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March 10 - March 11, 2024
Making Valroy suffer Puck’s company for an hour would easily equal the murder of Oberon.
“Hello, little witch.”
“Why not leave me to rot? You are the Unseelie Queen. Without me…the throne is yours. Surely you’ve put that together.”
“How bad is it? I cannot honestly tell.” “You…have looked better.” She tried to force herself to smile. “But I expect you have also looked worse.”
“By the gods, I do not accept myself as their queen. I have no claim to it. I was crowned but for moments before you attempted to murder Valroy.”
“A king for a king. It seems only fair.” Titania shrugged. “You will find another, in time. You are young, and you were tricked into believing you love him.”
“In the end, it will be that simple.” Simple. Kill two worlds. Or kill the man she loved. Shite.
For when she had placed her hand upon that tree…some part of her recognized it for what it truly was. No. Not what. Who.
Valroy had asked her to solve the Maze. And for what seemed like an eternity, she had no concept of what he meant. But now…she did. And the horror of it made the encroaching darkness the safer place to be. And she let it take her more than happily.
“You know what’s worse than fearing you’ll never be loved?” He stood and cracked his neck. “Knowing you never will.”
“I was the Maze, before it had a name. Before it had design. I was chaos and death.”
“Why did you not tell me any of this?” He laughed and, opening his eyes, smiled up at her as best he could. “Yes, because that is a conversation one wishes to have. ‘My dearest love, I am an ancient and unstoppable monster from beyond the pale who wishes to destroy two worlds for I am unable to help myself. Pass the mustard, would you?’”
“Do not say goodbye to me,” he murmured. “I do not think I could take it. This is but a parting until the morrow. I am eternal, my little witch. And I will come back to you someday—even if it is when this world has turned to dust, and I am ethereal once more. Go within my Maze, and embrace it, and you shall embrace me.”
She could not. She loved Valroy. She loved him. All of him. Come the darkness, come the war, come the death.
He was the Maze. He was a primordial evil. And she was his bride.
“He means to say he cares,” Abigail interjected with a halfhearted glare up at the Unseelie King. “Shush.” Valroy shot her a matching look back, though there was still a playful twist to his lips. “You will ruin my reputation.”
“Ah, see, you have it just a little bit wrong.” He tilted her head to look at him. “A great unstoppable monster of darkness from beyond the veil who has an enormous—” She slapped her hand on his chest. He winced in pain. “Easy on the gashes.”
“Titania chose to end her life. She wished to ensure that Valroy did not take it from her. And as she died, she gave me the golden crown.”
“Wanting you and loving you has nothing to do with agreeing with you. It has nothing to do with condoning your actions.”
It was exactly at that point, as she began drifting off to sleep that was spurred by sheer exhaustion, that Abigail came to a conclusion. Loving someone did not preclude wishing to punch them in the face.
Not even Titania had reached such a connection with the world around her. Abigail had become the Queen of Winter. Just as she would become the Queen of Spring, and Summer, and Autumn in turn. The Gle’Golun still tangled in her hair, as it always would, as that pernicious weed would never die, no matter the season.
If he had been made Death so very, very long ago… Now she had become Life.
“I would not ask you to be anything but what you are. I love you more than I can put into words, my little witch. My Seelie. My queen. My adversary. If I want you to love me as I truly am, how could I do anything but give you the same respect?”
“Can you even fathom how mind-numbingly frustrating you are?”
“You gave me love, only to make me rip it to pieces. You made me watch her die, knowing that you would simply make me do it again. If you wish for me to suffer, so be it. But it shall not stop me!”
“I…I came to pray to the Morrigan. You?” “I came to scream at her.”
But like all moments in time, they fell away like grains of sand.
He had adored her fear, but he had fallen in love with her defiance. And now, it stood before him in all its glory.
“Promise me one thing.” His words were quiet, nothing of his anger remaining in them. “Tell them you defeated me in battle. Or say you played some terrible trick upon me. Do not tell them I…I could not kill you. That I would rather surrender all that I am than to watch you die a second time.” His features contorted in pain. “I could not—I could not survive it.”
“My little witch…my Seelie Queen. No matter what we shall endure. No matter what becomes of us. My sunlight. My glowing blossoms. My living heart. I will not stop until I defeat you. And I will relish every moment I fail. I love you.”
“And I love you…my Maze of Shadows.”
She ran her fingers over the arm of the throne and smiled faintly. She did not want it. She did not ask for it. But it was hers. After a moment of hesitation, she sat upon the golden throne. For she was the Seelie Queen.
