A delicate blossom, the king had called her. His lily.

“Do you know what lilies and foxglove have in common?” she asked over lunch, and he laughed—Only women care for flowers.

She watched him lift the petal-tainted bite to his lips, and she contemplated the resizing of his crown.

C.M.F. Wright is an avid reader and sentence wrangler. Her short stories have appeared in Fifty Word Stories, Microfiction Monday, Syntax & Salt Magazine and the VSS365 Anthology.