Reveal me

[raihnstar]

Neil ran his fingers through his hair nervously, clenching his teeth and taking a deep breath. Okay Neil, this is it. This is the moment. Or…it will be soon. He sucked in another breath and left the house quietly, with all its sleeping inhabitants behind. Better if he went alone. He let a bolt of lightning take him from the outside of his house to the fairy kingdom, and dusted himself off as he let himself inside the castle. The fairy’s took no notice of him, although his eyes were roving among them restlessly, searching for a friendly eye. He soon spotted one, a tall blue fairy that kept glancing at him and jumping nervously when a night fairy went nearby. The wandermage wove his way over and leaned casually against the building, “Is she safe?” he asked, his voice low enough that only the blue fairy would hear. “Safe enough. We’ve managed to isolate her,” the fae named Baroch replied. Neil nodded, “Take me to her.”

Baroch brushed his fingers against Neil’s eyelid and he felt the world melt around him, then reform in front of the Queen’s doorway. “She’s in there, mage…but you’d best go quickly. She looks…so looks odd, these days. I keep seeing, out of the corner of my eye…shadows around her face, but when I turn…it's gone.” Neil kept his face blank, “I thought the fae knew the nature of their own glamour…” he raised his eyebrows, and Baroch shook his head, “She would not enchant herself for us. She wouldn't lie…” Neil chuckled dryly, “Whatever you say,” he told the fairy comfortably, and knocked on the door.

There was a short pause, and it swung open. Kassidy didn’t look up from her papers, but her eyes did not move as she “read” them, “Wandermage. What have you come to my halls for?” she asked, her voice icy. Neil gave her a warm smile, “To wander, I’d suppose. Come, Queen, I’ve a place to take you to.”

“Certainly not. I’ve got duties, although you seem to believe me not when I say so.”

“Duties to look pretty and stay put? No, no. I jest. Do not be angry. What I need to show you…is of some importance, I think. It has to do with your parents…” Neil said in a painfully tight voice.

The Queen looked up, “What do you mean?” she asked quietly.

“If you please…we must make haste. The King is busy elsewhere and now is a good time.”

She didn’t question his mentioning the King, and hesitated only for a moment longer. Curiosity had gripped her. “We must be back…within three hours.” She said quietly, lifting her fingers and placing them gently on Neil’s arm. “Of course, lady.” He said, and lightning took them, leaving a charred mark on the floor.


He moved them to a quiet glade, and Kassidy frowned, feeling an ebb in her power. “Why have you brought me here? There is a human dwelling somewhere here…”

“Think on it. In the center of your kingdom… quickly, for time grows short.” He said in a hushed whisper, making his way through the glades and towards a small shack. He entered it, expecting her to follow but she had stopped short. “You don’t know our laws well enough, Wandermage.”

“Ah, yes…I had forgotten. Kassidy Bree Soraria, I invite you into this dwelling.” He said with a short bow, and went in without another word. Kassidy’s magic flooded back into her and she stepped into the threshold, carefully, followed him inside.

It was dimly lit, with only the sparse sunlight streaming through the planks that made up the ceiling. The whole place smelled of mould, and decay, spiders skittered around on the floor and in the corner a small moldy cot lay in the darkness…Kassidy let her eyes get used to the dark and they flicked around, “I don’t understand.” She murmured. Neil seemed to almost fade into the blackness, but he said nothing. Something stirred on the bed.

“K-kassidy?” a little voice, feebler than a shaking leaf on a branch, came forth from the bed. Kassidy’s heart froze. “No.” she whispered, her eyes wide. She walked over hesitantly, her fingers shaking. And when she saw who it was, her heart broke.

Her mother, aged and dying, looked out with blind eyes. “Oh Kassidy, it is you.” The tiny fae murmured, a smile lighting her face. “Mama! Mama you’re alive!” Kassidy cried, running the rest of the way and holding her mother’s hand. “Mama what are you doing here?! Let’s go back! Oh, let’s go back!” she squealed like a child, kissing her mother’s fingertips. Eleanor laughed softly, “I’m dying child. I plan to die here…I planned it so very long ago when your father was killed…It broke my heart for you, but I did.” Kassidy felt tears stream down her face and she whipped them away, “Why?” she asked with a whisper.

“I was tired…I was so tired of it all. I just wanted…to die…slowly. I came here, and my magic was taken from me…and my immortality as well. I asked…the mage…to let me see you before I went.” The ancient woman’s lined face smiled, and Kassidy cried harder. “I hid here so my magic would go back into the land…and I’ve only got my soul magic left before you become the most powerful Queen of all…”

From behind them, Neil cleared his throat, “Lady Kassidy, if I may suggest...removing the glamour you wear.”

The Queen looked ashamed, and the aging woman blinked tiredly, “Mage, now is not a good time...”

“I see no better time then now, actually.” Neil snapped with unreserved vehemence that startled Kassidy.

Eleanor sighed, “Go on, Kassidy dear. The mage says I should see something.”

Kassidy looked at Neil uneasily, and shed the illusion she wore. Her face now was tired and shadowed, bruises near her eye, and a cut lip and eyebrow. Her eyes looked hollow, and tired, and now sad as well.

“Oh, my child! What have I done!” Eleanor crooned sorrowfully, clutching at her heart. Neil looked horrified as well, and looked away, trying to control his anger.

“Go on then, Fae. Tell your daughter what you did.” He snapped impatiently.

Eleanor looked frightening for a moment, as she shot the mage an angry look, then she looked old and feeble again. “…I hope…you find it in your heart to forgive me for what I’ve done…

Long ago I was like you…young and beautiful and incautious…unmarried to your father. I…fell in love. With a fairy named Wendel. He was… poor. Lower than I was… So I rejected him. And I married your father. I was happy.” she paused here, to shoot Neil another look of anger, but the man was ignoring her now, staring fixedly at his finger nails.

“When we sent you to Magikus…you wrote to us… about a pixie. I sent a spy over.”

Kassidy stopped, frowning, “A pixie? What pixie?”

Eleanor continued as if she hadn’t heard, “The spy confirmed my fears. You were deeply in love with it. I thought it would go fine, at first. You sent him away…but it broke your heart.”

The Queen frowned, “Mama what nonsense are you speaking of? I’ve never been in love. Much less with a pixie.”

“He came back, that pixie…he came back and cured you, but I was blind to your love, and I only saw the lowly pixie… it reminded me of Wendel...the mistake I almost made with him. The princess? In love with a pixie? My daughter!? No! I would not accept such a poor fate for you…ridicule of the courts, your subjects mutiny…oh had I only known what you had in store—but I didn’t… Oh Kassidy how can you ever forgive me?! I made you forget him. With the most powerful memory spell I’ve ever made…I made you forget him…”

“And doomed her to a life unfit for the lowest peasant.” Neil spat, “You fairy’s and your prejudices. I really can’t understand them.”
Kassidy was shaking her head, “No. No that—that didn’t happen. Nothing happened at Magikus mama. I came back when you died…that was it. But—you didn’t die… I mean, I ruled… I’ve ruled for… mama what are you talking about?” her voice was genuinely concerned, as if Eleanor had lost her mind.

Eleanor looked older than she had during their whole encounter, “How will you ever forgive me… Come here, child… My sweet Kassidy.”

Kassidy bent over, her face distraught and pale, looking almost as tired as Eleanor’s. “What is it mama?”

The old fairy put a hand on Kassidy’s shoulder and closed her eyes. Slowly, Kassidy began to feel a tug at her heart, a strong pull unlike anything she’d ever felt before. She cried out, trying to pull away from Eleanor, but the woman had an iron grip. For half a second the Queen felt like somebody had reached into her body cavity and ripped her heart out, and she screamed, then felt intense relief flood into her.

There was a dark sphere floating between them, blacker than anything Kassidy had ever seen. “Well, it is time for me to go, Kassidy my dear… after I take this orb… I just hope you can forgive me…” she said again. Though Kassidy cried ‘no’, the woman grabbed the arm, and it flew into her.

The old woman’s eyes went blank, and something like a little tremor went through the ground, and Eleanor dissolved. “NO!” Kassidy screamed again, but then she found she couldn’t speak…

Beautiful garden full of purple flowers, a man…who was he? He turns, smiles at her with that roughish grin of his. “I’ve missed you, dolt.” Kassidy said, laughing, and then pain. Pain through her skull and arms, and back, pain that made her fall to the ground and scream. Oddly enough there is something nice about that pain. Real, after all this dreaming. Real after this nightmare. But her heart aches and the seconds never end and she lives each one of those twelve years without him again, and she remembers him this time, and every second hurts more, every moment feels like another heavy blow. She wonders how she is able to stand at all, wonders especially what his name is. She should know it. She’s been told it so many times. Has wanted it to echo in her head. Wanted to speak it, held back somehow. Wanted to think of nothing but /him/. Felt a thousand needles in her skin when she met Victor, felt her heart split in seven when she married him. Dax dancing with her at the ball. /That/ was it. Dax. Floating, feeling giddy, together. Wanted to launch herself at him, to hold him to her chest and cry and laugh and kiss him until she died. Dax. Dax. Dax. Dax.

And she’d relived the twelve years away from him in a few moments, but this time she remembered him the whole time. Her whole body was tense and rigid with pain, and her face was livid. “How…dare…she…do that to me…” she said in a thick voice after the ordeal was done. Her fingers were balled into fists that she couldn’t relax, and she felt like she wouldn’t be right until she saw him…but no…she was married. The heavy weight of that realization wanted to kill her. She felt a tear trickle down her cheek, mix with the blood from biting her lip so hard. Neil leaned down and picked her up. “Put on the glamour.” He said quietly, in a commanding tone. She did it without a second thought, her whole body stiff and rigid in his arms.

Then they were back in the castle, and in her room, and Kassidy was looking the same as before, rigid and angry, and sad. She felt like she could barely breath.

Neil shifted uneasily, “Do…you want to see him?” He asked carefully, feeling his skin crawl nervously. This is it...and you know this answer...oh the pixie won't be happy about this...

“No.” Kassidy said shortly, closing her eyes. “I’m /married/. And I know that…that if I saw him…” her voice died out and Neil nodded, understanding. “He won’t…be happy, about that.” he told her tightly.

“No. He won’t.” Kassidy said softly, saying he like a blessing, like a salve for all of her wounds. She couldn’t say his name yet. Not yet. Not out loud, although it was running endlessly in her head, skipping about and making her heart jump. Her mother was gone. Truly gone now…but she’d grieved for her before already and she didn’t want to grieve again…now was the problem…of hiding Dax from Victor. There were certain advantages to her not knowing who he was…now he would know. Now he would try three times as hard to find the pixie. “Keep him safe, Neil.” She ordered, pain and fear in her voice obvious. He nodded, bowed and disappeared, wondering /how/ on earth he would tell the pixie that he couldn’t see his Queen.