I was awoken by Anne in the middle of the night, she seemed really startled, but I couldn't understand why. I guess in retrospect I should have suspected something, but it was just too early for me to care about anything.
"Anne, please let me sleep five more minutes."
"No!, Alexi, we have to leave now. Your father ordered me to take you with me."
It was then when I realized Anne was crying. I didn't know what to do or say to calm her down, so I just grabbed her hand and followed her to where she wanted to go.
It was raining that night, I could hear the thunder colliding with the footsteps of guards roaming the castle. They were shouting something that I couldn't understand. The halls were poorly lit by lamps, and their massiveness led to our footsteps giving off echo.
Eventually, we arrived at the castle exit, but not the main exit. We stood on a door that was opposite to the castle, I have never been or seen this part of the cattle before. A small old wooden door, covered in drawings, or rather symbols. They seem like something a Borrower would put, but I had already done the tests with Clarisse to see if I was one - but I wasn't, so I hadn't bothered to study Borrower glyphs. I was somewhat familiar with their purpose. But these glyphs, in particular, didn't mean anything to me
"Listen, the king asked me to take care of you while everything is sorted out." She explained.
"Is it going to last long?"
"Yes, of course. It will only be a week or two." She lied.
**13 years later.**
I woke up from that nightmare again. I stared at the ceiling of my room for 10 minutes. I glanced over outside the window, the sun was coming out, It was around 6 am.
"Has it really been that long ago?" I said out loud.
"What was that Alexi?"
I heard a voice coming from the kitchen, it was Clarisse's.
"No nothing, I was just speaking to myself."
"Ok then, get ready to work, the recruiters are coming in a few hours. And happy birthday."
I smiled even though she couldn't see me. I had lived with Clarisse and Anne since the Queen's death and they had been really supportive of me. Anne fed me and Clarisse helped me finish my studies. I was grateful to both of them.
It was thanks to them that I had been able to cope with the King no longer recognizing his own son, and rather adopting Alexi Trovador's own family into the royal lineage. After my second week in this cabin, news came that my mother was dead and so was the prince. The autopsy was revealed to the public, most likely in an attempt to incite war again.
Gleighmourn was blamed for the queen and prince's deaths.
Because of that recruitment for the army rose to an all-time high in the following years. Various micro raids had been orchestrated on the outskirts of the Empire, but now, after practically no progress in the war for 16 years morale was kind of low among our kingdom.
But then a week ago, the king issued an order to make enrollment into the army mandatory for every male and woman over 21 and lower than 25.
And I turned 21 today.