Dear Goddess, please take your devoted son Alistair into your loving arms, Rosslyn silently prayed. Heal him. Make him strong again, so that he can lead the Kingdom and protect those who love him. Do not take him from us. He still has so much left to—

A knock came at the chapel door, and Rosslyn's head snapped to the side.

She rose from her knees and dusted off her dress before she answered the man at the door.

"Come in," she called gently.

Oran stood there, still breathing heavily, face slightly flushed and sweaty. He had clearly rushed to the chapel.

"Your Highness, at your orders, your father—"

"He is awake?" Rosslyn asked.

"In a few moments now, undoubtedly, he will be," Oran replied.

Rosslyn quickly rushed from the chapel toward her father's sickbed.

She had wrestled with her next steps in solitude, using the precious little buffer time she had, and she had decided to get her father's opinion before she made her irreversible choice. She had almost made her decision before, in conversation with Sir Jaren, but it was hard to follow through and leave the city less defended at a time when attack could be imminent without at least attempting to speak with her father about it first.

She opened the door to the room where her father lay abed without pausing to reflect any further. The time for contemplation was over. The moment of truth was almost upon her.

Rosslyn's jaw dropped as her eyes fell on her father.

He looked, if possible, worse than he had before. His skin was a strange, unhealthy gray color. His lips had turned almost white. And the King appeared slightly emaciated.

The smell of fresh food hit Rosslyn almost as soon as the sight of her father did.

She saw that somewhat had opened up a tray of delectable, yet easily digestible, food.

Of course. Since I ordered that he be woken up, this is also their chance to feed him real food. The healers had simple methods of feeding a comatose patient, but there was no way yet developed to get truly hearty food into a man's stomach when he could neither chew nor swallow properly.

"Your Highness—" One of the healers began to speak, but Rosslyn raised a hand to cut him off.

Her father's eyelids were fluttering, and Rosslyn could tell at a single glance that he was about to wake up.

Sure enough, a moment later, he opened his eyes and met her gaze.

"I—I do not feel healed," the King said hesitantly. "Was the process unsuccessful? Or has the worst happened?"

Rosslyn instantly felt a bit guilty.

It is selfish of me to have him awakened, she thought. But I need him to help me make this decision. As she looked at his sunken eyes and ashen skin, though, it was hard for her to tell herself that she really needed her father to help her right now.

What if this decision, to wake him and consult him, actually shortens his life? The healers had reassured her on that score, but they acknowledged that theirs was far from an exact science.

"R-Rosslyn?"

"Yes, father, um, the healing process has been interrupted. I asked—ordered that it be interrupted. I needed your advice on a matter of state."

"Tell me, daughter," he said, attempting a smile.

She nodded slowly, took a couple of deep breaths, then looked around them.

"Could everyone else leave the room, please?" she asked in a quiet but firm voice.

The healers immediately stepped away from the King's bedside and moved toward the door. As Rosslyn turned her head to watch, she saw Oran hold the door for them. Then the butler bowed his head slightly, stepped out, and closed the door behind himself too.

"A matter of high secrecy, then," her father observed with dry amusement.

"Well, secret enough," Rosslyn replied. "We now know the Demon Empire's attack is closer than ever. Less than two weeks away now." The King's eyes widened, and he sucked in a long, slow breath, but he said nothing, so she continued. "The dungeon also grew worse since you last received an update. Monsters are beginning to roam the area around the city. This will make evacuating the surroundings to the city very dangerous, of course." Her father was nodding. "I want to lead a mission to quell the dungeon." He immediately stopped nodding and began shaking his head.

"You cannot go, Rosslyn," he said. "The people need their Princess here in time of crisis, especially when their King is—" He gestured at himself and then grimaced as if the sudden movement had made him feel weaker—"like this."

"Father, you should eat something," Rosslyn began.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"No, you woke me for a reason," the King said, "and it was not to stuff my face. I will resolve this matter with you before I slip back into the coma—that is what will happen, yes?"

Rosslyn nodded. That was what the healers had told her should happen after the draught they had administered to wake the King wore off. Hopefully his healing would continue unabated.

"If there is time afterward, we can eat," he said.

The Princess did not bother to say that her appetite was quite ruined. Her stomach was tied up in tangled knots.

"Why would you even consider leaving the city?" he asked.

"Because the people in the countryside will be sacrificed if we do not move quickly." Her voice was small, weak, defensive. "I will have as many of them moved into the city as I can over the next few days, preparing for the likelihood of a siege. They will gather or burn their crops. But if the dungeon remains active, the city will be vulnerable to attacks from its creatures too. Many dungeon monsters can fly or climb over walls—"

"Then the Empire's soldiers will have to deal with that risk too," he said.

"The Empire seems to coordinate its moves with the monsters," Rosslyn pointed out.

"The beasts do not actually appear to be intelligent, Rosslyn," her father said. "So, even if the Emperor has a way to trigger their attack at the same time that he invades, they will still go after the Empire's people as easily as ours. They have no way of telling the difference."

"Yes, but those are trained soldiers—and demons, far stronger than humans." Rosslyn found herself reaching within herself, insisting with her father in a way that she never would have before. She supposed her mind had been made up before she ever asked the healers to wake him. "Even if we somehow lost the same number of people to the monsters as the Empire, which seems unlikely to me—we need ours more than they do."

The King nodded slowly, reluctantly.

"Fine," he said. "It is true, the lives of our subjects are precious. While they are evacuated into the city walls, then, dispatch a small group of knights, and have them engage—engage the dungeon." He coughed in the middle of the last few words, and he also averted his eyes as he finished.

It struck Rosslyn immediately why.

He knows that any "small group of knights" we send into the dungeon would be a sacrifice. We would be throwing all their lives away to secure the civilians…

Rosslyn began to wonder if the adventurers had truly been cowards for giving up on challenging the dungeon, or if the interior might actually be more dangerous than she and her father realized—and perhaps he had already guessed as much.

If that is so, it makes it far more imperative that I go myself… But delving into that notion would only stiffen her father's resistance to the idea.

Her father started trying to speak, but coughed again. Rosslyn waited a moment for him to clear his throat and try again, but that only unleashed a series of coughs.

"Father…"

Rosslyn stepped forward and picked up a chalice full of red wine someone had poured for the King, and she began helping him drink it.

After her father had swallowed some of the liquid down, a little of the color miraculously returned to his face, and he seemed able to speak and breathe again.

"Thank you, daughter," he said. "You are not eager to come into your inheritance too soon, then." He chuckled quietly and suppressed another cough.

Rosslyn forced her lips into a thin smile.

"Not until the Goddess calls you home in her own time," she said. "Death by old age, surrounded by your grandchildren." Rosslyn tried to hold back a little sob at the thought of her father dying. She failed.

"Grandchildren." Her father smiled, and a little tear trickled down the corner of his eye. "Surrounded, eh? That—" He coughed again—"that does sound nice. As long as you will be there too."

"Of course," Rosslyn said. "Where else would I be?"

"Dead, perhaps," he said seriously. "Rosslyn, a group of knights—fine—fine." He shook his head gently, and she could see his eyes blinking sleepily as he spoke. "It is fine to dispatch a group of knights. But you should not go yourself. Cannot risk your own life. The city needs you. I—I need you, I—"

But if I send a small group of knights without me, they will probably be senselessly slaughtered. If I send a large group, and they are drawn deep into the dungeon, they may defeat it, but I will not have enough men left to defend the city. The knights were some of the most magically potent people in the Kingdom, and they would be essential to the defense. It would be tragically ironic if the conquering heroes emerged, having vanquished the dungeon, only to discover that Wayn had fallen to the Empire. The only way this works is if I go myself…

As she stared at her father beseechingly, she saw that he was fading irrecoverably. He would be back in his coma shortly, unable to argue with her. He had set out a mandate—as good as given her an order.

But with the King locked in this unnatural sleep, Rosslyn would have the discretion to do what she felt was best.

Her father's eyes closed tightly shut one more time, and his breathing changed.

"I—I—" He muttered a few more words, incoherent and under his breath.

Rosslyn leaned in and planted a tender kiss on her father's forehead. It felt unnaturally cool to her, so she carefully draped a blanket over him before she straightened her body and turned away.

She knew what she had to do, to a certainty now.

Father was right, though, she thought. I have no idea what I might be facing. If I enter the dungeon, I have to do everything I possibly can to mitigate the risks, especially the risks to myself personally. Rosslyn did not hold her own life as some precious thing, especially not knowing the Goddess's ways. But her family and her country were another matter. If I do not come back, and I take a squad of our best knights with me, while father is in a coma…

The Kingdom's fate would seem to be sealed at that point. She had to do everything possible to ensure that she would return quickly, and alive, from the expedition.

I have to ask them for help, Rosslyn thought. Her heart sank. I will probably get what I need if I ask properly, but at what cost?

The Princess had no answer to that yet.

But she knew her duty. That was all she would have to lean on in the days ahead.

She stepped out into the hallway and walked until she found the healers. She told them the bare facts of what had happened, and they rushed back to see to her father again.

Then Rosslyn began to make her way to another wing of the palace.

She did not yet know exactly what she would say to the Dessians, but she knew that she needed to speak to them right away.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.