by Ashley Meira
Thoughts of an ambush came back to me as I caught sight of her. She was curled up in an armchair facing the bed, knees tucked under her chin and arms wrapped around her legs. Her dark brown eyes bore into the innocent mattress, calculating and… angry? I wasn’t sure, but something was obviously bothering her.
“Don’t like the bedsheets?” I joked. It probably wasn’t the best idea, but that could be said for everything I did. “Fancy place like this would probably change them if you asked.”
She ignored me. A silence fell over us, one so drawn out I considered leaving. “It’s big.”
I followed her gaze, taking in the cream-colored sheets and sleek wooden bed frame. “Queen-sized, I think? Since there was no way you and Fiona were sharing, I figured why not splurge on my sisters a little?”
Truth be told, the money had been burning a hole in my metaphorical pocket. It had been intimidating at first — hell, it still was — but the chance to splurge on something I’d never been able to afford after years of counting every penny was too tempting to pass up, especially for people I cared about. Or used to care about in Diana’s case.
Not that I didn’t care about her now, per se. It was just hard to figure out where I stood between her and the rest of my friends. I wasn’t even sure how much of my feelings were my own and how much belonged to the little girl I used to be, the one who remembered her sister.
That little girl used to be me, though, so shouldn’t it all be the same? Urgh. Didn’t I just say this night had ended well? Why did I have to sabotage myself?
Diana jerked her shoulders in what I assumed was meant to be a shrug. “Not used to this sort of stuff is all.”
“Yeah, I don’t remember seeing anything remotely pleasant in Nicholas’ castle when I was escaping. Guy probably sleeps in an iron maiden or something.”
The glare she shot me might as well have been an actual bullet to the gut. “The master surrounds himself in luxury. I’ve seen rooms like these. Far grander ones, even. I just don’t stay in them.”
Even as the guilt hit me, I made a note to figure out one joke that wouldn’t cause her to bite my head off. It was a shallow goal, but something about Diana made me feel a lot lighter than being around the others. Maybe it was because we didn’t have as much history? Okay, that was a dumb thought. There was something, though. Something that made me feel like I could be a little less serious for a while.
That was it: she wasn’t expecting anything from me. I didn’t feel like an invalid when I was with her. That wasn’t Adam or Fiona’s fault, of course. I knew they were just concerned and it came from love. But sometimes it was hard, exhausting even, to be around people who showed so much concern. It made me feel like I had to force myself back to normal, which only made doing so even harder.
Diana didn’t do that. She knew that I’d get there on my own without anyone breathing — well-intentioned or not — down my neck. It was also possible she didn’t care, which wasn’t as nice a thought, but it didn’t change my appreciation over the way she treated me. There were no kid gloves with her, no coddling. She body-slammed me into the mat no less than four times tonight, and she expected me to get off my self-pitying ass and stop her. A good kick in the butt always did wonders for my motivation.
“Always did,” she said, voice slightly muffled by her knees.
I jerked my head toward her, trying to make sense of her words.
“Whenever you cried as a kid,” she said when it was clear I had no idea what was going on, “all Mom and Dad had to do was pull you to your feet and pat your butt. Then, you’d pout, rub your eyes, and get back to whatever you were doing.”
Oh. I’d spoken out loud. Heat rushed to my cheeks, but it was ignored in favor of searching my memories. There were none, of course. There’d always been a black hole when I thought of my childhood, and time had not chased away the darkness.
Tentatively, I sat on the edge of the bed, never taking my eyes of her. “How much do you remember?”
Another jerk of her shoulders. “Everything.”
“What?!”
My surprise didn’t impress her, if the brow she arched was any indication. It dropped down a second later, and the awkward tension in her face came back in full force. “The master doesn’t remove memories. Not ours, at least. I don’t know about the others.”
“Then why—”
“Trauma,” she said bluntly. “That’s my guess. Too much pain in the end. You blocked it out. Or maybe he changed his mind and wanted to erase your memories, but that wouldn’t make sense. Not you.”
“Not me?” I echoed, my shower-induced clarity shattering into a million pieces. “Why not me?”
“You—” Diana swallowed thickly and looked at the carpet. She seemed both tense and defeated at the same time. I wasn’t sure how to make sense of it — or anything at this point. “You were the success, the good one. I was the failure. If he needed to ‘recreate’ someone, it would have been me.”
After a fruitless attempt to understand on my own, I said, “Tell me what happened. Everything. Please.”
Diana’s eyes darted to the door, and I could see the fight or flight instinct warring in her head. However, her body was still angled toward me — it usually was, I’d noticed — so I figured I had a good shot of getting her to talk.
But she didn’t. She just stared at the door, then out the window. One minute turned into two, which turned into three. I lost count at eight but knew at least twice that time had passed. My heart began to pound with each passing second. Fear laced through my veins, drawn forth by doubt. Maybe she wasn’t going to tell me—
“We were nine,” she finally said, voice thick and eyes downcast. “It was a week or so after our birthday. We were in the kitchen eating lunch. You wanted a ham sandwich but I pushed for macaroni and cheese. We bickered. Dad found a compromise by putting ham on our macaroni and cheese.”
A strand of hair fell in her face, and I realized this was the first time I’d seen her with her hair down. She pushed the hair back and continued. “I remember putting the food in my mouth and frowning. It didn’t taste the same. Usually, our parents’ cooking was delicious, but that day it tasted awful. I was too young to place the taste back then—”
“Tar,” I whispered. “I had a dream like that. We were younger, picking flowers in a field with our mother.”
She nodded. “That was his first attempt. Our parents moved us around a lot after that. Never stayed in the same place for more than a month or two. It drove us crazy — every time we made a new friend, we had to say goodbye. But our parents always told us it was for our own safety. Not that that made sense to us at the time.”
I tried to remember how old we’d been in that dream, but it wouldn’t come to me. “In my dream, we seemed to be four, maybe five, years old. Did we really spend that long on the run? No one could help us?”
“My story isn’t done,” she said as a non-answer. “We were too young to sense his magic back then. But because of our heritage — the Protector and the Warrior — by nine, our senses had sharpened beyond our parents. We sensed him before they did.”
“We?”
“The macaroni and cheese tasted like tar,” she continued, “so I spit it back out. I turned to you and saw you’d done the same. We exchanged looks, wondering which of us would speak up. It was you. It was always you. You asked Dad why the food tasted different. He was confused. Then, Mom came in. She’d been outside. Closer to the master’s path, I suppose. Her face was pale and her eyes were wide. ‘He’s coming.’”
“Then?” I pressed when she went silent.
Diana shook her head. “Darkness. Everything was dark. When we woke up later, everything was pitch black. I cried and something touched me in the dark. I recognized your hand instantly and reached for it. We held each other and cried. I still don’t know how long we were in there. It felt like years but was most likely days. We’d have starved otherwise.”
Her words carried an odd quality to th
em. Not a dishonest one, but more like she was in a trance, as if speaking of all this had brought her back to that time and place. Dark hair had fallen in her face, but I could still see her eyes staring at the floor. This time, there was no anger or discomfort, just a hollowness that broke my heart.
“Eventually, he came. The sudden light scared me, and I hid behind you. He was polite and soft spoken as he entered our cell. Told us we didn’t need to be afraid, that he was here to help. He held out his hand to us and asked if we were hungry, thirsty. Did we want food?”
I tried to remember that moment. Nothing came up, so my mind conjured up its own image. Nicholas opening the door, bright lights burning my eyes, a hand offered in kindness, an offer of food…. It would almost seem heartwarming if the man in question wasn’t a monster. Instead, the image in my mind was creepy and made me feel like worms were crawling underneath my skin.
“He waved his hand and a man entered with two trays of food. The sound of our stomachs was deafening but neither of us spoke. We just held each other tighter, trying to avoid staring at the light. He noticed our discomfort and ordered the guard to close the door until only a strip of light remained. He asked why we chose to sit in the dark. Why hadn’t we conjured fire. We stayed silent. I began trembling harder and felt you pull me closer. He asked again if we were hungry and said we could have all that food if we did one little thing for him: conjure a flame.”
Diana held out her palm and a ball of fire blazed to life in her hands. If I closed my eyes and concentrated, I could almost smell the hazelnut aroma of her magic. “I snapped and started crying. Howling, really. I called for our parents, wanted to know where they were, where we were. I wanted to go home. The master watched me with a calm I’d never seen an adult maintain around a crying child. Years later, I realized he was studying me. Once he finished his appraisal of me, he turned to you with that same curious look.”
She closed her fingers and the flame died. “The moment he’d walked in, you’d wiped your tears away and stood in front of me. You were so quiet. Even after he finished speaking, you just stared at him. I don’t know how much time passed, but it was long enough for my tantrum to fade. I watched the two of you look at each other, his expression inquisitive, yours calculating. Eventually, you held your hand up and conjured a small flame.”
I watched my fingers curl into a fist and open again, trying to visualize a flame in my palm. “Good thing he isn’t asking now.”
She didn’t even look at me. “It continued that way. Every day, he and a guard with food would come in. He’d asked us to cast magic. Usually, it was a different element. Sometimes, he’d make a more complicated request. I’d cry and ask for our parents, you’d stare at him then do as he asked.”
Well, that didn’t sound like me at all. I was more likely to set my captor on fire than acquiesce. Then again, I’d just spent a month playing the innocent sheep in the Black Citadel. Maybe I’d felt the same compulsion to keep my head down and weather the storm back then?
“I don’t know how long it continued, but one day I woke up and it was dark. After our first meeting, you’d taken to keeping a flame conjured for us, so I immediately panicked. At first I thought you were asleep, but you always rose before me so there’d be light when I awoke. I called for you but there was no reply. My crying began in earnest once more,” she finished, her jaw tight. Neither of us enjoyed admitting weakness, it seemed.
“It didn’t take long for the master to appear. He told me I needed to learn independence. If I wanted to see you again, I had to be your equal, to demonstrate the same powers you had.” Diana paused, reaching to tuck back the wayward strand of hair that had fallen out of place again. “You were my entire world, so of course I obeyed.”
My entire world. My heart seized at those words, and I let out a deep breath to mask my grunt of pain. “Was he lying?”
She shook her head. “I don’t remember the exact trials he asked of you, but it seemed he asked as many of me. It was sixteen days until I saw you again, but first he took me to an elderly lady who washed me down. That was the first time I realized we hadn’t bathed since we’d arrived.”
“Bet Nicholas loved meeting us during that time,” I said, forcing humor into my tone.
For the first time in a long while, she raised her eyes to mine before quickly dropping them once more. “The lady passed me off to a guard, who led me down a series of stone hallways and into what would become our sparring room.
You were there with Nicholas’ hand wrapped over your own as he showed you how to hold a sword. He moved the weapon the around, speaking softly as he explained the nuances of swordplay.
It wasn’t until you noticed me and began ignoring him that his pleasant demeanor shifted. His other hand gripped your shoulder and forced you back into place. Then, he turned to me and said focus was half the battle — that you’d begun to learn the basics but still had a lot of improving to do and that I would be instructed in the same arts. If we could behave, he’d teach us together.”
My imagination wove pictures of that scene. I couldn’t help wondering what would have happened if I’d whipped around and stabbed him instead of playing along. Well, he would have probably dodged. And even if I’d succeeded, the guards probably would have killed me. It would’ve been worth it if it meant he was gone from this world, though. Considering how old he supposedly was, however, I doubted defeating him was as simple as a sword through the eye.
Before I could ask her any questions about Nicholas’ supposed immortality, she continued speaking. “We trained for years after that, learning swordplay, magic, languages, history…. Many things. The master was — is — a strict teacher, and many of our lessons ended in blood, but he taught us well. You more than me.”
Damn it. I’d wanted to call her out on saying Nicholas was a good teacher. Fine, he was the reason I was so skilled. The admission made me want to rip my skin off, but I could force the words out — mentally, anyway.
But strict? That word was so politically correct it had me seeing red. He wasn’t strict. My dreams had shown me his teaching methods. He was volatile. The moment things stopped going his way, he snapped. Harsh, cruel, downright evil were all good descriptions of his teaching method; strict was not.
So, yeah, I wanted to bring that up. Then, she added that last sentence, and now it was all I could think about. “Me more than you?”
“You were better — outshone me in every subject. I didn’t even want to learn, but I knew if I didn’t put in the effort, he’d split us up. I was afraid I’d never see you again. After a while, my fear turned into anger — and it shifted to you. True, you never left my side — you made it a point to stay with me — but you never replied when I asked about our parents. You never spoke of our parents. It was like you’d forgotten them. There was no resistance in you, no attempts to escape or fight back. Everything you did seemed tailored to please the master.”
I shook my head. Absolutely none of this made sense. She had to be confused. “Are you one hundred percent sure you aren’t mixing us up? Because I’m, like, the most confrontational, dogged person I know — and you’ve met Fiona.”
“You really don’t remember?” Her words were heavy with expectation, as if I’d suddenly cave and admit I remembered everything so she wouldn’t have to continue. I wished I could.
“I don’t even remember my last name,” I said. “Or birthday. Or age. Or nationality—”
“Or how to shut up.”
“Ha. Ha. Ha,” I said flatly. “You’re funny.”
“One of us has to be.”
“Well, one of us is confused.” I gave her pointed look.
She rolled her eyes, but since it was the first show of non-miserable emotion I’d seen since sitting down, I took it. “And you think it’s the one without amnesia?”
“You think you’re so perfect,” I teased. “With your perfect memory and everything. Well, hate to break it to you, but you’re short.”
“We’r
e the same height.”
“Duh. We’re twins.” I forced a huge grin on my face. “Shorty.”
Diana’s fingers clenched, but her bare fingers meant no sword appeared in her hand.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you about that ring, by the way. The one that matches mine.”
I tilted my head back to look at the ring on the nightstand behind me. It was an exact match to the ruby ring I wore, only with a sapphire instead. I’d found my ring in a small drawer with my name on it, so I always figured it was a keepsake of some sort. Seeing Diana’s cemented that belief, but also brought new questions.
“Was it from our parents or Nicholas?” I asked the question that bothered me the most. “You use it to summon that sword, right? With the totally bitchin’ phoenix hilt. Can I do that? Is it—”
“Can I finish my first story before beginning a new one?” she asked tersely.
“Right,” I said sheepishly. “Sorry. You were in the middle of hating me.”
She flinched. “Hate isn’t…. I spent years resenting you. Not only was I stuck in your shadow as the master’s pupil, but I felt betrayed. It was like you didn’t care about our family anymore, like you’d left our parents behind for him. Then, eight years ago, I finally understood your actions.”
Glad to know I hadn’t been a stone cold bitch. The way the story was going, I was beginning to think I’d been an awful person and losing my memory made me nice. Well, nice-ish.
“Once we turned fifteen, the master began sending us out on missions, usually to track down something or someone. One night, we were given a new assignment, an extremely important one. The master made it very clear: we had to bring this artifact in — failure would not be tolerated.” Diana’s glowered at her clenched hands. “I made a mistake that allowed the nereids to escape. The entire mission was a disaster, and it was all my fault.”
“Nereids?” I asked, an unpleasant sensation creeping up my spine. “What were we supposed to get?”
“The Right Fang of the Ocean Queen,” she said. “One of the earrings housing a piece of Seraphine’s soul.”
