1Zakari and Elysia
Verona Road was the one place where a Moskovan man or a Kilandri woman could absolutely never, ever walk without expecting some sort of bloodshed.
For whatever reason the road was the only official barrier between the two kingdoms, but tension was still so great that the Moskovan side had been covered with white pebbles and the Kilandri side covered in black. And also some red scattered here and there which were cleaned off whenever it rained and replaced whenever someone got mad and decided it a good idea to begin a massacre, which happened approximately once a year.
This year it happened when a Kilandri swordswoman dropped an orange.
"I cannot BELIEVE," the Mediator thundered, their voice literally causing the clouds above to rumble threateningly. Which would make sense, because they were a god and had both the power and the permission to use thunder as a dramatic effect.
"I CANNOT BELIEVE," they repeated, "that you two and your INSIGNIFICANT, GENDER-OBSESSED nations would DARE disturb the balance with your PATHETIC little squabbles not just ONCE this year but TWICE. TWICE! IN ONE YEAR!"
King Theseux of Moskova and Empress Phoebe of Kiland were, for once, silent. Not often were they both summoned to the Mediator like this, unarmed, unaccompanied and embarrassed enough to stall the already-slow international trade for possibly months after this. In fact, this was the first time in thirty years that the Mediator had deemed it necessary to summon anyone to their abode in the aether, so you could probably imagine the alarm of the two rulers when suddenly they were not in their warm beds but rather standing in the temple of an ancient spirit they hadn't heard from since their parents' rules.
Neither would admit it but both felt very, very small in the god's cold marble temple, where they were both about forty feet too short to be able to appreciate its beauty and where judgment glared down at them from every floating yellow torch. Both the King and the Empress itched to open their mouths and defend themselves, but their instinct to address the apparently genderless Mediator as either "my lord" or "my lady" made it a little awkward to say anything, and so both patriarch and matriarch said nothing.
The god whirled around. Their single eye, bright gold and pupilless, met Theseux's stare and then Phoebe's before closing again.
"If peace cannot be found between the man and the woman," said the Mediator, "if a balance cannot be made, both of your nations will surely fall. To the King of the Moskovans — the women whom you have oppressed and ravished for so long shall turn their hands against you. To the Empress of the Kilandri — the men whom you insult and chain shall burn your palace to the ground. You will both destroy yourselves and beg the stars to take away your own actions, but you will be shown no mercy. That is all."
When the rulers next blinked, they were in their own beds in their own palaces, a hundred miles away from each other and with the temple just a memory. The sun was rising, a clear golden eye.
There was one place where there was always peace. It was right at the end of Verona road, ironically, surrounded by a perfectly circular forest fifty miles across, with a grey stone domelike building in its epicenter. It was the designated meeting place between the ever-warring nations, where their exchanges would be judged and guarded by the neutral pacifist Thei — a very small population of humanoid beings who, much like the Mediator, were to all intents and purposes genderless, raceless, and would demand hell to pay should their peaceful circle of forest be disturbed.
Our story truly begins here, at this haven of negotiations and terse pleasantries tossed bitterly between the white King and the black Empress, as their stoic female bondservants (of the Moskovans) and their docile male slaves (of the Kilandri) watched their master and mistress with wide eyes. King Theseux at one end of the long, long stone table; Empress Phoebe at the other; and a very cold and very awkward silence compressed between the two immovable forces. Nothing nice was said at first. For hundreds of years, nothing had been. And until two young people met in the hallways perhaps three hours later from this time, nothing would be.
The main hemisphere of tension, however, could barely compare to what was going on elsewhere with the aforementioned young people. On the edge of the dome there were smaller domes, used as guest rooms where dignitaries could stay for the night if negotiations lasted longer than a day. Or, in this case, where the two heirs of the two royals could rest and watch their parents without the dangers of being out in the open.
King Theseux's son and heir, Crown Prince Zakari, was sixteen on that day and just getting younger. He was a ruddy, strong youth just like his father, but unlike his father he had simply refused to grow up. There was always a scraped knee or elbow and his hair, despite hours of his servants' combing, seemed to just dislike gravity. Even worse he was known to be a victim of lovesickness — a terrible dreamer, always in the library reading children's tales of shining knights and damsels in distress, composing saucy poems and serenades to ladies who had never spoken to him, not even listening to the laconic words exchanged by his father and the Empress and instead envisioning the perfect dance, a flawless exchanging of his words with a woman. Prince Zakari, many said, was in love with love.
On the other side of the meetingplace in a very similar guest room, there sat Empress Phoebe's fifteen-year-old heiress Elysia, named after the fields of reward in the underworld. A princess named Death, and so she was — the hour that she was born was when her father, her mother's favorite concubine, had died of mysterious causes. She was also the spitting image of the terrifying Empress, with the same beautiful dark complexion and piercing black eyes; a silver tongue and an instinct to lead. She sat in front of the viewing window with her hands folded, taking in every movement of the two rulers with a keen judging gaze. Once in a while she would cast a sympathetic glance towards the King's young, silent wives.
For two hours nothing had happened except a pointless squabble pertaining mostly to the benefits of matriarchies versus patriarchies and which ended in the Thei judges leading the King and Empress back to their separate guest rooms to calm down. Prince Zakari rushed to put away his poetry and sit up straight just in case his father came in; on the other side of the dome Heiress Elysia turned away from the viewing window and pulled the bell to have a glass of water. But no one came to either of the heirs' rooms, and coincidentally both at once they decided to leave and find out why.
You can thank the architects. Surely, it was because of the circular, artistically cylindrical design of the corridor that neither young person saw the other until they were face-to-face, toe-to-toe, and it was too late to turn back.
The Moskovan Prince looked at the Kilandri Heiress, and she at him. There was no way they couldn't have known who the other was and yet, across both of their faces, there was the distinctive wisping desperation of two people who both wanted to deny the same thing. He saw her curls of black hair done up with pearls and gold filigree, and her slender dark body draped in a red silk sari. She took in his light tanned skin and lemon yellow hair weighted down with a silver-and-sapphire crown; his wiry build under stiff blue velvet; two surprisingly soft grey-blue eyes.
"Prince Zakari." She spoke first, coldly.
"Princess."
He stepped back a bit when she next spoke, no less coldly than the first time. "Heiress."
"Heiress. Heiress Elysia." The prince scratched the back of his neck anxiously and, after a hesitation, used the bow used during courting. "My apologies, milady."
When he stood straight again she hadn't moved, much less blushed and extended her hand to kiss which was what he had kind of learned to expect from women. "It's a pleasure meeting you, milady," he tried again. He couldn't meet her eyes.
"You know it hasn't," she replied shortly, a little softer, then sniffed. "Politics. Matriarchies and patriarchies. It's all pointless in the end, though."
Well, she was right there. He sighed. "I suppose. In all honestly — " going on a small limb currently, but being Zakari he only barely thought of the risks, " — your mother is just as stupid as my father. Or. Er, the other way around, if you wish."
Elysia raised an eyebrow but her thick lips pressed into a smile. "But someone needs to have the power."
"Perhaps."
But the comment made both of them uncomfortable.
"I…have to be somewhere," Zakari finally broke the silence, scratching his arm. "It's been a pleasure, Heiress." Her fingers gripped the end of her scarf and Zakari met her gaze.
"Oh…may I?" he asked, gesturing to her hand. She inhaled, then offered it to him.
His lips were chapped but gentle. The Heiress drew away. "The pleasure was mine," the Heiress bit the inside of her cheek. Almost in perfect tandem they turned away too quickly, each back to their rooms. Each replaying the conversation in their heads. For the first time Elysia lay in her bed with nothing in her hands, daydreaming of grey-blue eyes and a kiss on her hand. And Zakari, for the first time, looked at his journal of romantic poems and thought that they weren't quite right.
She fell asleep smiling and he threw his poetry into the fire.
The negotiations lasted three more days and both parties, as they tended to do while Verona Road's spilt blood lingered in their minds, simply created more problems than they solved. For one, the problem of their two young heirs, but since the parents didn't know about that we'll return there in a moment. But for two there was the assassination attempt of both parties, where events had turned so quickly and violently that the King and Empress ended the day's negotiations with a to the death wrestling match. No one was hurt but it was pretty clear that yet another declaration of war was now on the line, even though both nations already and still held thirty-two unresolved ones. In all honesty, declarations of war no longer performed their intended purpose and were now simply just louder political shouts of "I DO WHAT I WANT AND YOU CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT."
As such, both royal families retreated from the haven at the end of Verona Road and slunk back to their palaces to do exactly what the Mediator had told them not to do, which was sit and let prejudices boil over an open flame until they both exploded, which was inevitable. All they didn't know was when, and that thanks to some teenagers it would be a lot sooner than expected.
The young heiress of Kiland went about her business as usual, reciting laws and practicing with her swords and ignoring suitor after suitor, but unlike before, only half her heart was in her actions. "We women deserve to rule," said her mother at least once every day and like every time Elysia nodded, but less fervently with every passing day.
On the other side of Verona road Zakari sat shut up in his room, away from his brothers and even the few friends he had. It certainly hadn't been the first time but when he returned, one of the first things his best friend Tyva mentioned to him was a lewd comment about a servant girl's backside — and what hit Zakari was something very much like nausea. He couldn't stop thinking of the Heiress. The Kilandri men were often pitied for the abuse waged on them by their overladies, very similar to the comments Tyva had just made. Comments of that nature, given to a Kilandri woman, might very well lead to another wave of war.
So who was really wrong?
Well, what happened next was perhaps one percent desire and ninety-nine percent fate and Zakari was the one percent to put it into motion — when King Theseux called together a meeting with his most trusted generals and asked for ideas, and one of them suggested a kidnapping, Zakari instantly stood up. "I'll do it," he burst, and when all eyes swiveled to him, he shrunk a little and returned with less boldness.
"I…I met the Heiress, during the negotiations. She's weak, Father; conquering her would lower the Kilandrian morale and perhaps end the war once and for all — I know the Empress loves her very much." He didn't. Judging by how cold both women were, he couldn't imagine it. He inhaled. "If someone could abduct her, perhaps at night…"
"That someone being you," Theseux frowned. "What makes you so certain you should do it?"
Zakari took a breath in. "I can climb, Father. You remember. And I read about the palace architecture; royals always sleep in towers. And…" He shifted for effect and glanced away. "It wouldn't matter if I were caught. Alcha's only a year younger and does better in all his studies."
He'd expected a blatant outburst but his father actually seemed to be considering it. "I suppose… you're not exactly suited for the task, however, not many men are. How would you get her out?"
Zakari didn't flinch. He couldn't get her out, of course, but he wouldn't say that. "She's very small, Father. I could easily knock her out and carry her the whole way."
The advisors were all silent. King Theseux stroked his beard before replying. "Very well, my son. Prepare yourself and get good rest; you will leave tomorrow."
The prince bowed and turned to leave. But before he did, an advisor made a crude remark that raised chuckles in the room full of men but sent a wave of nausea through Zakari's stomach:
"And perhaps the young prince can quench his lovesickness once and for all — if teaching a woman her place isn't enough to make you a man, I don't know what is."
Three nights later Elysia lay in bed, eyes wide open, ears alert, listening.
Scrape, scrape. Something was climbing up her wall, not an animal — she couldn't think of any animal that would climb a twenty-meter cobblestone tower, but she couldn't think of many women who could do that either. Or men. Or…gods, who even cared anymore. She turned from her left side to her right for perhaps the twelfth time in an hour.
It wasn't stopping. It was, actually, coming closer to her window, and even though her balcony door was locked she didn't think that would stop anyone this determined. So she slipped out of bed, quickly arranged her pillows and blankets to look more like a sleeping person (it didn't really, but it would do in a pinch), and ducked behind her wardrobe. Her hand closed around the hilt of her sword and out came the blade.
A shadow across the moonrays, and a click, click, clack — someone pushed the door open just enough to slip in.
She pounced out, wrapped her arm around his neck and pulled up her sword.
It was a he, yes — under the dark attire, there was pale skin and a shock of yellow hair, too. Moskovan. He struggled at first but she was strong, and after a second he simply stood there, breathing heavily, trembling.
"Say your rank, name, and purpose in your presence here, or I swear," Elysia whispered into his ear, "that I will slit you throat and scream loud enough to raise the dead."
Perhaps just out of instinct but he lifted his hand to her arm and tried to loosen her hold, and in return she pulled the sword a tighter. "I — I'm here to warn you, I swear. It's me, Zakari."
Oh…well, that wasn't expected. It was certainly his voice and when she spun him around (sword still up) it was certainly his face…
"What the devil are you doing in my bedroom?!"
Zakari's eyes, glimmering wetly in the dim light, darted back and forth between her face and her sword. "Look, just listen. I can explain. My father declared war on your mother, and was just about to send a man to kidnap someone of your kingdom — er, queendom. I…I told them I would go, maybe to stall them, maybe just to see you again but — "
"Why would you want to see me?" Even though she thought she knew.
The prince inhaled deeply. His hands were by his side, unarmed; and he blinked, and blinked, and blinked. "All my life," he was shaking. "All my life I thought I knew what love was, I thought I knew what was a woman, and I thought I had it all. I thought…it was something I could own, control…dream into existence. Not anymore."
Elysia lowered the sword by an inch. Slowly.
"There's something my mother says about men," she spat, too forcefully. "She said we formed our empire on the backs of reformed criminals, on the principle that men are dangerous. Our objective is to keep them in such fear that they never think to use their physical strength to harm us, and that if we teach them their place through the only language they know — chains and ropes — everyone can be safe. Women, naturally more mature at a younger age, are free to lead and rule in confidence. Men are in their place, working the fields and building the walls and using their gifts to benefit the whole of society, instead of just satisfying their own lusts. We can form stronger families without being led astray by a blind desire for the physical pleasure, instead with the woman, the head, following the wisdom of the soul.
"Your people teach the opposite. Your nation is a place where men benefit from the subordinance of women, where millions of girls are raped, molested, objectified and abused every day because it's socially acceptable for men to act on harmful, preventable impulses. Women do not even have a chance to prove themselves in your society because their 'place' is in the kitchen and in the bedroom; they are mere pawns put up as useless objects of beauty while honorable work, fighting and thinking and working to support other people, is dominated completely by only half the population. We aren't people. We're things in your eyes, Prince, and don't pretend that you don't see that. I wouldn't be surprised if this 'love' is a ruse, if in your coming here you just meant to satisfy yourself. I wouldn't be surprised at all."
Zakari simply stared, his mouth cracked open and soft blue eyes wide. "L…look," he tried again, "I, I know it's wrong. But I can't do anything to change the way my people think and I apologize for my inability to change anything." He bit his lip. "But I didn't come here to talk about politics. I came here to tell you that despite our and our parents' statuses as the most powerful and hateful people on the continent, I can't help but be really…really in love with you."
She didn't reply at first, not verbally. But when her hand couldn't help but lower her sword all the way to touch the carpet, both knew the words that hid in the motion.
"Why should politics determine the worth of a human life?" the prince whispered. "I came to tell you that I love you. And it's like nothing I've ever felt before. It's not an ownership. It's…it's something horrible. It's my body being thrown down a dry well with fire at the bottom. Getting lost every time I close my eyes. Hating every word even my own family members say because it makes me so sick to think of them saying it to you. This is love, princess, and it's so terrible I have to admit it. It's killing me from the inside out."
The sword fell, just a dull thud on the thick rug. She turned away towards the balcony. There wasn't anything to say so she didn't speak; she chose instead to gaze out at the expanse of low, dome-roofed stone houses that constituted the capital city. Zakari followed, still breathing hard.
"I'm not going to bow to you but I don't ask you to bow to me either."
He held out his hand.
"That's not the way love works."
Elysia closed her eyes. Love. The way he said the word, so naively that she couldn't help but think that maybe, just maybe he was telling the truth. His country was wrong…but there was still that nagging feeling that maybe hers wasn't all in the right either. So many people died every year just because of the struggle between woman and man...
"So many people die," she murmured. "Your women. Our men. I'm dying right now, Zakari. Why did you have to be the prince? Why am I the Heiress? I never meant — " she stopped; her eyes opened. The moons looked down on her. "I never meant for this to have happened. I never asked to repeat, every day, my mother's laws. I should have been more careful; guarded my heart but — now you're here, a boy whom I should never have loved, who comes from a land of oppression with a message of freedom and equality and…and peace…"
She threw out her hand and the two clasped, drawing both young people together. There was fire in both of their eyes. A fire that was desperation and terror and the brightness of youth, of a new era just waiting for its seed to be planted. An idea. Not even. But at the very least a spark.
"Imagine," she murmured, "what that would be like. A land where woman and man were equal in love and life."
"What a strange dream."
She nodded. "Indeed."
A Letter To King Theseux, Sent By Messenger Hawk On Stamped Vellum
Father,
I regret to inform you that the mission to kidnap the princess has failed. I cannot tell why, not because I do not know, but because I do know and do not understand why, from here, a course of war is entirely necessary. I have not been captured; in fact I have found refuge with a woman sympathetic to my causes and will be staying with her for a short time. In the meanwhile I request a favor of you, which you might think is a trick. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. And hopefully just those words are how you know it is really me, and ensures that you will do it. Please come to the edge of Verona Road, two miles west of Thei Forest, on the Thirty-Second of the Month (six days after my sending of this letter; thus giving time for you and I to prepare) with no more than a single legion of unarmed men. Do not come prepared to fight. It'll be easier to say what I have to say with just you.
Signed, your son Zakari.
• • •
A Letter Found In Heiress Elysia's Bedroom, On A Torn Parchment From A Diary
Dearest Mother, High Empress of Kiland:
I am writing in peace in order to tell you that I have decided to take an…impromptu vacation of sorts, in order to take a break from the stress of war. In addition I have learned things, new viewpoints that have caused me to rethink some of the actions you have taught me are not only justifiable but necessary. I wish to meditate on my own, and until the Thirty-Second of this Month you may find me in our beachside vacation home. However I request that you respect my decision to be alone and away from you, specifically, just as I would respect your decision and leave you alone.
I understand you are worried, but I can assure you I am safe and very much not kidnapped, as you would probably think, but you know my hand and this decision is one only you can decide to trust. Forgive my brevity and the misshapen form of this letter; however, I've found it such a desperate impulse to leave that I cannot, or perhaps will not, stay to make it better.
If you wish to see me, do not come to the beachside home. Though I do know you and I believe your first move would be to go exactly there with a small army so — you always were so dearly protective, Mother, and thank you but — I will not, in fact, stay there the duration of my leave of absence. Where I am staying I will not tell you. Where I will be, however, I shall.
On the Thirty-Second of the Month I request to meet you, two miles West of Thei Forest on our side of Verona Road. Bring no more than a single legion of unarmed women. I do this for your safety and not mine — if the Moskovans detect us with an army then they will think your wishes are invasion, and may become alarmed.
Thank you, and dearest wishes.
Elysia
Even with these letters, the King of Moskova and the Empress of Kiland did, in fact, freak out.
You couldn't blame them. They were parents, after all, and as self-obsessed as they both could be, these teenagers weren't just their biological children but their heirs, their legacies, the futures of their nations. And that's why both kingdom and queendom went up in panic. Soldiers were sent out to search every building in the continent, letters by hawk flew frantically between nations, threatening and pleading in tandem to tell the other where their child was. Prejudice escalated. Nearly every possible hiding place of the two young people had been searched and yet they were nowhere to be found.
And as the Thirty-Second of the month approached, both Kilandri and Moskovans made a unanimous, but desperate decision. They would do what their children or their children's abductors wanted — except that they would bring armies. They would meet two miles from Thei Forest on both sides of Verona road and they would wait for whatever it was, whatever the cost, however many men or women they lost in the fight that they knew would ensue.
It wasn't like they had any other option. And this, both Prince and Heiress had known, was what would make their plan work.
Empress Phoebe brought mostly cavalry; King Theseux infantry. At dawn the Empress and her women on their steeds set off from camp, across the expanse of rocky red soil towards Verona Road. Similarly, but just before dawn, the King ordered his troops a path across their plains of tall blue grass; and before noon both troops stood with just fifteen feet and black-and-white pebbles between them.
"You come on horses," shouted the King to the Empress, with a smirk. "Neither the strength nor the will to walk on your own. You hold bows. A weapon of the weak. Your men are back at the camp, lifting the heavy burdens and doing work that you know you cannot bear, as a woman. Your strongest warriors wear more armor than even I. And yet…you dare call yourself strong enough to beat us."
Phoebe blinked but nothing more. Then she lowered the faceplate of her helmet, took up her archer's bow, strung it with a thick, black shafted arrow and lifted it to the sky — releasing the arrow but only to watch it fall once again through the body of a large crow. It landed at her stallion's feet and she dismounted, plucked the arrow out and mounted her steed again.
"To increase your chances in a defensive position isn't weakness, my lord," the Empress spat out the title like a curse. "It's called wisdom and it's something of which you might make good use, at least, if you had any."
Theseux sneered and merely spat on the ground. One of Phoebe's lieutenants muttered a curse; the King's sergeant grumbled something under his breath that made the men nearby laugh. Phoebe's head snapped around to the sergeant and the glare she gave him could have broken glass.
"Shall we just skip the pleasantries and commence in killing each other?" she snapped, her voice high and proud. "Because if you want to devalue what it means to be a woman and if you want to act like the half-witted animals you men are, then I'll be happy to make the first move."
A growl rose from Theseux's throat and almost without thinking his sword was out, along with every other infantryman's. "Don't forget that the white chess pieces move before the black, your worshipfulness. Now listen — "
But he was never to finish. A chorus of shouts rose up from the east sides of each of their armies, their soldiers pointing and yelling the King's and Empress's names.
"Look! Look there, Empress! King!" The men and women all looked to the east, where the Thei's forest traced a dark outline on the horizon and set a contrast for the two yellow-clad figures walking down Verona Road.
Hand in hand, Zakari and Elysia.
They weren't stupid. They didn't even think of going to the beachside vacation home, instead riding on horseback straight to the Haven of Thei, where the peaceful, benevolent beings offered them refuge until the Thirty-Second. Here they spent time simply relaxing, enjoying one another's company and the true love that had taken them both by the collars and didn't let go, just as the honest side of Aphrodite never did. And at dawn they set off on horseback to the edge of the forest, where the guides left them and they took to Verona road alone, hand in hand. At first Elysia walked on the black-pebbled side and Zakari walked on the white, but they soon switched.
From a mile away they could see the red flags of the Kilandri and the blue of the Moskovans. Their clothing was both woven Thei gold.
She glanced over to him and a little up, just in time to see him bite his bottom lip — he was just a few inches taller than she, but when he met her gaze and kissed her forehead he leaned down to accommodate the difference. "You're nervous," she commented, and squeezed his hand.
"No, I'm not," he protested, which made her laugh.
"You always bite your bottom lip when you're nervous."
She was right. She gave him a hug and in return he wrapped his arm around her shoulders.
"They might kill us," he looked up mournfully at the gathered armies. "I'm not my father's only potential heir and your mother can have another daughter whenever she wants. There's a lot to be nervous about."
Elysia sighed. They were walking a little slower now. "I know."
It didn't take long for the armies to notice them. Cries of "look!" and "seize them!" were prominent among the wave of shouts but for whatever reason, no one moved a muscle until the two were directly in between both armies, just between the King and the Empress. The cacophony of voices began to fade until all was silent except the rolling, swirling thunderclouds above. Not a single eye missed the sight in front of them, especially not the two rulers.
"You said you were going to kidnap her," Theseux finally murmured blearily, lowering his drawn sword. "Not…that you were in love with her…"
Zakari glanced across to his father, and nodded solemnly. "No. But not all lies are said out loud, or for evil causes."
He squeezed Elysia's hand and their eyes met. Then they raised their joined hands in the air.
"We ran away," the Heiress shouted, with a clear voice loud enough to reach the furthest soldiers in the armies but swept partially away by the wind, "because we wanted to show you something. Something that we realized you've been hiding from us, denying since our ancestors first founded these two nations."
"And what might that be, hmm?" Empress Phoebe's eyes narrowed and the dare was obvious in her words, but Elysia didn't even flinch.
"Equality. Civility. Respect for all people, regardless of gender."
Lightning cracked in the clouds after her words, making both King and Empress jump in alarm. "This — this is madness!" King Theseux gripped his sword again and pointed it at the Heiress. "You — you've been deceived, Zakari! This girl, women — you can't trust a Kilandri woman; don't listen to this — "
"This what?" Phoebe suddenly spoke up, and dismounted her horse so fast you'd think she'd teleported to the ground. "What, might I ask, was the word with which you were about to address my daughter? I may not stand with them on this issue but if you even dare raise a word against Elysia I swear to gods that I will — "
"You'll what?" Theseux took a step closer and both Zakari and Elysia were pressed closer together, caught between both angry parents. "You'll kill me? Hurt me? Complain to your royal court?"
"I'll pin you with so many arrowholes that when you try to take a drink, it'll all leak out the side of your throat. Your corpse will be in a future museum under a placard reading 'Ancient Man with Arrows Through Intestines and Genitals'."
"Oh, I'm very scared, woman. Why don't you get back to the kitchen where you belong and make me a dinner of ham and potatoes — "
"Why…you insolent piece of — "
"STOP!"
A roll of thunder echoed in the word, together so loud that the Empress, the King, and their armies threw their hands over their ears. The Prince and the Heiress stepped out together, standing taller than ever before — their eyes were bright and reflecting gold; golden scarves whirling out behind them in the wind. You couldn't just look at them. You had to stare, you had to gape in absolute awe and terror of what they'd become. Because it was too much.
"If hate is all we do," Zakari declared, "we will never learn how to love. And we will never, ever find peace."
For the second time in the story, both King and Empress did not know what to say.
The slick cold wind whipped up around the two young people as if they were in the middle of their own personal hurricane, a storm formed by passion. On the Moskovan side, the grass bent nearly horizontally and a flag ripped from its pole; on the Kilandri side, dust blew up in clouds and the soldiers shielded their eyes. It began to rain in stinging veils but neither Zakari nor Elysia moved, only glancing back and forth between King and Empress. Then, as not two but one, they closed their eyes and the world was enveloped in golden light.
Some people heard a scream. Others, a single note of beautiful singing. But the light was a figure from sky, clearer to see now, and they materialized standing in front of the couple. The storm had stopped. All else was still. They shook their head and glanced at the King, then the Empress.
"It's amazing," sighed the Mediator, "how the first people to figure these things out are always the last ones you'd expect."
They didn't stay long. They were a god, after all. They had other things to do and it wasn't like two squabbling nations were the first thing on their schedule. Basically they stayed until Theseux and Phoebe gave the orders for their troops to retreat and father and son, mother and daughter were alone with the god.
"Now. Did we learn something today?"
Elysia glared at her mother and Zakari at his father, but the aforementioned parents didn't see because they were busy glaring at each other. The Mediator subsequently reached out and gave both of them a divine slap across the face — which made sure the glares were now on them instead.
"I'm so offended by your facial expressions," the god said sarcastically, if a god can even be sarcastic. Because this one certainly was. "In any case, stop it and learn how to love. I understand it's hard to forgive grudges and that you may be angry about things the other has done — "
"Abusing men," Theseux grumbled.
"Abusing women," Phoebe said at nearly the same time, and the Mediator gave a godly shriek.
"WOULD YOU PLEASE QUIT IT?!"
They did.
"If you cannot accept," the Mediator growled, "that both of you have made mistakes and that neither of you are any less guilty than the other, then you are just as bad as the person who doesn't see sin in anything their enemy does. If you cannot fix your problems on your own then I suppose we will have to wait until you die and your children — your revolutionary children, leading throngs of oppressed women and men — take your thrones and unite them for you."
The King coughed and the Empress opened her mouth to say something, but then closed it.
"Thank you."
The Mediator looked down. Elysia and Zakari met their eye, both with smiles on their faces.
"Thank you, your honor," repeated Elysia. "For everything…but, with all due respect, what do we do now?"
The god looked at them blankly for a second before simply shrugging. "I cannot say. You are human, child. You can do what I cannot — you can change."
They knelt down in front of the young couple, sighing. "Start small. A law here or there, a public speech perhaps, honoring and respecting people all the same. It may take a very, very long time. Longer than you are alive. You may never see the ripples of the stone you have thrown into the pool. But you can change — if you're brave enough."
The Mediator stood up.
"I'll be leaving you now," they said coolly. "I trust that you will no longer be needing my presence, ever again."
"I hope," Zakari smiled, and squeezed Elysia's hand.
The god smiled. His one clear eye blinked; in the sky the storm clouds parted to cover the land in an ethereal ray of golden sun. "I hope so too," they told them, and vanished in a swirl of yellow light.
It took a while.
A few weeks after the event at Verona Road, the Empress of Kiland and the King of Moskova met up in Thei Haven once more to sign exactly thirty-three peace treaties and allow the two young lovers to see each other again. Soldiers were told to go home once and for all; the draft was retired and as people flooded back to their towns and villages, families grew and national trade thrived. Everyone knew of Zakari and Elysia — as you might figure the tale, as it spread, spun and twisted until some people believed they had already married with a child whom they had used to prove of their love, and others thought that one (this depended on the country) had kidnapped the other and that "love" was just a clever trick that would help the enemy conquer the entire continent.
Nevertheless there were the supporters, and even if there weren't any they probably would do it anyway — and three years to the day after Verona, Zakari and Elysia were married in Thei Haven with a wedding of white and black and gold. From the public there was an uproar of mixed feelings but neither of them let go, and two years later Elysia gave birth to twins. A boy and a girl.
Theseux was the first to die, from an unfortunate stroke. But instead of taking the throne, Zakari let his brother Alcha rule as prince regent while he and Elysia directed the construction of a new palace on the seaside at the other end of Verona Road. A few years later Empress Phoebe passed away from fever, and the power shifted entirely to the King and Queen in Palace Verona. The barrier of the road and many prejudices remained but the countries of Moskova and Kiland were dissolved into a single state — Aequus.
Their children were barely toddlers when the famines struck, and mass riots and uprisings began to spark. But they didn't give up. They reached out to other kingdoms that had long since left the former Moskovans and Kilandri to fight it out alone, and with their help raised enough aid to feed the people until rains began again. Interestingly enough though, the famine had done more good than harm — lack of resources had caused a large amount of former Kilandri to flood over Verona Road into the more fertile Moskova, where tensions were high but desperation made cultural diffusion inevitable. And people, just as the Mediator had said, changed. They adjusted.
A hundred fifty years later and both Zakari and Elysia were dead. Their oldest daughter had fled royal life to become a painter; their son instead took up the line of the family and his daughter, in turn, reigned long enough to see her great-grandchildren. Things changed. People listened, people accepted, people respected and people loved. Verona Road was for a long time paved half-black and half-white, just in remembrance, but all too often the stones would get mixed and the road would turn speckled salt-and-pepper. Eventually they just left it be.
The nation of Aequus prospered, even as the world around them shifted. The line of Zakari and Elysia faded into a constitutional monarchy; soon the names were nothing except ink in textbooks. The Thei long since left, perhaps to a land they could truly call their own. The Mediator was nothing but a myth.
The world changed. The nation changed. People left, people came, borders redrawn and countries renamed. Discoveries. Revolutions. World wars. Hundreds of countries uniting in the way Moskova and Kiland had done so long ago, a balance based not of a struggle for dominance between man and woman but of equality, and respect, and love.
And yet there is still, ever still, a grey dome at the end of a black-and-white gravel road, inhabited by a coffin for two. It bears a single inscription in the stone, outlined in gold, the only ever-glowing light in the last shadows of all our tale has become —
The Last Bed of One Love; the Conqueror of Hate.
A/N: Well, I'm back from writing camp! Or, currently, in it and pretty much done. Sitting in a basement bunker with a bunch of new writer friends which is cool.
So I wrote this in less than four days, an accomplishment I am actually very very proud of. Two drafts, one case of carpal tunnel in two wrists. No mentioned violent death of a main character, which is the most surprising. But yes. I am proud and I am done with something that I have been swirling around my head for a very long time, which makes me happier than I have been with my writing for a while.
Anyway.