The Midnight Before Me
Page 9
A lock of hair tickles her arm. Regenerated. Still white and silky just like it was before. Still perfect no matter what. How disappointing.
White hair. A symbol, in this country, of the upper class. The Frost family, naturally talented at magic, were also more educated than the Ronumese in general when they first came to Galviton. And because of that, they hold their place at the top of the family ranks in Galviton. Or… so she’s been told.
Maybe, if she was an Aroma, she could be any class she wanted. Maybe, she would be free from her miserable life in these chains high-class life has put upon her. Maybe, she wouldn’t have set off the curse that led her here.
Just because she’s the Queen, everyone assumes that she must have been happy. That she must have been content with her life and her problems were trivial and petty.
It can’t be further from the truth.
That fame. That money. That unwanted power. It’s the source of her unhappiness. The core she strives to destroy now.
Yes. Destroy it. Destroy it all. Nothing else matters.
Sometimes, in order to fix something, it needs to be destroyed first.
Gathering herself together, she starts picking her way through the rubble. Blown bits of the cage from when that girl, Midnight, blasted it away are strewn around the forest—stuck in trees, bushes, and various shrubbery. Glass dust scattered along the forest floor prick at her numb feet, giving her the tiniest sensation of feeling. She shivers in anger at the thought of that girl again.
The buzz in her head is beginning to come back. It’s a bit louder than usual. There’s chattering in her head, busy and distracting, but it only fills her with more drive as she listens.
After wandering for a long amount of time, she finally reaches a nearby town.
All of the houses are skillfully built, with tiled roofs, stone walls, and beautiful groves in every yard…
Fortunately, a wealthy family of Aromas has a house nearby, and their maids are hang-drying some laundry. The weather is dry enough today, it seems.
The clothes hanging in the frosty breeze are a girl’s nightgowns. Glorieux’s petite frame barely fits into one—a simple white gown with no design or embroidery. It’s still wet and cold, and she risks a little more heat magic to dry it off quicker in the safety of a bush. She still feels exposed.
Shivering, she finally dares a Teleport through the window as discreetly as possible, and the comforting sight of a fireplace calls out to her temptingly. The heat lulls her eyelids to start drooping. Falling asleep, she curls up on the sofa with the heat of the fire.
On a certain evening, three years ago, the skies were clouded over just like any other day. Glorieux’s fragile slippers slapped the ground as she ran, and she didn’t doubt that she would have a hole in those slippers one way or another. Her white hair floated through the air behind her like a wispy fog, and her formal silver blue dress only made her seem more ghostly than usual in the misty streets of Galviton’s capital city, Juntale.
Her destination: the Aristide Judgement Hall, attached to the Juntale military headquarters. If one looked at it from the outside, it would seem like an extension of the Winter Palace itself. It was in the middle of the main street leading out of the gates of the Palace, but it had such an intimidating disposition that it almost seemed as if the street had been built around it.
Why Father? Why? What petty crime pushed you over the edge this time?
Glorieux pushed her way through the doors and beheld the usual sight.
The beams of the gallows were there as always. The monstrosity of them loomed over the crowd, and she quickly slipped into an empty seat in the back. Her dress clung annoyingly to her body, slightly damp from the humid air outside.
She never told her father about Soren, but she always wondered what would’ve happened if she did. For all she knew, he probably would’ve organized an exorcism on the spot.
Well, the equivalent of that exorcism came. His cruel way of cleansing the world.
Ever since he began those grim ordeals, she could never fully look her father in the eye anymore or even hold a decent conversation with him. It was sickening, at first, to see these sorts of things—these executions—but she had gotten used to it, even if she felt shame every time she saw it.
But then, looking at the stool and knowing who was going up, she felt nauseous and lightheaded all over again. The walls of the execution room were like those of a Thyrmian chapel with rows of pew-like seats throughout the whole thing with a gray aisle cutting through the middle for people to march up and down. Her father preferred doing it this way—in a grandiose gesture of authority. High arching walls that reached up towards the heavens, stained glass windows with weak, foggy light barely shining through, and the naturally cold temperature of the room gave the chamber a foreboding, haunting feel.
Countless people had died from the noose on that raised platform already. That one was a special structure. It was made completely out of stone the color of pigeon feathers that probably weighed as much as a full grown elephant. Instead of a flaxen or hemp rope, the winding cord was instead made of thin white silk meant to delicately and gracefully cut off the breathing of its victim. It was all just a flex of her father’s power. To send a warning to all not to question him.
And that day, her balding, white-haired father stood stoically on the gallows, giving another one of his excessive speeches in front of the wooden platform of death. His coat was a white smudge against the foggy stone walls. The swirled magenta patterns embroidered on his jacket seemed to burn her eyes, and the silver glint of his gun glared at her from his belt.
Where is Soren? Please… cancel this abomination, Father… Stop talking.
“…stole a painting—” He kept talking. “—from Mr. and Mrs. Dominique Frost, and stole important confidential documents from the councilmen and the King’s advisors… And… most of all, stole the lovely innocence of our esteemed Queen Glorieux Dolce Frost-Galviton.” Gasps were heard around the room, and her heart sank to the floor. “I present to you, a national criminal of Galviton who must be sentenced to death: Soren Archer Frost, son of Archer Corbin Frost.”
Glorieux could feel all of the blood drain from her face and adrenaline so strong it tickled her fingertips. Her palms started to sweat and out of habit; she started biting her nails before chiding herself along with the echoes of her etiquette teacher from just that morning.
Soren finally walked out of a large wooden door, his hands bound together with a dirtied white cloth. His eyes met hers, and she saw fear stricken throughout his entire, doe-eyed face. His dirty-white hair was out of place and tousled, and there was a bruise on his cheek. He no doubt had more injuries underneath his prisoner uniform—clothes that consisted only of a dirtied shirt and pants the color of wet sand borrowed from a previously executed soul.
Glorieux already knew by then how they treated prisoners sentenced to death. Like scum and rubbish. It made her spine shiver, and her eyes shut for a moment as she tried to silence the growing anxiety building up in her chest.
She drew in a shaky breath and reopened her eyes. Soren was looking right at her, finishing his death march down the aisle, his eyes begging for mercy. She so wanted to reach out, console him, and pull him off of the blasted structure. But she couldn’t. Her duty and reputation hung on the line. A silly thing to worry about in such a dire situation.
Soren will be fine. She thought this to console herself, but she already knew that his fate was already decided at the hands of her father.
A soldier put the noose around Soren’s almost fragile neck on her father’s order.
He’ll be fine… He’ll be fine… He’ll be…
No.
She couldn’t stay put any longer. She stood up from her seat and looked right at her father.
“Stop!” she yelled, her voice resonating against the bones of the building. “Father, you promised me you wouldn’t hurt him!”
More gasps, and faces turned her way.
The hateful stares turned back to the white-haired boy up front. Mindless children who could only follow the pied piper.
The veil wrapped around the back of Glorieux’s head started to burn.
“Father, he didn’t hurt anyone!” she tried again.
“I forgave him once and let him off with a slap on the wrist. However, now that I have discovered how he… defiled my one and only daughter, it is unforgivable!”
Cheers sounded all around her, while some audience members shot her disappointed looks.
There it was again. That disappointment. That expectation.
“Why?” she cried. She wanted to run up there herself and throw the rope off of Soren’s neck. She had promised to take care of him. That she would love him properly one day. And yet, there she was, helplessly watching him stare Death in the face… because of her.
Soren, getting desperate from his place on the stool, started shouting with her.
“My name is Soren. My name is Soren Archer and don’t you forget that! I’ll curse you all! All you rich bastards who celebrate death when it isn’t yours! I’ll make you remember death!”
Her father continued to ignore both Soren’s and Glorieux’s pleas.
“Remove the stool!” he ordered briskly.
“As your Queen,” she attempted desperately, “I order you…”
But it was too late.
And Soren made the most horrible of noises as his windpipe was cut off from air.
Ignoring the useless etiquette lessons and shoving past people in a flurry, she ran up towards the gallows. She pulled herself onto the platform in the most un-ladylike fashion, but her father stopped her, wrapping his hands solidly around her small frame.
Soren gasped for air for the longest time. She didn’t know what to do to help him—what to do with her hands, what to do with her feet. She could only stand up there on that platform, watching in shock.
“Stop this nonsense now, Glorieux,” her father hissed in her ear. “See? It’s already over. I’m doing this for your sake! So we don’t completely lose face for your foolish actions.”
We?
“Please…” The whimper escaped her throat. “Please… Stop…”
“Stop this ridiculousness, Glorieux! This is not the way you represent yourself and our family!” This time, he shouted in her ear.
The anger came. Red and hot, the anger made her spin around to face her father, finally, finally, meeting his eyes, a copy of hers.
A strong pulse of magic started flowing into her head giving her a tantalizing feeling.
It’s all his fault, she thought.
“You, Father… are despicable! You hang people for your own pleasure and escape, yet you play it off as an act of justice!” The fire was coming. The words she had seen in that old magic tome laying in Sucre’s cage came back to her.
I’ll make you remember death!
An idea. An idea that whispered the temptation of revenge.
Why not fulfill Soren’s dying will? Her father deserves it.
Those ancient, forbidden words…
“Il, Margh, Leam, Ral, Ril, Lokh, Nakh…”
She forgot the last two words. She struggled to remember. She had forty seconds to keep speaking it before the spell became null.
The seconds flew by while every person in the room watched as she fumbled.
40, 39, 38, 37, 36… 12… 6, 5, 4…
“Nakh!” she repeated. And then, “Rrel!” she finally shouted into the air, crossing her fingers for it to be right.
A rumbling shook the entire building. She could feel the magic of the enchantment at her fingertips calling at her to activate it…
Such magic… Why did it feel so ugly to wield?
The final breath of Soren whispered through the air, tickling her ear just as dread fell through her entire body. She didn’t say the right words, did she.
The ground began to shake. A thundering crash sounded at the back of the room. A large chunk of rock fell from the ceiling. The entire building began collapsing. No… the entire city started collapsing. Rumbling could be heard everywhere. As if a dragon was awakening underneath their feet.
“What did you…” her father started, but then a large mass of rock fell, crushing his legs.
Dust rained from the ceiling. The ground shook so violently that Glorieux fell over as the solid marble stone turned into a bucking bull.
What…
What did you do? A curious voice pokes through her mind.
That dear, sing-songy voice that she loves so much. Tears brimmed in her eyes, and she turned back, hope sparking in her mind.
But instead of seeing him standing, healthy, and smiling again, all she saw was his dead body still hanging from the stone death structure. Dead, already turning blue.
What… did she do?
The enchantment. That old tome she had stolen from Sucre with those finely printed letters in their aged, yellowing pages.
“…meant to enchant someone who has killed a loved one of yours to be eternally haunted by their memories of the moment they killed your beloved.”
She wanted her father to feel guilt for once in his life. She wanted to see remorse on his face. There he lay unconscious on the ground, his ragged breathing signaling he was still alive. Guilt and the words “I’m sorry” got caught in her throat.
That last word…
Glorie, came that voice again.
“Soren?” she asked, bewildered, spinning her head around the room looking for him. “Soren, where are you?”
Glorie… I can… I can hear your thoughts. I’m… I’m in you.
“What…?” she breathed.
A figure dropped down in front of the building, the entire entryway now crumbled. Yellow eyes gazed dauntingly into the room taking in the scene. The immediate fragility of the world made it seem as if the creature at the door would break through the crust of the earth at any moment, yet the animal stood, unflinching.
Nakh, said the nuagepanthère ominously. The word of love and care, synonymous with soul. Rrel, the word of…
His eyes started to glow a bluish white, piercing through the rubble as he stared straight ahead at nothing.
Destruction and insanity.
His eyes started to get brighter and brighter, spreading throughout the room. She could distinctly remember it—that power so potent she felt intoxicated. That, she realized, was the true power of the nuagepanthère.
You have created a dangerous enchantment… you have created a curse. Rrel… will manipulate the very enchantment itself, and change it into something monstrous. “They will remember my love, yet destroy my love.” That’s what you told it to do. And you have set it on the entire country.
Rrel. She got it mixed up.
Words, ancient words, started vibrating out from Sucre, hitting her mind with full force as he listed out chains of words with detached precision.
The world then went white, and she fell into a deep sleep.
Glorieux woke up soon after that incident in a prison cell, in which she spent two days and nights with barely any food or water. When she asked why she was there, they only answered with, “You’ll be released when you are able to control yourself again.”
Soren was there, comforting her, but she only felt as if she was falling, more and more, into despair. She knew what they actually meant: The only way for her to be free was to follow the rules again. Go back to the obedient queen again. At that point, it didn’t matter who jailed her. Father or husband, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome.
When she was finally let out, no one was allowed to attend her as she washed herself, nourished her body, and dressed herself in her normal attire once more. And then, when she finished, she was treated normally once again. She went back
to her everyday duties of overseeing various aspects of the kingdom through mere pieces of paper and stiffly smiling to her attendants, who all had matching stiff smiles on their faces as well.
Perhaps, that normalcy was even worse than staying in that stuffy cell. It was even worse because she stumbled through each and every day while pretending to curtsy and dance and smile while she suffered. It was maybe during those two days in that cell when she really realized how much she hated her life.
How much she hated herself.
How replaceable she was. Anyone can read and sign papers. Anyone can wear fancy dresses and smile politely.
She wanted to be back in those meandering hallways of that theatre with that smiling boy and unabashed girl running to the chocolate fountain, saying whatever they wanted.
She was tired of it. Tired of everything.
And so, her hatred only grew. It was because of these people—these selfish, greedy people taking lives for granted, for only thinking of themselves—that Soren died.
Dvitreland was a war that brought fresh insanity into the soldiers and civilians. And a fresh coat of mad over Glorieux. In that next year, her father, though paralyzed, still executed nineteen more people on the gallows before dying in the war, seven of which were unfortunate enough to have family or friends witness their deaths. Those seven went on to enter her mind, body, and soul to whisper in her ears every day. Whisper of freedoms outside of the palace walls.
And soon after it had ended, Glorieux’s will was solidified. And Sucre had offered her the perfect starting point. He could only break one half of the curse—the immediate destruction of Galviton part—the “destroy love” part of the curse. But he was powerless to stop her or the “remember love”—the part of the curse that silently corrodes the minds—due to running out of magic. “Memento Mori” she remembers some people calling it.
Now is the time for her to move, to utilize this opportunity to exact her revenge.
That is… as long as that silver-haired girl doesn’t get in the way.
Waking by the fire with a start, the eyes of a dull-haired Aroma girl meet Glorieux’s silver ones lit aglow slightly by the dying fire. She’s back in the manor she had snuck into; the nightmare is long gone.