by Sarah Dalton
“Bah! He is weaker than I!”
“Only someone who cannot see beyond skin would say such a thing. Have you ever taken the time to stop and get to know your son? Well, have you? I think not. You did not see the fearless way he fought in the Waerg Woods. He was frightened at first, but only idiots have no fear. Real strength comes from being afraid and doing it anyway. The opposite of what you are doing right now. I have seen Cas look death straight in the face without flinching. I have seen him embrace his death. Not like his father, a sobbing, quivering mess—”
“You don’t know!” he booms. “You don’t know how I’ve lived, how I’ve suffered.”
“Oh spare me. I do know. I have come close to death several times during my journey here, and, yes, I have flinched, I have fought, and I have almost failed more than once, but I never gave up, and I would never, ever, take another life in order to live longer. You have taken hundreds of lives to try and prolong yours. You have killed your own people to do it. You are a small man, a despot king, a man to be laughed at. I will kill you myself.”
I step forward in the dark with my hands in front of my face. It is useless. The nothingness is so thick that I cannot see even an inch in front of my face. If I am to find the king I must use light. The only way I can do that is by conjuring fire. I gulp at the thought. That means releasing more rage.
“You’ll have to find me first,” the king growls.
“I am more powerful than you can imagine,” I say. “And I will find you.”
I stumble forward, holding out my hand palm up. Despite my brave words, my fingers tremble. I’m not sure what I am more afraid of: summoning fire, or fighting the king. I shake my head and begin to let the anger burn within me. This is only a vision. It isn’t real. I can use fire here, I’ve done it before. I must force my powers to my will. This is the only way I will learn.
“You silly girl—”
“No, not girl,” I say. I have to stop and double over. The burning sensation ripping through my body causes real, physical pain. I let out a groan as I straighten my back and allow the fire to spring into action, glowing orange-red in the dark room, “craft-born.” I force myself to stand upright, strong and tall.
I will not let the fire control me.
Somewhere in the distance there is a whimper and the scuttling of feet. The king has seen my fire, which means that he cannot be far. I draw my arm back and fling the burning flame away from me, searching for the cowardly man. The fire burns bright and travels far, but there is nothing to be seen, no corners, no corridors, just a vast expanse of nothingness.
Where is he?
My gut twists with pent up rage. It’s like bathing in hatred. I hate fire. I hate what it makes me feel.
I wish I could sweep the room in a systematic fashion, but without walls or corners, there’s little I can do. I just keep moving forwards, throwing fireballs in all directions. They travel but never hit a surface. The king’s fear seems impossible to navigate because it is nothingness.
“There has to be something,” I mumble to myself. A trickle of sweat works its way down my temple. “No one can imagine nothingness. There has to be something, a trail, a pathway, something that he’s added to this world.”
I stare down at my feet. Perhaps the floor is the only clue in this world. After all, the king has invented the ground I’m walking on.
“Footprints!” I say.
Layers of dust have coated the expanse of the floor, and within the dust, there are the unmistakeable signs of boot prints. The king has left a trail of his attempted escape.
I slow my steps, placing my feet quietly onto the dust. I wrestle with the fire ball in my hand, controlling it takes all my concentration, but I manage to force it down to a candle flame. My control is improving, but the effort is draining. At least I’m doing it. Allerton was right to teach me the final element.
But still, the thought of killing with fire makes my throat close. There is something primitive about this element. I hurry on, wanting nothing more than to find the king and leave.
The silence becomes a suffocating blanket that highlights the sound of my own body. My breath becomes a hurricane; my heart is a beaten drum. I think for certain that the king can hear me approach. I imagine him crouched, waiting. Like a hunting cat engulfed in shadows.
I concentrate on my senses. There is no sound. He must either be still or moving very slowly. There is no sight of him. He is cloaked in the shadows of his world. But there is a smell. It’s a very faint scent, one of musk, dried sweat and something else… like the tang of metal. It could be the smell of his chainmail or armour. Or his fear.
He’s close.
My shoulder blades dampen with sweat as I think of how I will defeat the king. I could never take him in battle. He might be a pathetic sobbing mess, but he is still stronger than me in combat. I will need to use my craft-born powers.
I could consume him in fire, but the thought of watching a man die in the flames turns my stomach.
I could throw him against the wall with wind. A vision of his broken body hitting the wall with a sickening crunch causes my flame to die down to a mere flicker.
You cannot kill.
I’ve had more than one opportunity to kill a foe, and every time I have found another way. What if my doubts are correct? What if I cannot take a life? Back in Halts-Walden I couldn’t even hunt.
Is there another way to break this fear? The king is afraid of dying, it makes sense to kill him and force him to face his fear. And it’s not real. I must repeat this mantra. The Nix has constructed this reality. He has done it to test me, to weaken me. The only way I can break through is to remain strong and do what I must.
I must kill him.
I must.
There’s a scrape and my head snaps in the direction of the sound. I enlarge the fireball in my palm and lift it into the air until it hangs suspended above my head. It’s then he comes running out of the shadows, his chainmail chinking, his face contorted, his mouth gaping open, a battle cry escaping from his lips, his sword held high above his head.
I stagger back, tripping on my feet and tumbling to the floor. In that instant I am a little girl again. I am the pathetic little Mae who believes she is more daring than she really is; who demands adventure and then balks at danger. In a split second the sword is coming down on me, giving me one fleeting moment to roll from its path.
I jump to my feet, my pulse pounding; every single muscle tensed, ready to run.
But I can’t.
I need to break this cycle.
As the king lunges for me again, I call on wind to throw him back.
His steps falter as the wind pushes him back. I blow a gale, forcing him to push through the wind. He leans forward with his hair blowing back, his eyes are pale fierce spheres locked on mine and determined.
“You may have little tricks up your sleeve,” he says, “but you do not have the same passion to live. I will not face my end. I have not worked all this time to die at the hand of some Haedaland peasant girl.”
I keep the wind on him, battering him with my powers, but he pulls himself to his feet, staggering towards me, still with his sword held high. I can feel the gift diminishing from me, drawn out by mental drain. I’ve dipped into them too much too fast. As my powers weaken, the king grows stronger, coming ever forwards. He is right about one thing, he is determined to live. He has his fingernails plunged deep into the flesh of life and he refuses to let go; the tenacious grip of pure fear.
I drop the wind and snuff out the fire, running back into the shadows away from him, my body cold, clammy, trembling. My hands shake as I try to stay composed.
Now we cannot see each other at all.
I hear the king swing his sword, grunting with each stroke. I decide to use this opportunity to keep away from him and let him tire himself out. I need to recharge my powers.
“You won’t escape me, peasant girl,” he growls. “I will
find you and I will cut you in half. I will not be defeated.”
His voice is surprisingly close, prompting me to step back just in time. His sword swipes towards my arm, catching me with a shallow slice. The king realises this and comes closer, forcing me to turn and run away.
“I can hear you running,” he says. “You little coward. You have a lot of big talk for a silly little girl from the Haedalands.”
This is it. I need to use my powers. This time I manage to block out the full extent of the rage, but still find the fire come to me with ease. The fireball explodes from my hands. “I’m from Halts-Walden!” The release is incredible, like a rush of adrenaline I have never experienced before. It both exhilarates and frightens me in equal measure. I find that the pain of the anger and hatred has gone. It’s such a relief that I laugh. This is how it should be. This is how my powers should work. Fire is now as easy as summoning wind. Why did I have such trouble?
The fire hits him squarely on the shoulder, causing the king to drop his sword. He panics, swatting himself with his other hand, trying to stop the fire from spreading. There is a sickening scent of burning flesh in the air, but I have not ejected enough to kill him.
While he is distracted, I bend down and retrieve his sword, leaving him unarmed.
As the fire goes out, I say, “And I am not a girl. I’m the craft-born, you should remember that.”
There is a great roar, and before I can move away, the heavy beast of a man throws himself on top of me. His hands grip my wrist, attempting to wrestle the sword from me, but I hold it tight, pointing it upwards, somewhere near to where I imagine the king is.
I try to use wind to throw him from me, but the frantic nature of wrestling seizes me with a paralysing fear. I find myself scratching at his eyes with my free hand, while attempting to yank the sword from his grip.
We roll along the floor. A fist hits me on the side of my face, loosening a tooth and causing me to bite my tongue. Blood gushes into my mouth, metallic and warm.
I manage to knee him in the crotch and attempt to wriggle out from underneath him. He grabs at my thighs but I kick his chest, he lets out a cry and I scramble to my feet.
I prepare myself to invoke another fire ball, but the king is faster. With a great cry I feel his weight thrown at me again, but this time I have a tiny opportunity to angle the sword towards his chest. I grip the hilt with both hands and hold it fast as the king impales himself on his own sword. The deadly steel finds the weak spot between his armour, sliding up and under his ribs. All the way to his heart. With a sick feeling in my stomach, I push it that last inch, feeling the resistance of his flesh, and when I am certain that I have landed a fatal blow, I stagger back, with my hand over my mouth.
Through the darkness comes light, and it is not light I have created myself, it is a piercing light filling the nothingness. It shows the blood on my hands. It reveals the king falling to his knees with his eyes wide open in shock. I watch as the fear consumes him. I see the terror in those eyes.
My father’s books told the history of the kings, but that spoke even more about war. I’ve heard soldiers called heroes. Men fight for glory, but there is no glory in taking a life, only a sick feeling that churns at your stomach. In that instance you are terrified of your own power. You are aware of what we all have inside of us—the ability to kill. No matter how good you are or how sensitive, you can kill. I discover that in the moment the king falls onto his back with his unfocussed eyes staring up at me, still terrified.
I’m sick. I throw up onto the dusty floor of the king’s vision.
I never wanted this.
But somehow I took the responsibility I didn’t want, and I claimed it as my own.
After I’m sick, I cry.
What is it about our lives that make us feel so formidable one moment and so weak the next? Even in moments of pure power we find our true weaknesses.
I stagger back from the corpse and turn away. The last fear. I’ve been through them all and I have destroyed each and every one of them. If the Nix feeds on the fears of its victims, surely I have done enough to weaken its powers and break the curse. I need to leave this place. The Red Palace should go back to normal. The king will wake up and be alive. I need that reality now. I need it to happen.
But it would seem there is one last vision for me to walk through.
Chapter Nineteen – The Black Crown
I am in a room I have only ever peeked into before. It is the throne room, a place where the king is supposed to sit and listen to the woes of his subjects. According to the rumours spread amongst the servants, the king spends little time with the public.
The throne sits on an elevated platform at the far end of the room. Running up to the throne is a long aisle which shifts into steps nearer the dais. The steps lead steeply up to the large, stone chair. It is surprisingly simple. The seat is bare, uncushioned. The back rest is an oval carved to a point, with the image of a bird in flight chiselled into the stone. Around it are markings, like the loops on the brass doors in the palace. I can imagine Beardsley taking inspiration from this ancient stone chair. I think of him standing here, trying to imagine how he will fulfil the king’s latest demand. My heart aches for him. It aches for everyone stuck in this palace with their tyrant king. It aches for the people of Cyne, caught up in the king’s quest for eternal life, suffering because he needs money to finance his diamonds; living with the smoke, the bad soil, the dirty water.
After seeing the king’s living quarters I know he likes to surround himself in the finest of things. Yet the throne is plain. Perhaps it is the antiquity. Somehow I can’t imagine that the king cares about history. His wants and needs are a priority against the history of the realm. No. If he wanted a fine throne, he would have one made. It would be gold and carved into intricate patterns. There would be a fine velvet cushion to sit on and a boy waiting beside him with wine.
The king strikes me as a man who would rather be hunting, or brooding around the castle in his finery, than doing his duties. Tough decisions he leaves to his subordinates. That cowardice sums up the king to me. He wants the title and the glory but not the work. I try to imagine him as immortal. In one hundred years, who will he be bullying then? Will the realm even exist?
I think of the men who have sat on this same throne. Aldrych, Ethelbert, Gregor… men who have been mad or power hungry or weak. Aegunlund has had a bad run of kings. There have been many wars, many years of poverty, too.
As I make my way up the aisle towards the throne I also imagine the many men, women and children who have implored those kings to help them. I wonder how many went away with their problems solved. Few, if any.
With my body tired from the fight, it is an arduous trip up the stone steps. My muscles ache. I move slowly, delaying my ascent to that most coveted of seats. But the suspension only helps to whet my curiosity further. Why am I here? I have been through all the visions now. Is this still the king’s fear? What is going to happen? I imagine a riot of people filing in through the large open doors to the room, incensed by anger and searching for someone to punish. I tremble at the thought of being ripped apart by a mob.
It’s only when I move closer that I see what sits on the stone chair. It is a crown. I have never seen the crown that the king wears, I have only heard it described as golden, spiked and encrusted with colourful jewels. This one is nothing like that at all. The metal is black and twisted, reaching up like branches. The stones are back, onyx or… black diamonds perhaps. When I reach out to touch the crown, the king appears before me, relaxing on his thrown, one leg thrown out with a mocking grin on his face. I take a step back and a breath escapes my lips, shocked at the sight of his face once more.
Quick as a flash, the sight of the king disappears and in his place is Lyndon. Stone cold eyes stare at me from beneath the crown. His lips curl back to reveal sharp teeth, I shake my head, shaking the sight of him out of my mind.
And now it is Cas’s tu
rn, only it is not the Cas I know. He is older, taller, filled out, with a golden beard. His silver eyes are unsure, searching the room. There are worry lines between his eyebrows. He looks as a king should, heavy with the responsibility of his calling. I let out a sigh of relief.
But then the face changes again and I stagger back in shock, my hand coming up to my mouth.
“No, for all the Gods, no,” I mumble.
Sitting on that cold, stone chair, is myself. I am still a girl, still awkward with skinny limbs and curly hair stuck out at every angle. I couldn’t look less like a queen if I tried. The crown is too big for me. It slips down to just above my ears. My eyes are wide with shock as though I am unaware of what is going on around me, unprepared to wear the crown.
“No,” I whisper.
I screw my eyes shut and back away. My back foot trips on the steps, collapsing beneath me. In one uncoordinated move I am falling down, down, down.
My body goes limp as I hit the last step. The room spins, and flashes of images from the visions float around me. The Nix taunts me with more visions of Cas.
“No,” I say. “You must stop this. It is time for it all to end.” And then I close my eyes.
*
When I open them, Sasha kneels beside me, singing again, a high pitched melodic verse about a poor farmer’s girl who is kidnapped by a nobleman and forced into marriage. My head aches, and my body feels bruised. I lie there and close my eyes. I say nothing, I simply let her continue her song, watching her back, and the way her bright red hair ripples down her shoulders. Marriage. It seems to be what has driven my life so far. I ran from it. I hid my powers. It seems insignificant now.
“You’re awake,” Sasha says. “I wasn’t sure if you were going to come back.”
“Did it work?” I ask. “Did I break the curse?”
