1 Down with the Queen

"Your Highness, I think it would be best if you followed me down to the crypt." the Captain of the Queensguard stared at the ground, with his arms crossed behind his back. Alo looked at him from her place beside the largest window in her royal suite. Below her, she heard the screams of her people. Down with the Queen! Down with the Queen! Down with the Queen! They had been chanting all night, and she had stayed by this window watching them blankly. She still wore her hunting clothes and her tall leather riding boots that she had arrived home in from the night before. She had returned with several wild boar, she expected people to be happy for the food.

"Please your Highness, I really thinkー"

"You don't have to call me that anymore Reymund." She spoke softly, almost as if she were afraid that the masses would hear her.

She remembered the day that she was elected. The first ever Queen to be elected. The King before her was blatantly stealing from his people. A year after he began his reign he started routing all of the incoming imports directly to the castle so he could stock the castle first and the towns last. After a while, he stopped giving anything to the towns at all and blamed it on the worldwide hardship. A famine had swept through the land but you'd never know it from his lifestyle. He claimed that he wanted to be someone for the average person to look up to a strive to become. She hated him, and so did her father, the royal Hunter.

When she took over his role after his untimely death, she found herself unable to look her King in the eyes. She started spending more and more time in the surrounding towns speaking with the shops owners, miners, farmers, brothel workers, and fishermen. She told everyone, everything she knew about the King, she told them that he was stealing from them. In a few short weeks, she had united the Kingdom and led the march to the front doors of the castle. She still smiles to herself when she remembers the look on that horrible mans face when he looked at her, realizing what was happening. As he was led up the steps to the executioner's block, he spat at her and screamed, "My only regret is that I wont be able to see you crash and burn you hateful bitch!" Now she realizes that her was right, what was she thinking. How naive of her to think of herself to be the savior. She always thought he was the worst thing to happen to these people, but she was wrong. She was far worse, because she had instilled hope, and she couldn't follow through.

"Your Highness, please, will you come with me. It isn't safe here anymore. You've made some mistakes but we don't all hate you. Many of us want to help you." He stood a little taller as he pleaded, he seemed to be gaining some confidence. Who wouldn't be confident speaking to their former, powerless Queen, she thought to herself. She took a deep breath and one last long look at the angry mob six stories below her. I can't keep doing this. She thought to herself. They will be so much better off without me.

"Ok, let's go."