TBD
an excerpt

I can't stop thinking about her. I don't know what that means. I don't know if I should be thinking about her or not. It's hard to pin down what the thoughts are, and that worries me.
#
The skies are a leaden color and they feel as heavy as they look. I wonder how the soldiers feel. Are they aware of the burden of the sky? From my vantage point, they are indistinct as individuals. I see them moving in groups. I see a shifting pattern as the lines are drawn and redrawn by invisible hands; the commanders, far from the front, direct the movements of men whose names they will never know.
King Arthur in a petticoat is what they call her. I don't know why. I'm not sure who they think King Arthur was or why she is like him. I'm not sure if it is derision or praise, or both. If I'm this confused about her, how do the lords feel?
Her greatest strength seems to be that she is both aware and unaware of the effect she has. Her mind is subtle and liquid in its movements. I am befuddled. In her presence, I am witless. Others seem to struggle mightily and I've noticed that many of the lords come in packs, partly because they have never trusted each other, but mostly because they find themselves agreeing to actions that do not serve their best interests. Their lives are filled with regrets outside of her presence.
They must wonder why they cannot rise up and toss her off the throne. The first woman ruler in their history, she stands before them and appears to not notice their rage and pettiness. Before her, they all feel they are better men than they truly are. Before her father, they all felt they were, somehow, wanting. They puff up and make extravagant promises when she asks.
And now, every last one of them is committed to a war that seems impossible to win. Their farmers and herders have joined the battle and are dying in legions. The farms and livestock are tended by younger and younger boys, by women, or not at all.
The only relief is that the wolves of winter are too busy in the plains below to worry the sheep in the meadows of the mountains. From time to time, groups of soldiers escaping the battle are found roaming and raiding. Before long, though, the elite guards she maintains arrive and the men disappear, the raids stop, and life goes on.
Women manage the land, deliver the goods to market, buy and sell, and dispense the justice in towns. The men are down there, below me, dying because she sends them to their fate.
And she sent me here, to my fate.