Shelly Bryant

Love and War

In her private chamber, she stands before the only advisor she’s ever even remotely trusted.  As his answer sinks in, her eyes narrow, and a faint hint of scarlet tinges her pale cheek.

“I thought that problem had already been ... taken care of.”

“Apparently your scheme backfired, then.”  He ignores her rising ire as no one else in the land would dare do.  “My intelligence says otherwise.  And you know I’m never wrong.”

She turns her cruelest glare his way, the same look under which she is used to seeing brave men wither.

He simply returns the cool gaze, matching flawlessly the scornful expression that hides all her most secret plans, and her most secret terrors.

before the mirror
— troubled
by its answer