Foolish Queens.

ONE

Throne room. Attendants speak to the queen. She is young, supposedly inexperienced. A soldier enters; his time on the battlefield is recent, obvious. Disgust from the attendants. He is rugged and hardened, but kind. He behaves without proper royal formalities.

QUEEN: Leave us.

(Attendants scurry. Soldier comes out of the doorway.)

QUEEN: Speak.

(He remembers his place, half unsure of himself.)

SOLDIER: Majesty.

(He is awkward with customs. She patiently waits.)

SOLDIER: I…come to inform you that I am no longer fighting in the war between the Red and White.

(The barest hint that she is listening. He feels he must explain himself.)

SOLDIER: It has been eight years of defeats, morale is low, but our efforts lack possibilities for a stalemate, we face growing casualties from the conditions on the front as well as from enemy attacks, I fear that by three moons passed-

QUEEN: I recognise your face.

(He has not heard her.)

SOLDIER: Excuse me?

QUEEN: I have seen you from somewhere. Where have I seen you?

SOLDIER: I don’t know what you mean, Majesty… I’ve served as a captain for three years now, since the Eleventh March Movement in June-

(She is disinterested, knowing he is explaining the wrong things. How would she recognise him from some war effort? She was probably half asleep during the ceremony. It is no longer relevant, anyhow.)

QUEEN: I’ve met many captains but don’t have the mind or the memory to recognise them. Nevermind. You were saying? Desertion, mud, misery, pain, all prerequisites to triumph-

SOLDIER: -I just came to know why.

QUEEN: Why what?

SOLDIER: The war? Why are we fighting this war?

QUEEN: To win.

SOLDIER: And..what happens when we win?

QUEEN: We will have won.

SOLDIER: …

QUEEN: Was that all? Or did you also intend to announce your unlawful decision to the remainder of my court, in addition to bringing muck and carcasses into my home?

SOLDIER: …

QUEEN: If you are satisfied with your questions of ‘why’, then you may go. (beat) Unless-

SOLDIER: I wish to know more, Majesty. To win…to win this war is not possible anymore. Eight years ago we had a slightly higher chance. In the age of the ancients, a fighting chance maybe, but now…to fight is the coward’s choice.

QUEEN: Have your fellow soldiers deemed you wise enough to speak for them, to address me on the subject of cowardice and fallen hope?

SOLDIER: No, Majesty, I come by my own free-

QUEEN: And by your presence as a storyteller of a forgotten, useless war, you are declaring your oath - to this nation, your oath of unconditional loyalty to ME, to the good of the nation, the people you are sworn to protect…

(Fury, but he does not yield.)

SOLDIER: I do not declare those as broken things. I declare the war a war of spite and hate. It is a waste of lives and a waste of resources. There is no more to fight for. We receive letters from the scribes living in occupied territories, no traces of coded pleas for help. They live and are cared for, without need for bounties or ransom prices. Your orders to…murder those willingly joining the ranks of our enemy…I wonder who we are fighting to protect, I think of the Queen who is hidden behind curtains and marble walls while we fight arrows forged with crystals of the Fallen Knights. Who is truly wrong and what is truly right?

Majesty, we cannot win this war. I do not see it in our future, in the future beyond our lives and it would be foolish to believe anything else. Please, listen.

(He believes he is getting through to her. She lets him believe that.)

QUEEN: Wait outside.

(She will consider stopping the fight?!)

SOLDIER: Of course.

(He leaves the room, waiting on a bench beside the ornate, carved oak doors. A beat. He is shot by an arrow. The Queen opens one door, side-steps him and moves to watch her city under siege. She does not react, because she received a letter moments before he warned her of its contents: the war is lost, and she will die a fool today.)

~

Inspired by this song:

Thanks for reading and whatnot!

- Red 🌱👑✨