By Lucy

The Queen enters the cold, dark barnhouse with a stocky man by her side, a friar. We rise as she stands behind a velvet cushion placed neatly over the hay. Tears begin to well up in her eyes. The other servants around her mutter, but I stay silent. My sister and I had been taking care of the Queen ever since my mother died, and she had been taking care of the Queen since she was born, two days after I was and seventeen years and three months from today. She was like a sister to me, even though she probably thought of me as an aunt. She looks in my direction with a pained smile and I look away briskly. The man takes a white cloth and ties it around her head. 

Another man, tall and thin like her usual guards, walks in with a large axe by his side. He whispers something into the other man’s ear, who nods. The cream blindfold that the queen is wearing is soaked with her tears of anguish. She kneels on the cushion, her silk white dress illuminated by the sunlight in the distance. I wonder why she would put such a beautiful dress to go to waste. The taller man yells for the village people to leave, with the exception of my sister and I. The friar takes the woman by her shoulders and tells her to put her head on the wooden podium in front of her. She wails and gently puts her cheek on the wooden platform. I turn to admire the lady one last time, her stark white dress still glimmering in the sunlight. I remember what my sister had told me before, “Do not make a sound.” The tall man picks up his axe and I scream in pain, in her pain. The blindfold and silk dress become soaked with red as we stand in silence, and her choice of dress finally makes sense to me. She wanted everyone to see her, pure but soaked in blood, innocent but still killed under her king’s regime. I let out another cry as we watched her spill out.