The Queen of Kings

Father

Her father always called her Kurupi which is translated as fearless. In her tribe the goddess Kurupi was worshipped, she is the goddess of valor. Her father always said that she was not like the other girls in her tribe and he was right, for at a mere age seven she would go to the Lions’ den and feed them sometimes, she’d sleep there till morrow with them. He always said that she’d get herself killed but she said otherwise and told him that she’d live longer than her children and her children’s children. He would only bow his head and say “let it be so”. She never realized how much she would come to miss those words.

The war between the Tarad tribe and the Nurubi tribe lasted for 5 years and during that time a tribe that greatly amounted to more than a million was reduced to a mere thousand. More so they had lost their chief: The great Chieftain Baladari Hurumnd. It was a great bloody war and the Tarad massacred the Nurubi up and down, left and right. They took their lands, animals, provisions and their people. The Tarad was merciless in its killings.

Tawvari had watched through her window and saw her tribe on fire she had been locked in her room since the war began and had not left either to see her people or for a breath of fresh air. She hadn’t seen her father since it began, she only got letters from him and he never used her real name in case it came into contact with a spy no. He had it delivered by hand by a guard and every time she unfolded the parchment it always started with “Mahhild Kurupi” dear Kurupi. That was what he called her. Her real name were never on these letters, her name never uttered once by the many guards placed by her side. They only ever called her “Mihkail” young chieftess. In fact, she had come to forget her own name, the last time it was uttered was by her father the day he left he had said to her “Tawvari. I call you Kurupi because you are as fearless as the goddess. Do not let anything seep through your veins and bring you down my dear, create a name for yourself as I have for peole remember what you have done not whst you were born into, but remember be forever undaunted” it was also the last conversation she had with anyone other than her trainers whom she practiced sword mastering with or taught her how to read and write. It was quite lonesome. She rubbed her temples, there came a knock on the door.

“enter” she said. A palace guard came in

“Mihkail there is a package for you” a package? Could it have been from her father she wondered, she quickly put on her over coat and silently went with the guard walked into the long corridor and through it. The guard opened the double wooden doors into the receiving room in which a large box was placed on top of a table

“when did this come in?” she asked, looking at the box. It was rather big and beautifully bejeweled. Where could he get such a box in times of war?

“Not long ago, Mihkail” a guard answered

It had a rather peculiar smell, she thought ss she sniffed. Slowly she opened the box; lo and behold it wasn’t from her father for it was her father: he was cut into several parts- his arms, his legs and his head, his eyes were gauged out.

A single tear slipped down her face, everything was losing focus and going dark.

She had awakened long ago, long before the servants came in with her food or the physician came in to check in on her or as the guard came in and murmured something to one of the many servants that frequented her chambers. But she squeezed her eyes shut very tightly so as to block out the world and perhaps she thought that maybe if she closed and opened or pretended that she was asleep that what had happened, what she had seen wouldn’t be true that it would have been a hoax played upon her by her mind but it wasn’t that for she heard the sound blown by the Blue horn which signified the death, the passing of a chieftain.

Her father though did not die through natural causes or for his feat in battle. He was dismembered slowly, painfully she presumed, and they had done it joyously. There was an ache in her heart, a lump in her throat, it felt clogged so much so she couldn’t breathe properly. Her father she thought the only family she had, gone with no one else with her in the world. The tears started flooding out then. What would she do she didn’t have power and she would be cast out they would look for a new chief. Male. To replace her.

A breeze blew in from outside as she sobbed it rested on her feather lightly. Its gentle air caressed her “Do not let anything seep through your veins and bring you down my dear, create a name for yourself” she heard. It was as if the wind carried the voice as if it spoke to her. “but remember be forever undaunted”. She heard her father’s voice this time as if speaking to her, the words echoed inside her head. Her father wouldn’t have wanted this. He would have wanted her to take charge and rule and that was what she needed to do.

The Tarad thought they had won.

She would annihilate them.

All of them.

here…