Season 1
Episode 1 Outline
The Last Daughter
The Fall of Taremu
Dawn breaks over the outer settlements of Taremu, not with birdsong, but with movement. Civilians are already on the road. Not fleeing in panic, but relocating with discipline shaped by long familiarity with threat.
Layla moves among them in armor, not royal colors. She lifts children onto carts herself, redirects foot traffic, corrects routes when bottlenecks form. She speaks calmly, clearly, never raising her voice. Soldiers respond instantly to her commands, adjusting formations and escort lines without hesitation.
This is not ceremonial leadership. It is practiced.
Twelve imperial guards approach with grave news. The enemy force is stronger than anticipated and far closer than predicted. Their advance is disciplined, coordinated, relentless. The line are breaking.
Two of Layla’s four brothers gather with castle guards. They debate response. Tradition presses for immediate engagement, for honor through confrontation, for meeting the enemy before they break through critical lines.
Layla listens without interrupting.
When she speaks, it is measured, respectful, and deliberate. She reframes the situation. Not as defense of land, but defense of people. She argues for delay, not retreat. For buying time, not glory. She proposes collapsing the defensive line inward, forcing the enemy through narrow passes while the last civilians clear the routes.
The room is grave with the silent admission of defeat. She does not push. She understands the room, the weight of the reality that their kingdom has already fallen.
Strengthened by her resolve, her brothers adopt the plan, quietly. Without time to wrestle with the enormous darkness of it, they all move, with the clear objective in mind, prepared to do what great warriors do, until they can’t anymore.
The Last Stand
The castle gates are breached.
Controlled violence, elite fighters, dangerously skilled even in forced retreat. Layla fights beside her brothers. Her movements efficient, surgical, and decisive. No wasted effort. Elaborate traps. She’s unusually comfortable and familiar with the fighting form her enemy uses. She commands three highly skilled soldiers to watch her back and flanks as her efforts become more offensive than defensive. She closes gaps in the line instinctively, intercepting threats before they reach weaker positions. Her brothers see what she’s doing and adjust based on her movement alone.
But the enemy is relentless with unmatched skill and tactics as they attack in waves to preserve energy and shifting on the command “rotate” by one of two twin generals. Fatigue sets in with Layla’s comrades. The line begins to bend. Layla does not slow, but her support does and eventually breaks.
The defensive line fails and Layla’s brothers with it.
One brother falls holding a flank too long to buy civilians time to clear a pass. Another dies sealing a breach with his body. Their father, the King of Taremu, takes a final choke point alone, holding it long enough for the last evacuation to be completed. A king who chose to fall with his kingdom rather than run from it.
There are no final words. Layla sees each death.
She steps into her father’s position without ceremony, without hesitation, without grief slowing her hands. No posture of surrender.
Protocol is clear. With no willful surrender the royal line must end to prevent future uprisings. Elite soldiers approach Layla cautiously. They have heard the stories. The legend that precedes her. But half of it was never told.
King Nassori rides up to see the last princess of Taremu displaying an impressive and very familiar last stand.
Two of his elite guards fall before the others even understand how. The entire royal guard is in awe at her fighting form. They exchange looks and murmurs as Layla fights until sheer weight, not skill, brings her down. Blades pin her. Her armor cracks. Desperate breaths. Calm rage in her eyes.
She does not beg. She does not cower. She does not blink. To die with her dignity is all she has left, and she will gladly take the last blade for it, as long as it came from one worthy of wielding it.
Nassori studies how she moves, how she calculates even now. One of the twin guards raises a blade to execute her. Nassori stops him with a single motion. He studies Layla for a long moment longer. Eye contact. Her rage. His respect and curiosity. All eyes waiting for the king.
He orders her taken alive, riding off without even a hint to why.
Aftermath
Layla is taken away as Taremu burns behind her.
She does not struggle. She turns her head just once, committing the horizon, the smoke, the land she has lost to memory. It will drive her fury, her desire for vengeance. She is the only prisoner.