CHAPTER 2
~JARAH~
Despite our… situation, Father still insists we attend lessons. He doesn’t want fools for children so even though we will never marry and most likely never leave the castle, he still insists we learn. It makes no difference to me. Pretending we are normal is a farce I no longer feel I need to entertain. Being princess of Ames means nothing to me, and if I can die an ignorant wench it'd be fitting.
No one speaks to us but our tutors, and they never stay long. The chain that swings between me and my sister keeps us all safe but the kingdom remembers the days before the chain. They remember the people I murdered. By the time our father clamped the metal on our ankles, my demon’s kills totaled forty four soldiers. It’s as much use convincing the tutors they’re safe as it is trying to teach me how to write my name. I’m only one half the coin in a body I share with a monster. What does it matter what my name is and if I can write it?
“Jarahais,” The woman snaps. I turn my head from the window to look at her, abandoning my fantasy. It's been three weeks since I was allowed outside. Four weeks since they’d tried to drown me in a water barrel in the dungeon.
“Did you hear what I said?”
Tenderly, I pick up the intricately decorated book in front of me and turn to the page we’re reading. “I’m sorry,” I murmur, but the woman fixes me with a hard glare. Her name is Nauda and she usually works in our library but recently was conscripted to teach us history. No one outside of the castle wants to teach us anymore, but under my father’s rule refusal isn’t an option.
She doesn’t call us princesses. She isn’t as timid as the man who taught us last week, but people almost always disguised their fear with hatred.
“Now tell me about the origin of Ofros, our sacred land. Who discovered it?”
“Athair, The Great Father,” Jamie answers quickly. Nauda hates when Jamie answers for me, but she should be grateful I’m listening at all. I don’t care about any of this.
“Jarahais, why is Athair called The Great Father?”
I twist my hands, hoping her gaze drifts back to Jamie. Normally, tutors give up when I refuse to speak. But Nauda is stubborn as a bull and the longer the silence grows, the harder I find it to avoid her eyes. Eventually I look up and murmur, “Athair was The Great Father because he fathered the four kings of Ofros: Ames, Eshya, Ibex, and Fiore. He named the land Ofros after his wife, the great sorceress.”
“Good,” She says, but she doesn’t smile. “Athair was an explorer from a distant land and wanted to make a new life for his wife and himself. When he found our land, he was transfixed by its beauty. Ofros is a land dominated by ocean, sky, mountain, and valley- he found he couldn’t leave. So, he stayed.”
I glance out the window once more. I want to see the sky too.
“Jamie, finish reading this page.”
My sister perks up, “ But Athair’s wife, Ofros, hated the land. She yearned to return home. She’d come from a small village and missed her family. She was upset Athair had taken them so far away, and so the place Athair had come to love Ofros grew to hate. She cursed the land every day she lived, to her dying breath, and she died here. But before the sorceress died, she gave birth to many children including her three sons and daughter: Ames, Fiore, Eshya, and Ibex. When they were born, the great father and mother realized they possessed strange abilities and gifts that all had an edge of terrible misfortune. When Ofros cursed the land, she had cursed her womb as well and her children would bear that burden along with the soil.”
Nauda turns to me and clears her throat and I jump, embarrassed she caught me looking out of the window again.
“Finish reading, Jarahias.”
Gingerly I place my finger against the page, hesitating.
“The f-first three sons and d-daughter,” I stutter, “when old enough, moved away and started their own families in different corners of the land, establishing the four kingdoms as more journeyed to Ofros. Ames Athair was the founder of our kingdom, Ames. His father died of grief after Ofros died, but the curse on the land still remained. The children of their children were riddled with misfortune- the royal families being the worst in the land. Ames Athair was born with an affinity for strength and could lift boulders with his bare hands and throw them into the air, but his skin was thin- weak. He easily cut himself on the roundest of edges and would bleed profusely. He lived afraid to use his strength, but was known to suffer through his agony in service to his land and family, despite it. His family and eventual subjects began to admire his strength of spirit, and that admiration of strength is what is a trademark of the Amesian people today.”
Nauda nods and I breathe a sigh of relief. “How many kings have there been since King Ames the first?” She asked.
“Our father is the eleventh,” Jamie chimes eagerly and Nauda gives her a small tight smile, as if suddenly remembering we are royalty.
“He has one of the most difficult curses the land has ever seen, and thus our strongest king so far. The king is a mind-mage but-“ She stops abruptly, eyes flitting over to me before quickly darting away. Wary, she mutters, “Never mind.”
“You’re not going to tell us?” Jamie frowns.
Nauda hesitates, but I know what this is. People always keep things from us, so I know what it looks like when someone wants us to stop asking questions. But, Nauda surprises me when she relents.
“King Rufus Calduf Ames the eleventh, Grand Mage of Mind, is able to split consciousnesses. There are few with an affinity for the mind, but, I’m sorry,” Nauda says resolutely, “I’m not supposed to be talking about this. You’re supposed to be learning about Ofros, Athair, and the Kingdom of Ames. Let’s just turn the page.” Her voice is brisk and allows no room for debate so we quickly do as she says, but I’m confused. I’ve never known what my father’s curse is, or that he’s a mind-mage, but it makes sense. People fear him.
Later, as we are finishing our lesson, I decide to ask a question. I rarely speak so when I tug Nauda’s sleeve she flinches a little.
“Tell me why no one speaks about my father.”
“Oh, we speak of him,” Nauda says cooly, “We are just forbidden to speak of him with you.”
It’s then I notice her features. Nauda has hair a mix of pepper and sand, and eyes a murky brown and gray. She’s old, her wrinkles set deep in the creases of her eyes, but she must have smiled much in life because the grooves are there. It’s strange. She seemed so harsh from far away, but standing in front of her there is a youth and vitality I'd missed.
“I don’t understand,” Jamie closes her book, “We’re learning about all of the kings. Why can’t we learn about our father?” Our study is in the furthest tower of the castle, overlooking the rolling hills and gardens of Ames. I like this room only because the servants never come by this way. It’s said to be cursed, though looking at the towers of books and scrolls lining the walls and the idyllic bay windows, it’s just abandoned- now repurposed. Nauda perches against the thick slab of marble dominating the center of the room and crosses her arms.
“Do you,” I have to be very cautious with my next few words- I know they are borderline treasonous, “Do you think he’s evil? Is that why you don’t talk about him?”
She looks at me. “Do you think he’s evil?”
I don’t know what to say to that. She pulls away from me and gathers the rest of her things before giving us a short bow. “We will resume tomorrow. Have a good night.”
But I don't have a good night. I spend hours tossing and turning beside Jamie, mulling over what she told us about our father. I know close to nothing about him. I rarely see him, or our brother. But it doesn't make sense that we’re allowed to know so little.
“Why do you think he won’t let anyone tell us about his curse?”
Jamie rolls over, and though I can’t see her in the dark, I know her eyes are gray and calm as the waters of lake Aria. “ We have lessons tomorrow, you should sleep.”
“But don’t you think it’s odd,” I ignore her, “ She said people speak of him all the time. Nauda, the librarian, knows more about our own father than I do. The only time I see him is when…”
“When he’s trying to keep the demon contained,” Jamie finishes calmly.
I swallow and nod. “Right.” Whenever I speak of the devil, it seems to just give it more power to make my life a living hell. Words give shape to my specter, so I avoid speaking of it whenever possible. “But father can split consciousness. That’s what Nauda said.”
I feel Jamie nod.
“That’s incredible,” I awe, but Jamie is silent. “I don't understand what he can do at all. Mind-mage… But, you’re not surprised.” It should be a question, but it isn’t. It always seems like my sister is one step ahead of us at all times.
“I’ve known for a while, Jarah. I felt like it was obvious.”
My brow furrows only for a second but then, anger. I’m so sick of everyone speaking around me and through me like I don't exist. And now Jamie is talking down to me. What could possibly be so obvious that- “You think the demon is a split personality that father created?" It’s a shaky whisper. Wild conjecture.
Jamie, again, says nothing and I want to shake her. “You’re being very quiet about all these revelations.”
“Endiel and I talk about this all the time,” She shrugs,“ I know you and your demon don’t talk, but I think maybe you should. Endiel knows a lot.”
I shake my head, turning away from her and pulling my pillow to my chest. “No, Jamie, you don’t understand. I’m not talking to that monster. All It knows is…death. I’ll ask Nauda tomorrow.”
“Okay,” Jamie places a steady hand on my shoulder before turning over and going back to sleep. But for the rest of the night I can’t help but ponder my father’s ability. What is it like to split someone’s mind? How does he control it? Has he used his ability on us? Did he fail with me? Is that why I’m such a disaster?
These thoughts consume me, and the next morning I don’t let Nauda guide us through our lessons. I pepper her with questions until she finally answers my questions with rhetorical questions of her own. I’ve never wanted to learn something as badly as I want to know about my father. These past few weeks the chain repressed the demon. It is but a whisper in the back of my mind, and It’s absence makes me bolder. For the first time, I have full control over my own body and I determine then and there to start being more present.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
“Nauda,” I huff for the hundredth time, “Please tell me something about him. Anything. Why doesn’t he want us to know anything about him? Why is he always gone?”
“Because he is the King,” She snaps, annoyed, and I wilt. “The king spends time with his son, training him to be his heir. He has no time for princesses. He has a kingdom that relies on him for food. And safety. And governance. Leading is not easy.”
“Right,” I slump in my chair, “Of course.”
Sometimes I forget I have a brother. I never see him and it’s not like he cares for us much, either. Jamie rubs my back and Nauda slides our books across the marble towards us in a plume of dust. “Now, we’re going to finish your history lesson and then move on to the stars.”
The sun casts an orange glow, pistoning beams of light through the stained glass and tingeing our world in dyed reds and summery fire. The heat is a stark contrast to the ice running through my veins and stiffening me with each breath. I don’t care about dead kings. I only want to learn about the living one. When Nauda begins to speak, I look out at the rolling hills and feel my eyes begin to burn.
“Jarahais!”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, turning to pay attention, but Nauda’s angry. “Don’t be a child.”
“But,” I begin to cry, ugly fat tears rolling down my cheeks, “I am a child. I’d just wanted to know about him- something - and no one is ever willing to tell me the truth!"
Nauda sighs, lesson forgotten, and stands. She walks around the table and stoops to my level. “Why are you crying?”
I press fingers over my eyes. “I’m not… I’m sorry.”
She huffs again, running an agitated hand through her gray hair before placing it on my shoulder and forcing me to turn and face her. “I could be punished for telling you this,” She says hesitantly, but each rushed word makes the brown of her eyes soften. “What they do to you children in here…it’s not right. I’m sorry for being harsh with you, princess. But, you must remain strong. It’s the only way you’re going to survive this life.”
I remove my hands from my eyes and look at her. Her expression is kind and I can’t remember the last time anyone looked at me with softness.
“He hates me, doesn’t he?”
Nauda pauses, lips a firm line, and then says, “He didn’t always. He has done the best he can. The Queen…the queen was well beloved by the entire kingdom. When she died, King Ames probably did not know what to do.”
“Our mother?” Jamie glances up from her book, taking an interest, “What does she have to do with anything?”
“Jarahais’ birth killed her.” I’ve never known Nauda to mince her words, but in this instance I wish she had. The blow strikes me to my very core and fresh tears begin to flow.
“They told us she died of sickness.” I whisper in unbelief.
“There hasn’t been a plague in Ames for a hundred years.” Nauda stands and takes a few tentative steps away from me as if unsure of how I'll react. But that one step breaks me. I've grown used to being without a mother. I’ve never felt her absence, so used to loneliness I never considered anything different befitting me. But to know I once could have been loved? I could have been embraced and it was my birth that had snuffed that light from the world?
I bowl over with a new wave of grief and sob into my arms. I can't be angry. How can I be? Nauda called her "beloved of the people”' so she must have been good and I'd robbed Jamie of her. Why wasn’t our father the one to tell us this? Why was I hearing it from the fucking librarian?
“So,” I swallow past the tears threatening to tear me apart, “What does that have to do with-“
“He had been left with two children with curses stronger than he’d ever encountered and one was a monster whose birth killed his wife. When you were born, monsters from hell…” Nauda shudders and casts her eyes away, reliving something terrifying, “You brought forth hell itself. We tried to take care of you but he was riddled with grief. I’m sure Ames would have fallen if he hadn’t done what he had. Our king is strong. He is the protector of our people. He locked her inside her mind and created a docile personality to rule the body, one without a curse. One that would keep the kingdom safe. He created you, Jarah, to contain his daughter, the demon of Tëlas.” Nauda’s face is emotionless as she eviscerates my world.
“I’m-“
Not real. It whispers.
~DEOMI~
Have you ever woken from a dream but refuse to open your eyes? Afraid that if you ever wake, fully, the magic will be lost? Naturally, you chose to reside in the in-between, stuck between a dream and reality, suspended in that revolving world of black and color. You feel weightless. Time has lost its meaning and in that space you create your own world. You will things into being and cut them down if they don’t suit your fancy. That in-between can be either heaven or hell. It’s up to you. And, it is where I live when I’m not waiting for the puppet to let me out.
As the years pass me by, I learn there are more ways to feel pain than through the skin you wear. My home, the in-between, could be heaven. But I’m never alone, so it’s hell. Darkness is my curse and it finds me whether I have my body or not. It resides deep within me. We are both master and slave. I sit deep inside of Jarah and watch her, day and night, and the darkness watches me.
All the while, I learn what Jarah learns and grow as she grows. We don’t speak to one another. She denies to herself that I exist. She denies she is the pathogen burrowed underneath my skin. It helps her to think I am her monster. I am the one who stole her life, because the alternative- the truth- is just too unbearable. She is too weak to think herself a villain so she lives on as the victim. But it makes no difference to me how she copes with my presence. I want her eradicated. I want her layers peeled so far back she can't hide what I know to be true. She doesn't deserve our body.
When she learned of her creation, she spiraled. She laid in bed for days, refused to go to lessons, and nearly killed us by rejecting food. Her depression was dark and long but she never spoke a word to me or of me. So, I just watched as she dragged the blankets over her eyes and wept for hours at a time. Gods, it was pathetic. Weak.
Jamie was forced to skip lessons beside her and it was the sister’s never-ending badgering that eventually pulled Jarah out of bed. When they finally went back to Nauda, Nauda was angry.
“I told you of your origin so that you would stop asking questions. I didn't think it would destroy you. Lift your head,” She snaps, slamming a book in front of Jarah and making her wince. Jarah doesn’t like it when people are angry with her, but her sadness overpowers her embarrassment and she begins to cry. Nauda casts her a look of utter disdain before crossing the room and pulling out a map of Ofros.
“Jamie, since your sister has brought her feelings into the classroom, can I ask you to list off the seven main curses of the land?”
Jamie sits up straighter and I want to grimace. That is how I want Jarah to sit, but she’s always slumped over, breaking our spine in these ridiculous wooden chairs.
“The seven main curses are an affinity for the mind, body, knowledge, stealth, affinity for survival, longevity, and strength.” She smiles as she recites the seven main curses from memory. It is obvious she is happy to be back in her chair.
“Give me an example of an affinity of the body,” Nauda's piercing gaze swings to our body though it is Jamie, again, who answers and I wonder for the hundredth time why Jarah doesn’t use her own voice.
“Healers and menders of bones have an affinity of the body.”
Jarah wrings our fingers.
“And Jarah,” Nauda turns to Jarah who is still, in fact, crying, “Give me an example of an affinity for stealth.” But Jarah is not paying attention. Her mind is consumed with dark thoughts and she is crying so hard I’m afraid the snot will ruin her book.
“Jarah.” Nauda’s voice holds a warning. The woman is at the edge of her patience, as am I.
“I’m sorry I-I just don’t want to talk today,” She sputters and I can’t help but wonder how I could be so unlucky. A sniveling narcissistic fool is about to ruin my education when she already has control of my body. Fantastic. I literally couldn’t be luckier.
“Jarah,” Jamie begins soothingly, “You need to move past this.”
“I can’t.”
“You have a purpose. That’s more than half the people of this world. You’re a princess and also a protector of our people. You are saving lives as you sit here- you’re protecting us all just by breathing. You cannot let this crush you. I won’t allow it. Not many people are willing to teach us and Nauda is here giving us her time, so we must respect her and do our best to learn.”
Jarah shakes her head, fresh neverending tears beginning to flow. “I don’t know how you do it. You see the good in everything.”
“What’s so bad about our creation? It is a beginning and everyone has one. ” Jamie smiles, and even I respect her for it. She has a point. Jamie sees the best in everything, even when there shouldn’t be good to find.
Jarah rubs her eyes and glances at our teacher, “I’m sorry,” she murmurs.
“Give me an example of an affinity for stealth.” Nauda’s face is emotionless as she repeats her question. I like her.
“Spies and assassins who can blend into the night and sneak about. Those are normally the people gifted with stealth. Curses of knowledge involve people who can memorize a lot of things at once. Curses of longevity involve people who live for long amounts of time.”
“The longest recorded living person was four hundred years.” Nauda adds with a nod.
Jamie awes, “Amazing,”
“Now,” Nauda gestures to the map, “Tell me of the other rare curses.”
Jamie and Jarah both sit back in silence.
“They are country specific,” A hint.
Jamie leans forwards and points at our country, “ An affinity to darkness and blessing in Ames? And an affinity for earth in Ibex.”
“Yes,” Nauda says, “There has only been one recorded case of a curse for darkness and light and that was King Desmond Ames the Second’s two children: Wry and Tyson. They were twins, and gatekeepers.”
The room quiets with those words but my interest is piqued. Gatekeepers?
“Wry could speak to his ancestors and it was said he guarded the gate between the spirit world and Ofros. Wry spoke to the great father Althair himself and guided the kingdom into prosperity with his wisdom. They called Wry the chancellor of our people, and they buried him at the foot of the mountains between Ames and Eshya.”
“What about the other twin?” Jarah asks, tears forgotten. “The twin with darkness.”
“Tyson was the guardian of the demon world.”
Guardian. The word holds a certain weight but the meaning isn’t lost. The curses of my sister and I are night and day. I don’t know if she can hear the voices of our ancestors or if she’s spoken to the Great Father. But I do know about demons. I do know about voices that scream in the night and startle me into silence, the hunger and desire their words carry. But, if I inherited Tyson’s curse, that means that I’m a gatekeeper. I can wrangle back a semblance of control. There is hope...
Suddenly, Jarah stands and I startle from my thoughts. She grabs Jamie’s hand and storms from the room. She is finished with lessons about curses and demons. She is done dwelling on her origin and she knows she can make it so she never has to hear another word of it again.
To this day I still don't understand what could possess a person to do what she did. She didn’t think as she marched to her father’s study. She told our father- the man who ritualistically tortures us, that beast of a tyrant- about Nauda. And he ordered her execution for treason. That same day, father also destroyed the library, for good measure. Jarah watched it all burn to the ground, hidden behind Jamie who cried silent tears of anguish.
“I’m so sorry,” She whispers to her sister as the flames singe her hair and smoke billows into the busted rafters, “I didn’t know this would happen.” The stained glass melts and pops, seeping into the night sky and yawning darkness. The smoke is cloying and yet the sisters remain. Watching the vestiges of their only ally splinter and crack. I'll never forget how loud the fire was that day.
She couldn’t have known. She’d just been afraid. But it didn’t matter. Nauda died, but she'd given a name to the voices I heard my entire life and that is more than anyone had willingly ever given me.
Demons… creatures who actually want to talk to me. If I am a gatekeeper, that means I am the gatekeeper to the demon world. A world all my own- and maybe a place where I can belong. And it means there is something in this world just for me, after all.