"I do not understand," Tish shook her head, "Why must the Rān himself dirty his hands for poisoning a ....a....creature like him?" She asked, her voice thickening with the usual repulsion she felt at the very thought of the Parthan Dragon, "Hadn't Percival proven himself by defeating the Dragon!"
"I proved nothing."
Tish turned around. The Vedaris parted like river water and from the middle of them emerged Percival Leonhart. He was dressed in black leather and furs- as if he was heading for war. Percival never wore anything casual. He was always ready for a fight.
"Until the Dragon dies, he'll keep coming back! For Benevia!" He addressed the room loudly and then his voice dropped to a soft private tone, "For you."
"Just give him the girl."
One of the Korenis uttered, he sounded bored. It made a shiver run down Tish's spine thinking how little her life still meant to the most of the nobilities in Rān's court.
"Is a single Saintess worth all this chaos and destruction?" Demanded the man, "The Dragon had been clear in his demand from the very first. He wanted the Saintess. So give him what he wants! And let Benevia be saved!"
For a second Tish was afraid. But the fear was not for herself. It was for the man.
"Percy!" She warned in soft voice just as he stepped infront of her, a hand on the hilt of his sword, eyes fixed on the throat of the man. "You can't," she whispered to his ear, placing a hand on his forearm. She could feel the muscle tensing under her touch, "Please."
He didn't listen. He remained still like a predator making its final observation before catching it's prey.
"Sverad Radov. Your vision of future has become as poor as your eyesight," Anton spoke suddenly. He looked calm and impassive, "Have you ever thought why the Dragon has kept insisting to take Teresa if she was just a Saintess?"
Everyone looked shocked. Even Percival. He looked back at Tish finally, his eyes wide with unspoken questions.
"There is only another Saintess documented in the history of Temple of Rā who had been sent off to marry a monster in the South passing the Zimogora Mountain passes."
Tish held her breath. She felt Percy's fingers wounding around hers. They felt scorching hot. Or perhaps her own fingers had turned ice cold.
"Saintess Rāvanya," Anton Veskar said the name like it was something holy and forbidden at the same time, "Benevia's mother- the First Kingdom Valdneva was at war with Maurya- a country which stood where now stands Partha about five centuries back."
It was a strange feeling. Tish felt like she was reading the story of her own life but in a book which had already been written by someone else.
"The King of Maurya had one condition to stop his aggression towards Valdneva
. To give him Saintess Rāvanya, a chosen daughter of Rāva just like Teresa here," informed Anton, "Ofcourse our ancestors conceded being the short sighted fools they were like our friend here," he gestured at Sverad Radov briefly, "And she gave birth to one of the most notorious Dragon ever to walk on the face of earth- Ravaan Azhdar, the immortal King of Partha!" he spat out those words as if they were insults.
"The Grand Conqueror!"
"The curse of Rāva's blood!"
Everyone paled, the korenis, the Vedaris. Even Vran looked uncomfortable.
Finally Anton looked at Tish. His eyes lit up with a mixture of amusement and sympathy, "And now. His only son pursues you."
Tish's stomach twisted and turned, bile rising up in her throat. Her heart was beating so fast she was sure Percival could hear it. She didn't know what her face showed but it made Anton smile, pleased for reasons beyond her understandinh. He held her gaze for three seconds too long before his eyes drifted to the Rān, "And even till this day, the entire Grand Continent suffer from his and his son's atrocities. We cannot let this happen again. We cannot give the Dragons another Saintess."
"Why are we hearing about this now ?" Asked Rān. He looked pale too but not from fear, from rage ,"Weren't you one of those who voted to send Tish to Partha as the Dragon Princess Fianceé a year back?" He asked, "If you knew this-"
"We didn't. We found this out only recently while deciphering old scrolls we found when we started repairing the innermost sanctums of the temple this month," Anton cut off the Ruler of Benevia promptly, "The scrolls from which we found such information is older than thousand years. Most of them are still undeciphered. We are yet to read the whole of it but atleast we incurred the gist."
It was such a perfect excuse that it made Tish's breath catch.
"Then we mustn't let the Dragon take Tish away," Vran said. He fell quiet until Tish looked away from Anton and her eyes found his, "Although it doesn't matter whether or not keeping the Dragon separated from the Saintess had any historical significance or not. I'd have protected her either way."
Tish felt her throat hurting. She swallowed audibly and bowed to the Rān again, "Vran Rān, I thank you."
Vran held up a hand dismissing her gratitude, "There is no need. I have failed you once. I won't fail you again, beloved Tish. Saintess or not."
Something about the way Vran had been kind to Tish for past few months had always unsettled both the Korenis and Vedaris. But ofcourse, who would dare to question the Rān?
But Tish didn't know what to do with this tenderness either. All her life, she had been scorned by most people because of her lowbirth. As far as she could remember, even the commoners hated her family. Joshua and Sara Williams- Tish's parents were rootless labourers who had drifted to Benevia from the chaotic West Land (also notoriously called the 'Waste Land') and after a few years Teresa was born.
But just giving birth to a child doesn't make someone a parent. And Joshua and Sara were barely surviving — barely human in the way that people stop being fully human when survival takes everything they have.
So they gave Tish away to the Temple- something for which she would never be able to forget or forgive them.
Like her parents, Tish had no roots. She was a Saintess in a country which had never truly embraced her. And the place which is supposed to be her motherland- well, she had never been there.
And still she had become the most important chess piece in a board she didn't fully understand yet but was sure it was going to go down on history.
It was then Vran spoke, almost as if he had read Tish's mind, "Let us prepare to defend Benevia and the Saintess."
"Let us not let the history repeat again."