Fantasy Kingdom of Secrets [closed]

[unholy__war]

Today, like many days that passed the time between the Spring Sunlet and the Autumn Celebration, was full of warm and gentle rain. It pattered humbly against the windows that populated the leftmost side of the castle, a room only Safiye called the library. To everyone else, it had other functions. Sitting room. Drawing room. Lounge area. Decoration. Anything but the room full of knowledge it truly was, teeming at the seams with novels imported from all over the Nine Kingdoms. Safiye had worked hard to see to that. She spent most of her free days huddled by one of the many windows, reading. Only here in the library was magic allowed. It was acknowledged in the pages of philosophers, artists, critics, wanderers. The King paid such little mind to this room and Safiye's project of it all that he didn't ever bother to vet which books came through, so it was a simple task finding ways to learn about magic. So long as it wasn't written by a magical person, it could slip through the stone cracks of this sham. This castle-like sham. This prison, more like it. And not just to Safiye, but to the many actual prisoners that filled the lower dungeons.

It was no secret to anyone that the royal family had their enemies, many of whom took great pleasure in exacting their dislike through the peasants and commonfolk, from ransacking modest farms on the outerlands to charging a "we won't kill you... today" tax any time they passed a border town. The true secret was how the King always managed to misread his enemies for his citizens. Safiye used to joke to one of her guards that, if one wanted to find a place where all manner of citizens in the Kingdom of Diyarbakir gathered, one need only to travel down a few flights to find them.

Even through the rain, she could hear them sometimes shifting about. Heavy chains, cries, it all sounded the same after a while.

Safiye suddenly shut the book she was reading, discomfited by her trailing thoughts once more. The habit of a mind that thinks too much.

She hopped off the windowsill and gathered the front of her dress in her free hand, balancing the book in her other one and crossing the room to put it away. It was on one of the higher shelves, which would mean she'd have to climb. On a stool, perhaps. Or a table. Or, Safiye smiled mischievously, on one of the guards if she could wrangle one in here. Oh, how she loved messing about with them. Such small minds, such large shoulders.

Just as she cleared her throat, preparing to shout for help, she heard the clinking of armor enter the room behind her. "Oh, good," she said without turning around, "you're already here... Come help me with this."

 

[Chives]

Dean wasn't supposed to be here; Dean wasn't supposed to be in this Kingdom to begin with. "It's just a quick stroll" he said "Just a little shortcut to Visivius; I'll be there in no time." he said optimistically. And after saying that about a hundred times and stumbling into bar along the way, He was now treading through Diyarbakir Castle to kill the king, all for the satisfaction and praise of the citizens, Or more accurately, in his case, a bunch of drunks who dared him to do it after one too many drinks, and offered him a little extra coin.

"This castle's a damn Labyrinth!" Dean groaned to himself in frustration. For the past 45 minutes or so Dean had been wandering aimlessly through Diyarbakir Castle. The halls seemed to stretch out for miles, and there were way definitely way too many rooms for just a single King and a Princess living here, regardless of their wealth. At least that's how Dean perceived it. Either the Castle was very large or the hangover wizards were working their magic on his eyes

"The next time I stop into a bar, I'm gonna avoid signing off on kill contracts when I'm drunk." Dean said, burping afterward. "Or maybe not doing anything while I'm wasted."

Dean stopped for a moment to regain his composure. His head was beating like a drum with the massive headache he had. He pulled his cloak over his head and gripped his daggers tightly on his belt. He continued through the halls, looking through every room to find the King. He passed a library but barely noticed the guard standing in the doorway.

 

[unholy__war]

The guard did not move. Safiye rolled her eyes, despite being used to this recurring flaw in her communication with guards who already weren’t the brightest, but wore mandatory headpieces that muffled most sound. Truly a questionable decision by her father, as a guard’s main function—to guard—was made more complicated by their inability to detect anything lower than a cannon firing.

She turned on her heels, face already flushed with a pitying smirk, and opened her mouth to chastise the guard, but what she saw just past the broad metal shoulders made her stop.

Plain as day, hood cast and hands alert on sheathed daggers, passed a man. Safiye looked to the guard, then back to the disappearing silhouette of an obvious intruder. In fact, she heard him clang about just a bit in the hallway. Eyes narrowing in on the guard, Safiye waited a moment and then—realizing what had to be done—she clicked her tongue and walked past the guard, shoving the book against his chest as she did so.

Safiye exited the library, pace lax, arms slowly folding across her chest. The man didn’t seem to notice her. Was he stumbling? Safiye suddenly shivered, smelling alcohol in the air.

“You’re joking, right?” Her voice echoed in the stone hallway. “You’re seriously joking.”

 

[Chives]

By the grace of the alcohol sages, Dean's hangover was beginning to die down a bit. His headache hurt a little less, and he went from complete vertigo to just a little woozy. The mission seemed actually possible now, his chances of success went from 10% to 20%, not bad odds at all. He faintly heard the clicking of shoes trailing behind him, getting gradually closer. He didn't react immediately, or even acknowledge the person following him. Despite how sloppy the execution of the assasination was going, and his lack of a plan, Dean surprisingly had not encountered a single guard to stop him during his exploration of the castle, or rather, a single competent guard. No matter how much noise he made, stumbling around and bumping into armor, weapons and other various metal decorations placed around the castle, none of them seemed to notice at all, like they were deaf.

But now since one of them finally heard him, implying that this guard wasn't deaf, Dean figured he'd do the next best thing and cut his eyes out. Then came a voice, an angry one; a fed up one. While grabbing the hilts of his daggers, he turned around to face the person following him. It was a girl; he fancied that she was the princess, and she did not look happy.

He never really liked royals or monarchs. The idea of it sounded ridiculous to him. Why does one family of a consistent bloodline or lineage get to rule? Why does one or two people get to make all the decisions for the kingdom instead of the general public? Most of the time he thought they don't do anything but sit up in their thrones and use taxpayer money for more adornment.

"Funny that you asked," Dean said casually, "It started in a bar as harmless banter. Just a bunch of drunks talking about which princess we'd lay" He walked a few steps closer to the girl. "But then we got to the topic of killing people we don't like; we started betting coins on peoples heads; the king entered the discussion, and." He stopped mid sentence, thinking for a moment. "And here we are. Here I am, actually."

Dean wasn't going to hold any information back from the princess; It was too late to be stealthy; he didn't even have the element of surprise since the moment he walked in; It was too late to be cautious; he recklessly broke plenty of things along the way. Right now he was solely focused on making the woman as uncomfortable as possible; he did that to every high-falutin aristocrat he met just to irritate them and get on their nerves; it was amusing to him. If the intimidation didn't work, his beer breath definitely would.

"If you'll excuse me, sweetheart. I'm off to commit regicide." Dean walked down the hall, twirling the dagger in his left hand. "If you try to stop me, I may have to cut that pretty face of yours."