This Week's Flash: An Act of Kindness (December 2025, Week 4)

First flash for the week...and for a very long time.

An Act of Kindness 

A cup of water. Who’d have thought it would matter now that the battle was lost, but it did…or Shiloh hoped it did.

He dared to raise his gaze enough to catch his opposite number’s eye, and froze. Not because of the commander’s familiar features, but because of the markings on her armored breastplate.

“Y…your majesty?” he managed, staying on his knees, and all too aware of the firm grip on his shoulder.

The look she returned was implacable.

“You showed me kindness,” she replied in hard tones, “and yet you have rebelled. Tell me why I should spare you.”

“Spare my men,” Shiloh said. “Their lives were forfeit if they did not take up arms.”

“And forfeit if they did,” she reminded him.

“They have families…” Shiloh’s voice cracked, memory bringing grief. “Their lives…”

His voice shattered, and he bowed his head, unable to continue.

“So do you,” she said, but he shook his head.

“Not anymore,” he rasped, and dared raise his head once more. “Take my life in place of theirs.”

She pursed her lips, her face clouding as she ignored his request, with a question of her own.

“And if you’d had a choice?”

Shiloh struggled to stand, brushing against the gauntlet on his shoulder. It remained, relentless in its efforts to keep him in place.

“If we’d had a choice, your Majesty,” he grated, settling beneath it. “If we’d had a choice that let us keep our loved ones safe… If we’d had that, the usurper would have been dead a very long time ago.”

“You’d have fought for me?” she asked.

“Your Majesty, I gave you water when he forbade it,” Shiloh snarled. “And I’d do that again.”

“And the price be damned?” she demanded.

Shiloh opened his mouth to answer, only to find his answer choked by a sob. He bowed his head to hide his tears, but the bitterness in his voice betrayed him.

“If we had known, he’d not have been in a position to take you captive in the first place.”

It was enough.

“Then bid your men fall in, captain.”

A falcon swooped from the skies, veering toward a nearby man’s quickly raised arm, its life spared by its obedience to that unspoken command. The message cylinder on its leg carried a missive terse and to the point.

“We have them.”

The newly returned queen smiled, hard and warrior-tight.

“Tell your men their families are safe,” she said, “and fall in. The battle’s not yet won.”