The Calyx Charm

by May Peterson

  I drew a deep breath, nausea rippling up through my limbs. “Casilio. The calyx charm is protecting him from literally everything else. Fuck.”

  “There. Exactly.” Violetta sighed, blowing a few strands of hair away from her brow. She glowed for a moment, tired and luminous with visionary energy, but it seemed to mean something to her that I was following. “We need to look at what’s happened since I lost my ability to use the calyx charm for myself. Weifan tried to kill him, but the calyx charm saved him. Then later, Tibario tried to kill him, and the same thing happened. And who knows how many other assassins have tried and failed because the calyx charm makes him invincible?”

  Weifan had gone still, a strange aura of intention rolling off her. “Those are the parts of the story that went wrong—in other words, his continued existence is what will lead to you becoming a dragon-soul.”

  Violetta frowned. “Yes. The dragon-soul is making the correction. If the calyx charm keeps protecting him, the conditions for the dragon-soul’s birth will be met, and then the dragon-soul itself will be the only thing finally able to break through its own magic and remove Father from this future. It’s like a sequence where fate tries to knock him down, my magic keeps him from falling whether I like it or not, and each new attempt is more and more extreme and unusual—a mage, a moon-soul, who knows what’s next?—until finally my dragon-soul is the last option remaining.”

  This was all making a disturbing kind of sense on a gut level, though my mind struggled to put it all together. Rosalina was breathing heavily, eyes cloudy with her diffuse thoughts. “Wait, you’re saying what’s next. You believe there will be another event that threatens Casilio’s life, and if the calyx charm shields him once again—?”

  Violetta nodded fervently. “It will be the last time. We know this because the days are almost up. And since the dragon-soul comes from me, it’s very likely that this means whatever the event is, it will cause me to lose hope. Or come close to death.”

  Or decide to end her own life. She may not have meant that, but I had to consider it. Especially if her instincts told her it was the only way to avoid evaporating everything she loved in a fit of magical transcendence.

  “All right.” I grasped the pouch in her sash, pulled it out to set between us. “This is a provocative theory, but where does the lachrysinthe come in? Because I am getting rather profoundly concerned as to what you are about to propose the solution is.”

  She stared at me, her gaze growing palpably more sad as it softened. “We have to accept that there may not be a solution, Tibario. Maybe that’s the lesson. The future is coming and we aren’t always going to be able to change it. I tried. I’ve spent my life changing futures, and maybe I can’t do it anymore.”

  She may as well have kicked me in the chest. I choked on an inchoate sound in my throat, bowing in to see into her eyes. It hurt because I couldn’t argue. Being the Honored Child was a burden. A burden that may have been impossible to expect anyone to bear, and the cost was that we all wound up lost in a fragmented future doomed not to complete itself. In this way, she pronounced truth once again: the story had gone wrong.

  Perhaps this was the piece of her humanity the dragon-soul would keep for itself: that someplace inside her, she was withstanding the harsh reality by holding on to the dream. The dream of everything the future might have been.

  I touched her shoulders, massaged them, lowered my voice. “Then let’s stop. Stop analyzing it, stop trying to solve it, stop worrying, stop blaming. Let’s rest and let it be, if we can’t change it.”

  For a moment it seemed like she might agree with me. But she closed her hand around the pouch. “This is where the lachrysinthe comes in. Serafina gave the sense that timing was everything. My approaching death will only make the dragon-soul come faster, but lachrysinthe can put the magic to sleep. And if I’m right about what culminates my prophecy, we know what to look for. We know to be ready for one last crisis that makes my dragon-soul seem like the only way. In short, we wait for me to give up hope. Then I need to be able to count on you—all of you—to dose me with the elixir. Will you do that? It may not work, but if it stops the flow of the magic, it may keep the dragon-soul from being born.”

  Rosalina chewed her lip. “Will the elixir harm you?”

  “I don’t know. But Serafina speaks of it as safe to use at least occasionally. She doesn’t want me to die, I don’t think. That much I believe of her.”

  “Then we’ll do it.” Weifan rubbed her hands together, appearing pleased to have some plan of action. “And agile as I and your beau are, we should find it easy to keep you under surveillance. How many of those syringes do you have?”

  She distributed one to each of us and showed us where she was storing the case with more of the elixir. It was possible Mamma had deceived her, but the Mamma I had said goodbye to was not the triumphant player who would make such a move. She hadn’t expected this.

  If it was true that Papa was gone, and Mio and I were gone, and Liliana was nowhere in sight, then another of Violetta’s prophecies had come true: Mamma had brought about her separation from those she most dearly loved.

  The pins were dropping, one by one. The days grew thinner, and the unanswered questions were either attaining answers or fading into the mist. It was as if some quiet force were cleaning up the debris of this life, making way for the last future.

  We went about the day as usual, me going to sleep with Violetta curled into my arms. It felt good to hold her, share this pool of silence and reprieve, smell her clean hair and feel the warmth of her body. But I had trouble sleeping nonetheless.

  This was a grim task. Not being asked to administer a medicine—that sounded simple enough.

  It was watching for despair to win, and knowing that at best we could buy more time.

  Every choice in my life had simply been a way to buy more time. Time I had hoped would last forever, as long as I needed to find a place for my heart to go before it stopped beating.

  There was no doubt: the story was about to end.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Violetta

  I was dreaming again. Damn.

  Dreaming and prophecy weren’t that similar, as alike as they often felt. Dreams said more about what was within, prophecy about what was everywhere.

  But the ripples of the future could easily bleed into my dream experience, and I was so tired of the future never leaving me alone.

  Right now, something seemed different. Lighter.

  This wasn’t a dream. Not really, but I was asleep. My consciousness floated in a tranquil dark, as if I was waking inside my mind as my body slumbered. I felt the impression of my body against the gentle dark.

  And there was something here.

  My first impulse was to close myself, fight the touch of the future leaking into me. But this wasn’t the future I was feeling.

  Not something. Someone.

  I felt into the dark, finding a brightness that expanded into visions like a spot of liquid prophecy. There she was.

  I calmed my mind, took shape within myself. And spoke. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?”

  She moved like a swarm of lit clouds, a shape blurring out of nothing. She became a face, a silhouette, wreathed in a red garment, hair falling behind her like wings.

  Serafina.

  This was her as she might have been in her imagination, more relaxed. Softer, somehow. A wan smile shone on her lips.

  Her voice sounded real, physical, as it swam in the dark. “So you are asleep. Good. It’s easier to communicate that way. I’m not trying to control your mind, Violetta. Not that I’m fool enough now to believe you have any reason to trust me.”

  I wound my attention tighter, shielding myself from her presence. She radiated no aggression, not even desperation this time. But she was right. I didn’t trust her. I may never trust her.

&nb
sp; I did, however, remember the erosion I’d seen over the past weeks. Something in her was changing. Seer as I was, it may be my task to diagnose exactly what that change meant. But we were all seedpods in a world of rapidly transfiguring soil. She would have to get in line.

  “Then why reach out to me?”

  Her image clarified, became as precise as in the waking world. She looked less soft now, more weary. Like a stone becoming bleak as it attained the hardness of diamond.

  Her smile was as wicked as it was sad. “You could have forced me out once. That’s impressive, you know? Other than Mio, you are the only witch who has ever managed it. I respect a formidable opponent. But Tibario told true. I should never have treated you as an opponent, Violetta. You didn’t deserve that from me.”

  My insides were stirring, that familiar sensation of my body in vibration, picking up the future. I felt too vulnerable like this. “Tell me why. Lay all your cards face up on the table, Serafina. That’s what I’ve always wanted from you.”

  She nodded, looking helpless for a moment. “I came to ask a favor, one more time. And you have every right to refuse.”

  Before saying more, she paused, then slowly sunk down to her feet, to the ephemeral ground of our shared dream.

  And she bowed.

  It was a servant’s bow. Hands stretched out, forehead touching the ground, face hidden as if in shame. The motion took me aback, was surreal to watch from Serafina of all people. She held it for several moments before raising her head to face me.

  “I do not ask for your forgiveness.” The wicked smile gleamed once, then lost some of its light. “I realize I have forfeited the right to do so. But I am sorry. I told you that I don’t regret the things I’ve done, fighting for the future I believed in. But when Tibario was gone and the house was empty, all I saw when looking back was my path of regrets. Indeed, it appears naught remains but regret. I found you at your most vulnerable and treated you exactly as badly as your father did. I like to believe I am a different creature than he, that if I am violent, it is in a nobler way, for greater causes. But with regard to you, he and I have been the same. And you do not have to forgive me.”

  This was what I was feeling. No tricks this time. She had agreed to my terms before, but there had been pressure. Pleading, persuading, reasoning. This time she did precisely as I asked, not only by the letter but by the spirit. She did not ask me to give her more time. She allowed that I might still reject her, and there was no appeal to what I could lose if I turned her away.

  Who cared if she’d changed? It wasn’t my burden to see to Serafina’s spiritual perfection. But she was both demanding less than ever before, and taking more risk. If she possessed me, Tibario would know. It would shatter any chance she had left with her son.

  We had mere days remaining in this life, if that. Maybe it was pity, or compassion, or simple knowledge that the end was already here.

  I made my decision.

  “Please stand.” I sighed. “Tell me what you’re asking.”

  She complied, scarlet robe trailing behind her like a comet’s tail. “I came to you twice before for a favor. This is the last one I will ask. It was always you, showing me the way, despite my harshest resistance. Many things would have been different if I had heard what you told me, so many years ago. I trust you now to understand how to honor my request, if you choose. It is only this: ask Tibario not to come after me.”

  That quickened my pulse, her words as heavy as omens. “I don’t understand. Come after you?”

  A fierce grin bloomed on her face, the glow of her eye like a sunrise. “I’m on my way to face Casilio. Once and for all, as was always the ending I anticipated for us. I am going to slay him. Or he will slay me, whichever comes first.” She paused. “I assume I have your permission.”

  “You don’t need it.” I swallowed roughly, digesting her news. “He’s terrified and oppressed far too many to be only my monster. But I have no desire for him to live, if that’s what you mean. I’d kill him myself if I could.”

  Indeed, I clearly would, and soon. It was the temporal loop my dragon-soul depended on. Father must die. He was a blight on the world, avatar of an evil he deliberately chose to represent.

  “I thought as much.” She chuckled. “But either through your powers or some other avenue, I presume Tibario will find out what I’m doing. So I’m warning you now ahead of time, because in spite of what’s fallen between us, Tibario will likely try to interfere. To aid me in some way. It’s what I once hoped. Mother and son, defeating our enemy together. But your prophecy is clear. Let me find another way, or die trying. If I die and Tibario isn’t involved, your prophecy may be broken. I won’t touch his mind, as much as I may wish to. Please, Violetta. I want there to be some use left of the life I have lived.”

  Her characteristic hauteur now sung with a faint sorrow, fatigued with the weight of her own deeds. It was what I had foretold for her, and in the time of its fruition she had found another answer. I didn’t know how to respond to this version of Serafina.

  Serafina in pain looked invincible. She did not look invincible now.

  The future began to roil within me.

  “You don’t understand.” I grappled with how to explain my inchoate fears and half-assembled portents. “I don’t oppose you doing this. I even admire it, in a way. But the calyx charm lies with him. You won’t defeat it. It isn’t because you aren’t strong enough, or won’t try hard enough. Not even your magic can pierce the charm.”

  She soaked this in like a wave, and with an alarming aura of kindness, she said, “I may know one thing that can. If no other option remains.”

  Oh, heaven and hell. I felt sad for her. I felt sad for Tibario who was going to lose her, who’d lost her so many times already to the battlefield our lives had been. We’d all already died at the hands of this world. The world of sorcerer dons and family spies and wars waged in shadows, in revolution and dust and the musk of deathless feathers. The world of the Honored Child. None of us had ever had the chance to be who we truly were.

  “I feel it approaching.” My hand went to my belly, the future readying to be born. “One more crisis is coming, and it will bring the prophecy to culmination. I’m not afraid of Father, Serafina. Or at least, he’s not the problem. My dragon-soul is. Maybe your failure will be worth something, but the story isn’t over yet. Your death could be the match that lights the tinder.”

  Serafina laughed. Low, amused. Sympathetic. “Oh, you poor girl. You’ve believed this about your foresight from the beginning: that whatever evil falls on us, it must come from you. What if you aren’t the one to cause this doom? What if you were wrong?”

  The possibilities were making me sick. “I don’t know anymore. What’s the difference? Me, the future, the dragon-soul, Father, you, it’s all running together. I will tell Tibario what you’ve said. But what he does is his choice, you understand? I won’t manipulate him into doing anything.”

  “That’s what I want.” Relief rippled visibly through her. “That’s what I’ve decided, as I face my own end. I want my son to finally have a free choice. Because I understand now that he didn’t have one as long as he had to please me.”

  Pain crested through me, tipping this encounter toward unbearable. I couldn’t take much more sorrow, and I never thought I’d have to make room for Serafina’s. “Then I can’t argue. You may have been right about he and I only choosing each other out of despair. But I want you to understand this. I’m grateful for my despair. Despair may be the only thing that has finally helped me see who I am. Maybe it hasn’t been so bad for you, eh?”

  She bowed her head once more as if in thanks. And on that note, she was gone. All that was left was a mirage shimmer of fading magic and the sourness of loss.

  * * *

  Over tea and several shots of booze, I told Tibario and the others what Serafina had said.

  Tib
ario held a blanket tightly over himself and looked down, absorbing my story through the clenched wall of a frown. Weifan leaned against her chair and stared out the window. Rosalina met my gaze, stirring her tea with one hand but not drinking.

  Of course it was difficult to grasp what this meant. I had suggested another battle coming, one that might need a dragon-soul to win it, and here Serafina came with weapon in hand. She might yet defeat Father, if no other mortal power could, because she was uniquely willing to spend her life on it. She was built on decades of opposition to Father and what he represented. Only someone who had been so invested in the fight against him—not only his politics or his agenda but his person, his spirit—while being so alike in power could have such a counter-identity. Serafina was the anti-Casilio, endowed with a purity of hatred that perhaps she alone could achieve.

  Weifan was the first to speak. She rose and thumped her chest. “All right. I never thought I’d be saying this. But I agree with Serafina. She’s throwing in her lot, and saying we need to let her do it. Of course we should. We have no obligation to risk ourselves for her, and she doesn’t want us to.”

  Tibario flinched, but it felt more like the reaction of someone being woken up than revulsion. “I’m inclined to agree. Mamma will do what she decides to do. I don’t want her to die, no matter what’s happened. But she’s saying she doesn’t think there’s anything we can do to stop it, and if the prophecy is about to descend, then there isn’t.”