The Cursed Crown

by Matthew S. Cox

  “Kitlyn!” shrieked Oona. She skidded to a stop as the sound of her wife’s scream from below faded to silence.

  Oona pounded on the floor a few times before standing and slapping at the door, not caring if the ground swallowed her too. She had to get to Kitlyn. “Beowyn? Isha? Where are you?”

  A man’s distant voice yelled out as if calling to her, too far away to make out words.

  “No!” She stomped on the spot of floor that ate Kitlyn.

  “There she is.”

  Oona spun to the right.

  A tall man in a grey maid’s dress stepped out of the swirling darkness, dagger gleaming in his right hand. Two more men in Evermoor armor appeared behind him, also with drawn daggers.

  Too frightened by the sight of the assassins who’d plagued her for years to question why they’d be deep within a mountain in Ondar, Oona screamed and ran directly away from them into clouds of black smoke. Men’s taunting laughter chased her. Six strides later, the shifting darkness gave way to the curving hallway in Castle Cimril. She looked over her shoulder at the three assassins racing out the door of her old bedchamber.

  “Princess,” said a man in front of her.

  Oona spun forward, skidding to a halt. Her heart nearly leapt into her throat at the sight of Ian. She tried to leap back, but found her wrists shackled together, connected to a chain leading to his fist.

  Ian held up an evil bottle of frothing purple liquid. “You haven’t touched your drink, princess.”

  “No!” Oona stared in horror at the shiny silver manacles. “You’re dead!”

  At rapid footsteps coming up from behind, she peered over her shoulder at the three assassins. Oona struggled at the metal locked around her wrists. Fear flickered to rage, but no matter how hard she pulled, the steel refused to release her.

  “You’re dead! You’re not real.” She hurled herself at Ian, reaching with her bound hands to swat the poison from his grip.

  Her shoulder crashed against his chest, which gave way, no more solid than a cloud. The manacles evaporated with a twinkling clatter like thousands of tiny fragments of steel falling to a marble floor. Oona drew her longsword and prepared to face the assassins, but they, too, had disappeared.

  She turned in place, sword held at the ready, looking around at the royal hall. “I’m not here. This is not real.”

  After a few minutes of telling the walls they didn’t exist—and nothing changing—Oona picked a direction, sheathed her blade, and walked toward the grand stairway.

  “Oona,” said a high-pitched voice.

  She stopped and spun. A door to a sitting room opened, revealing a willowy girl of about fourteen with blonde hair. Except for pale green eyes, Oona may as well have been looking into a mirror.

  “Mama was right.” Older-Evie scrunched up her nose in disgust. “How can you do those things with another girl? It’s wretched. Why did you take me away from my home? I hate it here. I hate you! You’re a disgrace to Lucen, doing that stuff with a girl. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Foul liar!” roared Oona, not believing her eyes for even a split second. “You are not my sister.”

  Older-Evie burst into laughter and ran off down the hall. Oona glared after her, furious.

  A short distance away, the teen turned to face her again and shrank back into a seven-year-old, once again a total visage of loving innocence.

  “Oona!” chirped Evie, raising her arms as if about to run into a hug. “I’ve missed you!”

  Ruby appeared out of nowhere, swooping in and grabbing the little girl, who erupted in tears, screaming for help.

  “She’s mine, you filthy wretch!” screamed Ruby, backing away with the struggling child. “You know I’m going to take her back. And she must be punished for being so disloyal to her own mother.”

  Ruby spat in Oona’s direction, then ran away.

  Evie reached over her mother’s shoulder toward her. “Oona! Help! I don’t wanna go with her! She’s gonna hit me! Help! Don’t let her take me!”

  Growling, Oona chased, surprising herself by drawing her longsword. She ran hard, but never gained any ground on the fleeing woman.

  At the end of the corridor, Ruby kicked a door open, ducked inside, and slammed it. Oona crashed against the door, emitting a bark like a stepped-on goose when it failed to yield. She sheathed her blade and grabbed the door handle, growling as she turned it and ripped the door open.

  She rushed into an impenetrably black chamber so cold her breath fogged before her eyes.

  “Evie?”

  Her voice echoed over itself four times.

  “Evie?” called Oona, louder.

  The echo came back six times, each repetition quieter than the last.

  Squish.

  Oona stopped and tried to look down at what she stepped on, but couldn’t see anything past her chest. Even the glow of her light orb only radiated to about three feet. Skittering and scratching surrounded her.

  “What is this place?”

  The darkness vanished.

  Oona stood at the center of a vast chamber filled with millions of spiders, insects, snakes, and unidentifiable bugs, some multi-legged horrors as thick as her arm and as long as her leg. She blinked in surprise, kicked a fat, black bug away from her foot, then sighed.

  “What am I, six?” She shook her head. “I’m not afraid of creepy-crawlies.”

  A millipede the size of a sausage landed on her shoulder.

  Oona screamed and swatted it away, shaking. “Okay, maybe I am a little. But bugs don’t get that big.”

  A handful of snakes crawled toward her.

  “This is not real. I haven’t been petrified of spiders for years.” She gazed up at a ceiling covered in webs and dead rats. “L-Lucen knows my heart. I do not bear falsehood. Not wanting to be near them isn’t exactly the same as being terrified of them.”

  The ocean of creepers disappeared.

  Oona blinked, and the large chamber became a city square in Cimril, the sky above overcast and grey.

  “Abomination!” shouted a man behind her.

  “Wretch!” yelled a woman.

  Oona spun. A crowd of angry citizens appeared out of thin air and advanced toward her. Two large men at the center flung a battered and bloody Kitlyn to the ground at her feet, a gaping sword wound at the center of her chest. The crowd appeared intent on doing the same to her.

  “An affront to the gods!” roared a teenage boy. “Burn them both!”

  She fell to her knees and gathered Kitlyn’s body in her arms, refusing to flee and leave her there. As the crowd of citizens closed in around her, Oona shut her eyes, thinking of Tenebrea’s blessing and the gift Orien had given her.

  “This is not real.”

  Men and women grabbed her arms, trying to pull her away from Kitlyn. Spit hit her in the face. Fists mashed into her back.

  “Kill the abomination!” roared the crowd.

  Oona clung with all her strength to Kitlyn’s body, shaking with anger.

  “This is not real. It’s trying to trick me.”

  Someone yanked Oona’s hair, pulling her head back.

  She opened her eyes and stared up at the scowl of a furious, unfamiliar woman. The cold edge of a sharp blade pressed into the front of her throat.

  “Not real,” whispered Oona…

  Before blacking out.

  32

  Too Far

  Kitlyn

  The narrow passage behind Kitlyn had become too quiet.

  She peered back and found herself alone. The others had all vanished.

  “Oona?” She looked around. “Beowyn? Isha?”

  For a few seconds after her voice stopped echoing, she stood there, not entirely sure what to do. Did I miss a hole in the floor? No… they would’ve shouted if they fell. People don’t simply vanish. She turned back the way she had been walking and stared at more endless hallway.

  “Wait… Oona is gone, and so is her light. How can I still see? That doesn’t make any s
ense.”

  The instant the realization hit her, it brought on a strong spell of vertigo. Kitlyn lost her balance and fell to the floor, surprisingly soft for stone.

  She sat up in her tiny bedroom across the hall from Oona’s chambers, covered by her crude blanket and a thin nightdress. Her bare feet poked out from the other side, dirty as ever. The shelf with her spare tunics and breeches stood beside her on the right.

  An overwhelming, sickening feeling crept into her mind: she’d dreamed it all. Oona loving her back, the Eldritch Heart, ending the war, being anything other than a pathetic lowborn girl. She’d had a wonderful dream that had become a nightmare. Little chance existed that Oona thought of her as anything more than a dear friend. She dare not admit her love, lest the girl recoil in horror and never want to see her again. That the princess had actually shared her love and even married her in Lucernia of all places could only have been a dream.

  “Ending the war?” Kitlyn stared at her hands. “Me, a stoneshaper? Ugh. Time to grow up. I’m not a child anymore.”

  True, she could make pebbles dance around to amuse little Pim, but rocking the foundation of the castle to threaten the king? Laughable. Raising a massive wall to crush an army of skeletons? Ridiculous. Becoming queen? Preposterous.

  Oona loving her back? The most absurd thought of all.

  At that, Kitlyn buried her face against her knees, and wept.

  Two loud bangs shook her door.

  “Coming,” muttered Kitlyn in a teary voice while wiping her face on the back of her arm.

  She slipped out of bed and took her nightdress off, dropping it unceremoniously on the thin mattress, then spent a few seconds staring down at her nakedness, imagining Oona’s hands caressing her.

  With a sigh, she pulled on her breeches and tunic, then left her bedroom. After heading down to the ground floor to retrieve a bucket, soap, and a brush, she returned to the third floor royal hallway and proceeded to scrub. On her hands and knees, she pushed the brush back and forth in endless drudgery.

  Oona emerged from her bedchamber in a beautiful blue dress, her handmaiden Elsbeth beside her. The two of them laughed and giggled about something banal. Upon seeing Kitlyn sprawled there, clad in rags and filthy, Oona whispered something behind her hand that made Elsbeth cackle with laughter. The two of them scurried off down the corridor, no doubt laughing at her.

  Tears patted on the brush in Kitlyn’s hands. When had Oona become so mean to her? She’d never been like that. Had she done something wrong? Oh, no… I must’ve talked in my sleep. Someone heard me and she knows I love her! Everyone knows I’m an abomination.

  Kitlyn curled up, shivering, dreading the shame that would follow. That didn’t bother her near as much as Oona being so cold—even cruel. The truth must have reached her ears. Her longtime friend had fallen in unnatural love with her, and Oona had reacted exactly as Kitlyn dreaded.

  Expecting Fauhurst to appear at any minute, she forced herself to scrub onward, still sobbing. Minutes later when she reached the middle of the curve, the door to the king’s bedchamber came into view.

  She froze, staring at it. Those doors felt as though they belonged to her, not the king. Not her father. No. He isn’t my father. I had a dream. A wishful, made-up, impossible dream. Me the real princess? Of course I dreamed it. I’ve been wishing for a nobleman to ride in on a black horse and claim me as his daughter for years. Minutes passed. No Fauhurst came to torment her. Still, the nagging sensation that she had moved into that bedchamber needled at her.

  Abandoning the brush in a puddle of foam, Kitlyn stood, wiping her wet hands down the front of her plain servant’s tunic. She padded up to the ornate doors and pulled one open. If anyone caught her going into the king’s private quarters, she would face severe punishment. Yet, the castle had become strangely quiet.

  The interior of the bedchamber appeared as she expected it should. She sighed with defeat and turned to leave, but caught sight of a simple crown perched upon a pillow in a locked cabinet. What? The king would sooner die than be seen without his crown.

  She brushed a finger across her forehead. “It’s silly to wear a crown into a fight. I don’t need to wave my station in everyone’s face.”

  Confused by the oddity of the crown sitting there unworn, Kitlyn pushed the door shut and jogged down the hallway. She hurried faster and faster, until she sprinted, her bare feet clapping on the smooth polished stone. Hallways and staircases blurred by on her way down to the throne room.

  A constant low murmur of voices came from within.

  Kitlyn grasped the handles of the great double doors and heaved them open. The instant the thick wooden doors parted, her servant’s clothing exploded into an elaborate gown of seafoam green with white trim. Matching soft slippers appeared on her feet, tiny fabric roses of dark emerald above the toes. She glanced at her arms, covered to the elbows in white silk gloves. The weight of a thin crown settled upon her head.

  A room full of advisors, courtiers, and nobles all stopped in mid-conversation to stare at her.

  Oh, this is far too strange. Am I still dreaming? Did I dream that I had a dream of being queen, then waking up only to still be dreaming that I am queen? She emitted a nervous laugh. I shall drive myself to madness with such circular thoughts.

  The throne sat empty, the carpeted path from door to dais unobstructed. For no particular reason, Kitlyn walked into the room. Whispers came from both sides, gossiping about how she loved another woman. Many expressed disgust at the notion. Some averted their eyes, refusing to even look at her, calling her a ‘creature.’

  “A shame such a pretty girl as the princess would be so vile inside,” said a male voice on the right.

  “They ought to make her marry that Lanwick prince.” A woman with a huge beehive hairdo scowled at Kitlyn. “And toss that peasant girl back to the farm she came from. Maybe she’ll wed one of the pigs.”

  The courtiers around the woman broke into laughter.

  Kitlyn glared.

  “Hmph.” The woman broke eye contact, nose in the air.

  “Prince Lanwick wouldn’t dare touch a creature like her.” A man scowled at Kitlyn and looked away. “Wretch.”

  “They’ll never produce an heir.” A portly man on the other side she vaguely recalled as a duke shook his head. “She simply cannot be allowed to rule on that matter alone. It breaks the hereditary royal family. She is not fit to wear the crown.”

  By the time Kitlyn reached the base of the throne dais, she found herself caught halfway between the urge to crush the entire room inward to silence the nattering harpies and wanting to find a small, dark place to hide away from everyone so she could burst into tears. How could people hate her so much only because the person she chose to love happened to be a woman, too?

  “My clothes changed in an instant. I am either dreaming… or I’m not.” She stooped and reached for the stone steps leading to the throne. A thin needle liquefied out and hardened at her command. She plucked her left glove off and pierced her palm with the point, wincing at the pain.

  Nothing changed. The horrible, whispering crowd remained.

  “I’m not dreaming.” She dropped the needle and stood, hands balled to fists. “This is real. The lich is doing something to me. Making me see things I fear.”

  Murmuring swept over the crowd. A disturbance developed at the back, sweeping across toward her. Bodies parted, revealing Fauhurst in his advisor’s robes, dragging Oona along by the hair. She’d been stripped to her smallclothes and bra, wearing more bruises and stains from rotting vegetables than fabric. Fauhurst marched up to Kitlyn and hurled Oona to all fours at her feet.

  “Kitlyn,” rasped Oona.

  “I will see our glorious kingdom restored, purged of your impurity.” Fauhurst put his foot against Oona’s rear end and kicked her forward so she crashed into Kitlyn.

  Kitlyn looked down into her love’s eyes, both blackened and bruised.

  “Wake up,” said Oona. “I’m right here. Kit!
Wake up!”

  Pure rage welled up within Kitlyn. She roared, lashing out with her magic, and thrust her right arm forward, tearing dozens of giant bricks from the walls and commanding them all to fly inward at Fauhurst.

  In that instant of absolute fury, her vision flashed completely white.

  The hand she thrust forward struck something soft.

  “Oof!” yelled Oona. “Kit?”

  She blinked rapidly until the blinding glow faded.

  Kitlyn once again found herself wearing her armor, standing in a black stone hallway, her right hand outstretched as if signaling a rider to stop his horse. Oona stumbled back, both hands clamped over her face.

  “Oona!” shouted Kitlyn before bursting into joyful tears and leaping into an embrace. “You’re all right! What an awful, awful vision.”

  “What did you throw rocks at?” mumbled Oona.

  Kitlyn relaxed the hug enough to make eye contact. “Throw rocks?”

  Oona mimicked the same gesture she’d used to hurl the stones at Fauhurst. “You mashed me in the face. The sorcerer affected us somehow. Not taking us over but making us see things. You were just standing there staring like a statue. I started shaking you, calling you, but it didn’t help. Then all of a sudden, whack.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry. I thought Fauhurst…” She choked up, but swallowed it. “I was about to crush him.”

  Beowyn moaned.

  Kitlyn glanced behind her.

  Both Beowyn and Isha stood slouched against the walls like drunkards, twitching and muttering.

  “They’re under the spell.” Kitlyn couldn’t help herself and clung to Oona’s arm, still trying to reassure herself that her rejection had been a lie in her mind. “Can we help them?”

  Isha jumped forward with a battle cry, swinging her blade at a phantom. Kitlyn leapt aside, shoving Oona with her to the ground as the sword passed within inches of them.

  “Highness!” shouted Isha. “Forgive me, I saw…”

  “It’s all right.” Kitlyn picked herself up. “It’s foul magic.”

  Tears streamed down the burly warrior’s face. He twisted side to side as if cleaving his giant sword back and forth at an endless onrush of enemies.