Nadaya, my sister, had always been afraid of failing the kingdom since she was little. I had given her the throne because I believed the people would accept her. She inherited the magic in our royal blood; I did not. And she had spent every day since proving that my faith in her wasn't misplaced.
Now she had given them a son they might consider unworthy simply because he lacked the gift that defined our bloodline for generations.
I stayed still on the window sill and watched. Nadaya was awake beside the cradle, watching her sleeping son with love and tears in her eyes.
She went completely still for a moment and turned abruptly. Her black hair fell loosely around her shoulders that slacked with exhaustion.
For several heartbeats, neither of us spoke. She gulped and smiled. “You came.”
I dropped silently into the room and walked towards her. “Of course, I came. For you and my nephew, the future king of this kingdom.” She rushed into my arms and I squeezed her against my chest, sniffing in her scent to ground my creature. She was my home.
We looked down at the sleeping child wrapped in white linen embroidered with royal crests, his pink face barely visible beneath the folds.
“He's like you, brother,” she said with a smile. “Two of the Council men already suspect he has no magic in his veins. What should I do?”
I tipped her chin to draw her gaze to mine. “The crown belongs to the person willing to carry its weight, not the person who possesses the strongest magic. Remember that.”
“What if they reject him? Like they did to you, like father did?”
“I will not allow you to teach your son that he was born lesser because the blood in his veins chose not to give him a gift.”
“But he has no magic.” A tear slipped down her cheek.
“You have to stop saying that. I had no magic either.” She stared at me and sniffed. “Yet I sat on the throne and ruled this kingdom. I kept it standing when people were starving and the nobles were tearing it apart.”
I reached into the cradle and gently touched the child's tiny hand. He closed his fingers around mine. “He's our blood and we must fight to protect him and his inheritance. If the Council questions his right to inherit, they will answer to me,” I added firmly.
My sister gave a small, trembling laugh through her tears and embraced me. “Thank you, brother.”
Outside, the first pale light of morning began to gather and I knew it was time to leave. I kissed them both goodbye before dashing through the window in a blur, my sister's soft gasp following me into the waking darkness.
I hope you enjoyed reading this short piece. It's inspired by the Freewrite #dailyprompt phrase "after midnight”.
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