The birthing went quickly, it was barely dusk when the prince took his first breath and gave a lusty cry. Bronwyn did not fare as well. After the caul came, the blood did not stop until she was almost bled dry. When she was finally clean and tended, Gretchen offered her the babe, but the young mother turned her face to the wall and would not look at him. Her body felt more bruised and torn than ever it had after a night with his father, and the pain brought back treacherous memory.
Gretchen bundled up the bloody sheets and rags to burn with the afterbirth, and then gently bundled the baby boy in an old blanket. She spoke in low tones with Grahme and left with the infant prince. Bronwyn shivered beneath the blankets, the heat gone from her body with her blood, and from far away she knew that Grahme built up the fire and admonished the little dog to lie quiet next to his mistress. The giant sat next to her late into the night, keeping vigil and trying to comfort her as her temperature came up again and then soared, and her body shivered as if she was freezing.
When her sleep finally came it was fitful, and the nightmares were close behind, and she was helpless to wake herself to escape the king's hard hands and cruel attentions. The dream changed, and he chased her through the woods, his eyes changing, his face changing, until the wolf snarled and sprang at her. She fell, hard enough that her back and groin and legs felt like they were ripped apart, hard enough to make her dizzy. And then the wolf was on her, rising over her to snarl into her face. An arm pulled it off of her, and another came 'round the wolf's neck to plunge a dagger into the beast's eye, and she rolled to the side in desperation to find herself staring into the face of the dead king.
She dimly heard the voice of the Lord Chancellor in her dream, and moaned in protest. She was desperate to wake, desperate for the pain to end. Grahme's voice answered the old lord's question, and there was an ominous tone in the giant's rumble; she realized she was no longer dreaming. Bronwyn struggled out of the depths of her weakness, flinging aside the blankets and sheets that tangled around her. Standing, she felt blood flow down her thighs as she staggered towards the door where Grahme's broad back blocked whatever stood beyond it. She didn't know how, but the Woodsman's knife was in her hand, and there was such rage and desperation in her that she could already feel it sinking into the flesh of whatever had come for her this time.
She must have made some noise, because her protector turned to look at her, and she saw the Lord Chancellor and a dozen guards standing at the door of the stone tower, some with swords unsheathed. She managed to stagger between Grahme and the newcomers, blood on her nightgown, knife in her hand. Whatever her expression was, Lord Wilhelm went pale and two of the guardsmen stepped back a pace.
"This is not your place, Lord Wilhelm, how dare you come here?" She swayed a little and felt Grahme's hand on her back, steadying her. Rob Longfellow growled at the lord from near his mistress' ankles.
"We were concerned, Your Highness, that you would come to harm in your laying-in. Your maid told us of your pregnancy a week after the King was slain by dragons. We want you to come back." His expression said clearly that he wasn't convinced that Bronwyn hadn't come to harm after all, and his glance up at her protector was apprehensive.
"The dragons didn't kill the king, a witch did," she said bitterly, her voice thick with exhaustion and pain and the weight of that king's death. "She killed him with a potion older than time. Do you know why she killed him?" The old man's eyes came back to her face, and she saw fear there, not a fear for her safety, but a fear of Bronwyn herself.
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"Please, my Queen, my lady Bronwyn, please don't -"
She straightened, and felt the flow of blood on her legs finally stop. "She killed him because he held her prisoner. She killed him because he held his kingdom hostage and ruined his daughter and gave nothing to anyone but pain and fear. Finally, she killed him because no one else would." She lowered her hand, the knife falling to her side. "Do you know how all the other queens before me disappeared?"
The Lord Chancellor stood there frozen, pinned by her gaze and unable to look away.
"One by one, they cast themselves out of that high window, to find their deaths at the bottom of that chasm. Their bones lay there still, pitiful wrecks that found release from their tormentor. But they have had no proper burial, Lord Chancellor, and that is yet another injustice that I can not correct myself."
"Dear God," he whispered, finally taking a step backwards himself. "We never knew, I swear -"
"You never wanted to know," she snarled. "You trained yourself not to see the things that happened before your eyes, the bruises, the bloody clothes and bedsheets, a princess creeping into her father's bed night after night after he raped his queen."
"Bronwyn," Grahme said gently, and she could feel his warmth behind her, keeping her on her feet with only the single touch of his hand on her back.
"Take the babe and go, Lord Chancellor. I'm done with all of you for now." She began to turn and would have fallen if not for her friend's steadying hand.
The old man stepped towards her again, but stopped when Grahme put a protective arm around the woman. He knelt before them, tears on his cheeks. "How can we make this right? How can we earn your forgiveness?"
"Just leave me be. I've given you everything I can, more than I ever wanted to or would have given of my own free will. I swear, though, if you raise that prince to be the monster his father was, I will come again and strangle him myself."
"But he's your son!" the guardsmen looked on, aghast at the spectacle of the Lord Chancellor weeping on his knees before the blood soaked and grieving witch.
She laughed, and one or two of the men at the back broke away and ran back down the path at the bitterness and fury in that sound. "Yes, he is my son, and I should have purged him from my womb the first time I missed my courses. Fate would give you a prince, though, and I could not." Her strength and determination drained away suddenly, and she was left only with tears. "Go away, Wilhem. There is nothing here that will harm me, and much that will keep me safe. I will not return with you."
With shaking hands Lord Wilhelm untied a purse at his belt. "I had feared that your answer would be just that." He set the purse on the doorstep. "Your rents will be kept for you, or whomever you cede them to. The decree is in the purse, and enough gold and silver to keep you very comfortable for a long time." He paused, his eyes haunted, and Grahme stirred, lifting Bronwyn into his arms effortlessly.
"You should go now. The babe is with a wet-nurse in the village," the giant said, and there was a quiet threat in his deep voice.
"Take better care of her than we did, Sir Giant. She is more precious than she knows." Grahme closed the door firmly and lowered the bar one handed. Bronwyn lay quietly against him as he carried her back to the hearth, setting her carefully on her feet.