescent moon clung in the heavens illuminating the waves and the shore below. The water looked inky black in the night sky and the cool waves lapped gently against the coast.
Princess Cassia gazed blankly out from her balcony wrapped in scraps of silks and chiffons, her hair pulled back in a styled chignon while her heart yearned to be out by the sea. To feel the gentle water pooling at her feet, to smell the salt lingering in the breeze, to feel her heart sing out in freedom. Instead she was here, inside the castle walls like some sort of barricaded animal. And yet all the while she earned the title of princess. What good was an extravagant title when she had no more rights than a prisoner?
That was the question she asked Ajax, a slave of her fathers and a good friend, every morning while she was hiding from my tutor Caius. He and she would run off to the northeast quadrant of the castle which was only held for special gatherings or festivities, and while they would spar she would repent to him her sins.
"There are times when I despise him," Cassia confessed while swinging her wooden sword, attempting to land a jab on Ajax's torso. These sparing lessons were held secret from her father as he would absolutely have a fit if he knew that his daughter Cassia, his precious jewel, was dabbling in men's sport.
"Your father," Ajax understood clearly, deflecting a jab of Cassia's that was heading straight for the heart. He knocked her sword aside without any effort and sat on a hard stone step, taking a sip from his animal hide flask.
"He treats me like I'm his possession, not his daughter. He keeps me in this lavish palace with all the luxuries in the world and yet I feel as though this chain around my neck is a golden noose. It is suffocating me!"
Ajax would always listen to her and nod his head. He would listen and remain silent then at the end he would open his mouth, almost as if to say something then shut it and simply mumble an: "Ay princess," before telling her to go find Caius before he complained to her father.
The sent of jasmine and rose petals in present day air told Cassia that her maiden, Laelia, had run her bath. She was a dark skinned young girl, no more older than Cassia when she had been sold to my father by the slave traders from Persia. She and Ajax both could not understand her situation. It would appear as though they were the ones with no rights, no freedom. And yet they received three meals a day and clothes on their back and were never told what to do or who they may or may not talk to. They were the ones with all the real problems. She knew she should be the one listening to them telling her about their life's hardships not the other way around. At times she did feel like a spoiled princess however no one could truly understand her life's disposition without living in her shoes for a day.
"My lady," Laelia's voice was delicate, like the sound of chiming bells, "Your bath is ready," Cassia turned around to face her hand maiden who stood still, not looking her directly in the eyes for it was forbidden for servants to look into the eyes of his or her master. A foolish law Cassia had no regard for.
