Chapter 12: Chapter 12

Nya didn’t want to walk into the room where Alsys and her family were saying goodbye, but she couldn’t tell the young girl no, either, not when she’d requested to see her. She truly hoped this didn’t get to be a tradition, that every time they chose a new sacrifice, she would have to meet with him or her before they were taken to The Point. But then… if she had her way, there would be no more sacrifices. Alsys would be the last.

That didn’t get her off of the hook this time.

One of the guards opened the door about ten minutes after her family had been in the room with her. The parents were draped over Alsys’s small frame, holding her, crying with her. Unlike Gavin, Alsys was crying, clinging to her parents. It was clear the frail child was terrified. Nya couldn’t blame her.

She didn’t know what sort of an expression to wear on her face. Crying seemed to fit the weight of the room, but then, she wasn’t moved to tears, not yet. She was too angry for that. It was Nya’s sister, Eru, who cried when she was mad, not Nya. Not usually. For the most part, when she was angry, she just wanted to bust someone in the face. Obviously, that wasn’t going to work either.

Nya hung back until the parents noticed her and beckoned for her to come in. “Princess Nya,” the mother said, her voice cracking as she sobbed. “Thank you for coming.”

Nya bowed her head. “Thank you for inviting me.” She looked at Alsys. The girl was a good foot shorter than her at least and so thin, Nya imagined she could put her hands around her waist. She would not be a hardy meal for the dragon, not that Nya would feel sorry for the bastard. Served him right for asking for children. “Thank you, Alsys, for your bravery,” Nya said. “I can’t imagine what any of you are going through.”

That wasn’t exactly true. She knew exactly what the parents were going through. Having lost her best friend in the world a year ago at this horrible event, she knew that Alsys’s parents were oscillating through a range of emotions at the moment, including despair, rage, disbelief, and desperation. How could this truly be happening? What could they do to prevent it? What would tomorrow and the rest of their lives look like once they saw their child sacrificed to the dragon?

The girl stepped forward, her face swollen and red from tears, wetness streaming down from her nose. She swiped at it with the sleeve of her dress and then, in a jagged, cracking voice that matched her mothers, though higher pitched, she begged, “Please, Princess, please. Isn’t there something that you can do?” and hurled herself at Nya.

Her head came to Nya’s breastbone, she was so small. The princess wasn’t sure what to do, what to say. She smoothed the girl’s hair. “I know this is terrifying, dear. If there was anything at all that I could do, I would.”

Was there anything that she could do? Thoughts of her sword and shield came to mind. She wasn’t ready. Rok had told her as much, but she knew it herself. If she went out there with the child and confronted the dragon that night, they’d both be dead with nothing to show for it. She commanded no army, could give no orders.

“Would it be possible for you to speak to the king on her behalf?” The father was just as emotional as his wife and daughter.

Nya shook her head. “I’m afraid not. I tried, unsuccessfully, last year to do that very thing.”

“But our child is different,” the mother insisted. “She’s small and frail. The dragon may see her and decide to burn the entire kingdom to the ground!”

Nya knew that there had been other children just as small as this one sacrificed before, and while the dragon was never happy about it, he always took them and flew away. She assumed he devoured them and then went out for a deer or whatever the hell he ate the rest of the nights of the year when he wasn’t snatching children from sacrificial altars. “I wouldn’t want you to get your hopes up that there’s something that I can do,” Nya told them.

“We won’t get our hopes up,” Alsys’s mom promised. “But please, try. Won’t you?”

Nya found herself nodding, even though she knew it would only provoke her father. “I will have a word with him. But… I’m sorry. I already know it will do nothing.”

Alsys let go of her and looked up through her red eyes. “Thank you, Princess Nya.”

Nya put a hand on her head and said a quick prayer to Zans that she would be looked over, that her passage would be quick and painless. How that was possible, she didn’t know. Being devoured by a dragon couldn’t be comfortable, she imagined.

“I’ll leave you in peace,” Nya said out of habit, but she knew there’d be nothing peaceful about the family’s remaining time together.

As soon as she walked out of the room, she heard the wailing kick up again behind her and knew that they weren’t actually expecting her to sway her father to change his mind. But she would try. She’d made a promise.

Nya took off for her father’s appointed waiting room, Rok falling into step beside her. “Where are you going?”

“They asked me to talk to the king. So I shall.”

“You can’t expect him to change his mind, do you?” Rok asked, not scoffing but being practical.

“Of course I don’t. But a promise is a promise.”

She thought of all of the practical arguments she could make and settled on the one they family had pointed out to her. With a sentence forming in her head, she stepped into the room, bracing herself for the inevitable no. She hated to be told no.

Kin Zar was sitting in a chair near the window, his back to his family as the moonbeams streamed down, illuminating his face. He suddenly looked older to Nya than he had in years. She watched him for a moment, ignoring her mother and sister who were holding hands on a couch nearer the door. Then, with a deep breath, Nya walked over to him.

“Father, I’ve spoken to the girl.”

He turned his head slowly, as if he was surprised anyone else was in the room. “The girl?”

“Yes. Alsys. The sacrifice. I’ve spoken to her.”

The breath he blew out was heavy, as if he’d accidentally ingested all of the problems in the world and the only way to get them out was through the explosion of his own breath. “Why would you do that?”

“Because… she asked for me. She’s a tiny thing, Father. You saw her. She can’t way much more than… fifty pounds at best.”

He shrugged. “Unlucky draw for the dragon, then.”

“What if he rages over our selection and takes it out on everyone?”

“He won’t.” The king seemed confident in his answer, though Nya had no idea how he could tell what a wild beast might do.

“What if he does?”

Zar turned and looked her straight in the eyes then. “He won’t. It is the girl. Her fate is sealed. Please… don’t, Nya. We can’t do this every year.”

She knew what he meant--that they couldn’t argue about the sacrifice every year, but she chose to interpret it differently. “That much I can agree with,” she said, shaking her head. Nya blew out a breath of her own and went over to join her sister and mother, sitting in a chair near them.

There was no use in sending word to Alsys that her request had been denied. She’d know soon enough. When the soldiers came to gather her, to walk--or drag--her to The Point, she’d know.

Then, Nya would be forced to stand there in that dreadful tower and watch as the dragon swooped down from the sky and snatched up the child, ripping her from the earth, from this life, and spiriting her away into the darkness of night to give her a new home in his gullet.

“I hope… her parents can find a way to endure it,” Queen Shu said, her tone almost as emotional as Nya’s had been when she was speaking to the parents themselves.

“They can’t,” Nya said, knowing from the short conversation she’d had with them that her parents would never be able to recover from this. They’d be dead themselves within a few months’ time, unable to work or earn a way to feed themselves because of the blindness their grief would strike them with. Either that or they’d end up in prison, having taken their frustrations out on the state by attacking a guard or some other official that represented the royal family to them.

It was a horrible, miserable, awful situation, one Nya swore she’d correct. Even if she wasn’t ready in one year’s time, she’d have to figure it out, because sitting there, thinking of the poor child in the room down the hall, her parents and friends overcome with grief, she never wanted to do this again.