by Brea Viragh
Merek never seemed to be in a place to satisfy my desire to know, and I dreaded pushing him for fear it would decimate the progress we’d made with one another. I wanted to know what had happened to us, since there was apparently more to the story than what I’d been led to believe.
“You should have told me.” I clasped the edges of my robe together, watching the steady fall of snow outside. The sconces on the walls did little to keep the darkness at bay, and had the fire not been stoked to such great heights the room would be tossed into near blackness.
His avoidance made it harder for me to detach with each passing day. I didn’t want him to disappear from me, to act like I shouldn’t be here anymore. I didn’t want him to act like a happily-ever-after was impossible…
Merek’s hands fisted at his sides. “What was I supposed to say to you? That you and I were together in the physical sense? That we spent more time in each other’s company than we did apart? It was a long time ago and a ridiculous mistake I prefer not to remember. Besides, you would have laughed at me.” He shook his head. “You would have taken one look at my face and thought me stupid.”
Now it made sense, the perfumes in the room where I slept, the dresses in the armoire that just happened to fit me perfectly, the necklaces and jewels and robe and slippers. My unease deepened as things clicked into place. My room, and a terrible window into a past I didn’t recall.
“But…what about me?” I asked.
“What about you? It’s none of your business.”
My face tightened. “Oh, right. It’s none of my business and I should try to ignore what happened in the past, sweep it under the rug. Great idea. I will simply pretend an entire portion of my life with you doesn’t exist, like the rest of the world does with this place.”
“No one cares what you think, Reila.” Merek sighed, and I wondered if he ever grew tired of the same untrue repetition. He cared. Deeply.
“Yes, exactly.” I chuckled dryly. “Especially since I can’t seem to find an answer to the curse. It makes me entirely useless and another mouth to feed, nothing more. It certainly does not make me an ally or a woman to be trusted. No one cares about my voice because it comes from me.”
Despite the size of the room, the walls closed in on me, the space shrinking around us until it was just me and Merek and the piano.
He staggered forward and my skin prickled at the size of him, though I was no longer afraid. “I didn’t ask you to be here, or to be given an easy out,” Merek said, his syllables deep and echoing. The voice of a prince. A king.
I refused to be cowed. “And yet there is clearly more going on here than you’ve been willing to tell me. Enough that you and I had a song. Our song.”
“Forget it. There is nothing more to say.”
“I think there is plenty more to say. It sounds like…we were in love.” I offered him a faint smile to soften the statement. The rightness of it resounded through me.
“Love?” He scoffed. “No. People are incapable of love.” His shoulders hunched as he strode out of the room, refusing to meet my eyes and leaving me alone.
Moments later the castle’s front doors slammed. I winced at the sound but knew I wouldn’t have been able to stop him or keep him from the only escape he had left to him. He would crash through the snow and into the forest to brood, to get himself under control, and I would be waiting for him when he returned.
What was going on? I didn’t even remember learning to play the piano. Yet I must have sat here, with Merek, at some point in our past.
I’d been waiting for him to make a move, waiting for him or somebody to fill in the gaps in my memories. And now it seemed painfully clear that no one was going to step up. Not my mother, not Merek, not the staff.
I shoved away from the piano and out of the room, still in my nightgown and robe. Better to leave His Highness miserable and alone. Stepping into the hallway, I dragged a hand through my hair and went exploring, feeling bold. Bolder than I’d been since my first few weeks there.
If Merek had something to hide about our shared past, then I would find it. Damn him.
Gloom shrouded the hallways and it was sheer instinct to want to turn around and run in the opposite direction. But a timid explorer never found anything worthwhile, I reminded myself.
Although I’d inspected them many times before, perhaps I’d overlooked something in the myriad rooms of this vast castle. The first few rooms I looked in still held nothing but the broken remnants of furniture and cobwebs. There were shadowed corners, dust, and heartache, as though the rooms themselves had absorbed the attitudes of all who still lived in the castle.
I made it through the first floor having found nothing. Certainly nothing that would give me a clue about my past with Merek.
Shaking my head, I pulled myself up the stairs, and instead of taking a left to get to my own room, I went right. Far away from me, he’d once said. Maybe it was time for me to close that distance once and for all.
How could I break the curse over someone determined not to want help? Determined to wallow in his own self-pity and storm off in a fit of rage rather than sit down and have a constructive conversation?
Merek was the most infuriating man I’d ever met. Part of me wondered if I’d always felt that way—probably not—or if I’d known about some redeeming quality that made the rest of his faults fade away.
At the moment, all I could do was try. I would try to understand him, and where he came from. Try to understand this place and the staff lurking around like ghosts. Try to understand how I fit into everything and what I could do to change the story.
“Follow…”
A whisper of sound echoed off the stone walls of the hallway and I turned in a circle, but saw nothing, no one. My imagination, surely. And then in the relative gloom I saw a delicate shimmer ahead of me. Light from somewhere bouncing off something shiny, no doubt. I was about to dismiss it when it pulsated and shimmered again, and then suddenly darted away.
What the heck was that?
Curious, I hurried in that direction, along the labyrinthine corridors. There were many more rooms than I remembered seeing on my first exploration of the castle, and if I hadn’t caught another glimpse of that tiny shimmering something I might have gotten lost. Almost assuredly.
I wandered after the fleeting mirage, feeling foolish but curious. Probably just some kind of insect that had gotten inside the castle. And yet my instinct was telling me not to dismiss it. A word came to my mind, an attempt to make sense of what I’d seen: will-o’-the-wisp. It almost seemed…intelligent as it teased me to follow.
So I continued on, catching another glimpse whenever I had to choose right or left, up or down. Now I felt convinced that it was leading me somewhere. No clue whether that would be a good thing or a bad thing, yet I couldn’t stop myself. I couldn’t force myself to turn around and flee back to the familiarity of my room. I had to know.
There was so much more to the castle than I’d previously guessed. Most doors were steadfastly closed, but a few were open. I passed by unused parlors and dusty storage spaces, peering into each as I hurried on.
Around another corner. And then I didn’t see it anymore. My feet stopped in front of a heavy door carved with the same insignia as the royal seal. Somehow, I knew this was where I needed to be. But for what reason?
The door wasn’t locked but it was heavy and resisted when I tried to push it open. It took all of my might to shove it aside with enough space for me to slip into the room. Unexpectedly, a whoosh of magic left me, lighting the sconces on the walls to fill the room with a soft buttery glow.
Another drawing room, I presumed, but none like I’d seen before. This one somehow remained entirely untouched by the years, by the wrath of the Beast who had rampaged through the castle and destroyed the contents of most of the rooms.
Save this one.
I wondered why. Maybe it was his father’s old office or something. It was obvious from how difficult the door was to ope
n that no one had been in here in a very long time. There were elegant furnishings, a desk and tables and chairs and sofas and knick-knacks, all without a spot of dust, all looking as if they’d just been polished, though the very air itself felt aged, as if this room had been sealed air-tight at one point and never entered again. I saw a pair of glass doors leading out onto what would surely be a sunlit terrace overlooking the gardens in the summer months. And on the walls…
On the walls were pictures. Portraits. What I’d been desperate to see since coming here, that would hopefully give me an inkling into the past.
I moved deeper into the room, the door remaining open behind me, though I had no reason to be frightened here. That shimmering whatever-it-was had led me here, I just knew it.
Still, my skin prickled and the fine hairs on my arms stood to attention. It may not be fear—I’d come to understand that Merek would never hurt me—but a feeling he would not have liked my finding this room.
The first picture I came to was a painted portrait showing a king and queen in regal poses. I recognized the same green of Merek’s eyes in the queen—his mother?—a serious-looking woman with unsmiling lips and hands folded primly in her lap. The king, however, looked like the type of man who laughed easily. Who led his people with heart instead of an iron fist. A golden crown decorated with rubies peeked out from the wild strands of his hair, while her crown was smaller but no less elaborate.
Stepping down the line, I moved to the next portrait and there I saw a baby in fancy trappings, in a fancy but elegant crib, captured during sleep. I crept closer to examine the dark lashes against cheeks like a porcelain doll’s, tiny Cupid’s-bow mouth slightly pursed, the little hands clenched into miniature fists even as he dreamed.
Merek Lyndon in the first months of his life?
Blood drained from my face when I approached the next portrait, as large as the first and miraculously intact. I expected otherwise the moment I recognized the two people there, each captured in heart-aching detail. I saw the wind-tossed curls, pale cheeks, an unblinking gaze filled with confidence and…coldness.
I saw myself standing next to Merek, who had one arm wrapped around my waist, holding me possessively to him. I saw him human.
The faces in the painting struck me in the gut. Hard.
I reached out to touch the Merek I saw in the painting. My heart pounded a frantic beat and I clasped my other hand to my chest as though it would relieve the ache. My head spun.
It was him. And it was me. It was the two of us standing together. A raw, shattered feeling overtook me. His presence, his essence, practically rose from the portrait and although I knew he did not stand there with me physically now, we’d stood there before.
“Reila…”
A shudder wracked through me and I leaned slowly toward the picture. Catching a small glimpse into the past through a dark riot of emotions as I lost my present self.
Chapter 17
The flashback took me under like the wave of an ocean, ripping me out of my current state and catapulting me into the past. I flew backwards, sideways, into a vacuum until the force of the trance popped me out onto the other side. In the room I now slept in upstairs, except the light from the chandelier overhead cast golden shadows on a luxurious space where everything gleamed brand new. The finishes shimmered, the wood polished to such a point where I might have seen my reflection if I bent down.
I was me but not me, my consciousness settling into the body of the woman I’d been five years ago. And I had a feeling the only reason I stayed aware of this through the experience was because of my magic. Tiny though it was, it kept me grounded so that I was experiencing my former self while I was aware of doing it.
Something was off. The smirk I shot myself in the full-length mirror didn’t look or feel right. I wanted to gasp in shock as I stared at my reflection. The woman in the mirror looked beautiful, yes. And displeased. Quite displeased and yet stoking that displeasure. As though the essence of her displeasure would manifest into the world as a physical, palpable force.
My hands went to my sides and pressed against the silken fabric of the gown I wore, deep midnight-blue with gold filament threaded through in intricate designs, with a nipped-in waist and generous folds down to my ankles. A good amount of skin showed near my shoulders and chest. Whoever had helped me dress had also done my hair for me and the reddish curls shone with reflected light. They clustered around my face, fell down past my collarbone toward the immodest cleavage. Gloves matching the color of my gown adorned my forearms up to my elbows, the right one secured with a gold bracelet set with a huge blue sapphire.
Looking at my image felt suffocating.
“You are a vision, Miss Reila. A true vision.”
An elderly woman with sleek gray hair approached me cautiously, her hands laden with an assortment of jewels for me to choose from. The memory felt familiar, a life I’d lived that I knew nothing about in my current reality. Yet I was still the outsider, the observer.
“Those are all you could manage?” I asked her, my words cold and dangerous, lashing out of my vocal cords like arrows from a bow. “You expect me to believe you tried your hardest to find the best gems to complement my look this evening?”
“These are part of the kingdom’s collection of crown jewels, dear,” the old lady hurried to say. “They are nothing to turn up your nose or scoff at.”
Mrs. Nettles, my sudden recollection supplied. Mrs. Nettles had been personally selected among the palace staff to attend me. The woman hated me. I realized it with a start only now, looking back. And if I scrutinized her expression in the mirror, I could see it on her face as well.
Had my merchant father survived, his fortune might have secured gems of the same quality for me, for my coming-out ball. The thought floated through my subconscious before disappearing. Hers, not mine. The Reila Barnes of the past, dressed for the ball.
“These were the best I could do on short notice,” Mrs. Nettles replied easily. She settled the selection on the vanity in front of me. “You and the prince called for the grand ball without proper time to prepare—”
“It’s up to you and the rest of the staff to get it done, and of course that is what we expect,” I cut her off. That is what I expect. “Now leave them with me and I’ll be down in a moment.”
Crown jewels. They glittered up at me in an unparalleled assortment of riches the people below could never hope to match. And by below, I meant the people at the ball, because no matter that my family’s fortune had disappeared with my father’s death, I did not consider myself on the same level as the regular folk who called Bellmare home.
No, I was above even the Matthews clan. Above their haughty and deliciously attractive son, Gray.
Ugh, disgusting! This suddenly felt like an amusement ride I desperately wanted to get off of.
“Would you like help putting on your shoes?” Mrs. Nettles asked from the door.
She was just trying to be helpful, Current Me argued, quite embarrassed by the way this woman waited on me literally hand and foot. She must be paid handsomely to do it because otherwise she would not be in the room. That much was evident from her body language and clear as day if Past Me had bothered to look at her. Maybe I hadn’t cared.
“I am quite capable of putting on my own shoes, Mrs. Nettles,” I said with no small amount of pique. “I have been doing it without aid since I turned two.”
I dismissed her with a slight wave of my hand, turning back to the mirror.
I stared at myself as though I were a goddess who had agreed to grace the mortal world with my presence. Curling auburn hair accented the cool sharpness of my blue eyes, the same color as the jewel on my wrist, my skin luminescent and somewhat pale.
I tried to find some kind of redeeming quality for Past Me, coming up blank the longer I stared. We stared. It was hard to imagine the person in the mirror as me. I’d gone so long without my memories that being smack dab in the middle of one felt like peeping in on another p
erson’s life, something I shouldn’t be seeing.
I do not belong here.
Yet it was me, clearly. And although it felt awkward, it felt right. Power glistened beneath my skin, all the magic I’d since lost. Magic I could at that time call to do my bidding with the barest wisp of thought, magic strong enough to down a tree in a single stroke. Strong enough to topple buildings.
The Grand Ball had been my idea, I now knew, to celebrate what I’d hoped would be an engagement announcement to Prince Merek of Halsworthy. An engagement that hadn’t manifested yet because he was dragging his feet proposing to me.
I was unable to fathom any reason why he might be putting off marriage with me. We had been through much together since our first meeting in the town square, when I caught sight of him in his carriage and felt my breath ripped from me. His good looks captured my heart, his royal station cemented the feeling, and his humor drew me deeper.
I came from a wealthy family, after all. We weren’t gentry, nor nobility. My father had been a successful merchant, and the haut ton never accepted that anyone in trade could be worthwhile society. But wealth could make up for a lot of faults, and while we might have lost some of it when my father passed away—most of it, actually—in my mind that didn’t take away from the fact that I considered myself a suitable match for the Crown Prince of Halsworthy—and thus worthy of soon becoming Queen Reila when the king died and Merek would ascend to the throne. It was a thrilling expectation and filled me with satisfaction that I would be the one to restore my impoverished family to its rightful place.
We haven’t yet moved into the cottage. We are still in the process of figuring out what assets are left to us and which ones belong to the bank. We are staying at the tavern in town while things settle. With a flash of excitement I realized some memories were beginning to return to me.
The impending poverty didn’t take away the fact that I had the knowledge and the power to move among the cream of society and fit into Merek’s world. It didn’t change the fact that the moment I’d seen him, I’d loved him. Loved him with the fiery passion of a woman who knew how to get what she wanted, knew she deserved what she wanted.
