1434 words.
Written for The Walls Have Eyes Competition at Diagon Alley II.
Chosen portrait - Morgan Le Fay (Morgana)
Disclaimer: I borrowed the Mad King from A Song of Ice and Fire and The Fury from The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas. Morgana and Merlin belong to themselves. Everything else you recognise is probably JKR's. I wish I was making money off this, because I could do with some, but alas, I'm not. I'm just having fun. At work. Please don't tell my boss.
Drowning In Watercolour
I was promised eternity, once. The grimoire of my mother, from centuries ago, pointed to the Avalon, peaceful and calm. I almost had it, too. Almost. Together, with my sister, we understood the writing, deciphered the code, gathered the ingredients. We were stood in the right place, under the right waning moon, ready.
He never did want me to be happy. Every time I was close, he squandered it. He tore all the light from my life and wondered why I stood amongst his enemies. He made me into what I became. Eternity never was mine, not really. My flesh stopped feeling a long time ago. My heart stopped sending blood coursing through my veins. My raven hair dried on my scalp and shed. My ruby lips cracked and bruised and rotted. Worms crawl where my eyes once were.
All that is left of me is a facsimile. My hair was longer when I was living. My eyes brighter. The artist left a mere impression, and it's not a very good one. It always strikes me as odd how aware I am that my thoughts are a mere shadow of those I had when waking. It's like the pallor of watercolour paints has paled out not just the green of my eye but my mind, and all that was once inside it. I used to think in bright technicolour, but now I am left with only pastel shades.
\_/\_/\_/
When I was first hung, Transfiguration was taught in the classroom behind the oak door to my right. Charms was down the corridor, just around that corner guarded by the Broken Knight. Slowly, they forgot about the corridor. They forgot about the portraits and sculptures. They forgot about me. Merlin himself used to hang in the centre, over there, where the stonework shows in a pale square. They moved him into the Great Hall, as he was Great, too.
I, too, was Great. They do not want to remember.
It is the fate of the losers, is it not, to be portrayed as the evil ones. Those considered evil are, over time, turned into jokes, stories, and memories of them fade and warp into falsities while the heroes, the winners, are preserved, remembered and revered.
I think, at least, that is why I am here. With the Broken Knight, and the Mad King, and the Nameless Few.
They are only the Nameless Few because the Nameless Many do not have portraits.
Sometimes, I envy them.
\_/\_/\_/
I can hear them, you know. The children. The teachers. A corridor still used is only feet away from where I hang. I think the wall has grown over the old opening like forest vines across a forgotten trail. If they looked closely enough, they would see, but people never do.
A long time ago, they talked of a muggle man. The Fury. Hitler. When I first heard it, muffled by the echo of the great walls and chambers, I thought the child said "hit learn". It was only as I knew more that I understood that misinterpretation was not all that far from the truth, with his book-burning and controlled, biased education systems. Learning did take a hit under his rule.
Before him was when I began to learn many new words. Electricity and lightbulb and telephone. Gramophone and machine gun and telegram. The children born on the outside brought these words in and shared their knowledge with those who would listen. Many wouldn't.
Before Hitler, the children born on the inside talked of Dumbledore and Grindelwald. At first, the two were always named together. They used 'and' and 'with'. It seemed to suddenly change to 'against' one day. I remember the boys, out of breath and excited, pretending they were Dumbledore and Grindelwald, play fighting in the corridors, showing off to their sweethearts. Suddenly, Dumbledore was good, and Grindelwald was bad, and the fact that both were nearly the other, that they toed the fine line for so long, was long forgotten in the blink of an eye.
When I drew the comparisons between them and me, I longed to walk on two legs again, and speak with a real voice. I wanted to be a part of history as it was being made once more. I wanted to see and feel, experience, in three dimensions. Instead, I was left flat and empty, breathless and tired.
After Hitler, I learned nuclear bomb. It seemed many people were scared of nuclear bombs, so I decided they mustn't be good things. The teachers said they were silly to be afraid, but the children didn't know why it was silly, so the fear remained.
After Hitler, I also learned the name Voldemort. He'd been a boy called Tom. He was one of the very few students who ventured down my corridor, looking at us all, but not speaking. I didn't know how clever he was until I learned how many people were afraid of him. He sparked such discussion for such a long time. The half-stories I heard and half-facts made of opinions made me curious. I longed to ask someone to explain, to tell me more. Was he as bad as they said? Or was he like me? Feared because he thought fear and respect could be akin to love? Feared because he thought fear and respect were the same thing?
Even in the years he was gone, he was still talked about. It showed his power, I think, that he was not forgotten. He did not stay gone. Maybe it was people's memories - people's inability to stop talking about him - that brought him back. Maybe he thrived on belief.
I felt like I should help the world defeat this enemy. I felt like I ought to stand up and share what I knew about villains and heroes, evil and good, and help someone. I didn't know how. I was too old. I was too tired. I had seen too many wars. I began to wonder, then, what they could do for me if they remembered I existed. Could they show mercy, and end my existence? I couldn't bring it about myself. I wondered if I should find a painting in the castle that risked getting caught in rain through open windows. I wondered if it was possible to drown in watercolour when the watercolour was you.
When the boy came here and the man came back, the school was never silent except down this little corridor. A young girl with bright blonde hair and radishes hanging from her ears found us, but she did not seem surprised. She waved a hello and carried on around the corner, to the end where the walls meet on all sides, and back again. She even came back once or twice.
She asked me, once, how I would defend a castle, taking my loneliness and her recognition of me for granted. I was startled. I didn't know when I had last spoke to anyone. I told her it didn't take much thinking when the castle was full of Knights.
"Yes, I thought the same thing," she told me, before wishing me a farewell and leaving. I wondered if it was even possible for me to fare badly.
\_/\_/\_/
When the war came to the castle, I learned I could fare badly. No corner of the castle was left unscathed. When my canvas was set alight, I barely escaped with the vestige of me I had. All that was left of me, paper and ink, so easily gone. I hid in a landscape painting, harsh cliffs and stormy seas, a sun just peaking through the edge of the clouds.
I had been so desperate to leave, to know nothing more. I was sick of knowing things. I knew too much and I'd seen too much. I had been ready to run straight at death with open arms, smiling. I was already dead, anyway, so what did it matter? But when I was faced with it, I realised I'd convinced myself it would be better. I realised I didn't want it. I wasn't drowning in the soft lines of the paint. I was breathing because of it.
They found me there in the storm-wracked scene, shivering, a few days later. They promised an artist would paint me an Avalon to call my home, if I wished, or a Camelot for me to rule, like I wanted in life. I asked for Avalon, if they would be so kind.
It's been a few months since then, and I think it'll be ready any day now.