Chapter Text
An unblinking stare.
It is a look crafted from days of unyielding conference, months of negotiations, and years of ruling.
It is a look the two queens have mastered, monarchs like no other, both as fierce as a lion and as ruthless as a wolf.
They level their gaze to the other, making it clear with no words just exactly what they will and will not do.
It has only been a day since the uneasy cease-fire of the East and West kingdoms, rival rulers who have been fighting long before their current queen’s time.
In the Western Kingdom, the legend of how the East began the war - By encroaching on their territory, slaughtering the helpless farming villages that lined the border, and moving closer and closer until something drastic had to be done to stop them - That legend is proclaimed every month by the royal storyteller, in the kingdom square.
The people gather around so that they know their history, realize who they are fighting, and understand why they wage this seemingly endless war.
The Eastern Kingdom possessed quite a different narrative; one of how they were simply trying to put empty lands to use, their ever-growing population in desperate need of food.
Suddenly, the first settlers were attacked by Western savages they had not even known existed. What else could be done but fight back?
Yet, the West seemed to believe the dark blood staining the East’s pale hands was innocent, and when they retaliated, quickly, harshly, the Eastern Kingdom suffered more than they expected.
What followed was the deaths of soldiers fighting for a passionate reason: the slaughter of their brothers and sisters. Then eventually, it was because they were told to, and then because it was what had always been done.
This war was practically tradition, and not one easily broken.
But as two new queens rose to their duty, as those before them had done, as they gazed upon their ravaged, hungry, tired people, they looked into each other’s eyes and decided no more.
An unblinking stare.