7 Vision's View

This muggy night much like the nights prior was not my night it seems, I snuck away once more in a desire to find my charge but to no avail. I'm no hunter as I rather flee and leave the fight to stronger soldiers. This thing between my charge and I is less cat and mouse and more like a hunter after prey but seems that I would be classified as the prey as I can't keep eyes on my target. Adding to the disarray and overall failure of this night, I returned to a trashed camp. I could care less about the overall thrashed site as it was common in these lands as any site was poised for raiding for any supplies within. This raid was different and the one thing that made it truly disheartening was the missing journals that logged my visions and all knowledge on my charge. The fear that they were taken by an enemy was crippling but the idea that she came and took them shook me with a mix of pride and rage. Deep inside I had a feeling that it wasn't her who took the journals or trashed my camp, at least not this time as she liked to leave presents of death. Though she had come through her sent was faded and in one area. Her sent being the one of the few my nose knew or could truly discern from proved infuriating and a key flaw in the design of my very being. This could explain our near extinction or maybe that's a personal belief. The vision species was granted a limited time strong eyesight and uncomparable set of ears but my smell wasn't half of even the weakest shifter to walk this plane.

Seeing no other option with the lack of results on my miniature investigation gained it became clear I had to return and admit my newest incompetence and beg for mercy as well as aid. Using a binding spell that any shifter could muster due to its simplicity, I was able to bind the area allowing only those with me inside this space at least for the time being as it being an easy spell it wasn't designed to last long. Fleeing the area to limit my presence and any further disruption of the scene the race to the kingdom was on as time wasn't on my side.

Upon my arrival, something was off and my visions of a bloody throne room filled my mind as well as cynical laughter. Pushing away from the new and highly confusing visions as they would have to wait. I instead chose to focus on the situation on hand. I rushed through the back entrance stumbling along the way in the overly wet grass, only to grab the first captain I saw. When I went to speak and break the news of my journey I was quickly silenced. Annoyance flooded my system but them as if iced water poured over me I took a look around and realized the overly wet grass wasn't wet with water but blood and that those around me were on edge and suddenly my problems seemed so minimal. Then the visions I'd repressed resurfaced and left a pit in my stomach and with it a wave of panic as I practically screamed at the captain and his men mere feet from me. " Throne room! That's where we must go three around back and rest upfront. Don't engage but watch and wait. I have a feeling the one inside is the one we have all awaited!" A mix of wincing and hissing met my senses as the captain eyed me up soon he nodded and sent his men off to do as I had suggested. The title of Sier played into the ability to get those around me to do as I say as with little to no retort. Soon we gathered our strength and dispersed only to be overwhelmed by the smell of blood, panic, fear, and joy that permeated the halls. Within seconds we came to understood the feelings as we emerged to find the path to the throne littered with fallen soldiers with only three alive. Breaking up our already limited forces four fetched the injured and rushed them to the doctors to attempt a resurrection. The remaining soldiers readied their weapons as for me I was pushed to the back as I was weaponless and essentially helpless with little combat knowledge. The throne room was rushed two things became clear there was but one intruder and that this night was about to change everything. The voluptuous woman on the throne was quickly surrounded as she lounged on the recently transitioned throne. She paid no attention to those around her as she merely gazed them over and lingered on me, before closing her eyes. The dead easily broke twenty with the numbers in the hall and in the garden the total was closer to a hundred dead yet she seemed perfectly calm almost content. The more I staired to more I realized that the woman before was in fact the woman I had been seeking for the past few years. Laying so carefree was my liege who was in excellent health but covered in crimson so much so that her shiny coal locks dripped against the floors and the bit of white was almost unseeable. We watched in a ray of emotions as she swayed her legs and a small hum left her ruby lips. I had so much to say yet the words were so jumbled that nothing came out yet she beat me to the punch as her apathetic voice filled our ears. She abruptly sat up and spoke but in a way that dismissed everyone around her as if they were all scum yet her eyes stuck on me.

"So after all these years your the seeker who has watched me aye" her eyes shimmered with a mix of humor and curiosity but the hollow orbs brimmed in hatred were clear. The hatred was expected with her past but it was as if the hatred had only grown over the years. " Tell me seeker am I a toy to you ..a game...a pon to be used in a greater move on board I know not of?" I wanted to reply I really did. " Well, seeker have you no words to speak? have I not changed since the last encounter?" she motioned her body as she sat up, "Am I speaking too quickly or too formally for you to grasp that the one you have sought is before you? Still, no response color me, surprised little seeker. With you I thought I'd finally found excitement but neigh I'd only found more boredom, how disappointing." I'd answer but it's as if my throat went dry, " To answer my own question yes, we both can see and sense the changes, so how oh wise seeker did you not see me coming? Were you too distracted by trying to be quiet and unnoticed in your return from your unapproved venture away? You were not quiet by the way as I'm sure even captain Tic could tell you. Or was it that you're too distracted by the panic held within you over something missing from the camp you made in the forest?" She spoke so much for the first encounter that leads all the previous which were silent. I am enjoying her voice even with the monotonous way she is speaking. " Worry not I seek not a reply as I don't need one as I already know the answers to your questions as well as my own. Well, I should say that I know most things as what I don't know or have yet to figure out and will soon be figured. I'll admit that a while ago I found your camp and a few things that were hazy became clear and the rest fell into place not long after." That explains a few strange instances as well as clears up some confusing visions from the last few years. "The incident of tonight was all my doing not as a way to show my strength and legitimacy but your camp was not of my doing. I'd hoped to kill you first little mouse but you were lucky as I gain more with you alive. You a vision sent to watch a child of an unfortunate pairing one of the four desperately fighting for a throne that lays in vast wealth and power but steeped in corruption and death." she stopped for a bit and stared at me as if waiting. "For the love of all things wretched can you still not speak my little dying vision. "

All eyes flickered between her and me as neither spoke and the tension began to rise. without a logical thought in my mind and as pride filled my words I found my voice rasing and much like before almost yelling my innermost thoughts. " If you knew this was your kingdom and all that has and is continuing to occur in your absence why did you wait so long to come and claim your birthright. I know you knew and rejected this for so long and it was a bitter pill to swallow yet I held hope you'd return after your wounds healed after the river. This is not what I or any other had imagined when we imagined the return of the great leader. My dear liege, you were needed and desired for so long yet she who is before is must be calloused and ignorant to all others but herself to slaughter her way to the throne that was already hers. Cant, you see that you are the only hope in the impending war yet you vanished from my and all other radars for years. Alas, you return to smart for anyone's good, and at this rate, all you will do is lead us to death with the attitude you present. Quizzically, I must question if you knew all things then why have appeared before us tonight of all nights. I speak a truth that you won't even see or understand. How has the one who went from loving all equally and possibly being the most unique and most suiting leader in decades become so shallow and cold!" How far over the bounds I had stepped didn't settle in till the laughter began. The realization of all I had said dawned on me as panic her will to see me live would die as a need for my head would prove far more alluring. I spoke the truth but I am but a servant and she the queen. The differences of value were clear and the opinion of one lowly soldier means nothing.

Sinister laughter erupted and her colorful eyes analyzed all of us, seeing as the others never left per her first order, no they had just faded to the background hands gripped tight on their weapons. She started stepping forward as we stepped back into an unconscious battle of power and influence. Silence had engulfed the room and fed into the suffocating tension as we all waited for her or another to break it. Moments pass before she spoke in more of a relaxed tone than prior. "True I didn't return to a place that is supposedly mine to rule when all those before me who did so died so quickly after doing the very thing you have desired me to do. Supposedly four are born every three hundred years and amongst them, only one is the true leader. Who decides that one of the four is meant to rule is unknown but a pull to this place is placed in us all in a certain order. That is what I know deep down and from research. I stayed away due to not wanting to accept the reality I was the luckiest of unlucky in this batch of four when the other three have vanished from the lands and joined a certain organization that is hell-bent on taking these lands sooner rather than later. Like you, they to have awaited to the new ruler as they wish to use them to achieve the goals more underhandedly but will soon be more direct hence the war. Over the years I focused on growing stronger in mind and body as I fought off insanity, rouges, and every other struggle one faces living in the badlands. It's only been around four years. Am I right my darling vision or has it truly been longer? Honestly, time does fly by when the shackles are broken and a form of forced freedom is granted. Don't get me wrong I was happy to be free of the pack but I was more than unprepared and had to learn rather harshly how to deal. Essentially, I was tired of doing what others wanted thus I did what I wanted no matter the consequences that would ensue be it death or war or even both. Clearly, both options are occurring and have occurred in the absence of a leader. In this time I have met many and learned even more than one could understand or believe. I wasn't ready before and likely I am still unprepared but at least know I stand a fighting chance. This war you speak of that is brewing is not on me not in the slightest bit and my arrival be it sooner or later would matter little. My dear vision that is on those who started the bloody thing all those centuries ago. I waited and will continue to wait to claim that which is mine meaning those in the palace will know me as a soldier and my true position will remain a secret till it is determined to be safe. Even to those outside these walls, I will be nothing but a new warrior, as I hold no desire to die and if I come out to be known as the queen, well I'd be lucky to see three moons before my slaughter. I want and have always wanted freedom and in a twisted sense of circumstances exchanged one set of shackles for another form. Those before me will all take a blood oath to keep my arrival a secret as you will be told the plan for how I will enter the palace and be aware of small details and nothing beyond. What will be simply is me the princess being promoted to the role of the queen by end of the week, all the knowledge I don't know will be told and you, my kingdoms dearest and last vision will rethink your last words as respect is rated highly to me. Oh and the thing I'm supposed to say to prove I am well me. Ego deum puer ego novi et ultimum princeps."

Silence filled the room as the power she held and the meaning behind her words laid uneasily amongst those who heard. She whispered to herself before all dropped to their knees, she smirked as she walked the room rubbing her blood on each mans lips and sealing it with a kiss. Once she went around the room she returned to the base of the stairs and requested cleaning materials. Three men left to fetch her request as she handed out tasks for each man. She helped gather the discarded weapons as a group of two worked to clean them and return them to the armory. Four men worked on gathering the inside bodies while three worked on the outside. When the men returned with the cleaning products I and the captain were assigned hosing down and cleaning the garden. Three were charged with cleaning the outside walls and two the stone pathway from the castle, through the garden, and to the exit of the garden. six were tasked with scrubbing the halls leading to the throne room. Inside six scrubbed the floors, four the walls, and the remaining eight worked on repairing and cleansing the tapestries throughout the area. She sent one to fetch ale, blood, and tea and had him serve her and the rest of us. She drugged the castle to ensure none would awaken aside from those working currently as well as summoning a fog that doubled as a drug. In the process, she transitioned to each unit and aided in the cleaning. Once all bodies and blood were removed she requested a sweep of the entire palace and an extra mopping. She then led us to the town square where we were to help stage the bodies of the soldiers amongst fallen townsfolk. In all, a hundred and twenty people died and three buildings were burned. She gave us a story and sent us on our way. Tonight would be marked as a night of despair as the royal crown was stolen and an unknown amount of parcels taken from the three burned shops. The responsible parties lost two to the being caught and three escaped one of which was a witch who drugged the kingdom through a haze. The incident would be the spur of a new wave of gathering trainees from the surrounding areas and outward to the sea.

The important event of this evening was that the queen was home and she is no longer a pushover nor a sweet thing who is broken and scared. The woman she is now is sharp and deadly, and may the moon help any who cross her. I fear my death maybe by her hands rather than the overuse of my abilities. Even though the fear I held for dying by her hands was strong, I could feel inside that my role was coming to an end and wasn't likely to be by her hands. This innate ability to sense one's own demise is a hellish trait but it is the fate of all visions. I believe that I have lived a fruitful life and accomplished my mission to find and return the true leader to the throne. Her words to rethink my words were taken to heart, the life of a vision is as lonely as her life of royalty would be and has proven to be. I am the last and will have failed the hopes of passing on my genes as I never found my destined lover. I wish her a brighter future in regards to love and fostering anew generation.