The Word Changers

by Ashlee Willis

  Kyran paused, gazing at her for an unbearably long time before he said, “Because there is no room in me for something so poisonous. Such a thing does me more harm than it could ever do good. Can’t you see that? If mercy is undeserved, how much more should love be?”

  Posy shook her head, feeling tears burn behind her eyes. She looked down at her feet, and Kyran grasped both her hands in his own.

  “Anyone can love something that is good and right,” he said quietly. “It’s easy. And even empty, sometimes. And that’s not the life for me, Posy,” he continued, leaning toward her. “Neither is it the one for you, I think.” He reached a hand up to brush her hair away from her face, then pulled her close. “No,” he said, looking beyond her through the window. “We choose to live for greater and deeper things now.”

  Posy closed her eyes. Kyran had loved his father through unthinkable betrayal and cruelty. And it hadn’t harmed him or taken away from him; it hadn’t shamed him. It had made him bold, and it had set him free. Posy now understood that, and she could see that Kyran felt it as well. For it had given him power over any threat or enemy he may ever have. It made him strong beyond believing. Posy felt she held a stranger in her arms. Yet his words had hit her somewhere she hadn’t known existed, a place so deep she thought it must have been shrouded in sleep since the day she had been born. They crept through her, making their way to her center, and awoke the place that slept. Her heart took in Kyran’s words like a balm, like a secret she must protect with the last breath of her life.

  Kyran released her and looked down into her face again, his dark eyes seeking hers. “You must leave soon, Posy.” His words gave her only a moment’s surprise, then she nodded.

  “Yes,” she said, and waited for the tearing feeling that had become so familiar to her: the feeling of heartbreak. But it didn’t come. She sighed, and knew it was this knowledge, this new secret she held within her, that would give her the strength to leave this place she now loved so much. Not much strength—but enough.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Farewell

  The characters all came out to feast their new king, and the Wild Folk with them. It caused some stir among the villagers to see a tree-man walk across the meadow, limbs creaking and patched with moss, ferny hair sprouting from his head; or to see a centaur canter across the cobblestone courtyard, noble head held high and proud. The villagers thought of these creatures as fairytales for centuries. But Posy knew what they felt—she knew what it was to have a fairytale come true before your eyes.

  Great long tables lined with silver and green cloth were set up in the castle’s largest courtyard. A hundred extra servants were hired from nearby villages to help with the cooking and readying of the castle. Everything was bustle and work, and Posy tried to help as best she could without thinking of when she must leave. She knew she was putting it off, but she told herself she would know when it was time. Everywhere she went, she carried the glass bottle that would take her home. She would sometimes slip a hand into her pocket to touch her fingertips to the smooth crystal. She didn’t like to touch it, this thing that would take her away from Kyran, but she had to know it was there all the same. The mist had been right to urge her to find it, for Kyran’s soldiers had destroyed everything in Falak’s chamber that hinted of magic as soon as they gained the castle.

  A sunny afternoon two days after they had spoken with the king, Posy sat with Kyran in one of the small gardens surrounding the castle. He had paper, quill and ink before him, working on a short speech he would deliver to his people before the feast.

  “How can I ever find the words that need to be said?” he asked wearily, looking up from the paper in front of him and rubbing his eyes.

  Posy smiled.

  “What?” he said with a ready smile in return.

  “It’s just that ...” she began. “Oh, I don’t know ... you can’t find the words, you say. You changed the words, Kyran.”

  “Did I?” he asked, his face now solemn. “I’m not sure of that at all.”

  “Not sure?” Posy looked at him. “Kyran, they called us the Word Changers. The story has changed—only look around you. Of course, the words are different now. How can you question it?”

  “But they didn’t change because of me,” he said quietly. “No.” He stopped Posy before she could speak. “I was one among many who started those changes. You, my sister, even the owls and my father ... we all did it, and that is how it was meant to be. And do not forget the ones who died defending the True Story. Their noble deaths changed the words to our lives more than anyone.”

  “Yes,” Posy said slowly. “You’re right. We all did it. We were all the Word Changers.”

  Kyran’s dark eyes turned to look at her, then past her, to the land beyond the garden and past the castle. He sighed. “But how much more has changed than words.”

  * * *

  The feast day passed in a whirl. Posy’s body was there, but her mind strained ahead of her like an animal on a leash, and it took all her strength to keep it with her. The day dawned green and brilliant; it opened like a flower with the sun’s touch. Posy knew it was perfect, and she watched as if in a dream as Kyran and Evanthe performed their duties, greeted their people, and took joy in their new Kingdom.

  Kyran’s speech came before the meal, and before the people were drowsy with good food and wine. He stood from his seat on the low balcony overlooking the courtyard and raised a hand. Silence descended like a blanket. Every man, woman, child and creature of the Wild Land had eyes only for their king now.

  Kyran’s strong voice rang out into the corners of the square. “Not long ago,” he said, “we lived in darkness. Nothing can enslave a person more than his own thoughts ... his own ignorance of the choices before him ... his cowardice to face down what he knows is wrong. No ruler on earth can have more power over you than this. The Plot told us who we were, what we were to do, how we could live, and even die. But no more.

  “The True Story can now begin. It also knows who we are and how we will live and die, just as the Author wrote it. But there is a difference. The magic of the Kingdom does not hold us now. It cannot confuse and blind us as it once did. The mist has driven it away and can live among us once again, reminding us of who we once were, and whom we can become.

  “There are things a king cannot decide for us ... and things an Author will not. The Author knows what will become of us, but he will not reveal all. We were happy to leave those things hidden for so long. But when we decided to reach out a hand and lift the veil, we found what we were meant to find all along—what had been there, next to us, all the ages of our lives. And we had not seen it, or we had forgotten it.

  “This war, these deaths, have had a true and noble purpose—for now we have found it, now we have remembered what we had so long forgotten. This is a new world, my people.” Kyran cast his eyes over the crowd as if he would look into each man and woman’s eyes. “And I will tell you in truth ... defeat will be more sorrowful now. But victory will be more beautiful, and love will be deeper. What a thrill it will be for us to not know what turn the story may now take, or what wonders it will lead us to!

  “We can live now as we were meant to, and only once. The Border has been broken, and with it, the continual replaying of our story. A reader may come a thousand times to turn these pages of ours, but he will only find the flat memories of us, for we will be moving now, ever onward. And who is to say? Perhaps the True Story may have an ending ... and perhaps not. Perhaps one day we will discover what is beyond the Wild Land—perhaps we will visit the Unknown Land, and it may be a new story will begin there.

  “But in this story we are no longer slaves of a merciless Plot. We are free characters who were brave enough to push away the darkness that we came to recognize, brave enough to welcome that strange, mysterious light that comes from each of us—that the Author placed there when he wrote us—that will change the words and make our story into what it was always meant to be.”

&n
bsp; Posy found she had been holding her breath—she didn’t know how long. She released it in a long sigh and turned to look around her at these characters whose fate had been wound tightly with her own. She looked into their faces, and saw what must have been written on her own. They were eager to agree, desperate to believe, and Kyran barely finished his last words when they all sprang up and roared, clapping and shouting together, so thunderous that Posy thought the courtyard walls must be rattling in their foundations. She couldn’t help but smile, and cry, and raise her hands alongside these people who meant so much to her.

  * * *

  Posy had always hated goodbyes. It was no different here. In fact, it seemed a thousand times worse. For she knew when she said goodbye here, it would be forever. She had a kiss for Nocturne as she ran her fingers over his silky smooth feathers affectionately. She had tears and embraces for Faxon and Caris, two of the king’s new councilors alongside a variety of creatures and people including owls, Wild Folk and characters.

  Evanthe had taken her aside to hold Posy’s hands within her own while tears streamed down her pale childlike face. But as childlike as she was, and despite her tears, Posy saw her strength and knew Kyran would not lack for help with any of the difficulties ahead that he may face. Posy gazed at the princess. She is the reason I was brought here, not long ago. And now I am bidding her farewell for the last time. I’ve barely had time to get to know her at all. Posy found she was crying, too, but the tears were somehow full of something good, not the desperate sadness she had expected. When she reached to put her arms tightly around the other girl, she felt nothing but reassurance and happiness.

  “My brother won’t be the same without you, dear one.” Evanthe ran a hand over Posy’s curls. “And neither will I. You saved me ... a person you had never met. You risked your life for mine, and a debt like that cannot go unpaid.”

  “There is no need,” Posy faltered, shaking her head. “You are thankful ... you are alive. That’s all the payment I need, Princess.”

  “All the same, Posy, I think we will meet again. The Author knows a loose end like this cannot be left in a story.”

  “Come now,” Kyran’s voice came to her from where he stood holding the reins of his horse. “It’s time we went. The sun will rise soon.”

  He swung up into the saddle and deftly pulled her up to settle behind him. She wrapped an arm around him as Belenus’ hooves clattered on the stone courtyard. She had decided ahead of time she would allow herself to turn once, as she left, to watch the people and creatures she had come to love. More than that would be tempting an unnecessary pain. Therefore, she turned now to take them all in, standing scattered across the backdrop of the castle. The last of the moon’s fading beams made puddles of light trailing from where they stood to where she and Kyran now departed. She didn’t need to raise a hand in farewell. She didn’t need to call out any words to them one last time. The suffering they had all been through, along with the triumph, passed between them, written in their gazes, more than any words could have communicated. For they all knew—they understood each another. And they all felt the same.

  * * *

  Posy held onto Kyran tightly as they broke into a gallop across the outer fields of the Kingdom. She had felt when it came time for her to leave, it could only be in one place—so they now directed their path there: the Wild Land. She looked up to see the moon glinting off Kyran’s black hair. She watched across the meadow as tiny lights flew up, circling, then plunged back into the tall grass. There was much about this world she would never know. But undoubtedly—and she almost laughed—there was much she would never know about her own world.

  Her own world. She closed her eyes and leaned her cheek against Kyran’s back. Memories flooded her mind. Not the ones that made her cower and cry, but ones that made her long to return home. She thought of her mother and father, their faces and voices. The familiar scent of her father’s aftershave seemed to rise to her nostrils from nowhere, and she took in her breath sharply. She felt the soft brush of her mother’s hand on her face, as she had felt it so many times before. Lily’s face also swam before her, with its sweet smile, and suddenly Posy ached to see her sister—to touch her and be sure she was real. To talk to her—return to the person who had always been her other half. Posy began to think—she began to suspect—that her blame and her anger had been magnified, and perhaps not so deservedly as she had thought. She began to believe that, however much she feared the things that waited for her in her own world, she would never see them in the same light again.

  Kyran’s horse began to slow, and Posy’s eyes snapped open to take in their surroundings. They had reached the forest’s edge.

  “Kyran,” she said quietly. “What’s beyond the Wild Land? Surely, the forest cannot go on forever? Is it another place entirely? Or does it just ... end?”

  “No one in the Kingdom knows for sure, Posy. We have always called it the Unknown Land. But I will tell you.” His voice grew soft, as if he was about to reveal a secret. “I intend to find out one day. When my kingdom is fully at peace once more, when the crinkles of our pages have been smoothed into the story it is meant to be, I intend to take some men and go there, into the far reaches of the Wild Land. For the forest must end somewhere. We will discover if it ends in nothingness ... or in a new world altogether.”

  Posy shivered against him. What was beyond the Wild Land? Perhaps—and her heart leapt ... but no, that would be impossible.

  Kyran urged his horse into the sheltering darkness of the trees, right into the thick mist that hovered like a ghostly shroud on the forest floor. When they had gone some distance, Kyran dismounted and reached his hands up to grasp her waist as she slid from the saddle. She watched his face, so open with its sad, crooked smile—sweetness that was like a knife in her heart. So different from the haughty and sneering smiles he had given her little more than a month ago, Posy thought. Loving each other had made each of them into a new person. And she wondered with something like shock if that had been the purpose of her journey all along.

  “Well,” Kyran looked at her, his black eyes and hair darker in the shadows of the trees. “The sun will be up any moment.” He paused; then, in a rush, “You could ... you could come back with me, Posy. You could be my queen. Everyone would love you—they do already! And I ... I love you. I don’t know what I’ll do without you.” He sounded like a child suddenly, not the warrior she had seen, terrible and strong on the battlefield. Posy lifted her hands to hold his face. She looked at him and felt that looking at him forever wouldn’t be long enough.

  “Your sister,” she said slowly, “felt sure we would meet again. But you know I have to go now. I love you, Kyran. But there are others I love, too.”

  “Yes,” he said, nodding, understanding. “Yes, I know.”

  And who could know better than he? thought Posy sadly.

  He leaned down to kiss her, and they both knew it was the last time. Posy had felt she had been strong to hold back tears until now, but this undid her, and she tasted her own tears mingling between their lips. She embraced him, feeling the familiar hardness of his muscles, the warmth seeming to emanate from him.

  “Go,” he said at last. If there could be both courage and heartbreak in a single word …. He kissed her hand so softly it was like a butterfly landing for a brief moment, and of everything, that was what almost changed her mind. But she pulled her mind back from the memory of the first time he had kissed her hand, bowing before her for forgiveness there in the forest, and she returned to the task at hand.

  Squaring her shoulders and taking a deep shuddering breath, Posy reached into her pocket to grasp the crystal bottle. She backed away from Kyran, just a few steps, for she didn’t know what would happen when she removed the lid. Really, she thought gazing down at it, she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do at all ... was she to drink it? Why hadn’t she thought of it before?

  She didn’t have to worry about that, though. The first narrow rim of bright s
un was emerging atop the hill beyond the forest, and as its rays spread like fingers through the trees, Posy knew the moment had come. She looked up at Kyran, and found she suddenly felt fear. Her hand hovered uncertainly over the bottle. He nodded and smiled, and before she could think anymore about it, she pulled the cork from it.

  The rays of sun seemed to flee. Then Posy realized they had only converged together, into a great orb, pulsing and glowing ... and growing larger every second. It was bright, brighter than any eyes should be able to withstand, but she and Kyran both stared in amazement as it took shape into a great beast.

  It was a creature that crackled with fire and surged with water. It deepened with the blackest shadows even as it shone with blinding brilliance. Through the pulsing light, Posy could make out the shape of a great beast, tall and proud. And wings, wide and powerful. A face with eyes that were ... less than human? Or more?

  “So it is time for you to leave this story and return to your own,” said a voice Posy knew well.

  Posy only nodded, still awestruck at the sheer gigantic size and overpowering presence in which the Author had chosen to cloak himself this time.

  “Well, then, child,” the voice sparked and fizzed with flames. “Come, and I will embrace you.”

  Embrace? Posy stood frozen for a moment, her eyes watching the leaping flames and moving shadows that flowed like waves over the creature. Then she thought fleetingly of all she had been through, the terror and joy both, and knew this one last thing should not frighten her. She walked closer to the Author, feeling his fiery breath as she neared him. He spread one enormous wing, blue and white as a wave, and she stepped into the shadows beneath it.

  It was like both drowning and breathing more clearly than she ever had. It seemed the Author found pleasure in writing things that were at odds with each other—things that seemed to oppose, but could not exist without each other. Posy turned within his wing to rest her eyes on Kyran one last time. She saw him in the distance, his clothing and hair blowing as if a strong wind was suddenly whisking through the forest. She reached out a hand to him, hoping he would see it and know everything that was unspoken between them. He did not wave back, but put his left hand up to cover his heart, and Posy knew he was showing her the place she would remain with him.