23. Ofelia
23
Ofelia
W hen I lifted my spinning head, I was instantly aware of the strange, gritty sand clinging to my arms and my hands. My feet were bare except for my stockings—my shoes must have fallen off during my descent. I was lying on my side, and a short distance from me, Mother’s locket lay in the muck. I swept it up and cleaned up the front with my thumb, revealing the M for Marisol . Without thinking, without feeling, I hid it in my pocket and wiped my hands on my skirts. My hands were nearly white in the odd light from behind me.
I turned and found the moon—no, a massive, white crystal, glowing from within, from where it was suspended high, high above in a black void. Little white and purple crystals glittered around it like stars. And beneath them, pulsing slightly, back and forth, was a body of black water, extending far beyond what I could see.
Remembrance struck me like a blow.
I had been running through the gardens.
I had been running from my father.
“ Ofelia, beloved of the king ,” came a whispering voice from behind me.
My heart plummeted as I slowly turned. Standing on the beach was a Shadow. But it wore long black robes and a crown on its brow: a simple band of gold, with four long, threadlike spikes.
A king. A king made of darkness.
A scream was caught in my throat.
“Do not be afraid,” said the creature in that same everywhere-at-once whisper.
I couldn’t run. I remained frozen, the waves behind me murmuring, my heartbeat crashing in my ear, the figure in front of me holding out a hand.
“Please come here,” it said.
“Are you—are you the god of this place?” I asked, my voice faint as a breeze. “The lord over the Shadows?”
Its fingers, long and clawed like a Shadow’s, curled into a fist.
“I am their maker,” said the creature. “Their father.”
It was all as Lope had said. The monsters plaguing our world had come from the depths, had poured out of the gardens of Le Chateau...
This god was responsible for my nightmares, for my pain, for the scars on Mother’s arms, for Lope’s lifetime spent fighting monsters, for the deaths of thousands.
I didn’t dare take a step closer. I wrapped my chilled arms around myself, taking a quick glance up to the heavens—to the place from which I’d fallen. Above me was nothing but a black abyss, peppered by those white and purple crystals.
The cold within me spread up my shoulders and down my spine. I inched back, closer to the black water. “Please send me back to my world,” I whispered. I frantically shook my head, my breaths gathering in my chest like sharp icicles. “I didn’t ask to come here. The king—the king pushed me through a door; I didn’t want—”
“He gave you to me.”
Deep in my memory, I could hear King Léo’s voice echo, King of Shadows... Take my beloved Ofelia to your kingdom .
“I—I am not his to give! I don’t belong to anyone!” Frightened tears dribbled down my cheeks. “Please, I want to go home!”
“Only a mortal who crafts a door between worlds can open it on either side. I am trapped here below as much as you are.” He glided closer—he had no legs. His dark robes melted into the dark earth, like he was part of it—or like the world and this god were one. “The bargain was made. What’s done is done. You belong to me and this world now.”
He reached out to me, his long fingers unfurling. “Ofelia,” he said, his whispering, inhuman voice freezing me in place. “I must touch your hand, only for a moment.”
His long, cold fingers wrapped around my wrist. I stood there numbly.
There was nothing more I could do. No other way I could fight.
My story was finished.
I was bound here forever.
“I’ll not hurt you as your king did,” said the monster. His other hand lightly brushed the skin of my palm.
With him standing so close, I could now see that this creature, this god, did have a face. It shifted, sometimes with a long nose, sometimes with a small one, sometimes with a jagged line of a mouth, other times with soft lips. But always, his eyes remained glowing white embers.
His forehead bunched. His shoulders rose and fell, and he let out a mournful sigh.
“A pity,” he muttered.
“What?” I asked.
His eyes met with mine. “He did not love you.” He released me and snapped his fingers. I flinched—but nothing happened. And then—movement.
Far behind the king of Shadows, the black beach led up to dark hills, dotted by what looked like stars. And on the tallest of those hills was a long, stone staircase, with someone, a human, quickly descending.
The god caught me staring and glanced at me. “Her name is Marisol. She was sent here, like yourself.”
Mother.
I gathered up my skirts, covered in mud and sand, and sprinted across the beach, through the dark grass.
“Ofelia!” she cried.
“Mother!”
I had traveled so far. I had missed her for so long. For many horrible days, I feared she was gone forever. This fate of hers was even worse. But we were together again.
She threw her arms around me, and once again I was enfolded in the smell of lilacs and oranges. I wept, laying my face against her heart, her fingers curling in my hair, her chest heaving with sobs of her own.
“She is your daughter? The one you feared for?” asked the monster.
Mother’s voice came out small and choked, “ Yes .”
She let out another sob, and my chest ached like someone was twisting my heart in their hands. Mother pulled back from me, sweeping a strand of hair from my eyes.
“I’m so sorry,” I whimpered. “You are only here because of me. If I hadn’t begged you to go to the palace—”
Mother silenced me with a kiss to my forehead followed by another tight embrace. “You are so brave, my love. You faced monsters just to find me again.” She took my hand. “Come, I’ll take you to the others.”
“Wait,” said the king of Shadows, his voice like the rushing of the waves behind us. He slipped soundlessly closer to us, moving like a cloud across the sky.
My mother wrapped her arms around me. “Leave her be!”
“I’ll not hurt her,” he said again.
He knelt onto the ground, the darkness in his robes blending with the black earth, and took my foot in his hands. His brow furrowed. “The other mortals came here with coverings on their feet. You do not have any. Why is this?”
“Shoes, you mean?” I murmured.
“Shoes,” he repeated thoughtfully. “Why don’t you have them?”
I laughed softly—as strange as it was, as much as looking at the god made my insides turn, he spoke in an almost childlike way. “I—I think they fell off,” I said.
Mother tugged on my arm. “Please,” she said. “I have not seen my daughter in so long. I wish to speak with her—alone. I beg you.”
“Only a moment more.” He let out a long, slow breath, and out of the black nothingness around us, the ends of my pale stockings were covered up by new shoes, identical to the ones mother wore. These, however, were made of black glass. They sparkled in the dim light, and when he set my foot back to the earth, I realized how very comfortable the shoes were.
“There,” he said.
“Thank you,” I replied, barely above a whisper.
He inclined his golden-crowned head, like he was a gentleman greeting a lady. “You’re welcome, Ofelia.”
I stared at the creature’s face, vacant and changing and so much like the monsters that had nearly killed me and Lope not long ago. It was not difficult to imagine this beast opening its jaws and letting out the horrible, rasping scream that haunted my nightmares.
Lope had faced these Shadows. She’d risked her life every night at the palace, if only to protect me. Now she was gone. Now I would never see her again.
I’d at least make her proud. Even if she would never know. I wanted to be brave because she’d taught me how.
I held out my hand toward him. Mother gasped and grabbed at my arm, pulling me back from the creature. “We—we’ll be off now, Your Majesty—”
“What is your name?” I asked him.
A ripple ran through him, and he bent his head away from me. A crack formed in his face where a mouth should have been. “We gods do not have names,” he groaned. “The beloved of King Léo call me the king of Shadows. Or the creature. The monster. The beast.”
“Why do you not have a name?”
The god twisted his head back toward me, his whole body at a tilt. “We gods cannot be known. That is the way of things.”
Amid the fear beating in my throat, there was a pang of sadness in my middle. “That sounds very lonely,” I said.
He did not speak.
Mother’s fingers wove between mine, prompting me to look at her. Her blue eyes were as clear and beautiful as I remembered them. She was here. She was real. “Come with me, darling,” she said. “There is much I must tell you.”
I glanced back over my shoulder toward the beach. The nameless god had vanished.
“Can he just appear and reappear as he likes?” I whispered.
“Ignore that creature,” said my mother, guiding me up a stone staircase carved into a black hill. “He’ll pester you with questions and torment you with the past.”
We stopped at the top of the staircase. All around us was tall, black grass, brushing up against my knees. Affixed to black bushes were small, glowing sparks, like fireflies or stars, growing from the leaves. It was beautiful, yes, but twisted—like the world through the fog of a dream.
Mother’s hand squeezed mine. When I turned to look at her fully, tears glittered in her eyes.
“Let me just have one moment,” she said. “One moment to have you to myself.”
Her hand pressed against my cheek. She looked at me, and I took her in, too—her beauty, her warm eyes, and the way she was smiling, despite her tears.
I nestled my head against her heart, fitting myself perfectly into her embrace. “You were right about that palace. About the king. I should have listened to you—”
She hushed me and pulled me onto a bench made of glossy black stone. She rested her chin atop my head, slowly brushing her fingers through my hair. “I should have told you the truth sooner. I was so scared. That is why I ran away. That is why I changed my name. I never imagined that Léo would hurt either of us—it was the palace and its secrets that I did not trust.”
I shivered at the sound of his name. “Did you ever love him?”
“I did. I thought I did. But he was the king. He held incredible power over me. He could command of me anything he wanted. Even if the king was kind, even if he was more romantic than my husband was. His crown always loomed over us.”
Her words twisted in my middle. A girl, ordered about by a king. Commanded to do this, to go here, to say that. To love, if told to do so.
I thought of Lope.
She would have done anything for me. And she had.
I was the king’s daughter. I was just like him.
I wished I’d had the chance to be different. To show Lope the respect she deserved. To listen to her better. To be slow to speak. To look darkness in the eye rather than paint it over with gold.
As my thoughts gathered like storm clouds, Mother continued in a soft voice: “Luc made a comment in public about how close the king and I were. In a blink he was serving in His Majesty’s army, stationed at the front lines, and then he was gone.” She began to rock me, and for once in my life, I didn’t mind the way she treated me like a little girl. “Eventually I was brave enough to leave. I could feel you fluttering inside me, and I knew I could not protect you there.”
Mother pressed a kiss to my forehead, dampened by her tears. “You deserved so much better. I’m sorry.”
I wrapped my arms around her. “I couldn’t even dream of a better mother.” From within the pocket of my gown, I withdrew the locket, showing it to her. “The clasp is broken,” I said. “But it’s back where it belongs.”
Flipping open the latch, I looked at the painting of the two of us. Side by side, pressing close together, us against the world, just like we were now.
“Marisol?” came a man’s voice, warm and light.
Mother swept up the locket and rose to her feet. At the sight of the man before me, my heart lurched—he had the same dark eyes, the same proud nose, the same sharp features as King Léo. But he was smaller, and his long, curly hair was dark brown, neatly kept even in this strange, empty place. When he saw me, the color drained from his cheeks.
“Oh, gods,” he said. “He couldn’t have—his own daughter?”
Mother nodded and helped me up, pivoting me toward the stranger. “I’m afraid so. This is Ofelia, your—your niece.”
My eyebrows rose. “I have an uncle?”
The man reached out a hand. I offered my own, and he gave my knuckles a light kiss. “I wasn’t wearing a hat when I was sent down here, so in lieu of that...” He gracefully spun his hand from the top of his head in a low bow. “Philippe, Duke of Lierre. Léo’s big brother.” Philippe batted his hand at the air. “Of course, just ‘Philippe’ will do. As my dear brother has demonstrated in this grand game of the gods, titles and stations are all quite purposeless in the end.”
“You—you were first in line for the throne?” I murmured.
“Quite unfortunately.” He gestured behind him, where a lane of dark gravel led to topiaries of black and silver, including an archway made of leaves. “Come, I’ll introduce you to the others.”
The others. In the mirror I’d seen Francoise, and I had heard that this same fate had befallen Eglantine’s mother.... Who else was here? How many people had the king sacrificed? How many lives had he extinguished?
Beyond the archway, Philippe guided us through a massive garden. If the palace gardens were a loud declaration of the glory of the king, this was just its echo. Low hedges were carved into elaborate swirls. Fountains only trickled, with no figures atop them, just stones stacked into towers. Beds of flowers bloomed gray from stem to petal.
In an alcove, as motionless and dour as statues, were three women and one man. I recognized one of the women—Francoise, from the mirror. She was sitting beside a pond, lazily dragging her finger through the black water. When she glanced up at me, her lips pressed together. Like she was holding back tears.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “We were too late to help you.”
I shook my head. “It was my fault.”
“It was no one’s fault but Léo’s,” Philippe said firmly. He gave my shoulder a squeeze and guided my gaze toward a couple sitting on a stone bench.
The man was about my mother’s age, with my same auburn hair, tied into a queue. His coat and breeches were plain black but finely made. Sitting beside him on a bench was a woman probably twenty years his senior, with blond hair that was closer to white now. Their clutched hands and their closeness on that bench—it was an ageless, strong love. One that outlasted the Underworld.
Philippe gestured to the couple with an open hand. “My mother, Caroline, and my father, King Augustin.”
With a pang, I remembered the king’s story—his family’s deaths, and how tragic they had been for him. How lonely he had been without them.
All a lie.
The couple looked up at me, their eyes mournful but kind.
Philippe touched my shoulder. “This is Ofelia. Marisol’s daughter. And... and Léo’s, too.”
The queen mother leapt up and swept me into a hug. I almost startled back, but her embrace was so warm, and my mother’s steady presence at my side calmed me. The queen mother—my grandmother—gently pulled back to look at me, cooing over me and telling me how beautiful I was, how sorry she was, before pulling me back in. She hugged me so close, like she’d always known me.
Her husband, the old king, stood close by, smiling at me. “Forgive her enthusiasm,” he said softly. “You’re our first grandchild.”
The queen drew back, cradling my face in her hands. “How could he let you go? How could he do this to you? Oh, I could strangle him!”
“Let me go first,” piped up Philippe.
“No, no, we’ve all agreed. Should the day ever come, I throw the first strike.” A young woman who had been sitting by the fountain approached us. She wore a very old gown, in deep reds and greens, and a pair of spectacles on her nose. Her dark blond hair rested in a loose plait against her shoulder. When she reached out a hand to greet me, an array of bracelets clattered on her wrist. “Sagesse Lavoie.”
I shook her hand but frowned. Her name was familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. “Are you my family, too?”
“No,” said Sagesse. Her voice was scratchy and raw, like she hadn’t used it in a very long time. “But I ought to explain to you how we all came to be here. What binds us.”
“That creature, the god—he said we were all the king’s beloved,” I recalled. “And Lope said something about a... sacrifice?”
“Yes.” Sagesse sat on the edge of the fountain, her head at a tilt as she watched me. Something about her eyes seemed so familiar. “Many years ago, Prince Léo came to me, asking for help in speaking to the gods. It is easier for me than most to hear their voices. On occasion, they’ll even answer my pleas. The god who lives here? He is very talkative.
“Léo asked that I help him talk to this god, the king of Shadows. The prince wanted more than anything to be king, and to be king forever. He promised me a title, a place in his court , security , if I were to speak on his behalf. And I did. The god made a proposition: Léo would sit on the throne, ever young—but for a steep price. For every ten years he wished to reign, he would need to give the Shadow King the life of a person he loved with all his heart. He accepted the deal. Thanks to me, he got his door to reach the Underworld. And for his first sacrifice?” The bracelets on her arms jingled as Sagesse pointed to herself.
My brow furrowed. “He loved you?”
She threw her head back with a one-beat laugh. “Gods, no. He thought he could get away by sacrificing anyone. And I knew too much. At least he was punished for trying to fool the king of Shadows. But it was only a wound to his vanity. Turning his hair white.”
Sagesse nodded to the old king and Philippe. “Next, Léo gave up his father and then his brother. He truly loved them. And the sacrifices worked. He reigned and did not grow old. After twenty years, when it was time again, he sacrificed his mother.”
Queen Caroline lifted her head. Her cheeks were stained with tears.
“I was next,” Francoise spoke up. She met my eyes, worry making her brow wrinkle. “What year was it when you were... up there? I do not know how long I’ve been down here.”
“It—it was 1660,” I replied. How did time pass here? In this black abyss, in this world run by a chaotic god, did days last centuries? Did years last merely seconds? Even if I found some way to reunite with Lope... would she be gone from me by the time I returned?
Her brows rose. “But... it was the year 1660 when he sent me here! It was June then—”
“It is only autumn, now,” I said.
“It’s odd,” Philippe muttered. “Francoise’s sacrifice worked for Léo. There was love in his heart somehow. He did care for Francoise... but then he didn’t need another sacrifice. Not for another ten years.”
Mother’s face was cold and still. “He just... cast me aside because I was there. A convenient extra sacrifice, strolling into his home...” Her eyes were glassy as they fell upon me. “He had what he needed. He could have let you go.”
“It—it didn’t work anyhow,” I said, my voice soft, almost apologetic. “The king of Shadows said that Father—Léo—did not love me.”
My voice broke on the last word. I couldn’t understand it. How could I still long for his approval, his love, when I knew now what a monster he was? He was nothing more than a painted mask of a kind man, a father. But a father nonetheless. The only one I’d ever had. Someone who should have loved me.
Mother’s hand around mine helped ground me.
“He won’t stop,” I murmured. “He’ll send more and more people down here and let out more and more Shadows, and it will go on forever, because no one can stop him. No one will stop him. Everyone believes he’s blessed by the gods.”
“Easier to say the gods blessed him than to admit the ugly truth. Making a bargain with the king of the Underworld.” Sagesse folded her arms tight and dug the toe of her shoe into the gray dirt. “The bastard didn’t even pay me.”
“Are we the only people here?” I asked.
“I’m afraid so, my dear,” said Philippe.
I looked to each of them, their gray faces, their weary eyes, the utter, painful quiet of this place. Gone were the brilliant reds and violets and greens of the king’s garden. Gone was the beautiful rosy pink of Lope’s lips. There was no birdsong, no music, no dancing. It was as still as death, here below. Drained of life as it was drained of color.
I looked to the horizon, this world that was now my home forever. Beyond the dark, grassy hills around us, a tall castle stood like a beam of silver light atop a cliffside. Its edges were straight, and every tower was topped with spikes, as if the entire building were made of arrows.
“Is that where he lives?” I asked. “The king of Shadows?”
“Yes,” said Sagesse. “Sometimes he summons us there. He asks us to tell him stories.”
My eyebrows pressed together. “Stories?”
Mother nodded. “We don’t know why. But he wants to hear about the world above. Everything, down to the smallest detail. We have to sit there, trembling in his presence, retelling our lives.... I think he enjoys seeing us cower before him.”
I thought of the two kings I’d met—one beautiful and cruel and the other frightening and odd and... childlike.
If the Shadow King liked stories, I could weave them with ease. Stories were like heartbeats, reliable and steady. I knew the shape of a good fairy tale so well, it was like following a well-trodden path back home.
Perhaps with my stories, with all the bravery I could muster, I could soften whatever stony heart lay inside him. If he made a bargain with my father, surely he would listen to me when I petitioned him for our freedom.
I began to walk across the stone-paved garden, onward toward the palace, white as moonlight.
“Ofelia!” Mother called, chasing after my heels.
“I want to speak to him,” I said, my stride unbroken.
“He’s—he’s wicked, Ofelia. He created the Shadows. He’s not human , you can’t just—”
“I can’t give up,” I said to her, pausing to throw her a glare—but tears had sprung into my eyes. “Maybe it’s hopeless, maybe I’m helpless, but I will claw my way out of this place if I must. For all of us. I have to be brave; I have to be brave for...”
I couldn’t say her name. Her smiles, so rare and so satisfying when they were won. Her hand so firm around mine. Her gentle, patient spirit. The way her fearless demeanor would melt away to a sweet blush when I gave her a compliment. The wrinkle in her forehead when she concentrated. Her faithfulness, no matter how stubborn I was. That beautiful, endless faithfulness.
With trembling hands, I swept the few tears from my cheeks and walked on. Behind me, Mother’s footsteps clicked and crunched against the stone path.
“You don’t need to come,” I murmured.
“I want to,” she said.
After a few steps in silence, I let my right hand drop to my side, my fingers apart, inviting.
She held my hand, just like on our morning strolls. Instead of forests and meadows around us, there were dark plains as far as the eye could see. The cold air rustled the plants and made our skirts sway, but her palm was so warm against mine. The callus from forever holding her paintbrush was still there.
The king had banished us below.
He had dragged us into his story. But our tale would not end here.