Before the Dawn

by Kristal Lim

He realized that he had somehow ended up in the ballroom, which was really not surprising considering everything that had happened. Of course, he’d find her again here. He blinked as his eyes adjusted to the brightness and he saw things a bit more clearly.

  Her long hair hung in loose waves, framing her expressionless face, and the many layers of her night-colored skirts pooled around her like crushed rose petals. In her hand was the same black knife she had used to kill him, blood still glinting along its razor edge. She gently rocked herself as she sat, whispering words that he couldn't quite catch, her eyes wide and very dark.

  He felt bile rise in his throat as he looked at her. And at what she had done. "Aline?" he said her name softly, careful not to startle her. He was afraid of what she might do if he startled her.

  After what seemed like an eternity, the sound of his voice calling her name finally managed to break through her fugue and slowly, sluggishly, her gaze drifted upwards to lock with his own. However, she said nothing, and she looked as if his presence did not even surprise her.

  He didn't choose to speak again and instead took the time to look, really look, at the bodies arranged around her. He let out a little breath of relief when he saw that neither Meran nor Lady Ceirdwyn was among them. But, with a sickening lurch in his stomach, he realized some of them were girls he had seen before, girls he had only just remembered.

  Aline’s friends.

  "What did you do?" the words escaped his lips despite his best intentions to stay quiet. Then, because he couldn’t help himself any longer, he asked, "Why, Aline? Why did you do this?" Fear and grief were mingled so strongly in his tone he was surprised that he was still able to speak coherently.

  "I am a good wife," she said, her voice soft and broken, casting an eerie echo in the stillness. "I do as my lord husband wishes."

  "He made you kill your friends?" Trevor crouched down before her so he could try to look into her eyes, try to see if there was something within this lost creature that he could still recognize. "Oh, God. Aline, this is–" He couldn't continue. He was too horrified. This new revelation of monstrosity shook him so much that he buried his face in his hands for a moment and choked back a sob. How could this have happened to her? What had she become in the years she had spent under Benwyr's enchantment?

  A crooked smile appeared on her lips before she spoke again. "He made me kill you, too, you know. Many times. I've forgotten exactly how many. I kill you every time he asks me to. Do you hate me now? Is that why you are here, to tell me you hate me?" She sounded so sad about this, and her eyes began to glimmer faintly with tears. She looked afraid of what his answers to her questions might be.

  "No." He shook his head and moved closer to her, no longer fearful. "No, Aline. I've come here to help you. I came to free you from him."

  "Did you now?" She became as still as a statue for a second, staring into nothing, then her manner changed without any warning. An insane light flashed briefly in her eyes and her entire body tensed. Suddenly, she looked dangerous, like a viper ready to strike. "Always the loyal soldier ready to serve his Princess, are you?" Her voice sounded different, too. It was deeper and huskier, with a dark seductiveness that was at odds with her delicate features. "I know why you are really here," she hissed, beginning to crawl slowly towards him. She was oblivious when her hands came into contact with the blood of her victims that had pooled on the floor. Soon, her fingers were covered with crimson, making them appear like claws she had dipped into the open wounds of her kills. "You pretend to care for me," she went on speaking, her tone becoming lower with every word, "but what you truly want is my father's kingdom. You made sure I would lose my Prince so you could claim me for your own. Well, I won't let you do so again!" Then, lightning-quick, she lashed out with her knife and he yelped and toppled over backwards, avoiding the edge of her blade.

  She let out a scream of rage and surged forward to attack him again. He tried to defend himself as well as he could though he didn't really know what he was doing. He was just desperate to keep his life. They struggled against each other, his hands tightly gripping her wrists while she kept straining to sink her knife into his chest. Her long hair fell down over his face like a curtain and animal-like growls came from her throat. Eventually though, he realized that she was actually saying the same thing over and over. "I loved you!" she spat it out with pure venom. "But why didn't you save me? Why couldn't you save me?!" She screamed the last words right at his face, looking completely deranged by then and terrifying him with the murderous intent he saw in her eyes.

  "Aline, please!" Trevor begged in a panic. "Stop!" He didn't want to hurt her in any way, but it looked like he might have to if he wanted to live. Her madness seemed to have bestowed her with uncommon strength and he felt his grip begin to weaken, then the knife she held came a few inches closer to stabbing his right eye. "I said stop!" he suddenly yelled, completely overtaken by fear now, and then something wholly shocking and unexpected occurred.

  She cried out and flew back, the knife knocked out of her hand. He was astonished. What had just happened? He had shouted and something–incredible–had filled him up and struck out at her. Awkwardly, he got to his feet, every part of his body shaking and tingling with a strange new intensity. He was bombarded by the oddest sensations. The clothes against his skin whispered of sun and earth and rain and growing things. The shoes on his feet spoke of speed and freedom and wind. Even the stone of the walls and floors had voices, and they were telling him about the dark places of the earth where they first awoke and learned to be hard and strong. Everything, absolutely everything, in the room had its own story, and he was only getting to listen to them for the first time. His mind reeled with all the revelations and confessions he suddenly knew through senses he had no idea he possessed.

  There was one discordant note, however: a thin, high-pitched wailing that he had not noticed before because it had been drowned out by all the feelings he was receiving from the other things in the room. He looked around and spotted the one jarring element immediately, and he briefly marveled at this new ability to detect what was out of place in his surroundings without first examining any clues. He just knew, with a certainty that resonated in his bones. He walked over to where it was and looked down at Aline's curved knife.

  The sky iron used to make the blade was crying. It told him its tale of home, how it had been ripped away from where its heart was and how it had traveled and been lost for so long in a vast, cold emptiness. Then it had fallen and burned and shattered against a world that was not its own and it only wanted to please, please go home. Hesitantly, Trevor picked it up, wincing at the pain of its poison. He understood now why Raven had expressed such hatred for the bars in Benwyr's dungeons. This thing he held in his hand was not of the earth, be it in the Strangelands or the mortal world. No wonder it burned whatever it touched. It did not belong here.

  Like Aline.

  He dropped the knife with an almost apology and then he went to where she was crumpled on the floor like a broken doll, weeping with a pain that he knew he would never understand. Her tears had mingled with the blood in her hands and, when she stared up at him, her eyes looked like they were bleeding. "Trevor," she whispered. "I'm so scared. I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't understand anything. I don't know."

  With the new sight he now possessed, he saw what was destroying her from within. Some parts of her were Aline, the Aline he remembered, the girl he loved though he had not really known it for what it was when he was young. Then he saw the holes, the jagged wounds that had been torn out of her and replaced with the sharp pieces of someone else's memories. Dimly, he seemed to remember Raven saying that it was impossible to do such a thing. But Benwyr had found a way. Benwyr had done this to her so he could regain the love he had lost.

  "I'm so tired all the time," she continued whispering, "and like I'm always dreaming. I keep seeing you though I know you're not really here. I liked it better in the beginning, when I couldn't really remember t
hings well, when I was just Rosamund, and I was almost happy." She sobbed, and he saw the madness threaten to take over her again for a second, but her pain proved to be stronger. She just kept crying until, at last, he knelt before her and took her into his arms. As he held her, he noticed for the first time that her hands were scarred. It took a while before he figured it out. The knife. Her hands had become permanently scarred from the poisonous burn of the sky iron knife. It was a miracle that it hadn't killed her after all the years she had it in her possession.

  "It's going to be all right," he promised, and he hoped that she wouldn't realize he was lying. "It will all be all right." He knew now that even if he spoke the spell of Remembrance, it would not help her but only make things worse; having a silver leaf within her had only served to drive her further into insanity. The leaf had kept giving her the strength to resist Benwyr's enchantment, which most likely only prompted him to be more ruthless in his attempt to turn her into Rosamund. This, in turn, caused even more damage to her soul, and now he didn't know if Aline could still be saved from the worst danger of all–herself.

  "Trevor?" She pulled back from their embrace so she could look at him. "Will you promise me–?"

  He didn't get to hear what she could have asked of him because a deafening roar suddenly shook the entire castle. He pushed her down and covered her body with his own protectively as one of the walls exploded into pieces, raining down sharp bits of stone against his back. Once the great noise subsided and an eerie quiet seemed to fill the whole world, he raised his head and looked up in time to see Raven, wild-eyed and bruised, hovering in the air outside the hole created by the blast. Then the black-haired Prince stepped through the hole and made his way slowly to a dark-clad figure lying amidst the rubble.

  "It ends, my brother," he spoke softly and more than a little sadly as he gazed down at Benwyr's bloodied form.

  The other Prince still managed to laugh. A spasm wracked his body for a moment and then he coughed, spitting out blood. "Is it now?" he sneered. "So, you are going to kill me now? Where are our brothers so they may bear witness to my execution?"

  "We are here," Brannon said quietly as he and the other Princes appeared. They all looked somber. They knew the import of what was about to happen. One brother would slay another, and they would be in the presence of their next King.

  Benwyr smiled bitterly. "Of course," he nodded. "Of course. It is the end." He stared at Raven. "Please," he whispered, which seemed to startle his brother, "can I see her face one final time?"

  Raven didn't answer, but he stepped back and Aline suddenly struggled against Trevor. "Let me go!" she exclaimed, crying again. "He needs me. He's calling for me."

  Very reluctantly, Trevor let her push him away and he watched as she rushed to Benwyr's side. She wept loudly as she cradled the Prince's head in her lap. "Oh, my Prince," she crooned comfortingly. "I am here."

  "Rosamund?" Benwyr’s pale blue eyes no longer possessed their usual clarity.

  "I am with you," she said, her tone grave. She was making a vow.

  To Trevor's surprise, Benwyr shook his head. "No." He never imagined that such despair could be heard in just that one word. The Prince coughed again, and more blood leaked from his mouth. Whatever Raven had already done to him, it looked like Benwyr would die any second now even without a last killing blow. "No," Benwyr repeated. "Not Rosamund." He sounded like his heart was breaking.

  "Hush now," she told him and kissed his lips. "Hush. Rest."

  The Prince said nothing more. He was, at last, dead.

  Raven collapsed to his knees. His amber eyes were shining with bitter tears.

  Trevor went to his side. "Raven," he spoke, his tone urgent, "Raven, I lost Meran. She's somewhere here. The castle took her. Your mother, too. I don't know where they are, but they need your help."

  Raven snarled and glared at Trevor, clearly resentful that he wasn't being allowed to grieve for his brother just yet.

  "I know," Trevor said, and he did know. He understood. "But you're the only one who can help them. They're counting on you to help them. Please, Raven."

  The Prince turned his head away and, without a word, disappeared. Trevor sighed, suddenly feeling exhaustion wash over him. However, he still started in surprise when he felt someone grip him on the shoulder. He saw that it was Rogan, and the man had a grim expression on his face that suddenly filled him with foreboding.

  "She is Benwyr's wife," the red-haired Prince said. "She belongs to his Court."

  He was confused for a moment, wondering why Rogan was telling him things he already knew. And then he realized what it meant. He quickly moved away from Rogan and went to Aline's side. "No." He shook his head. "No!" he repeated in a louder, firmer tone. Looking around frantically, he caught sight of Aline's knife and he hurriedly scrabbled to get it, then he stood in front of her like a shield against the Princes' intent, ignoring the pain that was shooting up his hand from the point where he was holding the knife. "You can't kill her, too," he protested. "She was under his spell. I won't let you do this."

  To his immense relief, Raven reappeared right then, carrying a wounded Meran in his arms while Lady Ceirdwyn, also wounded though in a better condition, clutched at his arm. He became very still when he saw the stand-off between Trevor and his brothers.

  "Raven," Brannon said in a calm, reasonable tone, "after you tell your human to get out of our way and we are done here, I hope you can explain why he seems determined to risk his life for Benwyr's wife."

  Raven didn't say anything just yet. Instead, he slowly laid Meran down on the floor and examined the wound on her shoulder. He murmured a few words and her wound glowed with a sudden golden light. When the brightness faded away, the wound was gone. Meran gave a little sigh and slipped into a deep sleep. For a moment, Raven just stared at her, brushing her hair back from her face. Then he finally stood up straight and addressed his brothers. "I am afraid that I cannot let you harm the girl, or him for that matter. They are both under my protection."

  His brothers all frowned, but it was Kaemon who expressed what they were all thinking. "What do you mean? Why are you doing this?"

  Raven shrugged. "What I mean is I will do what I can to ensure all the humans here will not come to any harm. As for why I am doing this, well, let us just say," he sighed in exasperation, "it is a terribly inconvenient attack of conscience, and leave it at that."

  "An attack of conscience?" Baydr scoffed. "Raven, you will be committing treason if we allow this last person of the condemned Court to live."

  "Yes. Yes," he nodded. "I do realize that. But it is nevertheless what I intend to do."

  "And you will be forfeiting the throne if you do so!" thundered a new voice that was so powerful it brought Trevor to his knees, clutching at his ears in pain. The knife fell from his nerveless fingers. Grimacing, he saw that the Princes were kneeling too, in reverence, and even Lady Ceirdwyn was on her knees. Only Raven remained standing and looking nonchalant.

  A sudden brilliance filled Trevor's sight, and even squeezing his eyes closed could not completely shut out the dazzling light. Then it abruptly faded, and he opened his eyes to see spots dancing around everywhere before he blinked several times and finally regained his normal clarity of vision.

  A handsome older man dressed in green and gold had appeared out of the light. He looked at Raven with light blue eyes that carefully concealed all emotions and thoughts he may have at the sight of one who had killed a beloved brother upon command.

  "Prince Raven of Ashthorn," the man intoned, "have you no respect for your King?" He didn't sound angry, or even thunderous anymore. Instead, his voice was very solemn and calm, like someone who was determined not to betray any hint of vulnerability that might destroy his facade of strength.

  "Oh, none at all," Raven answered, his sharp bitterness and cold fury evident in his tone, "Father."

  ~~~

  Chapter 30