The mist danced around before displaying a portrait of a woman, kneeling in, what looked to be, a garden. Her hands covered her belly. Moving in closer, I was able to get a better look and noticed a little light glowing in the center of her stomach, pulsing to the rhythm of a heartbeat.
“Do you want to know the truth, Morrigan?”
The image moved again, this time showing a man. He stood tall, looming with a darkness that reminded me of my first arrival at the holy palace. Even though I couldn’t see everything, the anger in his eyes was perfectly readable.
“Ryuk did tell the others about her, but it wasn’t to seek forgiveness. No…”
The mist swirled, showing the woman once more, now sitting on the floor. Her back was against the wall, and her hands held a small baby wrapped in a thin sheet. The child was beautiful. And the smile the woman gave the baby reminded me of the one I grew up seeing onmymother’s face. The baby’s eyes held a faint glow in them, similar to those of the mother. Harley had described the gods to me before—it was why the lord’s eyes would glow when they used their powers. Each of the gods had a circle of light that reflected the color in their irises like a sea of stars.
“Hehadtold them of the child, but it was nevertheirplan to hurt him. Rosina sensed a shift in Ryuk when he first came to see the baby. The way he looked at him…”
I stared at Rosina, who now stood beside Ryuk. She looked at the child lovingly, the way all mothers would, but Ryuk… His lips were twisted in what appeared to be… disgust.
“He sensed something within the child. Something that scared him more than anything else.Death.”
I jumped back when something broke through the mist. It was another figure of Rosina, now holding the baby in her hands as she ran past me into the darkness. The mist began to swirl around me, showing different figures of the woman running—a look of anguish on her face that made my heart hurt for her.
“It frightened him so much that he decided something must be done to stop it. He planned to kill it.”
The mist dropped to the floor, and lying in front of me was the baby. I almost forgot that this was all an illusion, and jumped forward to grab the baby, but halted as little black veins cracked through the grey mist. They crawled up the baby’s neck, and the glow in his eyes began to dim. When the darkness reached his face, the light went out completely.
I wanted to yell, to cry… but I couldn’t make a sound.
“Clearly his plan didn’t work, but he didn’t know that.”
The next scene showed Rosina holding the child, walking through a forest that I thought I recognized. The baby moved again, cooing in her arms.
“In order to keep him safe, she kept the baby in a castle, warded off from Ryuk, so that he could never come for the boy. Trapped the child in a world he could never leave. But she hadn’t planned on losing. And she never made it back to her son.”
The rushing feeling returned, and I suddenly landed back on my feet, surrounded by the garden of daisies once more. I didn’t realize I had been crying until I felt his hand touch my cheek, wiping away the tears that had fallen.
“Y-You’ve… You’ve been here this whole t-time,” I whispered, stumbling through the silent sob that strangled my chest.
Buthiseyes were calm as they gazed into mine, rooted in a sadness he had too many years to learn how to internalize. We stayed there for a coupleof seconds in silence as he continued drying my tears, and I had never felt more selfish in my life.
When he finally spoke, his words were soft and warm. “My name is Tristan. And I’ve been waiting averylong time to meet you, Morrigan.”
Memory
300 YEARS AGO…
The heel of my shoes clinked against the sculpted stone steps of the castle, echoing alongside the beat of my heart.
We had always spent time near my home, but now… Now he wanted me to come to him.
A guard in black armor greeted me, but before he could open the doors himself, they burst apart on their own. In the empty space before me stood a tall, young-looking man, with blonde hair that fell to his shoulders, and a smile that could melt any woman’s heart.
“You’re here!” he yelled out. “Truthfully, I wasn’t quite sure if you were real. Kaiden and a girl? Well, Kaiden and…anyone, actually.” Just as he made to speak again, a hand punched at his arm, and the man winced in pain, but a smile still tugged at his lips.
“I told you to stay in the dining hall.” The hiss came from the only voice I truly cared to hear tonight. Kaiden moved past the blonde stranger and reached his hand out to me, waiting for me to offer my own. “I apologize. I should have warned you what our Saturday dinners consist of.”
“It’s okay,” I answered quietly, giving him my hand and blushing as he brought it to his lips, kissing my knuckles. Beside him, the blonde man seemed to smile even wider as he pranced back into the castle.
Kaiden wrapped my hand around his arm, pulling me in the rest of the way, and leaned down to place his lips against my cheek. “Are you ready to meet them?” he asked.
“I don’t seem to have much of a say in the matter,” I said with a nervous chuckle.
“Don’t worry,” he assured me, giving my hand a quick squeeze. “They’re going to love you.”
