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Camilla doesn't remember having fond memories of her mother. She grew up reading books of children and their mothers' gentle embrace. She learns that a mother was kind, that a mother was selfless. A mother would do everything to protect their child, even if it meant losing their own life.
Camilla figures that the woman known as her mother did not quite abide with those “rules”. The woman who birthed her did not caress her cheek or sing her to sleep. That woman only kept her alive, kept her around because she was Garon's child. There’s a part of her that was bitter that she did not have the luxury of a loving parent. That part of her disappeared the first winter of the period that would be known as the concubine wars.
That night, she suits up in armor from the orders of her mother.
Camilla pulls on a pair of leather gloves, and tightens her grip on the hand axe. A stray wind blows into the room and the lamp flickers, the flame licking at the castle walls. Should the lamp fall, the carpet would surely catch on fire. Perhaps the fire would spread, burning the furniture and the walls until the entire castle crumbled. Camilla shivers and breathes in the cold air. She’s strangely calm, even though she knows that this night could be her last. Now is not the time to be relaxed, or calm. Now is the time to survive.
Her thoughts are interrupted when her mother closes the window. The glass panes fit together with a resounding click.
"Someone's here," She states, her voice raw from the wind. "They're coming for us."
Camilla's mother steps away and selects javelin from the chest. She handles it roughly, the way that a bandit or mercenary would hold a weapon. She was never an elegant or graceful woman; to her, grace was unnecessary. Strength was what truly mattered.
"We'll kill them," Camilla's mother faces her sharply. Dark eyes glisten under a mane of purple hair. "This is a game of survival. Don't hesitate to kill. It's the only way you'll make it out alive."
"Yes, mother." Camilla restrains herself from mouthing her mother’s words as she says them, this phrase that she’s heard more than a million times.
There's a moment of silence, before a figure bursts in through the window feet first.
The panes crack and crumble. The glass fragments are a splash of clear water. Fragments spray and scatter, glistening as they catch slivers of golden lamplight. Taking a combative stance, the person whips out a dagger. The person lunges at Camilla’s mother. Camilla steps back as the older woman parries a hit and counterattacks.
Another gust of wind comes through the window, bringing with it small grey snowflakes and a second figure. They clamber through the window and perch on the sill. Camilla moves quick and throws her axe, hitting the person in the chest. The figure teeters before falling backwards. There’s no sound as the body hits the snow below.
Camilla's mother and the other assassin are still engaged in combat. One moves quickly and brashly, the other slower but precise. Camilla doesn't dare interfere barehanded. The assassin strikes again, a precise hit in the chink of the woman's armor, right between her shoulder and collar. Yelling in pain, Camilla's mother drops the weapon and shrinks away.
Panic hits Camilla like an avalanche, crushing her breath from her lungs. She throws away all reasoning and lunges at the assassin. As she barrels into them, they throw their dagger in a desperate attempt to break free. The two crash to the ground in a heap. Camilla pins them down. Both of her hands wind around their neck, squeezing tightly. She can feel the heartbeat against her fingers. The person thrashes and struggles, before their heartbeat fades and the person stills.
She’s trembling.
Camilla wobbles onto her knees. Behind her, her mother is splayed on the carpet. The dagger that missed Camilla is sheathed in her mother’s jugular. When Camilla kneels next to her, the woman is already dead. The carpet is damp with blood. The liquid sticks onto her skin in a way that her mother never would. Her chest is numb, empty. For years, she had known that this day would come. She expected tears, guilt, or maybe even some kind of regret for not loving her mother. She expected to feel heavier. But she never knew that she would feel so light.
The casts moving shadows on her mother’s face. She almost looks beautiful, when her eyes are closed. She almost looks gentle, when her mouth isn’t twisted. She almost looks kind, the way a mother should.
Camilla rises and removes the mask of the dead assassin. On their face, is a painted emblem of another of Garon’s concubines. The one who hired them. Camilla vaguely remembers seeing this one in the castle, a thin, pallid looking woman, and her son, a blonde and graceful boy. One of her siblings.
The sound of footsteps nearing the door causes Camilla to shoot up to her feet. She grabs the javelin her mother dropped, handle still warm from her mother’s tight grip. The door creaks open, and a boy- no, he's a man now enters the room.
Garon’s favorite prince looks regal in a way that she doesn't remember. Xander carries himself with new confidence was absent a few years ago. He observes the scene in the room.
"She's dead, yes?"
"Of course."
"I'll ask father to arrange a funeral." Xander walks to Camilla, who lowers her weapon. He holds out his hand stiffly. "I believe that we have not been properly introduced yet. You are Camilla, if I am not mistaken."
Camilla eyes the hand warily before shaking it. "You aren't mistaken, crown prince." His grip is firm. Camilla’s is firmer.
Xander visibly flinches at the name. "Please, call me Xander." He waits for Camilla's acknowledgement. "I have a proposal for you. It involves the war, and our survival."
"Go ahead.”
The man huffs, and she can see the tension in his shoulders grow. "As you know, only a small number of Garon's children will be able to survive these wars. He will stand by and watch his children be killed, until only the strongest remain. At times like this, it feels like my life is the only guaranteed one.”
“Are you feeling pity for the rest of us?” She sets the javelin on the table. “Because you shouldn’t. Some of us would much rather die than live another day as the pawn of power hungry mothers and a demented father.”
Xander winces. “I don’t pity you. I want to help.”
“Or you don’t want more deaths on your conscience.”
“No,” one gloved hand picks at the lining of the other. “I- I want to believe that there is still some future for our siblings. For Garon’s children. That there’s some way for some of us to depart from this war without bearing permanent scars. I want Garon’s children- I want us to have some semblance of family outside of our parents.”
He’s persuasive. "What do you have in mind?"
"I've gathered two other of our siblings. One is the son of the woman who sent those assassins. She disappeared this morning. The other is the father’s youngest. I want you to ally with them. Protect them. Make sure that you three are the three who remain after these wars are over."
Camilla swallows her surprise. She'd always thought that she would be surviving on her own, the way that her mother had expected her to.
The idea of taking care of two children seemed redundant. This country was unforgiving. They wouldn't survive, even with her protection. Especially if they needed her protection. Camilla didn't want their deaths on her hands.
In the end, it’s pointless. “I can't protect them and myself. If they need protection, then there’s already no hope.”
"They're strong," Xander states. His voice seems desperate. "Please, I beg of you to at least consider it. As much as I’d hate to admit it, I’ve grown fond of them. This war has just begun, and I hope that by the end of it, we will all have a family to return to."
With that word, Xander turns around and stalks toward the door. He walks with his back straight, held up unnaturally erect, as if he was putting his heart and soul into the task of standing a little taller while the weight of the world nested on his shoulders.
She is staring at the back of a child. A child pretending to be an adult. This weakness moves her, far more than it should have. It moves her enough to reconsider, because in that moment, she feels the way that Xander does. Like a child in dressed in an adult’s skin. A sheep in a wolf’s pelt.
True, she originally didn’t have plans for after her mother’s death, only that she knew for certain it would happen. At the same time, she can't imagine herself taking care of children, not when her own mother never treated her like a child.
When she picks up the javelin to put it away, she can no longer feel the warmth in the handle. And just like that, the shackles that constricted her body fall apart and lift away. Her mother’s heavy arms release her from their grip. Those shackles that she’d used for years as a replacement for a mother’s embrace are gone. She can no longer feel her mother’s presence, can no longer feel those chains that tied her to the ground.
She feels a pleasant flame in her chest.
Camilla is speaking before she thinks of the right words. She calls out to Xander.
"Why me?" She demands. "Garon has many other children, no doubt ones who are more honorable than I."
Xander turns around, and she sees a terrified child, desperately reaching out to people, trying to find someone to trust, scared of holding onto a faulty grip and falling back to the bottom. Perhaps this is the reason he follows Garon’s every beck and call.
"You are a good person," he says. "I can tell that much. You need not be honorable when you can be good. I believe that you would not kill your siblings unless they were trying to kill you. I believe that you would not kill a child."
The prince walks out the door, leaving Camilla to her thoughts and a room that reeks of blood.
All her life she has hurt and killed, fought to survive. She's done what her mother has, what her mother told her to do. Camilla has struggled and cheated, from the moment she was ripped out of her mother's womb. She's not a good person. She cannot protect or care for children. Not when she grew up suppressed with chains rather than being lifted with love.
But then Camilla remembers that a mother should be caring and kind and caress her child's cheeks and hold them when they're scared and sing them to sleep when the nights grow dark. All this time, she yearned for the touch of a mother, of a parent who cared. All this time, she yearned for a mother’s embrace that didn’t feel like cold, hard steel. Those children that Xander spoke of- her siblings, are just like her.
With growing fear in her stomach, she thinks that does not want them to grow up without the gentle touch of a mother.
The lamp doesn’t flicker, and neither does the fire in her chest.
The next day, she meets Leo and Elise. She sees herself in them, and hopes that she could undo the “unlove” that these children had been nursed with, that this fire in her chest could warm them. She’s selfish, and this feels like redemption. Leo is a genius with magic, and Elise is a bundle of sunshine. Camilla teaches Leo to never let his guard down, and the two of them (and Xander) become an indomitable force. They survive, Elise smiles, and Camilla thinks it feels a little bit like family.
She doesn’t feel cold again, not until her family falls apart.