Princess Mia Finally Decides to Take Revenge
Uh-oh. This is not good.
As she coughed some more, the dull, familiar feeling of fear started to creep back in. She almost finished. It was almost time for her to cross the finish line. But in the end, she was the one who held the hot potato. As the last person to speak, it was her job to give the most important word. And her throat was scratchy on top of that!
I think I can make this into something good. If I cough like this, maybe someone else will talk for me.
A wave went by! She only had to understand it. She was almost ready to jump on the likely helpful wave when a knock was heard on the door.
It was Anne, her most loyal servant, who came in.
“Excuse me, Mia-sama. I brought you a drink because I thought you might be thirsty from dancing.”
A glass of juice was sitting on a plate she held out.
“My goodness, Anne, what perfect time! Hack, that was really nice of you!”
Even though her throat hurt, Mia hesitated as she looked at the glass. Her throat would feel better if she drank the juice, even though it looked good. She would have to talk if she didn’t cough. Then she has to choose what to do with Echard.
I can’t get out of this mess. I should have thought about this while everyone was still talking. I wish I knew…
She took the glass from Anne and very slowly drank. She could stall for longer if she drank more slowly. A cool, sour but pleasant taste spread across her mouth. A lemon smell caught her attention. She enjoyed the moment.
This tastes like a sip of dew from a flower deep in the forest that was just waking up to the spring weather… The cool sweetness makes me think of mushrooms—
She stopped herself before she added “juice” to her list of people who would like to be experts.
Okay, calm down. Now is not the time to be poetic. I need to think of a clever thing to say to get Sion and King Abram to shorten Echard’s term…
She raised an eyebrow in thought, then took it back in surprise when Anne spoke again.
“Mia-sama, Ludwig has a message for you.” Anne’s face showed that she was very serious.
“My… What is it?”
“He said, ‘Go ahead and do what you think is right; we’ll take care of the rest.’” Anne put her hand on her chest slowly. “I’m of same opinion here, milady. Do whatever you think you need to do. We’ve got your back no matter what happens after that.”
“Anne…”
She told her helper and four-eyes thank you in a soft voice, but she kept that one to herself. As she closed her eyes, she thought about Anne’s last act of loyalty all those years ago and Ludwig’s unwavering desire to save the empire. She heard an echo of his “I’ll do something about it” phrase, which he used for every situation and never grimaced.
Wait! He did grimace. He also scowled alot. And frowned. And glared. Oho ho, that’s so nostalgic. She laughed softly. We sure did travel a lot. All over the kingdom. Even though I did most of the work, I guess I should give the stupid four-eyes some credit. He also helped. I’d say it’s a six-four split between us…
Really, it was more like two-eight. Then again, she was a real pain sometimes, so maybe one? Still, more than zero, for sure! She really did help! From time to time!
It was too bad that her attempts were not going to pay off. The seeds that she and Ludwig worked so hard to plant had died in the ground.
Huh. You know what? It makes me mad to think about this. I did a lot of work. It’s not right!
She felt a wave of anger rise up in her chest. She felt something that was a mix of anger and frustration. She thought at that moment that this might be her chance to get back at him.
Yes, that is true… This kind of chance doesn’t come up very often. I should get back at you! Okay, let’s even things out!
Once Mia established her goal, she felt quickly better. She took one more sip of juice to make sure her throat was perfectly clear.
“Thank you, Anne. Thank you very much for the drink.”
She put the glass back on the dish and turned back to face the crowd. They kept quiet until she spoke. She put her hand to her chin and let out a huff with what she thought was stately grandeur.
Her voice was serious as she said, “We must all reap what we sow…”
That was the most important thing she had ever learned and would never forget it.
“We must reap the fruits of our labor, no matter what kind of seeds they are or whether they grow into fortune or tragedy.” That’s how things are. “Your Majesty, don’t you agree?” She looked at Abram to make sure.
The king looked very wise in his eyes. “Yes. That really is the way things work…”
When she heard him confirm that what she said was true, she felt a strong emotion: anger. She was mad. Why wouldn’t she be? It was so not fair! What does that mean? If she plants a bad seed, she will have to reap whatever terrible thing grows from it? Even though she knew it would ruin her life? There are no second chances. No making things right. Only her destruction, which was unavoidable.
That can’t be right!
It was a repudiation in anything she had done to change her life. To hell with it, she went so far as to jump back in time. To find out that all your hard work was for nothing… That made her very angry.
So, she looked at the outlet of her revenge. Cut Echard’s sentence down and end the case? Everyone shakes hands, and this is never brought up again, right? No! Such vague answers would no longer make her happy. She wanted satisfaction! She wanted payback!
She spoke with her eyes closed and a voice filled with a religious seriousness. “It is certainly true that one must reap what they sow… But now is not the time to reap.”
She stopped, giving her words a sense of completion, and then she went on.
“Every flower, no matter what it looks like or what it smells like, starts as a seed. After the seed is planted, it needs to sprout, grow, and bloom before it can bear food that is useful. But it takes time to do that. We should give Prince Echard some time. He will get what he has sown one day, but we should let that day come, right?”
She asked for more time.
“So, you want to suggest…a suspended sentence?” Sion asked.
Mia gave him a nod that said, That took the words right out of my mouth.
“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean.”
But getting the time wasn’t enough. We had to use that time.
“In addition…” She then explained what the pardon was for. “If he plants more seeds after that… Not the same. Good ones. And a huge number of them, then maybe…”
Her eyes became very far away, as if she were looking through time itself at a past that could never be recovered, looking for the shape of a loyal subject she would never see again.
“Maybe even seeds of guilt can be killed in their tracks, never to grow…”
A little shaking went through her voice, like when someone prayed really hard for something. In her words, there was an earnest prayer that Mia from a different time had been pleading with god to hear. A hope. A wish. one that she had shared with eyes that were filled with nostalgia. They had fought together, painfully aware that they had to reap the ruinous seeds that were sown so deeply in Tearmoon soil while still trying to find a way to keep them dormant. The Mia of that time had worked hard but in vain to make something else happen, one in which the seeds would fall to the ground without sprouting.
She tried to make things right. She might have been stupid to do that. Maybe there is no such thing as forgiveness, and the reaping of seeds sown was as certain as the sun and moon going around and around.
But that makes no sense! Do I deserve to be destroyed just because I made one mistake? Without a chance to make it up? Not acceptable! I’m going to show you right now that that can’t be how it works! Using Prince Echard!
Mia had a dream. In that dream, Echard went back to Sunkland atoned and victorious. In his dream, people cheered for all the good things he did, glad that his death had been avoided. It was also a dream about herself, about a past that was cut short and a future that could have happened.
She was going to make her dream come true. When she did, she would finally tell those seeds what she had been meaning to say for a long time.
“Serves you right!”
To laugh as you stand over their dry bodies, their threatened consequences forever rotted. That would be her revenge.
I wasn’t given a second chance before, but I’ll take it this time! I’ll give out so many! Everybody gets a second chance!
Cause and effect could go eat dirt. They couldn’t reap because she brought a hammer instead of a sickle!
“I see… So that’s what the Great Wisdom of the Empire thinks,” Sion said in a low voice. He smiled. “Mia, every time you’re…”
He got off track, and the feeling that wasn’t said was lost in the endless void of thoughts that were unvoiced. He turned to Echard and let out a short sigh.
