A Tale of Two Kingdoms

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Love between two people from opposing, warring kingdoms.
13.5k words
4.64
673.8k
43

Part 1 of the 2 part series

Updated 10/16/2022
Created 11/04/2011
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The setting is fantasy, depicting a time similar to the Medieval era in some aspects but also a completely fabricated world in others. Apologies for any grammatical errors; did try my best! Story is just a bit of fun - hope you enjoy.

Eight years ago

Ysabel yawned as boredom and restlessness settled in and her carelessness almost cost her a broken neck. Quickly securing her grip around the solid tree branch again, she tentatively peered down...and down. How had she managed to crawl up such a towering tree in the first place with her aching fear of heights? Well, from the events of this afternoon it would seem that that was what self-preservation did for you - it made you brave, albeit transiently.

The sound of shuffling, approaching footsteps below made hands tighten. It would be Rat Face or Three Chins. Or another of her tormentors. All she wanted in that very moment was to grow a back bone. But at eight, that was a relatively tricky wish to aim for. The memories of a happier time she often clung to in such moments, of a time when her family had all lived in the distant Kingdom of Naru, filtered through her mind as she strove to calm herself.

Just why father had brought them back to his childhood village in the cursed Kingdom of Sydnam, she would never understand. He was a physician; he could work anywhere he chose and yet he had dragged them all here and she hated living in this Kingdom with its prejudiced people and their cruel natures!

Even more so, she hated the way they treated her mother, for as a native Naru female she was treated abhorrently and each day Ysabel watched her beautiful and light-hearted mother withdraw further into herself. The fact that her mother also happened to be soft hearted, too, meant that the one thing she hated more than the ill-treatment was confrontation of any sort and so she had learned how to act unaffected and withhold the truth of abuse and internal suffering from her husband, who she was certain would overreact thereby causing graver problems with his proud nature and over-protective manner.

Of course, father was fully aware that his Naru wife had been initially ill-received in his village and he had made his displeasure of this well known but then, which of the men and women from this small locale would ever openly heckle and abuse her in front of him - a man from one of the founding and most respected families in the village? Not one - especially when they knew the cures to their sicknesses and ills were contingent upon his services. No, they just did it covertly behind his back.

And now that Ysabel's brother Lukas had left home to study in the city, things were almost unbearable.

Hearing nothing more, Ysabel determined hopefully that it must have been a forest beast and breathed a sigh of relief though she couldn't summon the courage to climb down just and at this rate she would be up here all day! And who would know to look for her here? Her father knew how she shied away from heights and her mother had always told her not to venture this far out -- and nobody was about to protect mama at home, she thought feverishly! She began to get worked up despite the fact that it was broad daylight and the belligerent boys of the village had more sense than to ambush their home in full sight. For despite the logic, the thoughts became magnified in her childish mind and she started to weep quick, hot tears, cursing herself for her cowardice.

"Are you stuck up there or just passing the day?" the male voice made her start hard but effectively halted her tears.

"Go away!" she cried out, not quite recognising the voice as belonging to any of her usual tormentors, fear making her slightly bold. "Go away or I shall get my father to thrash you! Then you will learn once and for all to leave me and my mama alone!"

She heard a brief, impatient curse before, "I don't know who you think I am, but you've clearly got the wrong person...are you stuck up there or not?" the voice was laced with impatience now where before there had been only wry humour.

Ysabel finally peered down, dizzy with the effort and with her fear and her eyes snapped shut at the sight of the Sydnam boy so similar to the boys in the village with their fair hair and tall heights. With his bony, unremarkable face and close cropped, severely parted fair hair, he gave the impression of harshness and his features in that moment seemed to blur into the faces of all her childhood tormentors combined; cruel, pinch faced and vicious tongued boys who had taught her what it was like to be hated just for who and what ones parents were and how to handle the misery and pain of such torment.

But as the haze cleared she realised that she did not know this boy at all.

"I can get down quite well," she called out, pride making her scoff.

Shuffling her small feet across the branch they were resting on, her movements were slow and hesitant but despite this she felt her left foot slip beneath her in a whoosh of motion and cried out in alarm as her two feet dangled freely on the air, her skinny arms and weak hands straining around the branch, struggling to hold her up.

"I was lying; I can't do it!" she cried. "I'm going to fall! Help me!" she pleaded pitifully, feeling her palms moistening despite the cool day and worsening her plight even more.

"Just hold on, will you? Stop wiggling or you really will fall on your face!" the voice was sharper then, an unconscious command. "I'm coming up to get you."

The boy had already skirted the thick trunk calculatingly before he had finished speaking and attacked the tree head on, climbing higher and higher with lithe agility and in no time at all, she was firmly back on the ground but not after he had brow beaten her into letting go of her death grip on the branch and forcing her to put her arms around him.

"What were you thinking?" the rebuking tones made her open her eyes reluctantly and icy green eyes meet her perusal.

Held by a pair of sturdy but very slender arms, Ysabel felt fear mingle with revulsion and trickle through her. Enemy! she internally cautioned in childish antipathy as she looked at the Sydnam boy as he released her to the ground but a muffled and slightly panting voice caught her attention.

"Who is -? Oh, Lord, I knew it! Ysabel! Belle, for all that's holy!"

"L-Lukas?" the sight of her brother after so long an absence combined with her grazed and cut stinging palms, the angry boy holding her and the events of the afternoon with the boys of the village hurling abuse, all combined to make her sob pathetically.

"What did you say to her?" Lukas asked then, frowning.

The boy, affronted, replied in defensive tones, "Me? She was stuck up in that tree and one breath from falling on her head! Why anyone would climb up so high if they couldn't get down, I don't know."

"I'm fine," Ysabel assured Lukas with a sniff, wary of the eyes of the strange boy assessing her tear-stained, grimy face critically.

Ysabel waved her brother forward feeling like an old crone with her aching limbs and hugged him about the torso.

"What are you doing back, Lukas? In your last letter you said you wouldn't be back until the end of the school year," she sniffed before a horrible thought occurred to her.

"You didn't get expelled, did you? Oh, mother will be heartbroken! And father will surely thrash you."

"Of course not," he rolled his eyes before getting all excited. "But there was a fire and half the building was destroyed so we've all been sent home for four weeks until they sort it out - though we'll have to make up the blasted lost time during the summer," this, bitterly. "This is Damon, by the way," his tones were off hand. "He lives too far away to have gone back home so the school decided we had to pair up and offer a room to another, so he's staying with us," his indifferent tone relayed that this was more a chore than a pleasure. "Well, come on. Let's head home. Mother's been looking for you."

*

As their mother, Layla served dinner that night (a special one in honour of return of her beloved lordly Lukas) everyone sat around the scrubbed kitchen table and listened as Lukas gestured wildly as he explained how everyone had had to be evacuated from the school. His schoolmate Damon, on the other hand, was a picture of reserved sedateness and clearly not one to outshine anyone, more than happy to sit in the background unnoticed.

"Well, it's nothing to crow about, Lukas -- I hope nobody was hurt," Layla chastised/


"And so now you'll have a month long holiday," his father, Lindsen Caselle, cocked a brow.

"I don't make the rules, father," Lukas grinned.


There, Layla fixed him with a firm look. "Well, I won't brook you larking about; there are still studies you can get along with independently or you could always accompany your father at work - learn about your future job hands on."

Lukas grimaced but Damon spoke then, relaying in polite and stiff tones of how he appreciated their hospitality for the next month to which Layla brushed his words away with a smile and said he would always be welcome. To which Damon blushed in embarrassment making it evident to all already half in love with the woman. Ysabel eyed him with thinly veiled hostility. It would be a long four weeks, she mused, especially now that she had to give up her room for the boy.

*

"Oh, hello, mother," Ysabel yawned, eyeing the approaching form of her mother through half-lidded eyes, sleep beckoning her as the gentle ministrations of her mother tucking her in soothed her.

"You were very rude to Lukas's friend, Ysabel," she heard then in a firm tone unusual to her mother's soft spoken voice.

Cracking one eye open, Ysabel looked ahead sullenly. "I didn't say anything to him," her tone was tinged with belligerence.

"Exactly. You behaved shamefully. He's a nice boy and I want you to treat him like you would your brother for the next four weeks," to which Ysabel raised a doubtful eye. "He doesn't have a family, you know. Poor boy."

"How can that be?" Ysabel's forehead puckered in confusion, having always lived in small villages where everyone had a family.

"He was telling papa and I after dinner - his parents died when he was a child and he grew up in a boarding house until some relatives tracked him down. It's a glad thing, too, for now his uncle is funding his studies to become a physician so at least he can make something of himself instead of face an uncertain future."

Ysabel glanced at her mother thoughtfully. He had climbed all the way up that blasted tree to bring her down despite her flying, slapping hands and hurled insults... Lukas probably wouldn't have bothered, she allowed contemplatively. He'd have most likely left up there to stew whilst he settled beneath the tree and taunted her.

"He -- he doesn't seem much like the other Sydnam boys," Ysabel conceded in a small voice.

"No," her mother mused on a smile. "He seems lovely."

"Alright, I'll shall be nice to him," Ysabel nodded determinedly, feeling a great sympathy for his plight flower within her. How terrible to have no mother and father! No wonder he looked so sombre, she mused. Perhaps that's why he seems so unfriendly and doesn't talk much. Before sleep claimed her, she decided that she would make him talk to her tomorrow -- would make him be her friend. After all, it seemed he could use a friend just as much as she.

*

"Listen, no offence - but your sister has turned into my shadow and it's starting to get to me," Damon complained uncomfortably and Lukas laughed.

"No use looking like that, you've done it now -- you shouldn't have helped her down from the tree yesterday. She'll be devoted to you for life now."

Damon glanced at his schoolmate, mild despair in his eyes, and then started at the high, girlish voice calling after him. He whipped around, his eyes sharp and light and a little frightened.

"Do you mind," Ysabel eyed her brother tellingly, her voice slightly breathless on account of her hurried jog to catch up to them. "I'd like a word with Damon." Her propriety tones made the boy in question cringe and his schoolmate chuckle.

"He's all yours," Lukas grinned and on a bow, sauntered off.

"Er," Damon rubbed a hand around his nape awkwardly, taking a step back.

"I'm sorry if I was rude to you yesterday," Ysabel's voice rang out loud and clear as she bridged the gap.

"I hadn't noticed," Damon feigned confusion, having more or less dismissed the memory of her cool mood and snubs, his mind elsewhere.

"Only, I suppose it was a natural reaction," she continued as if he hadn't spoken. "You were rude for one, when you helped me down -- and also..." she trailed off nervously before looking over her shoulder a little wildly in the direction of the loud, rambunctious noise fast approaching from the clearing.

Damon frowned at the child's restlessness.

"Well if it isn't the Naru! Feeling brave today, are we?" a braying voice called out.

"Rat face," the girl whispered, her eyes round as moons and Damon read the situation more or less clearly.

"It's alright," he said in wary tones, trying to placate her. "I'll not let anything happen to you," he gave a brief, reassuring albeit stiff smile at that before looking away and more or less dismissing her.

"And just who are you?" a bony faced boy eyed Damon belligerently as he approached and stopped just before him and the girl. A larger boy with quite a few chins stood militantly by his side.

"What's it to you?" Damon inquired coolly. He was shorter than the boys by quite a large difference and much skinner. Which didn't really bode well for them.

"This is a close-knit village -- we like to know who we've got living here. But unfortunately," the boy sneered as he glanced at Ysabel, "there are no laws yet to rid ourselves of those who aren't worthy -- and who don't belong."

"Last time I checked it was a free Kingdom," Damon arched a challenging brow.

"Yeah, well once upon a time there were laws in place to stop people like her from even existing," the boy sneered. "and it's time it happened again. We don't want filth like you here -- everyone knows your mother is a whore. Well, a dancing girl from Naru, but we all know what that means. No doubt your father probably met her in a Naru brothel, the damned traitor that he is -- his grandfather fought for our kingdom against your lot in the last war but who does Lindsen have the nerve to bring back home with him? A bloody Naru! She's probably riddled with diseases giving her favours to any man who pays her a bit of attention. Everyone knows she lifts her skirts for any eager cock. You're nothing but a whore's get."

"You shut your mouth!" Ysabel cried, her face crumpling, not understanding entirely but knowing enough to be hurt and feel protective. She glanced cross at Damon in surprise then almost as if she felt the tension and rage bubbling within him.

Where before he had simply been impatient with the two boys, now he looked damn right angry and his small hands clenched into twin fists. Damon took a step closer and the two taller boys opposite him took the challenge with relish.

Something within him snapping, his mind a chaotic mess as bitter words and memories best left locked away flew at him, Damon felt the need only to hurt as he was hurting inside as past recollections assailed him.

"You hold him down," Rat Face said with a wide grin to Three Chins, "And I'll thrash him. Then we'll deal with the girl."

There was no way Damon could take the two boys and Ysabel felt indignation for him having to suffer at their hands and it was all her fault. He was so brave! So willing to protect her; like a fearless knight fighting protecting his lady love. Except, she didn't believe in mushy things like that, not like her cousin in Naru who never stopped going on about romantic tales of old. No, instead she felt almost like a proud parent.

But as rat face hurled a handful of dirt into Damon's face, a hot, blinding rage overtook all other emotions and she charged forward when no one was paying attention taking the two boys by surprise for all of her usual meekness as, with all of her small might, she jumped with both feet on Rat Faces's large foot.


"You bitch!" he bit out as he hopped on one leg and made to leap and grab her arm but Damon took the advantage of his distraction to elbow Three Chins in the abdomen before using the heel of his palm on Rat Face's nose.

"Come on," Damon raised his brows at a bemused Ysabel as she watched the narrow faced boy moaning and crying and cupping his crimson smeared nose, and grabbing Ysabel's wrist, pulled her with him on a lurching run into the forest.

*

Feeling tired and wretched having slept little and fretfully last night, Damon tried as best as he could to be patient with the child as she blubbered. But there was something very pathetic about her in that moment that touched something within -- memories of himself some years ago, no doubt -- and with her skinny frame and shabby appearance, he felt reluctant guilt at wanting to get rid of her.

"And, well, there was another reason why I was rude," she continued, on a snivelling sob "it was because you were a Sydnam but I know that was wrong of me. I just have a bad impression of them...maybe you can see why now."

He sighed. "Yes, I see it. Is it often like that?"

She nodded.

"Well, we're not all bad. Take your father, for instance -- he seems like a nice enough fellow."

She ignored his attempt at humour. "But it's true what Rat Face said - about the things the past Sydnam royals have done to Naru people...it makes my blood boil!" she leaned forward on her position on the grass, her knees bent, getting heated up all over again.

The two kingdoms had long suffered from unstable relations -- for as long as time began, some said...though affairs appeared to have improved vastly if you believed the words of the liberals.

For the people in this village here in the kingdom of Sydnam, however, the loud opinion was that the people of Naru were uncultured, uncivilised and inferior in every way. The relative emotions around here when it came to Naru's were of mistrustfulness and derision, for hundreds of years worth of war and conflict meant that there were still people old enough to recall the stories from their own parents of the last war - tales of savage violence, of underhand tactics and siege and plunder (which Ysabel knew to be false for it was the Sydnams who had launched the unprovoked attack).

The crowning point of contention saw Sydnam, some two hundred years ago now usurping Naru and staking an illegitimate claim over it by command of the then King and declaring the two kingdoms merged under the formers rule. The event still cast a bitter taste in the mouths of the people back in Naru.

Rat Face, Three Chins...they were all set to enlist in the Sydnam army when they came of age. Eager to serve their Kingdom and protect it against people like herself no doubt.

In a close knit, small and isolated village like this, the arrival of the Caselle family -- with a Sydnam father and Naru mother -- some six years ago, had caused quite the uproar. The petite, dark haired, amber eyed Naru woman who had arrived one rainy day with her towering husband who clutched onto his half Naru, half Sydnam children had been speculated over like an exotic animal, for none had even seen a Naru before and had never desired to...

Such ill-ease between the kingdoms was precisely the reason why her parent's marriage was a trying one -- for inter-kingdom marriage was still looked down upon in some regions where people were still in something of a time freeze despite the rules of centuries ago being abolished.

"Listen," Damon said then, shaking his head. "You need to know how to handle people like that and not just...act like a baby."