Pandora
♡
"You truly have a gift for making an entrance, you know that?" The man who's presence I genuinely don't care for right now, makes himself known. Using the opportunity of having my back towards him, I roll my eyes, as if that simple gesture would be enough to compensate for all the annoyance he has brought into my life so far.
"Didn't anyone teach you how to knock." I ask, not looking away from the map spread out on my desk.
"Didn't anyone teach you how to properly close a door?"
"My apologies, I didn't think it to be necessary to do more than lock a door to send the message that I'm busy."
"Apologies accepted." I can practically hear the mischievous smile in his voice.
"What are you even doing here?"
"Apart from savouring you annoyance?"
"Oh I see, you're going to be a sadist today as well?"
"At least now you learned one of my kinks."
"You're going to do this again?"
"Who knows."
"What are you really doing here?"
"If you're dying to know," he dramatically reveals, permitting himself to walk into my room as if he owns the place. Looking up from the map, I turn to him, arm crossed. Waiting silently for him to continue while he inspects my vanity, letting his fingers graze over my hairbrush subtly, as if scared to break it if applying too much force.
"I'm interested in knowing what got our little Precious so angry, that she stormed into a Royal Meeting, breaking the doors on her way in, and injured three Ministers, and one General."
"Cease the pretence of your ignorance, commander. You know well enough why I did it." Pondering on the thought, I don't recall having actually injured any of the members, I simply pushed them out of my way, that's all. Ok, maybe, just maybe, I might have used a bit too much strength than necessary.
Oh, well, I shrug unbothered, at least they got what was waiting for them.
"Please, do enlighten me, Princess."
"You must've seen it through Eagle's Eye, what the Salavars do to the prisoners they hold captive. These people, they may not matter as much to the King compared to a wealthy Clan like Silver Scale, who he immediately helped find refuge when they crossed their borders, but they're still his people. His responsibility. Yet he puts his marriage alliance before them."
"I think you're misunderstanding something here, dear." He mocks with a click of his tongue, balancing his bodyweight on his forearms leaned on the table, and my fingers irk to flatten the wrinkle he causes at the left upper corner of the map. "A King's responsibility isn't towards his people, but his House.
Even if it takes a couple of... unfortunate sacrifices, meaningless bugs like the commoners who strive to overthrow an entire system. The deaths of a thousand innocent lives, or even a marriage between the King and the human Princess. All will eventually be buried in the archives of this House's history. But do you know what will remain standing, a century or two from now on? Us. If the rebels become too much of an eyesore, he will just have to call the other three Originals to help their brother out, although Lucien isn't in the best of moods since his wife's miscarriage -"
"Lucien?"
"Anyhow," he continues with a humming inhale, the melody speaking to me in the depths of my memories, "Everything will be solved in time. People will be born again, replacing the loss of those who're dying now. The rebels will be no more than a phrase in our history books, described as nothing more but a failed rebellion. And that little Princess, that the King will take as his concubine.
Of her will remain nothing more but bones. So, in the end, what is the marriage really for you think?" The question remains unanswered as I try to think from his perspective. Needless to say, I will never live long enough to compare lives to mere numbers on a scale.
"What is it?" I sigh, giving in to my curiosity.
"An alliance. A House that has succeeded in turning the tables that have been immobile for the last thousands of years. For what is it that a country needs to thrive? Power. Land. People. Fear. And the humans will give us all in one, by bringing us their daughter. No Silver Root will be used against us, no other House will stand above us. Isn't that just wonderful?"
He's insane, I'm sure of it. Especially from this angle, when I look at his head looking up the ceiling, eyes closed. As if he can taste the delicacy of his words on the tip of his tongue.
"Is that really all our House stands for? Greed." The overflowing shame taking over me at the thought that all I've worked for, suffered for, all of it... just fro greed to obtain more power.
"If not that, what else is there to stand for?"
"Life." A life in which our kin can co-exist with one another regardless of their Clan, gender, or mana. But that will never happen, will it, at least not in the long suns that I'll be able to witness. Not as long as those at the top of the pyramid wish for it. Yet, when I turn back to him, the validity in my thoughts disappear all at once as I look him assessing me like I've lost my mind.
"Now, that would be a bit boring, don't you think?"
"Why are you here,"I remind him of my displeasure towards his presence again, seeing no point in talking to him any further.
"Another thing I now know you well for, is that there's no way in hell you're going stand by and wait for the King's orders to make plans on your own."
"You don't know me."
He chuckles, before approaching the desk slowly, his movements seeming almost too fluent for my instincts. Too sudden. One moment, he's standing on the other side of the table, inspecting the map of our House, with the red flags indicating which border regions have been invaded. The next I feel his ominous presence closely behind me, his whisper loud and clear in my ear as he bends over, and elopes me in the shadows with him - not once touching me.
"Precious, never heard of the saying 'great minds think alike'?"
"Exactly," I respond as brazen as him, turning around so that my lower back is pressed against the edge of the table. My upper body slightly arching away from him when I realise just how close we are to one another. From the dilating of his pupils, he notices it too, yet none of us make the effort of moving away.
Both of us far too unwilling to be the one retreating.
"It makes me wonder how your narrow mind could catch up with mine." Again, there it is, that shallow laugh. That signature glint of amusement forming an ever-lasting smile on his face. Yet, no matter how many times I hear that deep chuckle, his dimples only rarely make an appearance. Just like they do now.
"Why do you always laugh?" I blurt out before I can stop myself, not giving myself the time to ponder as to why I even care. I watch his amusement die out, until all is left on his lips is a wide smile that looks anything but genuine. The evening gleam of dusk painting a halo around him. The contrast between the light and his shadows an ethereal combination.
"Because my life is a joke."
Ok, not what I expected to hear from someone as authoritarian as him. He manages to surpass me again, when he fires my curiosity back at me.
"How about you Precious, why do you never laugh?"
"Because I have nothing to laugh about." I look profoundly into his eyes, because I've never spoken anything more true about the life that has been mine from the moment I was born. From that point on, I did what I was told to do, and lived in the way I was told to live. The only food I ate was what my mother ordered the cooks to prepare. Even when I was on probation during my punishments, I learned that nodding obediently was always better than speaking up. Because the moment I dared to be opinionated, Father showed me what having a mind of your own brings you as a noble - nothing but suffering.
"Then I suppose we do have something in common."
There they are, his dimples.
I use this chance to take a good look at the man standing in front of me, his obscure aura making those around him feel the oppression of his presence.
"How so?" The soothed lines around the corners of his mouth, that for once since I've met him, is relaxed in a straight line that makes his lips look even more full than normal. His eyebrows frown down at me, and I'm given the same expression as he gave my hair brush the first night he trespassed my chambers. Looking at me, a puzzle he can't figure, and maybe that what has kept me from death until now.
"We both wish to be someplace else..." he starts in a whisper, finally building some space up between us. I look away then, finally understanding what draws him to me.
"Anywhere else."
The fascination he has for me as a foreign object he can't figure out. I thought he saw me as a threat, when really I'm the toy that keeps him entertained until he gets bored of me, like he gets bored of everything else.
"Trust the King, Precious, he knows what he's doing." He says after a while as if trying to comfort me, although it's effect isn't achieved to the slightest. On the contrary, it makes me even more apprehensive for what the future might hold if nothing is done on time. Perhaps that is why I consciously make the mistake of opening up to him about my most worrisome thought that has been roading in my head for the past hours.
"It's not... what he is doing that worries me, but how long it will take him to do something. You know about it, don't you? My family's secret. The Travel Room... hiding under our catacombs." I shut my mouth in a whisper, observing as his eyes go wide and reflect dusk's soft afterglow, mesmerised by their complexity in colour compounds. Maybe that's why I didn't move when his pupils retract, didn't feel the fear I probably should have. As if only now I realise. The true meaning of being powerless to something, or someone.
And after he leaves, that's what leaves me bewildered as I aimlessly stare at the map, my hands clenched in first on both sides.
In this game of cat-and mouse we played until now, I was the mouse. This entire time I thought I was chasing, while it was me who was chased. And now, I'm caught in his grasp, and all I can do is fight for my way out.