42. Chapter Forty-Two
I can only pace in front of the mountain for so long.
In all my magic and physical strength, I can’t break through the barrier keeping me from Neera.
I’d tried to avoid the deep pull I felt to her from the moment I saw her at the market.
It burrowed under my skin until I couldn’t avoid it.
Maximo insisted that if I just got to know her, I’d be able to give her the key and never suffer from the affliction of wanting her at every waking hour, and often even in my dreams.
Only spending time with her made it worse because I fell for her, not because of the pull but because of her. She enchanted me with her words that could strike me down and build me up in every way I deserved or needed.
My throne room is always so barren, and the silence that echoes around it beats against my skull greater than the wrath of my castle.
I stare at the spot Neera stood when she first arrived in this room.
My anger wanted to choke her for bringing back the curse that has plagued my kingdom for much too long.
The true curse never rested in the rose.
It rested in how fate would bring her here to rip out my heart when her warmth left me to save everyone but me because there will be no soothing this despair with her gone.
I drop onto my throne and continue to stare at the spot like desire alone might return us to that time and allow me to fix how terribly I treated her.
Before, I'd have sent her up the mountain right then with nothing to protect herself.
The monsters would have spilt her blood, and I'd have feasted in my damp dining hall, never knowing how she brought with her everything that makes living worth it.
How quickly I'd have handed over peace and warmth to the mountain.
I have done so now, and I am empty with woe and regret.
There will be no living if her blood stains the rocks outside my window.
Nothing but insanity touches me in this castle. In this realm.
The kingdom is overrun by madness, but it is greatest in my heart over waiting for her to never return.
Without Neera the stars hold no worth above my ceiling window, and all that touches my lips is tasteless.
For a woman has broken a king with her absence.
The sorrow of those thoughts drops me to the ground until the desperate need to do something possesses me, and I do the only thing I can think of to be released from this great and terrible lamentation.
I run to the stables. “Fredrickson! Fredrickson!”
“Yes, King, you would think after all these years, you would finally call me Dinivan.”
“We might be beyond formalities, but I can’t remember. I need a horse now.”
“You can’t follow her up the mountain.”
“I’m going to wait for her at the well.”
He goes to a stall to ready my stallion. “It’s going to be days.”
“And I will wait as long as I need to for her.”
“Yes, that I know about you. You would wait lifetimes for her.”
I frown and raise an eyebrow. “Are the stable smells getting to your head?”
“No, sir.” He brings my horse out, and I leap onto his back, racing for the village frozen in time.
I’ve waited for Neera for almost three full days, and the sun over the western horizon glares a horrible reminder that she’s out of time.
Maximo warned me that the women always die on the mountain.
I curse the bastard wraith and his false promises that she would be fine if I trained her to face the monsters.
He told me it was an effort that those who came before me never attempted.
There’s only a small bit of the sunset left when I sink to the ground.
A cry rips from my throat as I realize I sent her up the mountain to die.
I don’t even care if the curse remains for a thousand more years.
All I want is Neera. I’m blasted into the side of a house and land on the ground with a loud crack.
Visions fly through my head in a vortex I can’t understand.
As the chaos settles in my mind, everything starts to make horrific sense. No! There’s no way. There’s no way.
“I was always you.”
I'm going to strangle Lazzus and command him to shut up. It’s my favorite thing to do, but he’s inside my head.
He’s me. I stare at the concerning cracks in the porch roof as I fully merge with my lost half.
All the terrible things of my existence collide, but I can’t fall apart because I feel her.
Stronger than the force that slammed me into the house, I feel her.
Only she’s falling. I leap to my feet and run for her, but not in time to stop her from hitting the ground.
Like the very first time this happened, I can't catch her in time.
I take her into my arms. “Neera! Neera! You’re alright. You’re alright. We’ll get you to the healers, and you’ll be fine.”
Her hand barely makes it off the ground and immediately falls back down.
She smiles as she looks at me, and then all life is gone from her.
I try to grab her soul and put it back, but I can't find it.
It should be free, but I can't find it to put it back.
All my work for centuries, and all my practice, and there is nothing I can do to save her. I can never save her.
“No! This is not it! She broke the curse. This is not what is supposed to happen. It’s me who should be gone.
She broke the curse! She broke the curse!
Queen!” I scream for the queen with all my rage, clutching Neera so close to me.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. She’s not supposed to die after the curse is broken.
Her soul in the very least should be where I can put it back and keep her from decay.
The confusion is splintering my mind. I writhe as I cradle her, trembling and holding her so close.
Maybe I can keep her here this time. Maybe there is some way I will figure out if I hold on to her tight enough.
The queen appears. “How sad. You lost her anyway. The curse is broken, but you lost her anyway, and you remain as always to drown in your anguish.”
"Where is her soul? You promised it would be free."
She shrugs. "It's free, which means it could have gone anywhere."
I fall back as I have no more strength to remain on my knees. Neera's head lolls back, and I scream at how light she feels. “I followed all your rules! All of them. Century after century I met all your demands because you said the curse was breakable.”
“Oh, it is. The curse is broken, and your kingdom freed.
Exactly as I said it would be. Your castle inhabitants can truly eat and live now.
Evelia sacrificed everything for that because she was always what none of us deserved.
Even you. Especially you. Only the purest soul could teach a monster to love.
" She does everything to twist her words into my wounds, like over a thousand years of torment didn't satisfy her.
“The curse was never the magic in my castle. It was never the cycles. It was always losing her. Always watching her suffer. Always watching her die.” A keening sound shatters the air, so deep from my soul I feel it will split me apart.
This time not in two, but into so many pieces I won’t be salvageable.
“Take my life instead. For existence is so much pain. So much pain! So much agony without her that I only endured at the hope that she would live at the end of this.” I kiss her forehead and hold her against me, losing myself in sorrow so deep it feels as though I’ve fallen into a torment more heinous than the collective’s emptiness.
My wails are alive, violently turning me to nothing. I kiss her forehead, her cheeks, her lips. I brush back her beautiful hair and close her eyes after staring at my favorite colors one last time. The ruthless pain is only softened by the thought that she’ll never suffer again.
She dances in my memory, gliding over the ocean like it belongs to her. “Feeling loss is a beautiful thing, Lazzus.”
“How is loss beautiful, Lia?”
She slides onto my lap and kisses me. “It’s beautiful because it means we loved something so much that losing it brings pain. We had the privilege of knowing what it’s like to feel so deeply. Because your heart can only break if you have loved something more than you have loved yourself.”
The memory fades, and I fall to my side, curling around my wife, where I will hold her until existence delivers mercy and ends. I will hold her until we both turn to dust and are carried to peace by the wind.
“Sister, I believe you have been cruel long enough.” The witch sits on the well, swishing her feline tail back and forth.
“He stole my son!” Zantara hasn’t left. She’s stood over me, like she doesn’t quite know what she should do with the curse broken and Evelia permanently dead.
“You mean your son who had the cruelty of the Leqru, far greater than Lazzus or either of us combined. The son who slaughtered and tortured animals and children for the sake of it? He would have been a prize of the collective if they accepted half breeds.”
“Don’t talk about him like that!”
The cat jumps onto the queen's shoulder, settling into the large collar of the queen’s dress. “You have had centuries to be angry that your horrible son is gone, and it has fixed nothing.”
“Lazzus deserves to pay!”
“And he has. It’s time to stop the madness. I would, but I only have paws.”
The queen continues to stare at us, and she makes no move to shove the cat from her shoulders. “It is a pity the girl has suffered.”
“Yes, the innocent girl you brought into this.”
"There's not much I can do with her soul wandering off. She always liked doing that when she shouldn't."
The witch lifts a paw, but I'm too far inside my mind to realize what she holds. Everything is being played outside of me.
"This is something I captured because it's you who needs to do the right thing, or you will drown in your bitterness, enduring forever, no better than the makers you hate," the witch says.
The queen still stares for a while longer, but finally, she turns to the well and uses the rope to pull up a bucket.
She sets it next to me. “The small bit of water I didn’t seal, so it could return Evelia control of her soul.
This is the last of it, and it will fully repair her broken body.
And with this, I forgive you. Not that it is deserved, but because our rage and destruction lets them win.
The collective is the only thing I’ve hated more than you.
Don’t waste this.” The queen pushes light into Evelia's chest before leaving the water and vanishing. The witch cat follows.
I sit up, not letting go of Neera for a second. There’s a small bit of water in the bucket, and I scoop it up and pour it on her blue lips. Nothing happens for so long it seems like another cruel trick from the queen. The gasp for air that parts Evelia’s lips is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.
She opens her eyes after several minutes. “Your eyes are back.”
“I will leave them for you.”
“Not even if they clash with your outfit?”
“Not even then.” I lean all the way over until our lips meet with the strong thud of the sweetest heartbeat singing in the back of my mind.