The Destruction of Prince Xavier (Acts of the Witch Queen Book 1)

by Allen, Amanda A.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  The Destruction of Prince Xavier

  About the Author

  More From Amanda

  The Destruction

  of

  Prince Xavier

  For Kristyn

  Xavier watched his mother with trepidation. She swept through the castle halls, a cold dark look on her face.

  “Do you realize,” she snapped, grabbing him by the ear and dragging him towards her mirror room, “who your true love is?”

  At ten years old, he scowled before he said, “I don’t care who it is. I don’t want a true love. Let go, Mama. Mama!”

  “Don’t call me that,” she said with a chill voice. “Between you and Roger I might as well give up. Even I can only curse a family so many times. I’ll have to have another child just to properly resolve this. I am not a brood mare.”

  “Mama, don’t. Please don’t.” The last baby had been so sad. So little and wrinkly, and Mama hadn’t even wrapped the baby girl up before she shoved the baby at Auntie Leandra after doing the spell and told Auntie to get rid of the baby.

  He reminded himself that the children had to live for Mother to keep their magic. The baby was living at least, but Margaret was his sister, and he wanted to see her again. She’d been so little. So little and wrinkly, and she’d looked so cold. He’d had to name her himself, and he wanted her back.

  “Quit your whining,” she said as she dragged him into the mirror room. Guards had already put a cage in the room.

  He hadn’t really fought until he saw it, but when he caught sight of it, he knew it was for him. He shrieked and pulled away. “No, Mama no! I won’t fall in love. I don’t want to be in love. I won’t.”

  His shouts did nothing. She tossed him into the cage and slammed it closed after him.

  “But you didn’t take my powers,” he said. “If I fall in love, you won’t lose anything. Not that I will. I won’t! But Mama?”

  He heard the begging in his voice and knew that he was finished with the sound of it. Mama hated it when people begged. It always made her meaner.

  “You can’t fall in love,” she scoffed. “If I let you fall in love, the rest will think that they can. And they cannot. They all do what you do. You have to go. Because of you, Roger tries to help the little ones. Because of you, Allen growls when I pass. Because of you, Franklin . . .”

  Xavier ran into the side of the cage, trying to break it. But it was strong metal, and he was just a little boy. “They hate you because you’re mean. You’re mean and you took their powers and you do bad things.”

  Her head tilted as he dared to yell at her. He snapped his mouth shut, but it was far too late. She gathered power in her hand and shot it at him. He felt the power knock into him, hold him against the cage, and wrack his body. Tears and snot rolled down his face, and he couldn’t keep back the screaming.

  But she didn’t stop.

  Not for a long time.

  “Xavier,” Roger whispered. He and Franklin and Eddy peeked around the corner, looking for Mama before they crept in. Allen and Will followed.

  “Hi,” Xavier said, trying to be tough. His lip quivered though and a tear snuck down his face.

  “Xavy, don’t go,” Eddy said. He was crying, and it made the inside of Xavier hurt.

  “I don’t want to go, Eddy,” Xavier said. “You be tough. You remember Mama is mean, and you hide from her.”

  Eddy nodded.

  “Roger, you gotta keep them safe,” Xavier told the next oldest brother. The two gazes met, and Roger took hold of Xavier’s hand on the bars. “You’re all that’s left. Mama won’t be nice. Not to anyone. Not ever.”

  “I will, Xavy.” Roger vowed.

  “Frankie,” Xavier said. “You be quiet and you run when you can. It’s okay to run.”

  Frankie was crying as he nodded. He wrapped his arms around Eddy and the two littlest of the brothers curled into a ball on the floor together. They were sobbing and Xavier joined in. He tried to hold it back, but he couldn’t. So he just cried and tried not to be too loud.

  He looked at Will and Allen.

  They looked back at him. They were old enough to know. Just like Roger knew. It was just a matter of time for them. Until Mama came for them and made them sad.

  “Should we run now?” Will asked.

  “I don’t know,” Xavier said. “I think Mama will be able to find you if you do.”

  “What should we do?” Allen asked.

  Xavier didn’t know what to say. Telling Frankie to run was one thing. Mama had all his magic, and his true love was already locked up. Frankie probably didn’t matter to Mama. But Mama hadn’t found the true loves of Eddy and Allen yet. And she already had Will’s. Will already loved Red Riding Hood more than the rest of them, and she was just little like Eddy.

  “I don’t know,” Xavier said. Being good hadn’t worked. Xavier had been good for a long time. But Mama still put him in the cage. Being bad hadn’t worked because Allen was super bad, and Mama just ignored him except for having a guard beat him when he really irritated her.

  Being quiet like Frankie and Eddy and hiding from her hadn’t worked because she hadn’t forgotten them.

  “Take care of each other,” Xavier finally said. “No one knows what it’s like to be us but us. We gotta stick together.”

  “We won’t be able to,” Will said. “She’ll take us one by one until there’s nothing left.”

  Xavier didn’t know what to say. It was probably true. They had the worst Mama ever, and they were just little. They couldn’t stop her. She could do things like hit you with lightning and tell when you were lying and know where you were hiding.

  The oldest boys looked at one another, and then Will said, “I’m not going to stop trying.”

  “I’m going to have fun,” Allen added.

  “I’m going to take care of my brothers,” Roger said. And then a look came over his face. It was the sensing of the future and puzzles that he could sometimes do. Mama hadn’t been as good at taking magic when Roger was born, and he still had some left. “If we stick together,” Roger whispered. “And we remember.”

  They all looked at each other, confused, as Roger continued, “And if we choose to be good, we can win in the end.”

  The last little bit was said so low they could barely hear it. It was scary to say. For Mama, if she heard, would make them never remember again. And she would make them hate each other.

  Roger bit his lip. Allen looked sick, and Will swallowed several times before he said, “I’ll remember.”

  Roger nodded and said, “I’ll remember.”

  Xavier and Allen looked at each other before saying together, “I’ll remember.”

  When the clock struck loud, Roger and Will lifted Eddy and Frankie from the floor where’d they’d fallen asleep.

  “Goodbye,” the brothers said, knowing they wouldn’t see each other for a long time. No one said anything to Xavier about what Mama would do. She’d do something. It would be bad. It always was.

  Mama didn’t come back for three days, and he was very hungry when she did come. He had messed himself, and he didn’t feel like himself inside of his head.

  She sighed as she saw him, and then said, “I’ve got a plan, but you really are too much trouble. I should have drowned you when you were born. If not for you . . .”

  He was too tired not to cry when she said that. She was his Mama. He tried to be good. He tried so hard.

  “I’m sorry, Mama.” He blinked slowly as Auntie came
into the room. She scared him. She always had. She was mean, and she pinched, and she had been too happy to take Margaret away.

  “Mama, please,” he said.

  But she didn’t even look at him when he said it. He closed his eyes and laid down on the floor of the cage. He was tired. And hungry. And his head hurt, and he didn’t want to see what Mama was going to do.

  But he felt it. It hurt so bad. It made his head spin, and he screamed and screamed as the power hit him, but she didn’t stop.

  “I can’t get it,” Mama said.

  “There has to be a way to take his power from him,” Auntie replied.

  “There is, but it’ll be worthless. It’s better to leave it with him than to burn out.”

  “You’ll regret this someday,” Auntie said, scowling down at Xavier, who sniveled at the bottom of the cage. He’d messed himself again and tried to curl into a smaller ball, but it didn’t work. “He’s a revolting little beast.”

  “All boys are,” Mama agreed. “We’ll crack his mind.”

  Xavier began to cry. If she broke his head, he wouldn’t be able to remember his brothers. He shook his head over and over again, but they didn’t listen.

  “That’s almost as difficult as taking his powers,” Auntie said. “Why don’t we just burn out his powers.”

  “We’ll put a limit on it,” Mama said. “The Pareon border. Then we’ll give him to Hardin.”

  Auntie paused and then shrugged. “Doable, I suppose. Hardin is an idiot though.”

  “True,” Mama said. “But a loyal idiot all the same.”

  “Mama,” Xavier said. They didn’t even look up. “Mama, I curse you.”

  They laughed at that, but he wasn’t her son for nothing. “I curse you to never be able to make any more babies. I curse you for what you do to me, and I swear to you that I will find them all, and I will help them to be happy.”

  “Do you?” she asked slowly, walking around his cage.

  “I can see the future,” he said. And enough of it was rolling out before him to calm him. He saw nightmares and shadows and mirrors and pain. So much pain. But he saw a girl with white skin and black hair, and he saw another woman with brown hair and kind eyes. He saw her wrapping him close and keeping him safe. The sight of that woman, whoever she was, gave him strength. “You don’t win,” he said calmly.

  Mama laughed when he said it. She thought he was lying. That was probably good.

  When the pain came and the spell, it burned through his mind. It hurt and he cried, and in the end he couldn’t remember his brothers or sisters. But he did remember a pair of dark brown eyes, and the memory of touching someone’s cheek and being awed by what he saw inside of her. He didn’t know who it was or why she mattered, but she burrowed into his heart and gave him a tiny center of warmth.

  About the Author

  Amanda Allen spends most of her time in a fantasy land where she wears pajamas every day, lives in a castle, and her dogs talk. When she isn't being ruled by those tiny beasts, she tells herself stories. Song of Sorrow is the first tale of Pareon and the machinations of the Witch Queen. She has also written These Lying Eyes.

  Check out Amanda on Amazon

  chapter one

  Fallow was not brave.

  So, when she wove through the trees, glancing over her shoulder, telling herself it would be okay, what she really wanted was to vomit. Or perhaps to curl into the roots of a giant tree, cover up in the red cloak of her Kin and wait until it was over.

  Instead she wove through the trees, telling herself to have faith in Grandmother. In what had been foretold. Grandmother, trained in the ways of the Shadow Kin could travel the shadow paths, she could cross even into the shadow worlds. She could ferret out secrets. She could bring the shadows to life. And, most importantly for Fallow, Grandmother could look deep into the Fallow’s shadows and see her possible futures—her secrets.

  Tonight, untrained as she was, Fallow had glimpsed her own secrets. Father had said he’d be home past midnight, but he’d lied, and his secrets had folded out before her. Father had heard of the dance in the trees. He’d forbidden her to go to such things, and he intended to catch her breaking his rules.

  And so he would.

  Grandmother had told her that she must abjure her father to be free. She must formally divorce him and her name. There was no sneaking away. Not if she wanted freedom.

  “Fallow,” the voice came from the shadows of the trees and Fallow turned, heart in her throat though she knew it was too early for Father. The voice was deep, the baker’s son, Noonan. Ordering herself to hide her fear, Fallow hurried into the trees that surrounded the secluded meadow.

  “I can’t believe you came,” said another, safer voice. Harriet, the baker’s daughter, who was as sneaky as a fox and as warm as the bread her father baked.

  “Fallow!” The gasp was so shocked, so amazed, so familiar that Fallow forgot what lay ahead—just for a moment.

  “You didn’t think I’d come,” Fallow said as she hugged her friend and stepped into the clearing. The woods were thick and dark as any nightmare, but the clearing was well lit with a bonfire, torches, and the sound of laughter. There were dozens there. Faces from far away that Fallow didn’t know and those from her own village.

  “Your father,” Linna whispered.

  “Is on a hunting trip.” Fallow lied swallowing bile.

  “He’ll know.” Linna didn’t have to list the many times he’d caught the two of them snatching a moment of happiness.

  He would know. This time, she wanted him to. Fallow pushed back a strand of hair that had come loose from her thick braid and nodded. Linna’s hand was a comforting weight in the darkness, but it shook just a little.

  “I’m not going back,” Fallow said. She motioned to the bundle behind her. They intended to shove her into marriage with Master Finnegan who had a half dozen children, a heavy hand, and was older than her father.

  Their hands clutched each other, fingers digging in. Fallow’s whisper was barely louder than breathing, “Grandmother viewed my secrets.”

  There was that rush of bile again, the tensing of her shoulders, the faint smell of copper in her nose—the blood yet to come.

  “She did?” Linna’s gasp was stifled under Fallow’s hand. They both glanced around before stepping even close, only a whisper of air between them as if they could squash the revelation in the darkness.

  Viewing someone’s secrets, reading their possible futures, if there was anything that Fallow’s father would punish brutally, it was that. He hated anything to do with the Kin almost as much as he hated Fallow’s grandmother. And yet, Fallow had let Grandmother whisk her through the shadows to the crossroads. Fallow had lit the candle that had been made with her hair and Grandmother had stepped into Fallow’s shadow looking down each of the four paths—her most likely futures.

  Just the thought of it made Fallow ill. Fate had not been kind to her.

  “And,” Fallow said resolutely as if she wasn’t aware that tonight would change the entire course of her life, “I’m here to dance before I claim the future I want.”

  “What does the future you want have?”

  “Love, children, sorrow almost beyond bearing, and freedom from Father.”

  Linna’s swallow was audible. She didn’t need Fallow to explain that her escape would not be easy. Those clever, friendly fingers, caressed the back of Fallow’s hand once, twice, and then squeezed gently.

  No words were needed. But they were said anyway.

  “I’ll miss you.”

  “And I you.” Fallow didn’t cry as she said the words. Instead, she took her friend by the shoulders, pulled her close, and clutched her for a long moment before saying, “This is our chance to dance.”

  Someone fed the fire and the flames rose higher. Linna and Fallow hovered at the side of the clearing. The bonfire crackled, the smell of wood and smoke filled the clearing, mixing with the scents of the forest. The revelry was so rare for them that it to
uched some part of the dancers that made them move a little faster, swing a little wider, leap a little higher. The laughter was loud but friendly. Conversation was stolen in snatches between dances and laughter was the most frequent sound.

  Fallow had never before experienced the like. She’d never been brave enough to risk it.

  Linna took hold of Fallow’s hand, leading her into a weaving line of dancers. “Then dance we shall. Dance until we can move no longer.”

  “Until the moon sets and the sun comes up.” Fallow yelled back as they swung into the steps, finding the rhythm. Friendly hands helped them as they struggled to learn but in minutes, it seemed as if they’d always known the steps. Neither bothered. They didn't want to meet the eyes of those around them.

  Fallow danced with Linna until she spun away, shouting about water. Fallow ignored her own dry throat, determined to enjoy every minute of the fun before Father arrived.

  Just the thought of him struck her with fear. Almost as if she could sense him moving closer, maybe she could. She prayed for strength. Reminded herself that she would make her own choices. And as she did, a hand took hold of hers. She thought, at first, that Linna had returned. But the hand was big, calloused, and a warm in a way that Linna’s never had been.

  There are many paths ahead of you. Grandmother’s voice echoed in Fallow’s head. Fallow gazed at the face that towered over her, but she could not make out any features. Did she know this man? The township was large for this part of Pareon and there were many smaller villages around it.

  “Hello,” the deep voice made Fallow shiver.

  Not in fear.klo

  All of your paths are rife with sorrow.

  “Hello,” Fallow replied. She smiled and felt both a burst of sadness and of knowing. That voice, that hand, it was as if she had always known them, though she was certain she had never met him before.

  Is there no hope? She’d asked Grandmother.

  The man pulled her close. So gently—giving her every chance to dance with someone else.