by Caroline Wei
This was too much.
“But it was a mistake,” she said. I hadn’t noticed she was sitting too, her dress fanned out around her. “I regretted it, but it meant I was in control. I had control over how much he suffered and when he died.”
“Sometimes power makes people sick,” I whispered.
The guards were coming nearer and nearer, but the floor was now a living thing. It threw me sideways until I collided with a filing cabinet, my ears ringing.
“I wanted you to feel what I felt,” Mother said, her eyes steady. “I wanted you to feel the heartbeat of someone you loved stop because of you. Then you would understand.”
Two men and two women, garbed in blazing white, stood at attention in the doorway.
“Your Majesty,” they said in unison, their fists to their chests. But the world was sliding sideways, and more sideways, and soon they were on the floor, Mother clinging onto a table leg. The center of the room was cracking inwards, collapsing, taking electrical cords and papers with it, her foot within an inch from the gaping hole.
The guards were reaching toward Mother, but she wasn’t listening. She was still looking at me, sad, but not crying. She wasn’t the type to cry.
“Mom, get away from there!” I shouted, adrenaline racing in my blood. Why was it that I was always losing something?
“You do love him,” she said, quiet like a murmur. “I see myself in you.”
“Mom, please—”
“But you’ll be better than me. You’ll see where I was blind.”
There was a scary, breaking sound, bubbling up from deep below. “You need to move away from there!”
She smiled at me then—it was quick, but it was so genuine, like a shooting star. You blink and then you miss it. In that moment, everything we had shared together glistened between us, a movie on fast forward. A baby growing into a girl growing into me, a nursery painted yellow, fairy cookies and an empty chair, the lost stories too many to count. But in every single frame, she was there, in some form or another.
The memories I’d been getting had never been Adella Hernandez’s fault, after all.
It was in that moment of love, however obscured, that I realized I could never hate her.
And then the earth swallowed her up, and I think I was screaming, but it’s hard to tell, looking back. There was a lot of dust, a whole cloud of it, so that when everything cleared there was no remnant of Mother but the scarred floor.
55
oliver
Niveus was on the news for weeks and weeks afterward. I couldn’t contact Alle for the entire time, and although her attendants informed me it was because of the large number of people who were trying to do the same, I knew she was just very overwhelmed.
Of course, the first thing Alle did was free Yale from her duties as a maid. She was named a duchess, and I spent most of my time with her at her new house. It was a beautiful little thing, painted mint green with pastel shutters, near the shore. We pretty much always stayed in the music room.
The second thing Alle did was release Clarice Ironstrike from prison, although it was only after she had served a certain amount of time and did plenty of community work for her crimes in the Amnesia Experiment. Afterwards, Alle reinstated her as head of the chemistry team, although I didn’t think they had very many projects anymore. I did know that Clarice had a lot of vacation days.
I was concerned for Alle, though. All the media were saying was that she was refusing to give any comments. She was only seen at her mother’s memorial service, not crying. I doubted she had any knowledge of the outside world. Instead, Alle stayed in her very empty palace, alone.
Though Alle hadn’t been coronated yet, everyone was looking to her as Niveus’ new leader. During international meetings with other countries, all anyone talked about was what Alle’s new foreign policy would be, or what she would do about the disastrous natural state of Niveus’ ice caps.
I knew one thing. If Alle ever needed Caesitas for anything, she could have it.
“What are you thinking about?” Yale asked, leaning her chin against her hands as she propped herself against the piano.
I looked up at her and smiled. “Nothing.”
“Mhm.” Yale raised an eyebrow. “Play something.”
“What do you want to hear?”
“A ballad.”
And so I did.
56
alle
It didn’t feel like there was a reason to get out of bed.
I was a doll under the covers. I didn’t wash my hair or eat very much, but I did take long walks occasionally, especially in the portraiture section of the palace. There were large oil paintings done of great-grandparents, grandparents, Mom and Dad. The one with them had been covered with a black cloth for most of my life, but I took it down after the memorial service.
My father had been a handsome man, broad, kissed by the sun. He was the opposite of his pale, wan wife, but both their faces glowed even within the painting. I could almost hear both of their voices, and it reminded me of summer.
Most of the time, though, I slept.
It was easier than facing everyone else.
After Mother died, potestrine had no more use on anyone who had ingested it before. There was no one to control it, so it was a relief that antidotes didn’t have to be networked throughout the palace staff.
The entire royal family of Rubrum was dead, though, and part of it was my fault. Their funeral had been aired live, but I couldn’t watch it. I knew the world blamed my mother, and I knew they blamed me.
The touch screen on my desk started ringing for the fortieth time that day. Maria looked up from her place next to my door. Sometimes I allowed people like her or Clarice into my bedroom for a little companionship. Although Maria’s citizenship was in Viridis, Queen Ximena had allowed her to stay with me for a while longer.
“Maybe you should answer, Alle,” she said, a finger in her book.
“I can’t.” I buried my face into my pillow.
Maria got up to look at the glowing metal touch screen.
“It’s King Oliver.”
“No.”
“But you have twenty-two missed calls from him in the last week. Everyone is very worried about you.”
“No.”
Maria rubbed her forehead. Ever since getting our memories back, everyone from the Experiment was dealing with it in different ways. Maria had been getting periodic headaches.
“Alle, I think this would be good for you. You can’t just lie in bed all day.”
I rolled over, my nose feeling stuffed.
“Nothing matters anymore.”
Maria’s glare was almost palpable. She sat down on my bed with a rush of air.
“The Alle from the Cube wouldn’t be saying that. That’s something that would come out of the mouth of a coward.”
“Maybe I am a coward.”
Maria shook my shoulder, hard.
“I’m sorry, but I saw you brave electric chairs, flying spiders, avalanches, murder, and an impenetrable metal wall. Not to mention thirst and hunger and death. If you’re a coward, the rest of us would be mice. Get to your senses, Alle! After what happened in the Cube, these are far better circumstances, the very situation we’ve been striving for. Are you really going to let it go to waste?”
The touch screen was still ringing.
I sighed and pushed myself out from under the covers.
“You’re really annoying, Maria.”
She smiled. “And you’ve only just realized that now?”
I picked up the call, and Oliver’s face popped up. He looked surprised.
“Alle?”
“Hi.”
“You look...awful.”
I ran a hand through my thickety hair. “Thanks.”
“Are you okay?”
“Does it matter?”
Oliver’s brow furrowed. “Is this about your mom?”
I thought of Mother’s last words to me, her face, so serene. “I�
��ve made peace with my mom.”
“Then it’s about Malchin.”
What was I supposed to do? Deny it?
“Yes.”
“I don’t understand why you’re so upset. Everyone knows you were under the control of the queen. It wasn’t something you chose to do.”
I blinked. This was news to me.
“Really?”
“Yes, really. Yale wrote an entire article about potestrine and its effects, with the help of Clarice, of course, and I published it to Caesitas’ government website. We also got verification from Carlen’s old chemistry team. Since then, it’s blown up.”
I had thought I would have to prove my innocence.
“I thought the world hated me.”
“You’re very wrong, Alle. The world can’t wait for you to be crowned.”
I sighed.
“It still doesn’t change anything. Malchin is dead because of me, and that won’t ever be reversed.”
There was a pause on the other end. It looked like Oliver was staring at something that I couldn’t see.
“Ollie?”
“Hold on,” he said, and then Yale was in the camera. She looked lovely, radiant, her fiery hair braided into a crown around her forehead.
“Al,” she said. “You know Malchin’s not dead, right?”
Maria gave an audible gasp next to me.
Yale and Oliver’s faces were blurring together, then coming apart, then blurring together again.
“What?”
“Malchin isn’t dead,” Yale repeated. “You missed his heart—actually, you missed the important parts in his body when you stabbed him. He’s very much alive, in Rubrum’s palace hospital. I thought you knew this.”
I don’t know how to explain what happened next. I suppose only people who have experienced it know what it’s like, to have someone resurrect into your life. I just know I grabbed the first thing in my closet, arranged a plane, and flew to Rubrum as fast as was allowed.
The ride there was peaceful. I watched Rubrum pass by from the windows of my jet. It was a beautiful country, but in a different way from Niveus, where everything was state-of-the-art but blizzardy. Rather, the air was warm and humid, and many people had gardens with big, leafy plants surrounded by rugged wooden fences. I could see tiny civilians on the ground crossing streets or haggling for lower prices at tents and vendors’ booths. There were a few flickering neon signs advertising hot dumplings or fried noodles, and in the distance was the palace. Rubrum’s palace was smaller, made of stone, with lots of windows. Their crimson flag waved at me, dancing in the wind from a silver pole.
After I got off the plane and started approaching the palace, a few of the civilians gaped at me, some of them stopping dead in the middle of the street to grab for a camera. I was much too full of anticipation to be uncomfortable, and when I reached the entrance, the guards let me pass without a hassle. Most of them tried to wipe the shocked expressions off their faces as they shifted into position.
“Your Highness,” they chorused as I walked into the grand hall. I unclasped my coat and asked for directions to the infirmary. Maria and two soldiers from Niveus were with me, and I could hardly take in the colorful walls, maps, and pictures streaming past as I ran. I burst through the infirmary doors and looked past the empty cots to the only one that was occupied.
He looked up, bandages visible on his chest underneath his button-up shirt. His hair was wet.
I ran.
He opened his arms.
I crashed into them.
Laughing.
“Not so hard, Alle,” Malchin gasped.
I looked up at him.
“Are you real?” The entire ocean was swimming in my eyes, but I didn’t want anything obstructing my view of him.
“Why didn’t you come visit me?” he asked, his embrace warm.
“I didn’t know you were alive,” I choked. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Shhh.”
“I didn’t mean to hurt you, I didn’t want to, I promise.”
“I know.”
We were like that for a long moment, me hiccupping, him with his chin on my head. Then he held me out from him, looking for a while, like he was memorizing something. His hand went into his pocket and came out with a diamond ring.
I gasped.
“I’ve been keeping this for a long time,” he murmured, turning it over in his hand. It was an exquisite ring, a silver band that joined with a starburst jewel, white as fire. “My mother’s, and her mother’s before that.”
“It’s beautiful, Malchin.”
He looked sad.
“I’m never going to find anyone else worthy of it, Alle. I know you don’t want to, but sometimes it makes me so…”
I stared at him, confused.
I need a princess, and later, a queen.
I won’t.
Sitting up, I took Malchin’s face in my hands.
“At the ball, I wasn’t talking about this at all. I wasn’t refusing you, I was refusing what my mother had commanded me to do. Because the truth is…”
“Yes?”
“The truth is that I love you. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to tell you enough.” I brushed my finger against the jewel on the ring. “I’ll be yours, if you’ll have me.”
He leaned his forehead against mine. We breathed, our inhales and exhales dancing to a quiet song.
We spoke to each other, but no words left our lips.
57
Malchin
“Are you ready?” Oliver asked, straightening my lapel. I looked at myself in the mirror, hoping Alle would like what she saw.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Oliver smiled. “I’m still jealous that your online fan group is bigger than mine.”
“It’s probably going to go down significantly after this.”
Oliver clapped me on the back.
“Good man.” Then he handed me a locket, old and rusted from use. He opened it, and the face of a young girl with freckles and caramel hair peered back at me. “I think you should have this.” Then he turned to everyone else in the room—cousins, aunts and uncles, soldiers and guards and servants both Oliver and I knew from our youth. The absence of my parents and Malaya was like a wound, but one I knew would hurt less with time. “A toast!”
We all raised our glasses. “To joy that never ends.”
We drank.
58
alle
Clarice put a couple of last touches on my face, stepping back, satisfied with her work. She was in the ombre blue-pink dress of a bridesmaid, Maria standing next to her.
“Yale,” Clarice called. “Come over here so we can see the effects of both of you together.”
Yale lifted her skirts and walked over to me, and we both stared at ourselves in the floor-length mirror that Maria tilted towards us. Our gowns were both white, like Niveus’ colors, but around our waists were navy ribbon, for Yale, and scarlet, for me. Lace crawled over our arms, stopping at the wrists to form floral patterns. The top had a sweetheart neckline, and the skirts were full and billowing, falling over itself, like soft snow, to the floor. Maria had insisted we wear our hair down, so they fell in waves, loose, across our shoulders, Yale’s like coral and mine like coffee.
It was like a dream that was coming true.
Yale clutched my hand.
“It’s happening, it’s happening.”
“And it’s almost time,” Clarice said, checking her watch. “Get into position.”
I took a moment to look at her, this friend that I’d gained and lost, then gained again. Her hair was corn silk swooped into a bun, her face clear of makeup. Yes, she had killed, and I hadn’t forgotten it. But I had learned that the worst of us were still humans, after all. They didn’t belong in a different category just because of their sins.
Forgiveness was a harder and yet much easier path to healing than hatred.
The sound of Pachelbel’s Canon in D played through the
open doors. Yale let go of my hand as we rounded the corner so we could hold our bouquets properly. I kept my eyes on the carpet as I heard a roomful of people standing up, the lights on us.
Then we were walking, and slowly, I lifted my gaze. Adisa was in a pew to my left, holding Ria in his arms. They were both grinning at me. Past them was Amanda and Amelia, two maids that I recognized. They weren’t really maids anymore, and so they weren’t in their uniforms, but rather in silvery violet gowns that Yale had ordered for them. Shy smiles kissed their faces.
Past that was two whole pews with plaques and small photographs that represented the victims of the Amnesia Experiment. Tears filled my eyes despite myself, and I saw as I neared the very front row two photos I hadn’t anticipated.
A woman with curling, dark blonde hair laughed out at me, draped in a deep blue gown, her collarbone wearing a silver necklace. Her stomach was slightly rounded. Right next to her was the picture of a man with olive skin, thick eyebrows, and an easy grin. He looked mischievous. My heart swelled with gratitude as I looked towards the altar, where both Malchin and Oliver were standing in sharp black tuxedos.
He was beautiful, his hands gloved, smiling at me like he knew words didn’t quite fill the need of the moment. Everyone else seemed to fade away as I saw him, and it was like it was just the two of us in the whole world.
The officiant, an elderly man with a grizzly beard and glasses, had us say our vows. I meant every word, my hand clasped in Malchin’s warm ones. This was an oath I would never break. Beside me, Yale and Oliver said theirs.
To be proclaimed Malchin’s wife made me feel like the sun had exploded and the earth had filled with light.
“And now, for the coronation ceremony,” the officiant said. To his left, two attendants dressed in white carried velvet pillows with garlands on each. One, a silver circlet with dark teal hibiscus flowers, and the other, gold, with crystal blush cherry blossoms. Malchin squeezed my hand.