The Golden Year and the Sorceress

by Isabella Hardiman

  "Stop doing that." Leonardo looks at me annoyed. "Stop pretending you are fine when you aren't. Stop pretending you do not feel pain. Stop pretending you never get hurt. It's okay to feel all of those things, it's human."

  "I told you 'I am fine'" I snapped.

  "No you are not." Leonardo clenches his fists.

  "Yes, I am."

  "You pretend to be fine because that is what you want everyone to think." Leonardo snaps.

  "I told you 'I am fine'." I repeat.

  He grabs hold of the blanket that covers my body and throws it to the floor. Leaving me exposed to my nightgown. He hesitates for a moment looking down my curves and I blush. Butterflies are not just let loose but every single animal in the enchanted forest. "Leila look." I follow his eyesight.

  I was only looking at my long legs but I saw deep cuts, bruises, knife marks and burns. It was nothing I had never seen before. Then again, I took a better look and some grabbed my attention more than others. "Eight bruises on your back, seven on your legs, four on your stomach, three on your neck and one on your cheek. Fifteen cuts, ten are deep, two were dangerously deep and one was infected. Two stab wounds and six burns...shall I go on."

  "I am not a piece of china. So what I get a bruise or two." I shrug and try to play it low key. I turn to stand up but I can't feel my legs. I feel too weak and I cannot lift myself up. "Come on, fact says most accidents happen in the home. I could have done this down a staircase." I try to lighten the mood. Leonardo just stares at me, clearly not amused.

  He runs his hand through his hair. "Leila you're hurt..."

  "I'm used to it." But as the words slip out, I see Leonardo's face cringe. I have no idea why but I am certain he is going to tell me. Isn't it sad when you get hurt so much that you end up saying 'I am used to it.'? Before he has a chance to argue again, someone interrupts us.

  "Leila!" I hear a call as Caroline bursts in the room.

  "I thought I asked you to go get some breakfast." Leonardo stares at her.

  "I did and now I am back." Caroline sticks her tongue out at him before she gives me the biggest hug her small arms can handle. "I missed you so much!" I close my eyes as I embrace her. The smell of strawberries and raspberries entered my nose and on queue my stomach grumbled. I blushed as the sound echoed through the room.

  "Besides my big brother was driving me insane when you left without saying anything... I really could not get him to be quiet. It was a nightmare..." I cannot help but smirk at Caroline's words. He had worried about me even back then? "You should have seen his face when he found out you left...." Before she could finish Leonardo puts his hand to her mouth. Caroline mumbles through his mouth and now I notice that Leonardo is blushing.

  "Are you blushing?" I accuse.

  "NO!"

  "Yes you are."

  "No, I am not."

  "Leonardo you're blushing." I nod with my arms crossed.

  "It's just hot in here."

  "There's frost on the windows." I point out.

  "So..."

  "So you are blushing."

  "Was not." He argued. "OW!" Leonardo removed his hand from his sister's mouth.

  "Was too." Caroline joins in.

  "YOU BEAT ME."

  "Well next time don't put your hand where it's not wanted. Really Leonardo, must I tell you everything. You do not go around putting your hand on people's mouths. I mean what do you expect to happen? Boys! They are absolutely brainless." She rolls her eyes and I cannot help but laugh. Leonardo gives her an impatient brotherly look.

  "Proudcloud!" Caroline called. That is when he came rushing in.

  "THAT'S INCREDIBLE!" He gasps. "BY JOVE. YOUR RECOVERY IS REMARKABLE. I MEAN YOUR SURVIVABLE WAS INCREDIBLE BUT THIS!" The stranger exams me as if I am an experiment of his. "Let me introduce myself, I am Proudcloud, Mr.Proudcloud."

  Mr. Proudcloud was a mid-height man, his hair was wiry ginger chaos and his glasses were round, with thick black borders. I could not help but notice how his glasses were foggy, as well as cracked in the left hand corner however that was not the most remarkable part of these objects was the lenses that magnified his eyes-making them seem huge. His clothes were sewn from every angle and patches from odd materials patched the countless holes. He clearly did not believe in throwing anything away. His feet were much like boats, long and flat . He smelt mostly of old books and damp. Lumps and clumps of different colors of threads mashed together. If anyone was ever a fashion disaster, it would be Mr. Proudcloud. I could imagine Josephine's reaction to his clothes.

  "Leila," I give him a nod.

  He instantly turns. "When the prince brought you here," I focused on the word 'prince'. It sounds foreign. Of course, I know Leonardo is a prince but we had spent so much time away from the castle, the titles, the people at court and the classes...it was different. For a second I wish I could go back.

  "Please call me Leonardo." Leonardo interrupts him and brings me back to reality leaving my thoughts aside.

  "Sorry your lordship." Proudcloud apologizes and I cannot help but notice Leonardo's irritation.

  "Well, when he brought you here. I thought you would be a goner. I mean that poison is powerful stuff. It's incredible you lasted that long." He turns to a long wooden surface which is covered in rare plants, herbs, powders, and spices. I hear the clatter of metal and wood but I have no idea what Mr. Proudcloud intends to be doing. I see rich red powders, mix in with purple petals, yellow liquids, and silver jewels. "Your body is strong, very strong." He looks at me closely.

  "That's my Leila, a fighter!" Caroline cheers and snuggles into me. "She promised she would come back and she did." Caroline chimes in. I hold her close and stroke her golden locks.

  "Of course I did." I smile down at her. I see out of the corner of my eye Leonardo watching us both.

  "Here." Mr. Proudcloud handed me a mug with the liquid that he had been hurriedly working on.

  "What is it?" I ask.

  "Something new I am working on, I think I am going to call it 'medicine'." He says cheerfully. Medicine, even just from the name I can tell it will not taste nice.

  "What is it made of?" I say glancing at the thick, lumpy liquid.

  "Trust me, you won't drink it if I tell you." Mr. Proudcloud runs a hand through his hair, nervously. Great! Pure and wholehearted, sarcasm.

  "What does it do?" I look at the bubbling, vile-looking liquid with a morbid face.

  "It will make you feel better. You need it for your strength."

  "That looks disgusting!" Caroline pretends to vomit. "It looks like melted metal and are those frogs eyes?" She giggles. I look at Mr. Proudcloud at the liquid and I go to put it down but somebody stops me.

  "I don't think so." Leonardo looks at me seriously.

  I look at his stern and judgemental face. I am one hundred percent sure he wants me to drink it to help but there is a part of me that wonders as if this is his way of payback. I narrow my eyes and he cannot help but smirk.

  I take the mug from his hand. He seems pleased with himself. Leonardo, Leonardo this is not over. Do not you know the best way to escape is by distracting. In one brisk movement, I am up on my feet, I would rather walk to Tenebris and back, then drink whatever that is.

  I throw the mug up in the air but the class goes higher than I expected. I see Leonardo's eyes on the mug but it begins to tilt slightly. I can already tell what is going to happen before it does and my first thought is 'run'. Run! I grab hold of Caroline and rush for the exit.

  Caroline jumps onto my back and we begin racing down the halls, leaving Leonardo back in the room covered in the thick gooey liquid. Caroline is laughing like a hyena. "LEEIIILLLLAAAAAAA!" Leonardo's shout echoes through the entire castle and I watch as doves flee from nearby windows.

  "RUN!" Caroline screams. "Hurry up!" She calls. "If he finds us we are dead!" She panics. "Down there." She directs me through the maze of halls and I do not stop the whole way back to her room. I burst into Caroline's room breathless.


  Caroline throws herself onto the bed after locking the door. "We are in so much trouble." But she cannot help but smile to herself. "Leonardo being covered in that medicine or whatever you call it," she can't stop laughing, "It's absolutely brilliant! I can only imagine his face." She makes a stunned, horrified followed by a frown imitating her older brother.

  "It's almost an exact copy but his frown is more judgemental." I add. "Well, we are going to have to avoid him for a while."

  "We can hideout here for a while." Caroline suggests. But on cue there is a banging and hammering on the door and it is like a storm is let loose. We both leap up from the bed and exchange worried looks.

  "Leonardo if that is you, you can forget about us letting you in." Caroline shouts. "I mean, I am blond but I am not stupid." She adds.

  There is a pause. "No your majesty, it's me Mar." A confused voice sounds from the other side of the door. Caroline opens the door to find a beautiful, tanned skinned girl with long back wavy hair.

  "Oh sorry, Mar." Caroline smiles. "Hurry get in here, we are hiding from my brother." Mar steps into the room and glances at me for a moment.

  "You are hiding from your brother and you couldn't think of anywhere in the castle, better to hide than your room?" Mar raises an eyebrow. "You have an entire castle and you hide in the most obvious place."

  "It's so obvious, he won't even think of it." Caroline explains. Mar makes a sceptical face.

  "Well, you can't avoid him for long." Mar sighs.

  "Who says so?" Caroline looks at her slightly irritated.

  "Your father, the king. He has requested your presence at the breakfast banquet in the grand dining hall."

  "WHAT?!" Caroline exclaims. I burst out laughing, Caroline instantly gives me an annoyed look and scrunches her whole face into crinkles.

  "Sucker!" I laugh. I am so thankful to not be Caroline right now. I make my way to the door to find a better hiding spot but Mar stops me in his tracks.

  "I don't think so." She shakes her head and I stare at her confused. "Something tells me that you are Leila, that Caroline hasn't stopped talking about. Well the one that ran off and ended up in a battle against Eris." I nod slowly, where is this going? "I am afraid, your presence has been requested as well as her highness." My jaw dropped and I cannot find the world. Caroline flashes me a brilliant grin.

  "Who's the sucker now?" Caroline mocks. "Now let's get Leila changed..." Caroline looks down at my clothes. That is when it dawned on me, am in my night wear, I ran through the hallways away from Leonardo in my sleep wear. Perfect. Absolutely perfect.

  After a horrid intense beauty treatment, which was by the way, my own personal form of hell..., the only part I enjoyed was the long and needed a bath.

  "That's better." Mar stares up and down me, pleased with her work whereas Caroline has been flickering through her book on her bed this entire time.

  "I like that dress." Caroline says giving Mar her nod of approval. "The blue makes your eyes stand out." The kirtle, the material that lay in the center of the gown was made of cyan silk, but I can also see . Whereas the main gown was a turquoise. Mar had braided my hair back with pearls but I refused to wear one of those ridiculous headrests.

  "So let's go get murdered."

  "Do you think he will be easy on us?" She asks.

  "We left him covered in a sticky liquid, that will probably take a week to wash off..." She ponders the damage. "Not a chance."

  "Well, whatever happens I couldn't have picked a better partner in crime."

  "Neither could I." She smiles at me brightly. "Even if it means Leonardo taking out his revenge on both of us."

  "Girls, it's time. Good luck." She waved us off as if we were heading off to battle and some weird way we were.

  Bring it on, Leonardo. I mean, how bad could it be?

  Chapter Thirty-four- Welcome home

  I felt my heart beating fast. How was I meant to be okay with sitting across a man who could take my head off with one word? A man who had been in love with my mother? A man who had relocated me and left me for dead? A man who had known my parents or still knew them if they were alive....He might know where they are...He held all the answers to my past but he had no intention of sharing his secrets.

  Time stood still and I held my breath. The guards opened the grand hall to reveal everyone and when I say everyone, I mean everyone. The dining room was in a grand U. Among the sides were all the nobles and wealthy from dukes to counts. On the main table where both aisles linked to either end sat the king, Cam, Josephine and beside her Leonardo.

  "Who's that?" I overheard a knight ask another. The second appeared familiar and then I remembered it was the knight from my first day at the castle. Everyone stared at us. Most of the women stared at me with revulsion, disapproval and above all anger.

  "Look at her,"

  "This is unacceptable, she doesn't even come from a wealthy family."

  "Gosh, she isn't even middle class." Gasped a girl, only three or four years older than me.

  Nevertheless, they immediately stopped when Caroline gave them a warning look. The men were a mix of friendliness, lust, and caution. Then I spotted a wrinkled, unpleasant woman sitting at the head of the left table. She seemed to burn through you with that gaze of hers. I wondered whether she had smiled once in her entire life because from the looks of it, I doubted it. She was a sickly looking thing. Who was she? She snorts at me and averts her eyes as if I am dirt to be stepped on.

  My eyes nervously look for a familiar face and my eyes find Leonardo. He sits there with his broad shoulders watching me and I cannot quite make out what his expression means. "Why is my brother looking at you like that?" Caroline asks me.

  "Like what?" I pretend to have no idea what she is talking about.

  "Don't you see it?" She stares up at me. "He doesn't look at the other girls like that. Especially not Josephine. Heavens, he does not look at anyone like that."

  I blush. "Like what?"

  "Like your entire world." She whispers and I gulp down hard.

  We make our way to the table slowly. The king gives me a cold look before I sit in front of Leonardo. "You are late." King Isaac scolds Caroline. Cam gives me a smile between spoonfuls of cream and pastry. He seems to be over indulging and enjoying it. "Mrs. Bourdet I am glad to hear of your miraculous recovery." He says blandly and I know he does not mean a word.

  "Thank you." I reply, this is the first time he has not shouted at me or threatened to kill me. Things might end well and by that I mean I will not die.

  "So, my son has been telling me about a few of the obstacles that you encountered on the road...care to share?" Isaac concentrates on me.

  "Share?" I look across to him.

  A servant begins to pour in my empty glasses with a series of liquids. I supposed the first was orange juice or pumpkin juice, the second strawberry pop-liquid from the northern lands and so on... "Tell us what happened, my son has not given me many details."

  "Oh," I hesitate.

  "I wish to hear all about my son's heroic traits and most importantly how many dangers you all encountered..."

  "I-I suppose it is a long story..." I spot the king's cold eyes and I know I have no choice. "Well, I left the castle..."

  "Oh yes about that? Were you actually thinking of running away?" He glares at me. "Because you know running away from your duty and service of the golden year is punishable by d-"

  "Leila had no intention of running away." Leonardo snaps before the king can finish.

  "Oh then what was she planning on doing?" Isaac raises an eyebrow, both are arguing as if I am not even here.

  "She was planning on saving everyone." Leonardo barked, "Risking her life for everyone in this entire kingdom." He pauses. "That's what." Everyone, including me, looks at Leonardo stunned.

  "I see..." The king turned back to me dryly. "How were you planning on doing that?"

  "There was a necklace in a book that I stumbled across." I lied. "So I went to t
he Seelie court, this was when Leo-" I spot everyone's faces and quickly correct myself. "I mean the prince..." Leonardo gave me a frustrated look but I ignored him. "After that I went to some caves in the east, we were taken underground to the gutters by bandits," My chest tightens as I am reminded of my home but above all Theo. I feel like a small knife is being stabbed into me repeatedly. "And finally to Eris's domain." I try to round it up.

  "What did she say to you?" The king stared at me intensely. "All of you..." He adds on but I know he has directed the question to me. I wanted to tell him that I knew everything. I knew about his broken heart, his plots and him leaving me for dead.

  "She said that she would kill your entire kingdom. She said she hated you." I answer. It is always better to know more, then you say. Besides, I cannot just accuse him...as much as I wanted to.

  "No surprises there." The king sighs with relief. "Anything else?"

  "The dark lord." I say. Everyone stops what they are doing and they turn to me. The king begins to choke on a mouthful of bacon. He stiffens all over.