by Cameron Jace
I had heard people claiming they talked to animals in the kingdom, but I wasn't one of them.
"Resurrect me," I heard the panther say, but wasn't sure it moved its lips. It was as if the sound just came from inside it; the sounds of a little girl. "Promise to take me to the Swan Lake," the girl's voice said.
The panther let me go that day, although it still seemed angry with my daughter. She did it after I had patted her and promised her that I would take her to the Swan Lake after saving my wife and child.
I didn't.
Months passed by, and I dreamed about the black panther every night. It usually took the form of a black swan in my dreams. But being occupied with the war against my father on the borders, I never went to Swan Lake, which I knew existed from only the talk of some of my fellow warriors.
One late night, coming back from war, I spent the night outside the castle, pondering why we fought in the first place. I asked myself if war was really necessary; if there could have been another way around it. Although I had been fighting the beast in me for years, wishing for the good in the world to arise, I had never understood war. A bunch of lunatics crashing into another bunch of lunatics, each one praising their own God, own king and queen, and willing to die for them. Some of these warriors could be destined to be great scientists, poets, or just regular fathers and mothers who were important to someone, loved by someone. But in war, your individual worth didn't matter. It was a game of numbers, where the side with most chopped heads on the ground, lost. In war none was considered human, only sticks and stones counted to determine one the winner. Still, with all the logic, I was a warrior. I just couldn't find another way to protect my people.
While thinking that night, I heard a shrieking sound nearby, and began looking for its source. I came upon a dead swan on the ground, some strides away from my wife's chamber. It was a Black Swan, and once I neared it, I heard that voice again, "Take me to the Swan Lake."
This time, I was reminded that I had postponed a promise I had made to the panther that had spared my life. There was no doubt the panther was the swan, or some spirit that possessed both of them.
I picked up the Black Swan and rode to the Swan Lake, thinking maybe this was God’s answer to me, to understand if I should continue my war on the borders or not. Maybe He had something better for me to do.
I assume you have read my wife's diary about meeting Lady Shallot and how we got our sun and moon, so I am not going into the details of the woman I met at the Swan Lake. Her name was Brighid, the Swan Queen. She told me all about how babies in Sorrow were swans before they were born, and how my wife had been ordered by Lady Shallot to come here to lift off her curse to get pregnant. In the end, she told me how the universe demanded balance and how Snow White, my daughter, the White Swan, killed the Black Swan in Carmilla's womb. The Black Swan whom I was holding dead in my arms, who I walked away from in the forest when she was a panther, was actually my own daughter, too.
I sank to my knees on the shores of Swan Lake with moistened eyes, staring at my own baby.
"Who would believe that Angel Von Sorrow would sink on his knees before me," the Swan Queen said. "It was for the good of the world that your Black Swan daughter died."
"How could you even know she was the evil one?" I asked the Swan Queen.
"Black is all things evil, you know that my king," she said. "What do you think the color or Sorrow is? It surely isn't white. Your father, the vicious and heartless Night Von Sorrow controls everything black, doesn't he? Why do you think that is?"
"You can't judge things by its colors, or by its last names," I yelled. "That's one of the humanity's most unforgivable sins. I myself am a Sorrow, but I fought to be good, and I am still a good man."
"For how long, my king? Can you guarantee you'll stay that way forever?" The Swan Queen said. "Do you think Carmilla will stay good forever?"
I didn't know what she was implying. My wife was from a noble descent. Her blood was cleansed of any evil.
But it didn't matter. What mattered was my daughter.
"Why did my daughter ask me to bring her here to Swan Lake," I asked Brighid.
"Snow White had won the war against her in their mother’s womb, and now her spirit roams lost in the world, unless she is brought back to Swan Lake," the Swan Queen said. "It's the dying rules in Sorrow, the way people bury their dead in the earth in other places. The dying should come back to the place of the beginning, for the death and birth are in many ways synonyms of change."
"She couldn't come here by herself?"
The Swan Queen said nothing for a while, as if she was pondering whether to lie to me or not, "The soul of the Swan dies and is never to be resurrected, unless it had been gifted with immortality while alive, or if..." Brighid paused again.
"Or if what?"
"Or if one of her parents brings her to Swan Lake," Brighid said.
"That why she asked me to resurrect her," my heart bloomed with mirth.
"But you have to know my king, resurrecting her is bringing evil to the world," Brighid said. "It's better if you let her die."
"I don't want to let her die," I snapped. "She is my daughter. I understand what Carmilla had to do, and I respect her for that, even when she didn't tell me..."
"She wasn't allowed to."
"I see," I nodded. "And I understand Snow White killing her in the womb so that good prevails. I don't blame her either. But the Black Swan is my daughter. I can't let her die. I want to give her a chance in this world, like I had been given a chance that I wasn't destined for evil."
"And can you bear watching your two daughters on the opposite sides of a war?"
I shrugged and said nothing.
"Haven't you just been thinking how to a avoid war, and why people fought?" The Swan Queen followed.
I realized at that moment that although war was humanity's greatest mistake, it had been unavoidable at the time. Not because it was necessary--but because it was a natural result of some events. Like me now, unable to decline my dead daughter's wish to be resurrected. I just couldn't. Even though I had never seen my daughter in her human form, I couldn't deprive her of a second life if I could give it to her, even knowing that the result could be disastrous.
"I take your silence as a change of mind," Brighid said.
"No," I dared her. "I want to resurrect my Black Swan."
The Swan Queen said nothing for a long time. "I could not argue with my king," she said. "But I will only remind you once more that you might end up seeing your daughters killing each other when they grow up."
"I will do my best to raise them not to," I said. "I believe that people can be taught, and that they can learn. People can change. If I teach them to love each other, this won't happen."
"The problem, my king, is that by fate, they could not live together anymore. In the universe's eye, the Black Swan, even resurrected, can't become a Sorrow. You might be able to give her life, but not control it."
"So where will she go when she is resurrected?" I asked furiously.
"To where she belongs."
I grimaced, not saying a word.
"The other side," Brighid said. "The dark one."
I had to think this over. Would I want to resurrect my daughter to be raised by the hands of evil? Was that a good bargain? Or would I let her rest in peace?
What tore my warrior’s heart out was that Snow White killed her in the womb. Or could that be considered an act of goodness, when one was foretold to become evil?
Other people might have agreed about killing evil before it was even born, but I couldn't. If I had been judged for what I had been destined to become, I would have never met Carmilla. I would have never been given a chance. I was like my Black Swan daughter once. I was raised and fathered by the dark side, and I resisted it eventually.
I kissed my daughter in my arms, and decided she deserved the chance. I prayed for her to resist the hell I was sending her to. It wasn't being raised in Hell that changed us,
but how we reacted to it. I trusted my Black Swan would grow up and become like her father. Frankly, in that moment, and in many years later, she had been my favorite daughter, for I could understand what she was going through.
"I agree with the universe's demand if that gives my daughter the chance, and the right, to live," I said to the Swan Queen.
"Then give her to me," Brighid said.
I walked into the Swan Lake, many other white and black swans at my side, and handed her my daughter. The Swan Queen asked me to go back to land and watch, as she submerged her in the water, turning her into a baby again.
The swans, black and white, folded their wings to create a bed for her above the water, as she began to cry like newborns do. My daughter looked beautiful.
"Such a sleeping beauty," a voice said from behind Brighid.
I watched the shadow approach, but could not make out its features in this moonbeam. When I tried to approach, Brighid told me to stop as from now on, I had nothing to do with her as we had agreed upon.
I watched her hand my daughter to the dark shadow as I sank to my knees again, fisting my hands, "Stay strong, darling," I hissed, wondering if I had committed a big mistake. "Be a warrior like your father. Fight the dark, and prevail."
"The Dark One wishes to know what you want to name her," Brighid said from afar, as the shadow cuddled my daughter.
"Let the Dark One show himself to me!" I shouted, as it started to rain. "Is that you, my father, Night Von Sorrow?"
"Your father can't enter Sorrow," the Swan Queen said. "The Dark One is someone else. So what do you want to name your daughter? The Black Swan? The opposite of Snow White?"
I couldn't think of a name but calling her my darling, for she was so dear to me at this moment, I would have died for her. I watched a white phantom surround her, as the Dark One took her up in his arms. I had just learned from my fellow warriors in my army that Gwendolyn meant white phantom in some far away language. I loved them instantly, as they took away the mentioning of anything black. Gwendolyn, the white phantom, I thought. She'd be as strong as her father and resist the dark in her. The beast in her, like me.
"Gwendolyn!" I shouted against the drizzling rain. "The Dark One calls her the Sleeping Beast."
"Tell him she'll never give in to him," I yelled. "She is going to be as strong as her father."
"He says that only time will tell," Brighid said, and I wondered why he didn't talk straight to me, instead of letting the Swan Queen talk on his behalf.
"My darling will be the end of you, filthy beast," I stood up and growled. "Stay strong, Gwendolyn," I said to her, resisting the tears in my eyes.
I watched the shadow turn around and take my daughter, walking towards the farthest point of darkness.
I couldn't help it and ran to the water after him, but the lake turned steeper, and I had to swim. Then the Black Swans stopped me, thousands of them snarling at me with their fangs.
"Don't resist it, my king," Brighid said. "You made a deal and gave your daughter the most precious gift in the world, life. If you believe she will be good enough to oppose the Dark One then you have to trust your judgment, and let time tell."
Stranded in my place, I saw the shadow turn and say something to Brighid. One last thing.
"What did this filthy one say to you?" I demanded, peeking over the Black Swans surrounding me.
"He says he will call her Gwendolyn Darling because you keep calling her ‘darling,’” the Swan Queen replied.
"Gwendolyn Darling." I whispered her name on my lips, and carved it into my heart. "Others might never know, but you’re the dearest of my daughters to my heart, and someday I will meet you again."
As I left, I remembered my fellow warriors mentioning that one of them had heard that the nickname for Gwendolyn in that faraway language was Wendy.
End of Prequel #18
Afterward
I didn’t write any notes in this bundle or a long afterward on purpose. I found the notes will spoil a lot of plot, so it is better revealed in the next bundles and main series. As always, thank you for reading the books, and your overwhelming support and dedication. I couldn’t do it without you.
Cameron
Other Titles in the Grimm Diaries
Snow White Sorrow
(Book #1 in the Grimm Diaries)
Cinderella Dressed in Ashes
(Book #2 in the Grimm Diaries)
The Grimm Diaries Prequels
(backgrounds on characters and what really happened before these events occurred)
The Grimm Diaries Prequels 1- 6
The Grimm Diaries Prequels 7- 10
The Grimm Diaries Prequels 11- 14
More Books by Cameron Jace
I Am Alive (Ya Dystopian series)
Table of Contents
Copyright
Forward
Prologue for the Prequels
The Grimm Diaries Prequel #15 Snow White Black Swan as told by the Queen of Sorrow
The Grimm Diaries Prequel #16 The Pumpkin Piper as told by Jack Madly
The Grimm Diaries Prequels 17 Prince of Puppets as told by Pinocchio
The Grimm Diaries Prequel #18 The Sleeping Beast as told by Angel Von Sorrow
Afterward
Other Titles