Mary's Birth
One may as well start with the first moments in Mary’s life that came with shrieks and curses.
Mary, daughter of Euphemia and Fleamont, was far too innocent at the moment to mourn the imminent death of her parent. What should have been a glorious day for Fleamont turned into a nightmare. The scream of the parent in labour soon faded into oblivion so that those of their daughter rose. Fleamont is going to raise their child alone.
“Walburga Black, Grand General of the Ground Patrol came to visit mister”, announced a nurse.
The Widower was staying by the corpse of his late lover, incapable of moving. Walburga's step echoed as she made her way through the room. She wore an elegant black unitard, the same used by every high-ranked member of the army corpse but her's was embroidered with Atlantica’s coat of arms. It was a simple shield made of blue, for strength, and crossed by a purple line, for justice. Her’s had a white horse in the middle representing her devotion as a Grand General. Around her left thigh, a scabbard, where her dagger rested, only the ivory handle stood out. Rumour has it no one alive had ever seen its blade. A cape was attached to her metallic shoulder pads and wavered through the air. Detail mattered, her position must never be questioned even though no one would dare such a thing. Walburga was always respected by its enemy and feared by its people.
Walburga created herself as a legend. She apparently started to train for combat at six years old after she had requested it, so they say. She then enrolled in the army as soon as she was of age and climbed to its top until she became the Grand General of the Ground Patrol. Walburga had done it all by herself and that was a fact. She is one of the most fierce warriors to ever be in the army. She has fought endless battles and lost very little of them.
Walburga's biggest fear was to be seen as fragile or be associated with the weak nobles that spent their day longing and betting their money away -money they make on the back of some poor person’s hard labour-. Therefore, she needed an ally. Euphemia was her childhood friend and now worked at the Ministry but mostly by obligation due to her Aristocratic background than because of what she believed in. As aristocrats they had few choices of path : the Ministry or the Army. They united to gather information about people who could become a threat to each of them. The woman did not appear to be forced and we believe that only her pure adoration for her friend led her to accept the task. She was brilliant and discreet enough to not bring any suspicions about her real intentions. Aristocrats are brainless and over talkative, they never held themselves before her, especially during gatherings where alcohol was the only beverage in sight. Euphemia had even found out a way to learn a whole bunch of information and rumours of all sorts on everything and everyone.
Euphemia made herself quite influential, she threw the greatest party in Atlantica and funded the most magnificent events around the Capital. She knew everything about the servant working on the lowkey, she knew everything about the every marchand who stepped foot into the capital, she knew everything about the duchess and dukes or whatever nobles living in and out the Capital. This being settled Walburga could prevent any minor to major attack on them. Euphemia was the brain and Walburga the body. The most thrilling part for both women was that no one except them knew that, which is why it had made them so powerful. The two women risked their lives if someone had ever become aware of the masquerade, they had fouled so many.
“Fleamont, I am deeply sorry. I believe your daughter needed the strength of two to survive labour. She will have a great destiny all the same.” They both stared at each other in silence for a moment until Diana continued, “She will be trained, with my son, she will enrol in the army along with him too when they come of age.” No soul could tell whether the death of one of her dearest friends was tragic to her. Her face did not translate any kind of emotion.
“You are not going to raise her like a pig to slaughter in one of your pointless wars!” answered the man in anger.
“I will not indeed, she will be more… the butcher, in fact”
The grieving man opened his mouth to speak but was stopped with a raised finger followed by a small grin of the woman.
“Everyone out” she demanded, rapidly the staff was out and she continued with the calmest voice. “You see, Euphemia was, above all, a very honest person. That being said, I was not surprised that she immediately came to confess her betrayal. Of course, I wanted the whole story. I knew her for such a long time, you know. I had to grant her that, she deserved me to listen.
“Unfortunately, my poor friend had been reported that her husband -you- was having an affair with some slag bourgeoise and that she was also having a baby. How crazy. Correct me if I am wrong, but, beyond the fact you were living an outstandingly well managed double life, you tried to blackmail Euphemia into revealing why she had to attend so many aristocratic events. You wanted her to rest, for the baby, you wanted her to retire from Political life once the baby was born. She obviously refused, except, this time she had and enough and she threw at your face that she knew everything. A shock of course. I admit, I was quite shocked too, that you could pull two absolutely breathtaking women like them, but then, I remembered that it is the speciality of cheaters, to play with the most marvellous being of this country… but that is another matter.
“You tried to make her spill the truth after you promised -at least you made her believe that you promised- to fully commit to the family you had with her and your future child. You see the problem is I have this slight obsession of wanting a full control over what is going on in the Capital, well over what is going on everywhere actually.”
“I think we all gathered that”, Fleamont had dared to break the monologue, but still held onto her stare. In a blink of an eye he was face to the floor, hand in the back blocked by Walburga’s left knee, the blade of her dagger under his throat.
“You fucking dare to interupt me once again in your life and I slaughter you and every descendants of yours. Yes, plural. How ironic that you did not only have a daughter tonight but also a son. I wonder if that makes them some sort of twins…” Fleamont started to move under to manifest his anger “Come on, just considering. All the same they already share a special bond thanks to me. See I was so angry about Euphemia’s fate that I could not let the woman you dare to commit adultery with… alive. I want and I need equity, justice, for Euphemia. So your son is half-orphan too” Her voice went deep and sombre as she explained the fatality she put upon this unknown woman… The widower was so upset he could have killed her. Obviously, he was not in position to do so. Fleamont tried to free himself, but he failed. As a response to this rebellion Walburga had started to slowly cut through the skin of his shoulder moving toward his neck, she then continued.
“ So here is what you are going to do : I am going to keep you daughter and you are going to go as far as you can to hide yourself from me with your son. If we ever cross paths again I will make sure you never cross anyone’s path again.
“Why not kill me now.” spitted the man.
“Great question, because the will to do so is very much tingling in my hand right now. The thing is, as much as I loved Euphemia, she always loved you the most. I really thought we could bond over the fact our husbands were cheating on us and having bastards. She knew I married for convenience. Jaeger and I were promised since he stepped a toes out of his mother’s uterus. However, it was a hard pill to swallow so I went for a walk, regardless of the late hour. Her choosing you over me was… overwhelming to me."
“This same night, I contacted my ancestors. Did you know I could contact my ancestors Fleamont? No you did not, only your wife would have known that. They told me something very interesting about a boy at the dawn of life who would rise and sacrifice the birds who feed themselves from the skin of others. To be honest, it took me quite some time to understand what that meant but understood that I had to let Euphemia go, so I did not beg my ancestors to bring her back. Now neither of us have her. The other one was for the revenge Euphemia deserved to have” Finally, on those words, Walburga released her speechless and broken apart prisonnier."
She graciously knocked on the door to signal the staff could come back and then asked for them to prepare the body for its burial the next morning. Euphemia had taken care of the ceremony and made it worthy of what she meant to her Walburga. No one saw Walburga shed a tear except the walls of her apartment the following night. For the first and last time. She could never be weakened from a broken heart and grief. It was for the average person and she is not average. Few days later she was on mission again at the border. The next month war began as the Siberic Empire invaded the Meadows lands, historically neutral, but in practice they were Atlantica oriented, like most neutral places.