The Soldier Gate

Being a child with not much to do other than walk around to pass time, Irene was aware of the location of the people in the house. She knew where the guards would be stationed, she knew where the maids preferred to walk.

She chose the most innocuous robe in her closet that was tailored to her size and covered her head with the hood. Like a thief in the shadows, her back was glued to the walls as she stealthily made her way through the halls. Her petite stature was just enough to hide behind a pillar and hide when someone was walking by. She carefully followed her mental map and miraculously wormed her way out of the mansion without anyone noticing.

Once her feet touched the dirt, she sprinted across the garden until she reached the wall. She had to be fast, there was nothing to cover her here.

It didn't take longer than a minute as she used the momentum to pull herself up the wall. Her body leapt into the air, causing her to crash her torso against the wall with a soft grunt. It took a lot of strength, but Irene managed to eventually get her leg over the top of the wall and pull the rest of her body over it. When she landed on the other side, she was breathing heavily beneath her cloak.

"I did it," Irene whispered to herself and pulled down her hood.

The cool breeze combed through her golden locks that had been slightly mussed from the hood. It was a sign of autumn approaching, but as of now, the weather was still relatively warm.

She stood still for a moment, allowing her achievement to wash over her. There was a mischievous smile on her face as she realized she'd managed to pull everything off on her own.

She shook her head; it was a little too early to celebrate still. After all, this was only the beginning of the mission. Her eyes once again flitted over to the palace in the distance. Her hand unconsciously tightened around the knot of the clock at her collarbone. She needed to find out what was going on, personally, at the palace.

X

Usually, she'd ride a carriage to school with her nanny, Momo, or her parents. Now, she had to walk along the street to town, and eventually reach the palace. It wasn't hard, but the journey was longer than a carriage ride.

Thirty minutes later, she teetered at the edge of the town. The royal palace was a marvel, even from afar. Its tall towers seemed to pierce the clouds above as they stretched tall, a symbol of the nation's pride. Every brick in the palace seemed to sparkle under the sun, even though they were made of stone and not gems.

The palace has three main entry points, the front gate, the soldier gate, and the servant gate.

The front gate is heavily guarded because most visitors to the palace came through there. During special occasions like a royal's birthday or a ministry meeting, the gates would be open for carriages to pool in. It was virtually impossible to sneak past the guards and squeeze through the gates because they have guards within every 5 meters of one another for optimum security.

The royal guards wore silver armour that sparkled in the sun. They stoically stood with their arms at their side, their helmets casted a shadow over half their face, exposing their lips that formed a thin line.

Irene mentally crossed that off her list as she pondered about the servant or soldier gate.

The commander of the guards at her mansion once explained that the servant gate was generally used to bring food or other materials into the palace. Though it sounded simple to sneak in, there would be a lot of people around. Plenty of adults talk about important things, like money, would be there, and Irene wouldn't be able to tell whether she was in trouble or not.

The soldier gate is for soldiers to enter the palace and exit the palace in the state of an emergency. It was rarely used ever since the war, but it is still very important to the soldiers.

After a moment's thought, Irene giddily made her way towards the soldier gate. Her heart was pounding in excitement at the thought of meeting the royal guards. Unlike the city's guards, the royal guards wore full armour from head to toe. They had to be well-prepared to defend the palace by any means necessary.

She wanted to ask them so many questions, like "Is it hot underneath all that armour? How do you keep the heat at bay?", or "How do you use the bathroom? Do you have to take everything off?"

Luck was on her side today as there were no guards at the soldier's gate. It took Irene some time to find it because it wasn't on any of her father's maps. She only knew about the gate because the commander had mentioned it before.

"I knew many soldiers who frequent the gate to get out," The commander said.

"But why?" Her words were full of wonder, but her brows were furrowed in confusion. She couldn't possibly imagine why one would want to ever get out of the palace. It was such a magnificent place.

"Well, some of us are homesick. You can't get out of the palace regularly when you're a full-time royal guard. Those that left came back quickly after visiting their family or, you know, a date," The commander trailed off with a mischievous chuckle as he reminisced about the past.

The only way the soldiers could sneak out meant there weren't many eyes on the gate itself, so Irene's journey once the gate was in her sights was relatively calm. She hummed a little tune as she neared the gate, it towered over her completely, its shadow swallowed her figure whole.

Irene eyed the handle of the gate that appeared to have a lock of some sort that had brown spots all over. It looked very old and worn. However, she was too short to reach the handle, so she could only try her luck. With a deep breath, she pushed the gate.

Though the gate was heavy to push, it made not a single sound as it opened. Irene grinned. It was unlocked!

Then, she sucked her stomach in and squeezed past the little opening that she's made for herself.

"Woah," she breathed.

The soldier gate led to a tunnel. Within this tunnel, there were rows and rows of weapons that appeared dusty and unused. It was the first time Irene had seen so many spears in one row, it was also the first time she's seen so many shields stacked up upon one another as if they were just planks of wood. Irene hopped over to the shields and brushed away the layer of dust with a small hand. The shield was engraved with the imperial crest.

The imperial crest was in the shape of a kite framed with gold. In the middle, there was a dragon flying with its wings spread open. The dragon was shined with gold, but the spikes on its wings were red in colour. At the snout of the dragon, there was a spray of water with two stray water droplets aside. On the dragon's wings, there were two diamonds in silver, they were meant to symbolize the wealth of the country and the size of the ruler's hoard. Beneath the flying dragon, there were two spears crossed over one another like an "X".

Irene remembered drawing the crest for art, it was quite hard to draw the dragon because it had a lot of details. Her crayons couldn't capture all of it.

"Oh, I shouldn't be spending so much time here," Irene mumbled to herself. She reluctantly retracted her arm beneath the cloak and pulled her body away from the shield. She walked to the other side of the tunnel, though she still occasionally stopped to admire the swords. Once she reached the other end, she tried to push the door, but it didn't open like the previous one.

A brief stroke of panic sliced through Irene. What was she going to do? The door wouldn't open, she can't just turn back now empty-handed.

Irene took several steps back. With a steadying breath, she ran towards the door and slammed her shoulder against the wood. Her shoulder burned with pain as she staggered backwards, she nearly fell onto her buttocks from the backlash.

"Owww," Irene whined.

She didn't expect it to hurt so much. Tears welled in her eyes as the pain in her shoulder only intensified when she went to touch it. Irene glared at the gate, her fiery gaze wanting to tear down the gate for attempting to stop her. Where people would've given up, Irene took another step back.

With another breath, though it was less steady this time, she slammed her uninjured shoulder towards the gate in a desperate effort.

A cry of pain escaped her lips, but she only resulted in falling to the dusty, concrete floor. The gate remained hatefully shut and did not budge. Irene wanted to cry, her body was starting to hurt a lot, but she had no way to enter the gate. Irene shakily got to her feet. She stretched her arms out, her palms pressed firmly against the wood.

She groaned as she pushed the gate, her feet pushing futilely behind her as if she were running in place. Sweat pooled down her forehead and the cloak was starting to feel too hot to wear. Irene paused to tear off the cloak, then she continued her mission to push, push and push against the gate.

It felt like forever as she made zero progress, then, something out of the ordinary alerted her. From behind, there was a crunch of dirt beneath someone's feet. Irene started to truly panic, but if she were to cry now, she would be found out.

She gathered her cloak in her arms, they shook and nearly dropped the cloak again. Her head shook like a rattle as she searched for a place to hide. With the lack of a better place and the footsteps getting closer, and closer, she hid behind a mountain of barrels.

Irene squeezed herself between them and draped the cloak over herself. Her hands covered her mouth to stifle her own ragged breathing that sounded harsh and loud in her own ears. Irene closed her eyes; a few drops of tears escaped from the rims of her eyes and fell on her wrists.

"Please don't notice me, please don't notice me, please don't notice me," Irene chanted in her head.

The footsteps stopped, and the gate opened.