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“What is she like?” Julie leans forward.
I stare at them. “You don’t hate me?”
“I want to know how you became king and how she defeated you,” she says.
“But I brought people here.” I condemned them to this non-existence.
“If not you, then someone else. This place exists for a reason…what I’m not sure.” She shakes her head. “But you aren’t the same man or monster that you were then. And you didn’t bring Michael or Joe through.”
No, but I did bring dozens like them. Some might have done something bad, like Joe, but others, like Michael, believed they were bad. I don’t know which one I was.
Something wet rolls down my cheek. I use the back of my hand to dab it, thinking that it is more blood. But my hand comes away wet. I stare at it, not sure what it means.
Julie scrambles up. “Oh my god you’re crying.”
She hugs me from the side, staying clear of my talons.
I am crying. But not because I’m sad.
“I’m relieved.” I wipe away another tear. The weight that had filled my chest is lighter. I have carried the fear of everyone knowing for so long that I can’t even remember what it feels like to breathe without being crushed. “I was scared that I’d be ripped apart if anyone found out.”
“So you grew a shadow and hid. You tried to disappear.” Joe moves closer. He lifts one of my hands, mindful of my talons. “You are letting yourself feel again, and that is a good thing.”
Another tooth falls out and lands on my tongue. I roll it around my mouth before spitting it out. I’m still changing, and I’m not sure I like it. “I don’t like being afraid.”
“No one does.” Julie picks up the tooth. In her hand, it seems too big. It’s pointed and sharp. “But giving in means no longer living.”
“You can’t live if you are hiding. You know that because you watched me and Michael but were unable to join us. If you don’t want to go back to that, you need to find a way forward.” Joe’s fingers smooth over my skin and all I can think about is how nice his fingers would taste.
“I am a monster. I was the worst to become king.”
“How did you become king?” Julie sits next to me. I want to put my arm around her, but if I do, I might stab her.
I close my eyes like it will help me remember, but it doesn’t. “I don’t know. But I do know that I had help.”
“You made a team…like we have made.” Julie bites her lip and looks at Joe. “Does she think we are a threat?”
“Then why not kill us?” Joe asks.
“Why lock us up until there are only two?” Julie is frowning again. I want to see her smiling.
“Because two can’t take over. You need the ruler and then at least two to act as guards.” That I have remembered. “Taking over is cooperative. I think that why I when I found you and Michael, I latched on even though I didn’t remember why. I thought what you were doing was unique. And it was in that you made a home. Monsters also work together to gain power.”
“Which brings us back to why not just kill us?” Joe’s grip on my hand tightens. “Tell us about the queen. What was she like back then?”
“I don’t remember her. I remember fighting and being wounded and then I was made to walk to the spire and climb.” The memory of failing feels fresh and fills me with the worry that I will fail again. I don’t know what I’ll do if Joe and Julie make it and leave me behind.
Fall and be eaten is the only option I can face. Because scraping out an existence, waiting for another chance isn’t something I can even contemplate. But then I probably thought the same last time.
“And those two guards? Were they here when you were?”
I shrug. “Maybe. Maybe they have changed so much that they are unrecognizable. I don’t even know what I looked like back then.” Will the queen recognize me? But it wasn’t me that the queen was interested in, it was Julie.
“Do you remember the castle? Where things are?” There’s a gleam in her eyes that I have seen before, and I know she is making a plan.
“I think so.” I’m remembering more by being here. “Why?”
“Because I don’t think we should wait for an invitation.”
