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I heaved a sigh of relief and turned my golden eyes from the forest
to my feet, which were sitting right beside a shining pool of enchanted water.
As I looked down at the still puddle, my reflection faded from view and was
promptly replaced by an image of Luken.
The aging king stood in the doorway of Nikola’s old room, taking in
the space that had remained untouched for over a year. Everything was exactly
as I had last seen it from the cup on the bedside table to the chair that was
placed beside it. Luken entered the room, his sullen eyes
briefly falling to the floor as he sat on that very chair. The Eurian ruler
leaned down and picked up a black, velvet belt that I immediately recognized as
my own.
As Luken stared at the long-forgotten accessory, the despondency in
his tear-filled sapphire eyes turned into rage and he heaved it across the room
and it stuck to the wall, which was suddenly slick with water. The mourning
king rested his head in his hands much as I had done moments before and sobbed,
rivulets of water streaming down the walls and furniture as he wept for his
dead son.
The smooth surface of the radiant pool rippled and a new, equally
somber view appeared. I saw my brother, whose demise I had engineered twice,
and my mother entering the castle in Abaroa that had served as my pristine
penitentiary for twenty-five years. The pair strolled through the castle at a
brisk pace, capturing the inquisitive gazes of every servant they passed until
they reached the door to my bower.
Mikel and one of the guards who flanked the entrance had a quick,
calm exchange of words while my mother wrung her bronzed hands anxiously with
her amber eyes fixated on the door. Finally, the two men ended their
conversation and the guards opened the door, allowing them entry to my bower.
My mother pushed past my brother and a heart-wrenching wail ripped through the
castle as she fell to her knees and pulled my lifeless body into her arms. A
pair of jagged slashes on my wrists and the bloodied comb on my irreparably
stained nightgown displayed the bone-chilling event that inspired her distress
and Mikel’s visible relief.
As the guards closed the door and gave the two the privacy they
needed, the water undulated and Nikola himself replaced the disturbing image when
the waters were still once more. My former consort sat in the Eurian library
reading a novel and enjoying a glass of wine. Just as he reached to turn the
page, something out of view caught his eye and brought a grin to his handsome face.
Nikola rose to his feet to greet Ihintza and the curly-haired infant on her
hip, whose sapphire eyes lit up at the sight of him. He took the child in his
arms and showered him with kisses, causing him to giggle and drool. The pure
adoration I saw when I looked upon his jubilant face mirrored the love I’d witnessed
in Garaile many times before, and my heart ached at the reminder of what I had
stolen from him.
Nikola and his beautiful young family vanished with the unaided
stirring of the water and gave way to the inn in Udane, where Garaile had
worked before our love story began. He stood behind the counter, bidding
farewell to a satisfied customer as he walked out into the Hestian sunlight. Once
the man was gone and the lobby was vacant, Garaile came from behind the counter
and walked into the kitchen. Katalin turned away from the dishes she was
washing and I was surprised to see how different she looked. Time had faded the
freckles from her slightly upturned nose and sculpted her once full cheeks.
The girl I had met during my unannounced trip to the inn had
blossomed from an unsure teenager into a beautiful young woman, and I could
tell based on the delight on her lovely face that the fondness for Garaile I’d
detected during my visit to Udane had grown. Katalin began to walk toward him,
but she tripped over the torn hem of her dress and lost her balance. Garaile
rushed over in attempt to catch her, but only succeeded in ensuring that they
both tumbled to the ground. They laughed for a moment as she lie on top of him,
but as the two gazed into each other’s eyes and became aware of their unusually
close proximity, the laughter ended.
Garaile reached up and tucked a lock of carmine hair behind her ear,
studying her intently as if he’d never truly seen her before. Then, he rose
from the ground and gave her a tender, slow kiss.
That touching scene disappeared with another ripple as quickly as it
had appeared, and I was left gazing upon my newly tearstained face. I wiped
away the evidence of my shame and sorrow, but my eyes remained trained on the
puddle. The events I had just seen were no longer possible, but that didn’t
alleviate the guilt that plagued me. Garaile would never experience a simple,
happy life because of his marriage to me and Nikola had no life at all, but I
could leave that remorse behind with just two drinks of the underworld's enchanted water…
I reached down to scoop up a handful of the brilliant liquid, but a
pale hand reached out and seized my wrist before I could touch the pool. When I
looked up, I expected to see Garaile, but the disapproving sapphire eyes that
stared down at me belonged to the man whose death weighed so heavily on my
conscience.
“Nikola? What—”
The violent rustling of leaves cut off my question as a fury, who had
been unseen until that very moment, took off from a nearby branch and soared
into the sky. For countless heartbeats, we watched the skies and the thin canopy
for an impending attack. Once Nikola determined that the black and bronze
she-monster had truly fled, he faced me again and spoke.
“For someone who has married two men with the hands of water, your
relationship with the element itself is problematic.”
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