It's said that memories from childhood are most easy to recall, and for Wrin, that saying would have to be right. At the time, she was six, her sisters Laylani and Nunnally were twelve and eighteen. Their father Clovis had been dead for almost six years, their mother, Agnes, and been the reigning regent since.
It was a dark night in the castle, and Wrin and her mother were sat side by side on the bench in the den. Agnes was knitting a scarf for Nunnally, her nineteenth birthday just weeks away. As usual, Wrin was reading a book, the knight arriving just in time to save the princess from certain doom.
That was when the captain of the Queen's guard burst into the room. Wrin had never learned his name, she had seen him so seldom, and it wasn't like she'd have to learn it; Nunnally would, being next in line for the crown. But Wrin did take the time to remember his name this night, a night that she'd never be able to forget, and name that would stick with her for the rest of her life. A name that would bring the destruction of a family in just one word. A name that would bring her to tears every time she heard it.
"My Queen," Lord Arthur Harding called, panting, clearly having run to this point from his previous destination. "There is news. Bad news."
Having set the knitting needles and partially made scarf aside, Agnes stood from her seat, her back ramrod straight as she assumed her royal duties to her country. "What is it, Lord Harding? What has you so distressed?"
Looking down as he spoke, Arthur Harding simply mumbled the name, "Laylani."
Nunnally and Laylani had left early that evening to see a play with Lord Gillian, Ally's fiance. They were expected back at any moment.
"What about Laylani?" Agnes no longer sounded like a queen, but instead as a concerned mother for her darling daughter. Having known the loss of her husband, and her oldest sister before that, Agnes couldn't bare the thought of losing anyone else. And Laylani never had the best of health; most of the time she was bedridden, too weak to get up. "Should I call a healer for Little Lani?"
Still with his head down, "there will be no need for that, my Queen." Visibly swallowing the lump in his through, his eyes darting back and forth, never focusing on anything. "Princess Laylani Teller is ready to be pronounced dead once you claim the body. . ."
By this point, Wrin had her book set on the nearest table and she was rooted in place next to her mother. This wasn't the first time hearing these words, for Wrin had heard them for her father, though she was just a baby then, with no hope of remembering. But Agnes did.
Queen Agnes looked ready to pull her hair out, her eyes rimmed with unshed tears. "You don't mean. . . Laylani is. . ." Shaking her head, Agnes cried out. "What do you mean, Lord Harding? What is going on? Where's Nunnally? Surely she can explain this mistake--"
Being a Queen, Agnes had never been interrupted. Lord Arthur Harding interrupted her, "There is no mistake, Your Highness. Witch Clarissa has declared Princess Laylani Teller dead." He said it bluntly, with no emotion. He hated the very words he spoke.
"Where is Nunnally? She must be so distraught. Bring my daughter to me, at once," Agnes whispered, her voice carrying defeat. Tears were streaming down her face. Tears that wouldn't stop coming for several days. "I want to see Ally."
"There is more news, Your Grace," Arthur Harding went on. "There was a rather large pool of blood found on the streets next to Laylani's body, and Witch Clarissa has declared it belonging to Princess Nunnally Teller."
Agnes Teller, Queen no more, fell to the ground, letting out a half cry, half scream. Her body was shaking with uncontrollable sobs.
Bending down to Agnes' level, Arthur said, "and there--"
"And?" Agnes asked. "And?" Each time she repeated the word, her voice rose from anger, from hysteria. "What "and" could there possibly be? What more do you have to say?" she practically yelled in his face. Mrs. Teller looked as if she was ready to claim Lord Harding the murderer of her children, ready to have him hanged right there in the family's den.
It is safe to say that the word "and" has become Queen Agnes Teller's most hated word that could have ever been thought up. Even more so than "moist".
Arthur Harding dabbed at his clearly sweaty forehead. This conversation was almost as hard for him as it was for his Queen. "Princess Nunnally's body has yet to be found."
In fact, Nunnally's body was never found. And the only recognizable feature of Laylani's body was her head, the only part of her that wasn't torn apart by what Witch Clarissa declared to be a werewolf. The man that had been escorting the two sisters, Gamzee Gillian, disappeared off the face of the world, never to be seen by anybody ever again. Or, at least not by anybody from Colichemarde. It was believed that he was a victim as well, for what other possibility could there be? It couldn't be that he was the killer; he loved Nunnally more than anything.
Unlike Wrin's books, there was no knight in shining armor to come and save her sisters from their demise. It would seem that such a knight does not even exist.
