“Lady?”

Saddy continued to stare into the coming night.
She had heard the voice but not the word. “Lady” was not a word Saddy recognized, especially when spoken to her.

“Lady” The voice persisted, growing a little pained with hints of desperation.

Saddy turned after a long pause.

“Lady, your bath is ready.”

The speaker could have been considered a young girl at one time. She was too old for her time.
Like the rest of the villagers, her face was worn. Her eyes were much too big. The body was too thin to be healthy and her hands were barely cloaked bones.

But, somehow, her eyes were still bright and reflected intelligence instead of misery.
Her stance was one of concern rather than neglect.

Saddy struggled to remember her.
Myler… Mya… Mina? Daughter of… ?
Did it matter?

“Please, call me by my name. I’m not a lady.”
Saddy tried to offer a wane smile and failed. “I was born just as you. No more. No less.”
The woman struggled with why this girl was so important. She was just another sack of flesh who was in denial of her surroundings.

“While that may be true, Saddy.” The girl sounded out the woman’s name carefully. Sa-d-d-y. It was as if she was afraid to pronounce the obvious word. “You are the lady of this land. I will address you as such.”

“Then, you will address me as I wish. And my name is Sad-dy.” Saddy’s words wasn’t cruel, but factual. Her tone plain. She held eye contact but didn’t really see the girl. She saw through her as she was nothing more than a shadow, much like the ones outside.

The girl’s voice tightened, just a little. Her eyes lost some luster and mouth formed a thin, pressed line.
“Saddy, your bath is ready.”

Saddy nodded her head, left the balcony, and walked out of the room.
The girl had served her purpose. The light continued to dim, and the girl ceased to exist.   

——–  

Across the plain, Aldren could see his castle outlined in the sunset.   

When he and Saddy first liberated it from the evil, it had become an ivory beacon.   Its brilliance shown in the night and attracted the good.   In his mind’s eye, that is how he saw it now and will always see it. 
The black creeping up the sides was, surely, a trick of the light.   

The good was still there, untouched, and pristine.  

“Lord,” Grubs pulled his house around.   “We’ll be home by tomorrow.  It would be faulty continue to move this evening.   The men are tired.   The night grows thick.”

Aldren hid his contempt.  Grubs spoke only the obvious and he had already made his plans for encampment a little way off the road in a clearing.  He tolerated the older man.    Nothing more. 

“Yes, absolutely.”  Aldren gestured to the south at a piece of land that gleamed in the sun.  “Set up watch and pitch the tents.    We deserve some rest.” 

Aldren’s words rang into ranks and the hundred men remaining focused themselves at the work ahead that was needed before their respite.