Zaerie

CHRONICLES OF A RUBERNI PRINCESS

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      Aleksandra Mariya Alimar, is the third child of Vladrick Hieromar Alimar, and Ester Rose Alimar née Devereux. She was born in 1735, along with her twin brother, Kazimar Pierce Alimar. Born a Princess of Rubern, Aleksandra and her family lived in Rubern for four years after her birth, until moving to Haense when the war began. From there, the family began to split, with Ester becoming the Regent to Curon, Marius becoming the Grand Prince of Rubern, and their cousins in Haense. During the war, Aleksandra, her older sister Anabel, and her twin brother, Kazimar, had an advantage that many did not, they were on both sides. Aleksandra went through the war wandering between them and got to truly see the sides of the AIS, and the Empire.

Chapter One

Blood on Ruberni Steps

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      The air in Rubern was crisp, as fall was in full swing. I sat at a table outside the small Ruberni tavern, watching the grass sway in the wind. I’ve done this quite often, walked the short distance from Reza, and sat in an open area in my father's Princedom. Even with the start of the war, it was oddly peaceful- when none of the soldiers were about.

      I have found that some of them were quite nice to me, others, like Aelius, I detest. The soldier, if that’s what he was, had lied to me, been rude, and simply seemed like an all around horrible person. At first the man wouldn’t even tell me his name, calling himself Jason. He was insane, he called his horse a dog, and fibbed every chance he got.

      Aelius, while not making himself particularly noticeable, was accompanied by Flemius. I don’t know what to think of Flemius, at times he was alright, and others he was simply cruel. Today, it seemed, was a cruel day. Flemius, Aelius and some unremarkable men dragged a man through the streets, bound. With curiosity taking grasp of me, I stood from my spot, and followed loosely behind the bunch. They heaved the Haeseni man out the gates, I chose a place to watch on the wall of Rubern, next to one of my few favorite A.I.S. soldiers, Tankred.

      They watched and listened to the group speak, threatening the man. “These, Haeseni, are the same steps that I stomped the Emperors head on.” Flemius declared, the group questioning the man on his allegiances, and why he followed the empire. He declared that he would never desert the empire, that he was loyal, and their threats would not change his mind.

      I watched in abject horror as they sat the man upright, seemingly done with the conversation at hand. Curling their fingers to tug at his hair, retching his head back. My eyes and mouth gaped as the soldier turned their dagger in their palm, sliding it across the throat of a bound, and helpless man. The blade sinking into his throat as if warm butter, blood permeating from his throat, and washing down the front steps of the Princedom.

      I embraced Tankred for a moment, looking for any comfort. Yet there, I found none, I simply found a motionless suit of armor. Once I released him, Tankred left, and I, at 6 was left to find my own way back to my room, to emulate the memory of the gurgling of a man choking on his own blood, until I cried herself to restless sleep.

Chapter Two

Your Jewels or Your Head

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     “Maya, let’s go to the gardens. We can play Haeseni Chess!” I projected an antic grin that spread across my face, ear to ear. “Da, let’s go, Aleks.” Maya replied, taking my small hand in her own, as she began to lead me through the city of Reza. We walked from the bustling city square that faded behind us and to the courtyard of the Ekaterinburg. I skipped gleefully down the road next to my cousin, the sun on our shoulders, with the shade striping overtop our skin underneath different branches as we made their way through the leering gate to the palace courtyard. 

      From either side where shadows loomed heavy, two men approached us with swords drawn. The grins on their faces were sick, with Maya being eleven and me as six. As we began to back further into the courtyard, one of the two rushed in front of me and I couldn’t see Maya anymore. I tried to look around or move to the side but the one grabbed me and held me back. 

     ”Please let her go,” Maya’s voice was shaky as she spoke, but not impossible to understand. I still couldn’t see her, “She’s just a child. I’ll give you whatever you want. Just let her go.” 

      “Give us all you have, or the child dies,” I thrashed about and tried to free myself, but it did little to nothing– save giving me the chance to see Maya again. She was shaking as she brought both hands behind her neck to remove a necklace, and any other jewelry that was upon her. 

      The moment the collection of items were within one of the men’s hands, I was thrown to the side and sent stumbling. “Get out of here, stupid girl,” they spat as one lunged for Maya and revealed a glint of metal. A knife was to her throat and one of their arms wrapped about hers as she was held back. I went running faster than ever before, with one foot after the other leading me through the streets of Reza.

      “Help!” I yelled out, “They’re going to kill my cousin!” I halted within the square with eyes darting about for anyone that could help. Several of the people wandering about had turned to me and come forth. It all felt like a blur as I spoke with them as quick as I could and pointed down the road to where she was. 

      Upon my return, and to my abject horror, Maya’s head was lowered and she was knelt upon the dirt road as the two men seemed to be readying themselves to behead her, despite being a child herself. Those with me drew their swords and the two men turned away from Maya– with our cousin, Godfric, soon coming out from the inside of the palace to begin the fight.

      With Maya released, I rushed for her and we both ran for the nearest door that would seal us within the palace walls. My hand reached up to take hers as we stood there, heaving breaths and trying to comprehend the reality of what had occurred. Queen Milena ushered us further inside while the two men were slain for their actions. As we were aided, I noticed something in the corner of my eye. Maya’s throat had been lightly cut, a slim line of crimson clashing on her skin.

Chapter Three

Cages and Decapitation

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      The road to Rubern felt longer than usual, as I slowly began to decipher my true allegiances. Walking to the Princedom became a chore I had assigned herself. The dirt beneath my shoes was petrified in the frost, crunching under my unexpected step. As I neared Rubern, my heart began to sink, seeing a group of men in the distance, along the steps that I still saw pooled with fresh blood.

      As I neared, I saw my older brother, Marius, with his men. Behind them, human sized cages. I hesitated to continue towards the scene, peering into the three cages, two grown men, one Haensetti, one that I didn’t recognise, and a young boy. A cloaked man periodically flung pinches of seeds into the cages, and would poke the grown men with sticks.

      As Marius noticed me peering towards the scene, he strode towards me, proud of his accomplishment of capturing the men. Placing a hand steadily behind my shoulder, he pointed to the prisons, “Spit on the bad men, Aleksi!” he gleamed, though I stood still, and sternly shook my head, “Niem, That is rude. I don’t want to.” Marius glared at me fervently, “They’re bad men, Aleksi, they deserve it.” slowly, I took a step back from Marius, moving out of his hold. “Niem, It’s rude. They’re people.” He turned fully to look at me, a fiery expression growing on his face. “You’re too much like Amja. Too soft.” he spat his words, before turning back to the Prisoners.

      To the prisoners, and to the people surrounding them, throwing seeds into their cages, poking one with a red hot iron through the bars. I winced as my ears echoed with the mans shout. The posters of ransom prices haphazardly skewed to the wood at the bottom of the cage. I looked at the boy caged in the back, though dared not approach, fearing being too suspicious.

      I watched as he was named as Leopold, Prince of Kaedrin. As my brother spoke to the boy through the bars, asking if he had been searched, and going to boorishly search the prince himself, tossing his sword, arrows, and bow out of the cage. Soon enough, the Kaedrin Prince was paid for, and returned home, though the relief of one less prisoner didn’t stand long on my heart.

      The echo of hooves, and unyielding steps, as Empire soldiers began to gather, facing off towards the large group of Ruberni. The two groups clashed like lightning, arrows impelling across the low clearing. I watched in horror from the gate of the Princedom, as I watched the Empire men fall, one by one.

      Ruberni gathered a number of surviving men, from a few peasant foot soldiers, to Duke Tobias Merentel of Curon. I sat near the square, contemplating what I had seen, and taking in what I began to hear would be done. A collection of men grouped around the slouched over Curonian Duke. Prince Marius wrote a letter to his mother, Ester of Curon, inquiring about a price for the Duke.

     While impatient for a reply, the Prince had his men bring the most expendable captured, who were to be hung. Given relatively quick deaths, I watched as the soldiers escorted prisoner after prisoner up, declaring them traitors that must hang. Eventually, my brother gave up waiting for our mothers reply. Duke Tobias was dragged up to the platform, where a Ruberni man removed his head in a single, adamant strike.

      Crimson blood gushed, splattering down the wood, and staining the dirt beneath, dripping consistently, the splash muted by the steps of Marius, heaving the head in his hands, and smashing it with his fathers mace. Gasping, I covered my mouth as Marius looked towards me, “Sister! Fetch me a box, or a sack!” nodding in nervous reluctance, I carried over an old potato sack, to where I watched my brother transfer pieces of Tobias Merentel’s head.

      “Come, we must deliver a message to Amja, Sister.” he said, motioning for a guard to escort us towards Curon, and along to Morsgrad for a small, yet peaceful visit.

Chapter Four

The Lady in the Hightower

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      I had wandered the halls of my old home, seeing only hatred haunting its walls through posters, paintings, and banners. I hadn't been able to sleep, my ears consumed by the sound of a man choking on his own blood, the echo of his throat being slit on the steps of Rubern. So I went to the garden. I was not afraid of the war, neither side had hurt me, and both had let me wander to my own will. Grasping the knobs of the doors and swinging them quietly, I stepped out of the large room, into the small garden. My silk slippers causing the frost laden grass to crunch beneath my feet- but that was not the only noise in the garden.

      I looked up, and my heart skipped as I beheld the scene in front of me. A small collection of uniformed men, climbing up into the broken windows of the tower. Darius, a darker haired man, paused as he looked at me in shock, obviously not prepared for such a visitor at this time. I knew what they were there for, who they were there for, and I was glad. I had dreaded the thought of being in Rubern when the Empresses head was bound to roll, and I had hoped to get the young Imperial Princess out of the palace before all this- yet had failed, as they wouldn’t let the two of us anywhere out of sight.

      I worried that the men would use me against my brother, Marius, to get the Empress out, if all else failed. I worried, but also knew that I would offer, if it came to it. To my surprise, they let me follow them and told me that I could leave if I wished. I tried her keys, tried to open doors for the men, but it seemed the locks had been changed, most likely to prevent this very attempt. “It’s alright, you tried. Thank You.” Darius had said to me as I inspected my keys, frustrated that they no longer worked as they had weeks before. 

      Climbing up into the tower, we reached the last door. The men paced as one attempted to unlock the door, but their attempts had failed again, and they found themselves wandering out to grab more supplies. Though I stated by the door, something told me that perhaps just knowing that someone else was here would help the trapped Empress. While they were out, the doors were slammed shut around me, by unusual gusts of wind from the shattered windows. Determined to get the Empress at least a small amount of freedom, the men slid lockpicks under the doors, and through the cracks to me, as I tried the door for the first time. “You can do it!” they cooed, trying to explain to me, at eight, how to lockpick a door.

      I heard the click, apprehensive that it was my ears tormenting me again. As I tried the knob, the door swung open to reveal her Imperial Majesty, Empress Lorena, standing on the other side. The Empress, slightly unkempt, though alive, rushed through the threshold, gasping as if she could finally take a breath. Soon the men had the other door unlocked, and the group rushed out, and towards Helena.

      Empress Lorena, reunited with her husband, turned to face me, “Milady, What is your name?” she asked, the group turning to where the Empress had looked to me. Bashful, I paused, contemplating my words, and the allegiances that my titles suggested, though I took the risk of announcing my full person, “Princess Aleksandra Mariya Alimar, Princess of Rubern.” “You betrayed your people to aid the imperial effort, we’re ever thankful for you, little Aleksandra.” The Empress replied, though corrected by her husband, Emperor Peter III, “It is no betrayal to come to the defense of man. Many Ruberni have been blinded by the lure of chaos -  you have resisted and demonstrated immaculate virtue. I am in your debt” The emperor gave a slight bow towards me, seeming unfazed by my shock.

      The Emperor began to depart with his family, though Lorena stepped forwards, going to embrace me, and pressing a kiss on my forehead. I returned the hug for a quick moment, “Welcome home.” I said to the Empress, before heading to my own home - Haense, not Rubern, shortly after.

Chapter Five

To My Homeland

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An Assumed Recreation of the Murder of Princess Alexandria, 

based off of reports, and journal entries from Princess Alexandria

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Following only a year after the escape of Empress Lorena from Rubern, Princess Alexanria Cecilya Barbanov ran through the streets of Reza, heading through the gate, into the snow cloaked forest beyond. She walked further than she should’ve, she knew. Through the snow further out was cleaner, stickier, it must be worth the walk, she thought. Leaving Andrik and Maya behind, her determined eyes cast out across the old Adrian plains. She had wished to get the best and most abundant snow for their forts, as she and some others were playing in the Ekaterinburg courtyard.

She mulled over a question asked prior. To enter their forts, Maya had proposed that each girl or boy must embody a prior King or Queen of Haense. Given, little Alexandria had only lived to see one Queen- her mother, passing shortly after her sixth birthday. What made a Queen good? Whomst was the best one? How could she ever know? Certain thoughts ruminated in her mind.

She knelt down, scooping the snow into her small satchel. Each fresh patch led her further from Reza. Yet, she soon found she’d no more space to hold this snow. Satisfied, her trek back to Haense began. As soon as the girl of nine reached the road, Ruberni men were upon her. They held the young girl by her collar, dragging her shrieking towards the gates of Rubern, where they would toss her into a cage sitting on the steps leading up to the town. The young princess cowered in the corner, her small body compressing against the stinging cold iron bars.

She knew no one of the crowds who surrounded her. Men clad in armour of different colours, different places. However one man rang out in recognition to the child- the doctor whomst she’d met prior. He sat with her, telling her of his research, his findings. Alexandria found small comfort in reading his reports- for she too dreamed of the day she might be a doctor herself.

The group surrounding the girl spoke of a ransom, teasing the weeping girl of a horrible fate, as a public missive was sent for her safety, though they failed to send the letters directly to the most important recipient; the child's own family. The men counted down the saints hour, taunting the young princess as they did, until finally they were satisfied with the time passed.

They stalked towards the cage, leering at the little girl inside. Retching open the iron, they took grasp of her and hauled the light girl out. As she feebly held up her satchel to protect herself from the oncoming attack, the men drew their weapon, her fate sealed. They stabbed the nine year old princess repetitively, as she cried out in pain, begging and weeping to be saved, to be spared. Her satchel would fall to the ground, the piles upon piles of snow littering the cell floor.

And, the doctor would avert his eyes. 

~

      I had heard the news quickly, the words sucking the air from my lungs as if a great blow. The twin of my best friend, Rupert, had been murdered outside the front gate of my homeland. Alexandria’s family wept tears of sorrow as they mourned her loss, a girl of nine murdered for gathering snow outside her home city, to build a snow fort with her siblings and friends.

      Walking from the Ekaterinburg Palace, I sat in my room and cried for my friends loss, though I soon became angry, then absolutely enraged. Pulling parchment from a shelf, I wrote what I could, though I was not yet as well versed as needed. Pouring out my feelings, I wrote pages of barely decipherable notes. Storming back through the doors of Ekaterinburg, and walking to my cousin, I heaved the papers onto the table. “I want to do something. Help me do it, Maya. For Rupert, and for Alexandria.”

      Maya nodded solemnly, as we went to her study, where she helped me draft the final version of my notes. We soon sent out a poster titled “To my Homeland” which was spread across both Oren, and the AIS. I was ridiculed for it by some, and praised by many. Though I knew what my words had meant, and I knew that it determined the state of my relationship with my siblings, nonexistent.  

Chapter Six

I Pray They Rest in Peace

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      I was four years old when war was declared upon the empire and its inhabitants. My grievances of war are like so many others with untold stories, who were raised in terror and saw their family slaughtered or ripped apart because of others being consumed by hatred. Children have been tortured and butchered without second thought, and innocent bystanders have become victim to the cruelty of this ever-war. The enemy has no motive other than hatred and blood thirst. 

      None of those affected by this war will come out the same, but we will do so together. We stand for unity and the strength that comes from it. I pray that memories of happiness will replace those of horror, and for those who are no longer able to obtain such– I pray they rest in peace.

Signed,

Aleksandra

TO MY HOMELAND

As issued and confirmed by HER HIGHNESS, Aleksandra Mariya Alimar, and scribed by private courtiers

To the Ruberni people,

Are you proud of yourselves? I’m certain you are. It is evidently such a feat of strength, to kill a nine year old girl. To the men and women who fight alongside the Morsgradi in their cause, I am certain you must feel accomplished in your prowess against children. As a Princess of Rubern, as someone who once stood at your side, I am revolted. I am disgusted by the side that my brother, Prince Marius, has chosen. You consider yourselves to be fighting for good, to be good, when I have witnessed nothing of the likes.

To an eleven year old girl, you threatened to hang her - Louisa Antonia of Pruvia, if her ransom was not paid for. What does a child of eleven have anything to do with war other than being another innocent bystander of the horrors? And to the Duke Godric, what ‘great sin’ have these children committed? It seems you to be two-faced rather, unable to answer to your own crimes and covering them with falsehood statements. How hypocritical these statements have become. There is only so much blatant aggression, so many lies and abuses, so many innocent lives taken any righteous man could tolerate. 

You, the Ruberni, and thus including the AIS, would willingly string up an eleven year old to hang for no wrongdoing. If Prince Leopold of Kaedrin’s ransom was not paid, a child as well, you would have slaughtered him. If the Empress, Lorena Christina, had not so valiantly traded herself for her child, what hesitation would you have had against taking a knife to the Imperial Princess - a five year old? There would certainly be none, as you had none against the slaughter of the nine year old, Princess of Haense, Alexandria Cecilya Barbanov. The Morsgradi and Ruberni people, those who stand with them, aligned with AIS, are a shame to all walks of life.

How dare you call your war for the good, for the right purposes. You are disgusting, shameful. You, my people who I was raised alongside, slit the throats of bound and defenseless men after taunting them of their demise and stabbed a young girl of only nine to death. You, my people, hold people in displayed cages, prodding them with hot irons, throwing seeds at them for ‘food’. You, my people, are no people I shall ever be proud of. I will never be proud to know I was born alongside you, with you, as a princess of Rubern.

The actions of cowards, willing to take pride in stabbing young girls, will come back upon you all. Come the reaping day, we shall be among you.

MAY PRINCESS ALEXANDRIA REST IN PEACE.

Signed, 

HER HIGHNESS, Aleksandra Mariya Barbanov-Alimar, 

Princess of Rubern