The Empress

“The carriage is ready, your Highness.”

“Thank you, Mila,” Vanessa responded. “Can you fetch the princess for me, please?”

“Yes, your Highness.” Mila started to scurry off, but the Empress caught her gently by the shoulder.

“Vanessa. As I’ve told you countless times, you may call me Vanessa.”

“Yes, your…” Her eyes widened at her mistake. She was practically shaking. “Apologies, your… Empress Vanessa.”

She scampered away like her life depended on it. Vanessa heaved a long sigh.

Minutes later, her step-daughter walked into the room, her baby pink dress billowing around her. An unladylike scowl was pasted on her face.

“Lissandra. You look beautiful, darling.”

“Where are we going?” Lissandra said, forgoing any greetings. “The servant girl said you wanted to take me somewhere in the commons, but she must’ve been mistaken, yes? Surely you know that I wouldn’t ever go there.”

“Mila was not mistaken, actually. We are going by carriage now. You are late.”

Vanessa half-dragged Lissandra by the arm through the palace doors. The Empress’s red gown trailed behind her as she did. Mila rushed over to lift it up, but Vanessa waved her away with what she hoped was an amiable smile. Mila nodded meekly and hurried away. The staff always seemed so scared of Vanessa, despite her efforts to seem friendly. She had never done anything to prove that she wasn’t, but she knew that her husband’s reputation fueled a lot of their fear.

Her step-daughter, who Vanessa was shoving into a carriage, wasn’t much better than her father. Nothing scared the Empress more than the fear that the heir had taken after the Emperor.

“Isn’t your son coming?” Lissandra asked, her voice tinny in the small carriage. The metal armor of the guards beside them clinked as the carriage bumped over rocks.

“I’ve taken Miach here countless times and he has never been even half as whiny as you, darling.”

Lissandra scowled. She seemed to dislike her half-brother even more than she disliked her step-mother, and for no reason Vanessa could think of other than that he was kind. Much kinder than Lissandra, and more well-liked than her. More poised, more respectful.

The people loved him. They didn’t seem to have much of an opinion of Lissandra other than that she was beautiful. That she was—she had, thankfully, taken after the Emperor’s first wife. While his internal ugliness showed itself on the outside in the form of his crooked nose and balding head, Lissandra’s was concealed. At least for now, it was.

But the people would find out. They would know by the second they realized that she had taken after her father that she was going to ruin them. Vanessa hadn’t forgotten what the people used to call him—The Shepherd, as he would wrangle his citizens around like animals. Others said it was because he had taken so much money from them that all the melted gold that made his crown was from coins stolen from shepherds and bakers and millers.

Or at least they used to call him that. She wasn’t sure what they were saying anymore. It had been so many years since she had been one of them.

The carriage came to a stop.

“Oh, thank God. The ride was horribly bumpy,” Lissandra said. She flung the door open before Vanessa could explain.

“Wait! Wait—” the Empress started.

“What…” Her eyes blazed as she turned back to Vanessa. “What is this? Is this some joke?”

Vanessa sighed. She let herself out of the carriage first, lifting the hem of her red dress and taking the outstretched hand of her henchman.

“Come now, dear. We’ll only be here a short while.”

Lissandra scowled and crossed her arms.

Vanessa put her hands on her hips and lifted her head. Look like an Empress. Act like an Empress, she thought, the mantra that she always repeated in her head.

“Lissandra, I will be very disappointed if you do not come from that carriage this instant,” she said with conviction. Lissandra all but laughed. “We wouldn’t want your father to find out about that guard boy that disappears up to your chamber every night, would we?”

Lissandra’s smirk fell. She stumbled out of the carriage, half-leaning on the henchman. She dusted off her dress, though there was no dirt on it.

“A short while,” she said. “That’s all.”

Vanessa linked her arm through her step-daughter’s as they walked through the orchard together. The trees bore beautiful, red fruits, like the shade of her dress, but not as artificially bright. Their beauty was true. She stopped walking to run her fingers over one of them gently.

“Please, feel free to take as many as you’d like, your Highness,” Jack said from behind her.

She turned to face him. He nodded his head cordially.

“Thank you, orchardist,” Vanessa said. “My sincerest gratitudes.”

His eyes glinted. “It’s nothing, my Empress.”

She smiled and plucked the apple from its branch, something she hadn’t done in ages.

“Would you like one, sweetness?” she asked Lissandra.

“I would really rather not. There are bugs here.”

Vanessa ignored her comment, as did Jack. She took a bite into the fruit and felt the tightness in her chest loosen slightly. The juice poured into her mouth, a sweet, sweet reminder of the life she once had.

“It’s exceptional, orchardist. Truly.”

“Thank you, your Majesty.”

An older, gray-haired man lingered among the trees, one she knew. He plucked an apple from its stem with a snap and placed it in a basket hanging from his elbow. He glanced at Vanessa for just a moment, then turned away just as fast. He continued his work.

“Orchardist, if you wouldn’t mind, I would like to roam around with my daughter alone.”

“Of course, your Highness.” He turned to Lissandra. “It was a pleasure to meet you, your Grace.”

She didn’t return the sentiment. After a moment of silence, Jack walked away, his face flushed.

“You should really try one,” Vanessa said, twisting the fruit around in her hand. “The palace used to get their apples from here.”

“Used to,” Lissandra said. “And I would much rather eat my apples in my palace after they’ve been properly cleaned.”

“It’s not your palace, dear—”

Lissandra took a step towards her. “It will be,” she said, her lip curling. Vanessa drew back, startled. “Once we are rid of you, I am to be—”

She never finished her sentence.

Her pale blue eyes went wide with shock as she clutched at her throat. Red spilled over her fingers, over her pink dress. Vanessa screamed as her step-daughter collapsed onto her. Her apple went tumbling to the ground. Behind Lissandra was the same gray-haired man, holding a dagger slick with blood.

“Had to shut her up,” he said. He didn’t even try running.

Vanessa held Lissandra upright. “Lissandra? Lissandra!”

Her step-daughter tried to speak, but nothing fell from her lips but red.

It wasn’t long before the guards came tumbling towards them, seizing the old man’s hands and wrestling them behind his back. One of them jerked him forwards, into the carriage.

“The Emperor would like to have words with you, traitor,” the guard spat. “And they will not be pleasant.”

With one last glance at Vanessa, the man was hurled into the carriage, his arms still restricted.

“Your Majesty,” the other guard said, suddenly beside her. He looked down at Lissandra with sorrowful eyes. “Is she alive?” he whispered.

Vanessa was kneeling now, Lissandra’s head in her lap as the blood seeped into the soil and the Empress’s red dress. Her eyes were cold and lifeless, the scowl finally gone from her face. Vanessa’s hand rested at the crook of Lissandra’s mutilated neck, empty without the feel of a pulse.

“No,” Vanessa whispered, her eyes prickling with tears.

***

“Mother?”

Vanessa whirled around. She had been on edge since the events of that afternoon.

But it was just her son.

“Miach,” she said, running towards him and cradling him in her arms. He was already dressed in black. He must’ve known.

He wrapped his arms around his mother weakly and sobbed against her chest. She held him tighter, running her hands through his hair.

“Hush,” she said, her voice breaking at the sound of his tears. “Hush, my child. It will be alright.”

“I don’t know what to do,” he whimpered. “I don’t know what to do.”

“I know,” Vanessa whispered into his hair. “But you will. You’ll have to.”

He drew back. His brown eyes were enormous, still glossy with tears. “What?”

“You’re to be an Emperor,” she said. “You’ll have to learn. I’m here for you, Miach.”

She held him for a long while, holding his weight as well as the weight in her chest. She struggled to stay strong for him, but one of them had to.

Look like an Empress. Act like an Empress. Look like an Empress. Act like an Empress. Look like an Empress. Act like an Empress.

***

“Your Majesty,” said the guard, rising to his feet as Vanessa approached the cells. “How may I be of service?”

“I would like to speak to the prisoner. The one who k—” She broke off and took a long, heaving breath. “The orchardist.”

“O-of course,” he stammered, then gestured for another guard to follow her.

“No,” she said, holding up her hand like an Empress would. She held her head high. “I would like to go alone.”

“Are you sure, your Highness? The prisoner is—”

“You heard me. Do your job,” she said, stepping into the room. After a moment of hesitation, the doors slowly creaked before slamming shut behind her.

And she was sealed into the room, alone with the prisoner.

“Your Highness,” he crooned.

“Save it,” she said.

“You seem upset. Have I done something to upset you?”

She looked away from him, down to her hands that were delicately folded together in front of her waist. She had scrubbed for hours, washing the blood clean from her skin even after the red had disappeared, but she could still feel it on her hands, on her throat, on her chest.

“Vanessa?” he said.

She still didn’t look at him.

“Miach came by here earlier. He has your brown eyes, you know,” the prisoner said. “He was practically trembling before me. I take it you haven’t told him?”

“No,” she said. “He needn’t know.”

“Ah, the sacrifices a parent makes for their child…” he said, running a calloused hand over his bristly stubble. “Tell me, Vanessa, am I to rot of old age in this cell? Or does the Emperor have plans for me?”

“We have plans for you,” she said softly. “You are to be executed tomorrow morning.”

He nodded. “I should’ve known.”

She forced her head up to look at him. She took a few steps forward and wrapped her hands around the bars of his cell.

“Thank you, Father,” she said. “Thank you for honoring our deal." She took a deep breath in. "And I’m sorry.” She walked away, head held high and heart heavier than bricks.