Challenge #02998-H075: With Great Power...

Power is power; it is pure, cannot be corrupted, intentions can. It is up to the individual whenever or not they use their power to ascend to divinity or fall to hell -- Anon Guest

They say, Power corrupts. They say, Absolute power corrupts absolutely. What they fail to recognise is that those who grasp for power are already corrupt. There is a true difference, indeed, between those who grasp for power and those who have to accept it. It begins with those who have to accept power also knowing what responsibility looks like.

They called her the Bent Queen. A combination of Scoliosis and surviving infantile paralysis[1] left her with a crooked spine and a shrunken leg. Thanks to social pressure, her father the King had prevented her from being seen by the public, by the council of lords, by anyone but a select few devoted to her care.

As a child, Agatha crept into the council meetings, listening in to the voices above the ceiling of wood. Listening to the debates and absorbing wisdom by pure osmosis. Her lessons in history - applied with better supervision - let her predict the patterns. Her lessons in economics made her wonder if the voices above her head had ever paid attention to the same ones. She only ever made one mistake in that atmosphere, reciting the simplest of lessons, "Coin is best for the economy when it's flowing, you dummies. Don't dam it up in your vaults!" Her father the King found her in seconds. Caught her in seconds more.

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