The Cycle

Chapter Thirteen

"It started with her. The red woman. I was only about eight when she came into our court begging for refuge from a group of men who wanted to kill her. She was beautiful and my father was instantly enchanted by her. Langdon was thirteen at the time and Adam was ten. Both seemed to want to trail after her as she walked around the castle, singing and dancing. My mother and Cara remained wary and suspicious. I think, if it hadn't been for Cara, I would have followed that woman around with my brothers.
She was... magnificent. Her hair was like blood and her eyes burned like fire and her voice was smokey. She would smile at me with a pair of ruby lips every meal time and would offer to show me enchantments in which I could mix paint.
Cara stopped her every time by feigning an excuse.
I hated her for it.
That woman was all I wanted to be around and my sister kept stopping me.
My brothers stopped coming to classes. My father started to sneak out at night and I watched as that woman destroyed my mother.
She leeched off of her, sapped away her strength and her husband and sons.
My mother was so, so weak.
Before she had been strong willed. A force to be reckoned with.
That woman fed on my mother.
Queen Morgan the fearsome they used to call her.
But once that woman came, she was no longer fierce. She was frail and tired. She grew weak easily and my sister watched all of it happen.
My sister pleaded to my father to do something. She wanted him to help our mother.
But he was too enchanted by the red woman. He didn't even see his wife dying, crumbling in front of him.
For so long, i let Cara drag me to mother's bedside and for so long I screamed inside my own head to hug her and comfort her.
But all that came out was a spew of hatred towards her.
Nothing could ever make me forgive myself for the words I said to her.
Nothing.
I was beastly. I told her I hated her. I told her that she could never measure up to the red woman.
I was so... awful.
I could never forgive myself for the way I acted.
Eventually, it reached a point where my mother wouldn't last longer than a week.
And soon Cara started to feel the same way our mother did.
She was weak. She couldn't get out of bed. At this point, I started to take notice.
When a twin feels wrong, everything feels wrong. The feeling I got from my sister was the same feeling I started to get around the red woman. I no longer wanted to be around her.
The red woman's allure was starting to fade.
I threatened her. I told her to leave.
And she attempted to strip me of my powers.
Langdon and Adam caught her and we four - Cara, Adam, Langdon and I- expelled her from the castle.
Within a few days, Cara was back to normal.
But mother stayed frail. She is better.
But she will never be the same.
For two years, we heard nothing from her. I was ten, Adam twelve and Langdon fifteen by the time there was word of her.
It was... horrifying.
The men who had been trying to kill her instead started to worship her.
And she built an army.
There was no warning. No signs. Nothing.
She just arrived one day, flocked by men holding spears.
And on those spears were the heads of our villagers.
Fae knights and women with blood spilling down their faces.
A ten year old should never have to see that.
The woman was sat upon a large bird-like creature as black as her heart. The sight was terrifying and I wanted to run.
I wanted to run from the men with my friends heads upon their weapons.
I wanted to run from the great black creature which stared into my soul.
I wanted to run.
And Cara? Cara was terrified.
The woman told us that every month, unless we crowned her queen, she would come for one of us and turn us into a creature filled with absolutely nothing.
Just emptiness.
My father refused and my mother told her to leave.
She did.
But she returned a month later and stole the handmaiden of my sister.
A wraith appeared in the forest the next morning.
And so the pattern continued, over and over and over again.
Men, women, children, babies. Anyone. They stole everyone until there was no one except us.
We tried everything.
Two years ago, we asked for aid from the other three kingdoms of Life, Nature and Power.
None came and our village was soon empty of people and our forest was filled with their husks.
We could not give the woman our house. Not our royal blood. The crown would destroy her.
But soon she took someone... someone precious. To us all.
Cara was taken on our sixteenth birthday.
Since then, the woman hasn't bothered taking anyone else.
She knows she's won.
She took the only person who could have saved us."

(~*~)

"Why was she the only one who could save you?" I asked, wiping my cheeks of any tears.
Jasper let out a heavy sigh and rubbed his eyes. He looked ill. Really ill.
"Me and my sister were strange at birth. My mother went into labour while in the human realm and she gave birth to Cara between the Fae world and the human world. She had me in the Fae world. There was a prophecy that a Fae child born between two worlds would help the kingdom of shadow."
"Is that the actual prophecy?"
He laughed a little and shook his head.
"No, Dorothy. The actual prophecy is a poem."
"Do you know it?" I asked.
He nodded and started to speak.

Sword and steel
Hide what she feels
Fae child
First kill
Born on the plane of stars
Failure behind and between the bars
Shadowland at the beck and call
Of the crimson ivy hand.

I stared at him.
"How the fuck did that make any sense?"
He snorted loudly, shaking his head in amusement.
"It just does. We used to study it as children and we would make up adventures based on it. Langdon would always be some heroic knight. Me and Cara were a heroic duo and Adam would always be either a villain or a hilarious sidekick. He played both rather well."
Jasper smiled a little at the memory, his eyes shadowed by his past. Just like the queen, this boy was haunted. This entire castle was haunted by ghosts and memories while the forest outside was haunted by wraiths.
The kingdom of Shadows indeed.
I furrowed my brow a little, realisation flooding through me.
"What made you think it was Cara aside from her being born between worlds?" I asked, feeling guilt blossom in my chest for tearing Jasper away from his memories.
"Well it said the Shadowlands. We took that as our own lands." He said.
I knew the Shadowlands. I had fought on them during my first battle. These were not the Shadowlands.
"The prophecy wasn't referring to the Kingdom of Shadows but the actual Shadowlands." I said, grabbing his wrist in excitement and feeling those familiar flames crawl over my skin in a comforting band.
He gave me a confused look.
"We're one and the same, Dorothy."
Shaking my head, I gave him a grin.
"But they're not. There's a spot of land between the Kingdom of Power and an ancient portal leading to what used to be a castle in the UK."
He wasn't getting it. He stared at me in confusion and shrugged. I groaned and continued.
"There used to be a village there but a rogue bomb came through during the humans war and destroyed it. We called it the Shadowlands because of the Black Knights who gathered there to overthrow Queen Alexia."
His eyes flashed as he realised what I had.
"Are the Black Knights still there? Maybe who we need is among them!" He asked urgently and my face fell.
"I... no. I'm sorry. They started taking children and the Kingdoms of Nature and Life were forced to intervene."
He nodded slowly, turning away and pulling his wrist from my hand. I felt a loss at the sudden removal of his hand and looked up at him
"But... my father might know something."
I was grasping at straws now, hoping to find a reason to go home. A way to get back to my family or even just a way to travel away so that I might be able to slip past them.
Jasper shook his head.
"No.. we have a way. Don't worry. We will sort it."
Heading to his door, he opened it and gestured for me to leave.
The boy needed sleep. And, as I left the room, I could see why.