by Eva Brandt
Even if my parents had tried to kill her and Alois, Dahud agreed to give them burials of great pomp. The ceremonies weren’t as grand as those of her parents, but they came close. Of course, that had a lot to do with the official story we’d told the masses. We’d claimed there had been an attack at the palace and it had killed my parents, as well as Dahud’s.
It might not have been believable had everyone at court not sworn up and down that things had happened just as Dahud had described them. Interestingly, the populace didn’t display too much unrest. They were waiting to see what would happen when Dahud took over. Since Dahud didn’t make any significant changes that would affect them, the people returned to their lives, completely forgetting about the dead royals.
Dahud had tentative plans to crown me as her consort, but first, she’d decided to secure her position a little more. By now, it was obvious to us that someone must’ve planned the whole thing with my parents. They wouldn’t have randomly known how to cast such a spell. The only person who could’ve done it was my aunt and we needed to find her, no matter what.
Unfortunately, she’d disappeared without a trace and inquiries made in my village led to dead ends. No one had seen her since she’d left to Ys to help us. It was as if, the moment she’d left Dahud’s manor, she’d vanished from the face of the earth.
Every night, my visions and nightmares kept returning. I knew something would happen, but the dark silhouettes mocking me in the shadows of my dreams were too blurry for me to discern.
Three weeks after the deaths of Dahud’s parents, I woke up with the distinctive feeling that someone was watching me. I usually slept alone, of course, as Dahud and I no longer shared a bed. But it wasn’t Dahud who was in the room with me.
My pendant was glowing again and my aunt was standing at the foot of my bed, her translucent silhouette shining in the moonlight.
“You!” I hissed. “What are you doing here?”
She shot me a tiny, sad smile. “I’m not the one you should worry about, Mathias,” she said. “I never wanted you to suffer. I never wanted you to feel this pain. But your enemy is right in front of you. You just can’t see him because you’re too busy looking for me.”
“And who, pray tell, is my enemy?” I drawled.
“You’ll find out now, if you go to the nursery.”
A chill swept over my spine. Alois was well guarded at all times. Dahud’s room was right next to the nursery. She’d originally wanted to have the baby sleep with one of us, but we were concerned about what effects the curse might have. Not wanting Alois to be caught into any magical backlash, she’d settled on that compromise and cast every protective spell she knew on the crib. Surely, that would be enough.
As much as I’d have liked to believe that, I just wasn’t convinced. I grabbed a pair of pants and burst out of the room, rushing to the nursery. It took me less than a minute to get there. The moment I stepped inside, I froze.
Dahud’s tutor, Gwenol was standing in front of the crib, holding Alois in his arms. “Gwenol, put my son down,” I ordered.
“He’s not your son, Prince Mathias,” he told me, “not really.”
“Of course he is, but that’s none of your affair anyway.” I took a threatening step forward. “Now, I’m going to ask you again. Put him down, or else.”
At that, Gwenol turned toward me. His eyes were feral with hatred and anguish. “Or else what? What do you think you can possibly do to me?”
I could do plenty of things—kill him, torture him, track his family down and rip them apart one by one. But if he feared any of those options, he didn’t show it.
Before I could make the threat, Dahud joined us. She must’ve sensed something was wrong too, because she was barely dressed and wild-eyed. Fire and insanity glinted in her eyes when she took in the sight of Gwenol holding her baby.
“Gwenol. So it was you all along.”
The man laughed. “Of course it was me. You didn’t think you were the only one talented at the mystical arts, did you, Your Highness? I might not have your power or that of your mother, but I know there’s nothing stronger than the blood sacrifice of two parents. Your mind control stops today. Your curse will be brought to an end.”
Dahud took a deep breath, as if trying to calm down. “Gwenol, don’t. If it’s me you want, you can have me, but leave Alois alone. He’s only a baby.”
Her words carried the subtle traces of magic, the same power that had turned Dahud’s parents into her tools. It didn’t work. “I think we all know that isn’t true,” Gwenol said, shaking off Dahud’s enchantment. “He was never a baby. He is a creature, one who needs to be wiped away from this world.”
Everything happened so fast after that. Gwenol produced a knife, clearly intending to plunge it into my son’s tiny body. Dahud abandoned the subtle approach and lifted her hand. Her magic came to her aid, immobilizing Gwenol and keeping him from going through with his plan.
I lunged at him, taking advantage of the opening to try to secure Alois. Once again, our efforts failed.
“Great gods of magic, punish this anomaly!” Gwenol shouted.
There was a bright light and Dahud and I were thrown back against the walls of the nursery. Dahud was on her feet almost instantly, but by then, it was already too late.
The spell Gwenol had cast was similar to what my parents had done to themselves in an attempt to kill Dahud. The scent of charred flesh and burnt clothes filled the room. The only thing left of Gwenol—and of our son—was ash.
Dahud staggered to the spot where she’d last seen Alois. She dropped to her knees next to the pile of ash, pawing through it with shaking hands.
“This… This isn’t possible. This can’t be happening.”
There was nothing there for her to find, nothing alive, at least. The powerful blast had left behind some bone and when she brushed her hands over it, she sobbed. “It’s his. It’s… Alois’s.”
She looked at me, and her heartbreak shattered what little composure I had left. “Mathias… He’s… He’s…”
I knelt next to her, unable to say a word. What could I possibly say, when I’d failed her so badly? I’d promised to protect her, but in the end, I’d been useless. We’d lost everyone and everything that had been important to us.
“I can’t do this,” Dahud whispered. “I can’t live like this, not anymore.”
I wrapped my arms around my wife’s shaking form. I understood her perfectly. We’d suffered so much. We might have tried to move on, for Alois’s sake, but without him, we just couldn’t do it.
The ground was already starting to shake. In Dahud’s eyes, I saw the same insanity that had destroyed Halvar’s mind, growing brighter and fiercer with every second that passed.
“Dance with me,” she said.
I couldn’t have denied her to save my life. Nodding, I helped her up. She was so beautiful, and I still loved her just as much as I always had.
As Dahud hummed the old lullaby under her breath, I pulled off my pendant and let it slide to the floor, onto Alois’s ash. For a few moments, we danced together, rocking in the center of our child’s ruined nursery. “Do what you must, Dahud. I’m with you, always.”
Outside, it was already raining. Tears trailed down Dahud’s cheeks, mimicking the rain. Or perhaps it was the other way around. It always had been.
“I’m so sorry, Mathias,” she said. “I wish I could’ve made you happy. I just can’t…”
“Go ahead,” I insisted, completely at peace with my fate. “We’ll be together again. I’m sure of it.”
Maybe this had been my path from the moment I’d stepped out of my village and pursued my visions. Maybe my aunt had been right all along and I should’ve never come to Ys. But I had and I would never regret meeting Dahud, Thrand, and Halvar. I would never regret loving and raising Alois, for what little time we’d had him.
“We won’t have a future, Dahud,” I told her, “but we’ll still be happy. Forever and into eternity, like we promised.”
She nodded and closed her eyes. Her tears stopped falling and she gave me a beatific smile. For that alone, it was worth going to my death.
I was still holding onto my wife when the angry waves she summoned crashed upon the palace, sweeping away everything in their path. I brushed my lips against Dahud’s one last time and I didn’t feel the moment when the water fell upon me.
Darkness took me and I waited. I waited to be pulled into the light, to follow Dahud, Alois, Halvar, and Thrand into the next life. It wasn’t meant to be.
The next thing I knew, I was waking up to the sound of rushing waves. My aunt was leaning over me, and her eyes glowed with a bright, golden light as she pressed her hand to my temple.
“Welcome back, Mathias. You scared me there for a moment. I thought I was too late.”
What? What had happened? How had she gotten to me? I distinctly remembered confronting Gwenol in the nursery, failing to save Alois, then deciding to end it all with Dahud. After that, Dahud had used her power to destroy everything and sink Kerys into the sea.
“You should not have done that,” my aunt said with a sigh, “but I suppose it was unavoidable. She was always just as unstable as your wolf shifter.”
I opened my mouth to answer, but no sound came out. I made a second attempt, and when I failed, I tried to reach for my neck, to see what was wrong with me.
That was when I realized something I should have noticed from the very beginning. I couldn’t move a muscle. Every inch of me was paralyzed. My eyelids remained partially responsive, but that was about it.
In every other way, I was trapped.
Having obviously noticed my panic, my aunt proceeded to explain. “Your curse protected you, but it also encased you in a shell of bone. There’s nothing I can do to crack it right now. But don’t worry, Mathias. I won’t let you die. Not now, not ever.”
The words should’ve reassured me. They didn’t. I had no desire to live like this. I didn’t want to live at all, not without my family.
Dahud was dead. I was sure of it. She’d committed suicide out of grief and would’ve killed me too if not for Aunt Anna’s intervention. Our child had been brutally murdered. Thrand and Halvar had succumbed to the curse. Our parents had turned on us and had died too.
I had no reason to exist left.
I shot Anna a desperate look and willed her to understand. “Please, Aunt Anna. Please kill me.” I hadn’t gone along with Dahud’s wishes just for her sake. I wanted this to be over too.
Against all odds, my aunt heard me. She also didn’t intend to let me go. “Don’t be ridiculous, Mathias. I won’t kill you, not after I took the trouble of saving you. You and I will fix what I broke. If it takes us an eternity, we will remove this curse from existence.
“Don’t worry, Mathias. I have a plan. I will bring Dahud back, as my own child, and when that happens, I will destroy the spell.”
Somehow, I had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy. I didn’t need to be magical to realize a person couldn’t just decide what soul her baby was granted.
But despite knowing that, I couldn’t help but feel a small sliver of hope. I didn’t mind suffering as long as it meant I had a chance to get Dahud back. Maybe Aunt Anna did mean well and she could give me back my wife.
Too late did I realize that when my aunt had said she’d never let me die, she’d meant that literally. As my existence prolonged into one of never-ending torment and hell, that spark of hope once again turned into the bright flame of hatred. I vowed revenge on everyone who had hurt me and my family.
Dahud had not been able to fulfill her dreams. She hadn’t been able to build the empire she’d wanted. Maybe I could do it in her stead. Maybe I could tear the world apart and rebuild it in her image. Maybe then, she would return, and be my eternal queen once again.
* * *
Somewhere in Peuce Island, Dobruja
Rothesteus was a busy man. His chieftain trusted him with handling the smaller settlements of their people, and it wasn’t always easy. They never had enough food and they lived in constant conflict.
For this reason, Rothesteus wasn’t happy when one of his attendants interrupted him from his work. “We have something to bring to your attention, My Lord,” the man said.
“Did we lose another village? If not, you’ll lose your head.”
The man didn’t even blink. “We didn’t lose another village, no. A group of hunters found something of interest during one of their patrols. It is a baby.”
“A baby,” Rothesteus repeated. “And should I care about this?”
“The child… The child is special. You should see him, My Lord.”
Rothesteus agreed, although he was already making plans on how he’d kill his idiotic attendant. And then, his eyes fell on the two men who’d come to his camp and the baby in their arms. His previous thoughts dissipated like smoke in the wind.
“Introduce yourselves,” he ordered the duo.
“I am Carn and this is my companion, Atharid,” one of the men replied. “We found this treasure while we were out fishing.”
Rothesteus looked down at the child in Atharid’s arms. As he met the bright blue eyes of the baby, he knew Carn had been right to call him a treasure.
In that gaze, he saw pain and destruction. He saw the memory of fire and death. He saw torn limbs, magic, and sacrifice.
There was a pendant around the child’s neck, and Rothesteus knew it wasn’t anything his people had made. In it, he saw the power of the gods, earth, water, fire, air, and spirit coming together to protect and destroy.
Then, he blinked, and the vision was gone. “Does the babe have a name?” he asked, proud when his voice didn’t shake.
“We thought we could name him Alaric,” Carn said. He sounded completely calm. Rothesteus wondered how it was possible, how the man could even be in that child’s presence and not keel over. Maybe the babe wasn’t the only one who was special.
He’d have to look into it further. In the meantime, he had plans to make. He would not let this chance go to waste.
“Alaric… I like it. It is a strong name, suitable for a gift from the gods.” He grinned down at the child. “You will be powerful when you grow up, little one. You will lead us all in battle, and you will help us defeat the might of Rome.”
Alaric didn’t smile up at him. He didn’t remember smiling. He remembered a man he had called ‘Ma’ and a woman he had called ‘Da’. He remembered their warmth and the safety they had provided. He remembered their screams.
Many years later, as he stood in the ruins of Rome, holding Atharid’s dead body in his arms, he would remember them again. And he’d set out on a different journey—one that would build the basis of a nation.
Epilogue
Dahud
Present day
Everything was quiet after I made sure Louis was no longer a threat. I emerged from his mind to find that, even if it had been a while, no one else had deigned to show up.
Past and present floated at the forefront of my consciousness. After so many years, I’d finally managed to defeat the witch who’d started this whole circle of madness. Louis wasn’t dead, but he was no longer an issue. His past life as Mathias’s aunt, Anna, no longer mattered.
And yet, as Dahud and as Lucienne, I’d always had far too many enemies.
The home of the Dames Blanches of Hastingues had been my shelter, my prison, and my doom, just like Kerys. But unlike that fateful day, when I’d brought the ocean down on top of me in despair, this time, I would not give up. I had big plans, plans to bring my lovers back. This time, I would not fail them.
Where was everyone? There had been more Dames Blanches in this place, I was sure of it. I’d only killed a handful during the ritual that had ended my lovers’ lives. By now, the others should’ve come to avenge the victims, destroy me, and make sure the evil of Queen Dahud wasn’t unleashed upon the world—or something equally as ridiculous.
But the room was still empty, with the sole person pr
esent being Lucienne’s friend, Diane. “What are you going to do now, Lucienne?” she asked tremulously once she saw I’d returned.
“I’m going to fix things,” I replied, eyeing her from head to toe. “I’ve already started. And I believe the next problem I have to deal with is you.”
She’d been Louis’s ally in his quest, but she’d been bound to him by a vow of loyalty, just like my soulmate Pierce. While she’d appeared to believe Louis’s spiel far more than Pierce had, I could hardly blame her for wanting to ensure her brother’s safety at the expense of the lives of my other soulmates.
I understood her reasons, but that didn’t mean I was willing to set her actions aside. She’d betrayed me once. She could do it again. She was too much of a threat to be left alive.
As Dahud, I’d been a little too merciful. Because of that, I’d been forced to drive a knife through Darius’s—Thrand’s—heart. Because of that, Halvar—Declan—had lost his mind and committed suicide. I could’ve stopped it sooner had I crushed my enemies when I’d had the chance.
Diane must’ve realized what I had in mind because she started backing away, all the while making frantic motions with her hands. “Wait! Don’t hurt me. I can help you.”
“And what kind of help can a twice-blessed provide that would make me overlook such treachery?” I asked as I stepped forward, past Louis’s prone form and toward my new target.
“I’m Pierce’s sister,” Diane answered. “You might need someone with a blood connection to him to bring him back.”
She had a point. A lot of necromantic rituals were based on the blood of some kind of relative. Souls were often drawn to bodies that were similar to their own at a cellular level. That was why Louis’s constant quest at encouraging my rebirth had relied not just on his magic, but also on his body. Even millennia after our first life, the ritual had bound me to Anna’s soul, but that wouldn’t have been enough if Louis hadn’t created an appropriate physical shell in Lucienne.
Still, I had my doubts. “Pierce’s mother is still alive and would probably be less of a chore to keep an eye on,” I pointed out.