25. Amelie
Amelie
I had no idea why I came here.
My entire life had been a tragic pit of nowhere to go but up, but every time I felt like maybe I was getting somewhere, the ladder was kicked out from under me.
When Arthur, Igor, and Liam helped me escape, I had no notions of a fairy tale to come. If I was being totally honest with myself, I didn’t think I’d make it through the night in the Forest alone.
Finding the cottage was a safe haven. I let myself fall into the dream of freedom, of happiness, and I was proven foolish again. Such a stupid girl to believe life was meant to be full of the finer things. Not material things, but things like friendship, a safe home, love.
But for a brief moment, I found myself wishing Kiaran would’ve stayed hidden.
He should’ve continued to be an asshole, he shouldn’t have made me feel like I was worth something.
I wish I hadn’t felt kindred with him, that this gravitational pull between us wasn’t such an entrancing array of colors that I wanted to continue to paint.
I felt it in my bones to the tips of my fingers that the prophecy was correct.
That he was who I’d dreamed of my entire life, potentially created specially for me.
But I supposed that the tragedy I was surrounded by manifested a tragic end to fit the narrative that was Amelie Bloch’s legacy.
It wasn’t until a figure in my dreams started to make me think there was hope.
My friend’s staying with me last night was everything I needed to feel reset.
To let my rage find the purpose I really felt it for.
The High Priestess of Avonya. After the lovely breakfast that was set for us and reading Ethel’s note about leaving at dawn, I went to look for Kiaran but he was nowhere to be found.
I assumed he’d hidden himself in shame, the way he hid himself from me when I’d first arrived.
It felt nasty to leave him in the cottage alone.
I knew he couldn’t follow me and it would kill him to know I was alone out here without our bond to communicate.
I had half a mind to turn around and go to him, kick his ass for keeping things from me then spend the last few days we had together, together.
But as I stood on the line between enchanted Forest and ruin, before the gaping hole in the Earth that I used to escape in the Forest mere months ago, I knew I needed answers and this time I would not be afraid.
My father was trying to talk to me, but I couldn’t get close enough to him in my dreams to find him.
The ground was colder now, being the dead of winter.
As I took a step into the tunnel, I turned back to adore the Forest in case I didn’t make it back out.
The Forest that protected me, warmed my cheeks every morning, showed me how powerful I could be.
Brought me a type of love that the story tellers passed down through generations.
My vision blurred as I thought about the man I left behind, regret churned through my stomach at the thought of him waiting for me to return.
“If you never see me again,” I whispered to the wind, “ please find a way to tell him I love him.” I sunk down an inch and added, “And that I’m sorry.”
The underground path was colder than before, it felt darker and more foreboding and I feared what I might find at the other end. Holleberg seemed unreal to me now, a lifetime shadowed by a few months of freedom.
I heard chatter as I came to the tiny bit of light shining down from the opening.
The voices were quiet and owned by men, of course.
The underside of the bed was all that stood between me and the palace now.
I held my breath hoping to identify the voices and one in particular gave me the courage to show myself.
I lifted the bed slightly, the cell was lit up with a few lanterns as three sets of boots stood facing each other, bobbing back and forth.
“We act tonight. This is the last opportunity we will have, Igor.” Arthur’s tone was demanding, yet defeated.
“He’ll be surrounded all night, it’s too dangerous,” Igor added.
“If it’s not tonight, everyone in Holleberg will be dead by morning.”
A long, pained sigh left all three men and I took my opportunity to crawl out from under the mattress completely.
“Fuck!”
“Amelie!”
“What the fuck!”
All three exclaimed, to be expected.
Arthur got to me first, his palms covered my shoulders completely as he checked to see if I was real.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Igor found me next, grabbing my hand in his and giving a second set of eyes to my well being.
“I want answers,” I started with. Arthur took a deep breath and released me, Igor followed. Liam already retreated to the door to stand watch .
The two men in front of me shared a look, they had plans for tonight and that was fine. What I needed was only a few moments of honesty.
“We don’t have time,” Igor told Arthur. I hadn’t noticed it before but he looked to his father’s second in command with the eyes of a son.
Arthur was his guide, as Ethel was mine.
Not a parent by blood but someone to trust as such.
I held my friend with such fondness, with so much respect and it made me feel better about Igor’s situation knowing he had someone like that too.
The fact that he helped me escape told me that maybe he wasn’t anything like his father.
“What is going on?” I asked. Realizing that prior to scaring them, they said Holleberg wasn’t going to survive the night.
“We are executing my parents tonight. My father is planning on burning the city down at midnight, we are taking Holleberg back.”
My breath caught in my throat and I had to will myself to let air pass again. So much had changed, yet being here still paralyzed me with fear.
“What? Why? Is my family…” I choked out, realizing I hadn’t had time to remember them the last few weeks. Guilt rolled through my bones.
“Well…” Arthur looked to Igor, they were deciding with unspoken words how to explain in the least amount of words.
“After you left, Lord Bosque fired most of his men. No one would admit to letting you escape. We said that after your sentencing, you fled and we couldn’t find you.
Lady Marilla was on a warpath to find you, mortified at the indignity of a peasant besting the royals.
” All three men scoffed, they knew as well as I did that the only indignity here was centered between Lord Bosque and his wife.
“He’s spinning out of control,” Igor added, “Arthur and I have been trying to redesign the laws and each time he enforces the old ones tenfold, changing them for the worse. People are worse off now than ever before.”
“We don’t have much time,” Liam spoke, one of very few times he’d done so. That fact made it all the more troublesome to the energy in the room that they were going to need to act now.
“What do you need from us? It’s too dangerous for you here.”
No part of me felt safe here, nor did I think coming back would be as easy as getting in and out unscathed.
I just had one question for my uncle. One that had been haunting me since I started to realize how much power I held within my dreams. Ethel confirmed what I thought was happening, explaining just how far the Bloch blood could bleed into the world.
I was awake all night chewing on every word Kiaran and I shared. The same answer kept coming to me; where was my father and why has he been visiting me in my dreams?
“I know my father is alive.” I gauged all three of their reactions. Arthur rolled his shoulders back and let out a long breath. “And I need to know where he is.”
Arthur rolled his lips together and narrowed his dark brown eyes at me.
“Who told you?”
And my heart dropped to my stomach. I knew it. I felt it but I had no confirmation of it.
“He started appearing in my dreams, every night. Always in the background though, like he was waiting for me to come find him.” I gestured around the room. “So here I am.”
Arthur nodded slowly as I spoke. Unshed tears pooled in his eyes and I could see a figurative weight lift from his shoulders. His lips curled up slightly at the corners.
“He, your mother, and brothers are all safe.”
My entire family?
“We relocated them to the outskirts of the Kirny Hills. ”
The room spun for a moment, or maybe it was just my head. I wasn’t sure, but my family was together, without me, while my life was fated for sacrifice.
“I need to see them.” The tears that poured cut my voice up, making it shake and tremble.
Igor stepped forward, taking my hand. Liam walked up behind him and wrapped his arms around Igor’s chest, I looked between the two of them. Realizing now why they were the only two men besides Arthur who worked for the Palace and had never hurt me.
Igor’s voice shook as he spoke. “After we complete tonight’s mission, you will be safe to return, as will your family. I promise.” He kissed my knuckles, Liam pressed his lips to Igor’s shoulder.
A partner, comforting his person in the face of his fathers impending execution.
I missed Kiaran in this moment. A strong pillar to lean on.
I endeared the two men in front of me with a smile, then looked to Arthur. “Did you know?”
He knew what I was talking about, as did the other two men. Their sidelong glances told me as much.
“I did. So does your father. It’s how I’ve been able to keep them safe.”
“You knew our dreams could change reality?” I pointedly replied.
He nodded.
“Why didn’t my father tell me? Why didn’t you? You sent me into the Forest blind.”
“You’ve met Grandfather Al?”
My neck jutted suddenly in surprise, my brows bunching. How the hell did he know Al?
“I assumed so. He came to me and your father in a dream long, long ago. We were on a great adventure, when we conquered, he said that Bloch’s would always conquer and that someday, a Bloch woman would save us all. ”
Chills rippled down my spine.
“Me?” I whispered, feeling arrogant for assuming.
He nodded at the same time as a loud crash sounded from the hallway outside the cell.
Arthur gave me a firm look, Liam and Igor took off in the direction of the echo.
“I wish we had more time, but we need to go. I have faith in you.” With an affirming squeeze to my shoulder, my uncle took off toward his son and the heir of Holleberg toward whatever peril laid ahead of my village tonight.
Faith.
Something I never had much of, but now it seemed everyone had so much of it in me.
But why? Faith was just blind hope. It was wishing on a star because it made you believe it was attached to something greater than yourself, that the wish would actually go somewhere.
Faith was praying, voicing your wants and needs out loud just to say you tried.
It’s fake and powerless. And the more I learned about who I was and what I was capable of, I felt the same way. Fake and powerless.
I shook my shoulders, loosening the grip desperation still held on my soul. Then I turned to leave but before I could, whispers haunted the cool, moist air around me in the absence of the three men. It wasn’t as gentle as Frea’s and was less frightening than Valla McCalmont’s from my dream.
She’s here…
She’s here…
It got louder and louder until it was a breath against my ear.
Spinning on my heel so fast I stumbled backward as the heel of my boot caught the edge of the drain.
A woman with long, white, wiry hair and white irises with golden rivers around them stood in front of me.
She was frail, just bone and sagged skin.
“Come with me,” she hissed, her voice was layered and enchanting .
I took a frightened step backward.
She met it with an equal one toward me.
“Who are you?” My stomach was in knots, my mind began to whirl as she got closer.
“You know who I am.”
“Who are you!” I bit out each shaky word, hoping the syllables hit her in three separate blows. My bravery was wearing thin, tears pooled in my eyes. I prayed Kiaran got my message through Frea. Whatever this creature in front of me was, it had parts of my soul cowering in fear.
“You’ve known me your whole life,” she said, but this time she reached for my hand.
With no input from my brain, my soul reached back and held the bony hand in front of me.
Static crackled over my skin, beginning at my fingertips and traveling like a wave up my arms and through my chest. My shaky breaths turned to desperate heaves, the air in the room seemed to dissipate.
The gold in the eyes I was staring into began to spark, the way Kiaran said mine had with Adan, like they did in the dream, like I’d realize they did when my magic came to life.
A crushing wave covered my soul as my eyes widened in fear, submission, and then freedom.
“Orla.”
The woman took one last step toward me and I instinctively tried to take an equal one back, but I was stuck.
The air in the room was gone, none left for my lungs to breathe.
She didn’t stop as she seemed to walk straight through me, but instead of crossing to the other side, she planted herself straight into the center of my soul.
Then the world went black.