I’m older now, roughly seventeen, and watching as the King looks at me laughing and happy. I’m dancing. It’s my first night in his court…
Another memory seeps through. I’m nineteen and in the Queen’s Ladies in Wait. My younger self is being courted by a handsome human man, letting him take me to the dance floor with my hand in his…
I feel tears building behind my closed eyes and watch myself at twenty-one, nearing the end of my time with the Queen and still happy and content and without a suitor. I’m flirting, enjoying my life at the castle, no trace of the young, harrowed girl left…
We flash again to me at twenty-three, sitting with the older men at court. Sir Miles is among them, smiling as all of us debate on topics and drink copious amounts of whiskey. That look of pure contentment still graces every part of my body...
I start sobbing fiercely, watching as the memory fades again to Elena. The Princess is meeting with her father in his study again, telling him that she has found a purpose for me.
“There are words that she’ll need to find, father. They’re of grave importance to the Old World. I believe them to be a prophecy involving the Ancient Hirovale. The book she’s holding in my vision turns to ash at her touch…”
Her beautiful features set in a small frown as she looks at the King, “she’ll need to enter the Old World libraries. You’ll need to find a reason to get her in.”
“I can arrange that,” Zander nods.
“There’s one more thing,” I watch Elena’s head tilt up with a distant smile, “Lady Alexis…”
The King looks at his daughter in curiosity, waiting patiently for her to continue.
“A few of my visions show her with Keane. They are destined, father. They will find eachother in the next few years…”
The vision flashes to another, more tense memory of a deep and dark room with a large oval table in the middle of it. All of the various Princes and Kings of the Four Kingdoms are seated around the wood, theirfeatures hard and silent as they watch Zander stand up from his chair. There’s no doubt in my mind that this is a memory of the Kingdoms Council, and in the short vision I see Clair seated next to her husband in deep and quiet thought. But Zander’s intention with this memory isn’t to take us through the full debate, instead he shows us his prior self leaving the room with Golem, grimacing when he catches Troy sneaking behind a hidden nook in the hall. The dismay on his face is apparent. He never meant for his son to know.
Another memory greets us, and it’s one that I know as I’m being approached by the King in a room that would become our standard meeting place. He’s giving me his proposition for my travel into the Old World libraries, and I watch as I smile at him and agree to my next adventure…
The vision flashes to about a year ago in same meeting room, just shortly before he tells me that he’s sending me to Dardar. I watch him frown as I walk away, my nonchalant and content attitude still holding true…
And finally, because I can feel King’s Zander’s emotions with this last push, he sends a vision of him speaking to Golem just after I departed from my meeting with him about the travel to Red Falls.
“You’ll need to slowly peel away the feelings Troy summoned into her, Golem,” the King looks back at his friend from his chair with a tired look on his face, “I don’t think she’ll be able to ever fully remember what happened to her in Woodlands, but we will certainly make sure to take away the faux contentment in everything she does.”
Golem nods and takes a slow step towards Zander.
“She’s already breaking through on her own, though, isn’t she? The travels are doing it for her,” the King continues softly, “is it not a sight to see?”
Golem nods again and moves to stand directly next to his King.
“Protect Keane,” Zander looks up in hard resolute, “he will need your guidance more than ever in my absence…”
My heart is heavy as I watch this unfold in my mind, tears streaming down my cheeks as I continue to sob.
“Tell him to remake Woodlands,” the King sighs to his magical friend in deep sadness, “tell him that I’m sorry I didn’t listen to him sooner…”
Golem reaches out to Zander, pulling the King into his side as he starts crying into his robes.
“I wish I could be there to see their children…”
The King releases us both from his summoning, his magic leaving my mind as my head falls heavy onto the bed. I grip his hand tightly and sob into the sheets, hearing a final plea leave his lips as he whispers to Keane.
“Forgive me, son.”
King Zander passed later that evening surrounded by his sons and wife. The wound to his chest grazed the upper portion of his heart, the green agate blade slicing against the vital organ and rendering it unable to heal. Itwas an assassin’s blade. The healers stated that he could’ve survived the attack had the stone hit half an inch higher, but the blade pierced the needed muscle instead, leaving him to bleed out.
That information was provided to me the same night through a heavy slip of parchment under my door. I had the distinct feeling it came from Desmond.
Following my visions with the King, I vaguely remember Golem leaving the room only to enter again with the Master Informer. The two of them helped me up from the floor as I tried to level my sobs, leading me through the royal residence and to my room without a word. They held my shaking body carefully and tucked me into bed, leaving me to my cries as I succumbed to the scattered visions.
And though my memories of leaving the King’s room are vague, I will never forget the look on Keane’s face once Zander fell into a deep sleep from the exertion of his summoning. His features were hardened and cold as he looked down at his father with glistening eyes, never once letting a tear fall. His stood over the bed with such a rigid posture that I thought for sure he was going to tear the room apart in fury, because there was no sadness or sorrow on his features, just a steady anguish that consumed his whole body and left him strangled by his father’s side.
