Warning for imprisonment, dehumanization, graphic descriptions of injury, brief mentions of suicidal ideation and child abuse.
This fic contains a bunch of nonsensical fantasy pseudoscience and anachronisms. Sorry about that! It's a fairy tale, featuring aliens and witches and the power of love; kindly suspend your disbelief.
This is part 1 of 3. Next part will be up tomorrow. Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy!
It's been three days now since Alex left for Lane Manor to deliver the chickenpox treatment the Lanes had ordered; three days for a half-day long journey. Alex was supposed to get there and be back by sundown. It's of course possible that she ran late, and was forced to stay there for the night. But it's been a night, and a day, and another night after, and still Alex hasn't returned.
It's true that sometimes Alex isn't the best with directions, but the letter said the manor was quite large and imposing and impossible to miss. This couldn't be a case of Alex simply getting turned around, Kara is convinced. She's sure there must be something more sinister at play.
If she shuts all the curtains and stuffs her nose and closes her eyes and sits still and concentrates, Kara is usually able to pick up Alex's heartbeat even at great distances. But she can't, now. As hard as she strains, she hears nothing. That may simply be because she's finally found the limits of her ability, but she'd really rather not bet on that theory with her sister's life in the balance. Kara puts on her cloak and her spectacles, and packs light, mostly snacks; nails an 'away on business' sign to the front door of their apothecary shop, and heads out.
Kara knows she could get there in minutes if she flew. She could find her sister, throw her over her shoulder, and be back in time for lunch. But she remembers the promise she'd made her new family, the promise meant to keep all of them safe, the promise her cousin was unable to keep, and then…
She sets out on foot.
Kara follows the directions the Lanes had given in their letter, keeping herself focused on the traces of Alex's scent lingering around trees, rocks, the dirt road. She walks for hours, sniffing the ground every once in a while to make sure she's on the right track, hoping nobody is around to notice.
Finally, an enormous, oddly structured building looms over her, and Kara tracks Alex's scent all the way to its gates. Straining her ears, however, still fails to reveal the sound of her sister's heartbeat. Or any sound at all, for that matter. It's almost as if Lane Manor is encased in a pocket of magical silence.
Perhaps that is the case. For all that Kara knows, the Lanes could very well be a family of witches. But why would they require an apothecary's services, if that were the case?
Her heart in her throat and a cold sweat soaking into the back of her shirt, Kara walks up to the massive wooden doors at the manor's entrance, and knocks three times. Seconds pass with no answer.
"Hello?" Kara calls loudly, knocks five times more. "Danvers Remedies here!"
She waits a full minute before trying again, forgoing the brass knocker to slam her fists against the door instead. Her knuckles are much stronger than soft brass. "Please, open up! Are you there? Alex?"
After two more minutes of fruitless pounding, Kara can feel her anxiety mounting, filling her up like liquid, squeezing out her air. She takes a thin, shaky breath, tenses her arms and back, and crashes straight through the heavy doors, smashing them to bits.
And there, right in front of her, sitting folded up in a tattered old armchair, heart beating strong and steady, is Alex Danvers.
"Alex," Kara breathes in relief, climbing to her feet, brushing splinters off her clothes. "Thank Rao."
Alex only stares at her, unmoving for a moment. Then she tenses up even more than before. "No," she chokes out. "No, no no no no…"
"What? What's wrong?"
"Get out! Get out of here right now, Kara, before—"
"What? I'm not leaving. If these Lanes have been keeping you here against your will, I'll—"
Alex laughs, wild and harsh. "This isn't Lane Manor," she says. "Kara, we're inside Luthor Keep."
Kara freezes, stuck mid-protest. Luthor Keep. The cursed castle of local legend. The place none who has entered in the past decade had been seen or heard from since. The place where a horrible, man-eating beast is said to reside, waiting patiently for the arrival of its next victim.
The ceiling above their heads creaks loudly, the thump of heavy footfalls following.
"It's coming," Alex says grimly. "Kara, listen to me. Don't believe a word it says. It's tried to manipulate me before. It mimics human mannerisms, it claims to want to help, it will try to gain your cooperation. Don't accept any of its offers. No deal with a demon is ever worth the price."
Alex has barely finished her lecture when a dark shape appears from around the corner, slinking into the fireplace's light.
The beast is as tall as a bear, and nearly as wide. It's covered head to toe in thick, shiny black fur; short, sharp tusks jut from its jaws; long, curved claws adorn each leonine foot. It has horns and a tail and big, hairy ears which flop down, relaxed; and it's wearing a long, tattered brown robe. All in all, it isn't the most terrifying creature Kara has ever seen, nor is its body language the most hostile. She thinks she could handle it just fine.
Alex scrambles to place herself in front of Kara, shielding her, grabbing her wrist and squeezing it in reassurance, or warning. Meanwhile, the beast motions with its front paws, and the heavy doors Kara had broken drift up and repair themselves, sealing the entrance neatly.
Kara gently eases Alex off, and steps forward. "Beast!" Kara announces loudly. "I'd like to strike a deal!"
The beast pauses, leaning back on its hind legs, seeming almost surprised. Next to Kara, Alex groans. Then, training its beady, shining eyes on Kara, the beast nods once, and turns its back on her. Kara follows as it leads her to the uneven, chipped stairway at the end of the room.
"Stop!" Alex calls and springs after them. "Kara, no! Come back here right now! This is your worst idea yet!"
The beast turns its paw, curling its fingers, and the floor at its feet shakes and writhes, surging up to meet the ceiling, creating a solid barrier between Alex and the two of them.
The beast leads her into a room, sealing its entrance too. It takes a snuffling breath, scratches at the fur around the neckline of its robe, and says: "You wished to discuss a proposal with me?"
Kara draws herself up, squaring her shoulders. "I want you to let my sister go," she says, clearly and evenly. "And take me in her place."
The beast lets out a short grunt. "Take you in her place? Of course I can't do that. You fool, walking in of your own volition… You've given up that leverage already."
"Please," Kara says, a hint of desperation slipping into her voice. "I'll do anything you ask, just, please, let Alex go."
The beast rubs its furry face with its great paw. "Wonderful, now I've two of them," it mumbles to itself. "And this one already stinking up the place… Wait," it says, raising its head to pin Kara with its unsettling gaze. "You aren't human." It isn't spoken at all like a question.
Kara lifts her chin. She doesn't feel like this creature is in any particular position to cast judgment. "What of it?"
"Then you aren't, truly? I…" The wrinkles in the beast's face shift and deepen, something flashing in its eye; for a moment, Kara sees something unbearably familiar in it. "I'm sorry. I might be able to grant your request. Your captivity in exchange for your sister's. But I think… perhaps I shouldn't."
"You must!" Kara exclaims. "Please, you have to release her! I can't… she's the only reason I'm even alive. And she... she has a future outside of here, a good one, and I… I don't… I just want her to be happy."
The beast closes its eyes for a long moment, a gesture Kara would associate with empathy if that weren't completely ludicrous given the circumstances. "Very well," says the beast. "But know this: you will never leave this place. You will never be with your sister again."
"I understand," Kara says. "I'll accept those terms."
The beast waves its paw and the walls tear themselves apart again, creating a misshapen, bloated entryway between them. "Say your goodbyes now, and quickly. After we start, you might not be able to speak to her."
"After we start?"
The beast nods grimly, shifting on its feet; its shoulders straighten, its fangs flash, the sheer mass of it coming into full relief, and suddenly, for the first time since she's stepped foot inside this cursed place, a shiver of real fear runs down Kara's spine. "After we start," the beast repeats, "the bloodletting process."
Kara stumbles back out of the chamber before her body can react further, angry at herself for this fear, this weakness she absolutely cannot afford to show.
.
Alex grabs her as soon as she sees her, attempting to give her a shake, but managing to move only her clothing.
"Kara! What did you do!" she demands frantically.
"Alex, it's all right, I'm getting you out of here," Kara says. "It's going to be okay."
"What did you promise it?" Alex demands. Kara hesitates. "Kara! What did you bargain away?"
"I promised to stay here," Kara admits. "In your place." She opts not to mention the bloodletting.
It's a good decision; already, Alex looks like she's ready for murder. "No," Alex says definitively, shaking her head. "No."
"Yes," Kara rebuts cleverly.
"If you think I'm going to leave you here with that monster—"
Kara scoffs. "That thing is barely the size of a grizzly cub. What does it have, some teeth and sharp nails, made of calcium and keratin? Even under a red sun it would pose no threat to me."
"Magic, Kara! It has magic."
"Well, I have superpowers."
"I won't let you do this," Alex says, almost menacingly.
Kara smiles a little. Her sister truly is terrifying. "Alex, shut up," she tells her. "Hug me."
Alex looks for a moment like she might refuse, and keep arguing. But Kara knows her sister. Bit by bit, Alex softens, reaching out to enfold Kara in a tight, wholehearted hug.
The beast reappears some minutes later, and Kara eases carefully out of the hug, kisses Alex's cheek, and, doing her best to ignore Alex's increasingly desperate protests, turns to follow the beast to her uncertain fate.
.
The beast leads her to its laboratory, directs her to sit down on the single bed and swabs her arm with alcohol. As soon as it approaches her with a syringe, however, it discovers the hitch in its plan.
"Ah," the beast says unhappily. "Impenetrable skin. You might have mentioned."
Kara shrugs.
The beast turns with a billow of its robe, walking over to a desk at the edge of the room, grinding and chopping and mixing several ingredients over a small flame. It returns to Kara with a small vial, which appears even tinier in its beastly paws.
"Drink this," it directs. "It will imbue your skin with just enough sympathetic magic for me to be able to pierce it. It will also put you to sleep, so there won't be pain."
"I'd rather stay awake," Kara protests.
"I'm afraid that's not a possibility, if you wish to survive the operation with magic under your skin."
Reluctantly, Kara accepts the offered vial, and takes a long whiff. Its scent is surprisingly subtle and fragrant, like a very light tea or fruit-infused water, nothing as potent and foul as a witch's potion is meant to be, or even any of the sleeping solutions Kara's ever concocted herself. She detects apple blossom and char and something refreshing and unfamiliar that must be magic, but no hint of opium or any poison she's familiar with.
Kara sighs. She has no hope of divining the magic's purpose, she knows very little of these things. At this point she's already placed herself completely at the beast's mercy. The only available path is forward. She downs the potion in a single swig.
"You swear you will let Alex go?" she asks the beast intently.
"If I am successful, when you awaken, your sister will be gone."
As Kara's eyelids grow heavy and she feels her consciousness fade, she thinks to ask, "Gone as in 'not here, but alive', right? This isn't one of those word play things?"
The beast carries on with its task preparing for Kara's possible demise, seemingly disinclined to respond, even as Kara's eyes close and her senses numb.
Kara remembers, perhaps in a dream, a deep, strange, regretful voice: "I can only hope."
.
.
.
Kara wakes up in an unfamiliar bed, to a fiercely aching head, the smell of herbs and blood and dust in the air, and some terrible, grating sound coming from the other side of the door. Her arm hurts, too. It's been a long while since the last time she'd been physically hurt.
Opening her eyes sends a shooting pain through her temples. She waits for her vision to clear to take stock of her surroundings. The lab looks much as it did—yesterday? Kara has no way of knowing how long she's been out. The clock on the wall shows the hour 7:15, but longer examination reveals that its hands aren't moving.
The work station where the beast had made Kara the potion is stacked with vials, jars and various chemist's equipment. Another table is equipped with a metalsmith's tools. A large glass cabinet is filled with an assortment of small contraptions. On the wall across from the bed, partially hidden behind a tall armchair, hangs a well crafted painting, depicting a pale, grim-looking family: two adults and two children. The original owners of the castle, presumably.
Kara turns her attention to herself. She flexes her fingers and her toes, bends her knees, tests her x-ray and heat vision and her freeze breath. All functional. Good. No paralysis or long term damage to her powers. She can rarely allow herself to use them, but it's a comfort to know she has all her powers in this strange and hostile place.
Kara's only injury appears to be her arm, which hurts, but not as badly as her head. It's also been cleaned and neatly bandaged.
Carefully, Kara props herself on her elbows and tries to straighten into a sitting position. She's instantly hit with an intense wave of vertigo. Damn. How much blood could the beast have taken?
Getting up on her feet takes two attempts. Once she's up, her head throbs all the harder, and she has to lean one hand against the wall to make sure she remains upright. Rao. Kara's never in her life felt so vulnerable.
Opening the heavy lab door reveals the source of the grating sound that woke her, though if anything solving this particular mystery only makes Kara feel even more off-balance. Balled up just outside the door, a small pool of drool soaking into the knee of its robe, rests the beast, snoring noisily.
"Hey," Kara says loudly. "Hey, wake up."
The beast snores on. It sounds awful up close. Like chalk being used as a saw. Kara is surprised it hadn't woken her sooner.
"Wake up," she calls, stern. No response.
Steeling herself, she extends one foot to poke the beast's leg with the tip of her toe.
"Wuh—? Not the jellybeans!" the beast exclaims, and jumps to its feet, blinking owlishly at Kara.
"All right, I'll leave the jellybeans alone," Kara says dryly.
The beast passes its paw over the side of its head, as if to tuck hair behind an ear. The motion appears to accomplish nothing. "I," it says, and stops. "Hello. Good morning."
Kara stares at it pointedly. She has no intention of making small talk with Luthor Keep's beast.
It seems to recognize her impatience. It clears its throat. It sounds somewhat like a rooster being throttled. "I apologize for the ambush," says the beast. "I didn't wish to intrude, but I needed to make sure I spoke to you as soon as you awoke."
Kara ignores all that. There's only one thing she cares to know that this creature can tell her. "Where's Alex?"
The beast motions to the lab. "Let's… let's sit down, please." Rather than argue and prolong the wait, Kara complies, sitting down on the cot while the beast takes the only armchair. "Your sister is safe," the beast tells her then, "but slightly injured."
"What? You said—"
"Very slightly! Only very slightly," the beast interjects loudly. Its manner appears almost… embarrassed. "She wouldn't leave on her own. I was forced to—encourage her."
"What did you do to her?" Kara demands.
The beast clicks its talons on the edge of the table. "I'll show you," it says, and leaves the room.
A short while later the beast reappears, and hands Kara a small, blackened silver mirror. "Here." It touches its finger to the tarnished mirror's face, and the reflection ripples and shifts.
Kara squints into it, blinking until the image settles. Rather than a likeness of her face, the mirror shows a person, struggling with a beast. Not a person—Alex. They stand in front of the heavy wooden doors at the castle's entrance; they'd been thrown wide open, and snow is drifting inside, catching on Alex's robes and melting on her skin. Alex has each of the beast's thick forearms in a white-knuckled grip; she's scowling fiercely and shoving at it, but it won't budge. Only, the beast isn't barring the entrance, preventing Alex from escaping; rather, it appears to be trying to push her outside.
The struggle continues for some minutes more, until finally the beast grows slack in Alex's hold, and Alex manages to push it back a step. It then shifts to the side, and Alex overbalances, loosening her grip on one of its arms; it immediately takes advantage of this momentary stumble to lift its thick fist in the air and bring it down on the back of Alex's head.
"She was only unconscious," the beast informs Kara quietly. "I checked."
And indeed, in the mirror, the beast bends down to press the rough pad of one monstrous finger to the side of Alex's neck, then holds its palm over her mouth to feel her breath. Satisfied, it straightens, grabbing Alex beneath her armpits and dragging her to the open doors. However, as soon as the beast's elbow pokes outside into the open air, there's a flash of bright light, and the beast drops Alex and stumbles away, jaws open in a silent howl, smoke emanating from its fur.
Kara glances up, and sure enough, even now there's a patch of singed, mottled fur at the beast's elbow.
The beast disappears from the image in the mirror, leaving Alex crumpled on the ground partway out the castle doors. It returns some moments later. With a broom. Kara watches, feeling numb and stupid from the medicated sleep, the stress, the aftereffects of adrenaline, as the beast crouches down and sweeps Alex out into the snow like so much kitchen debris, using an old household broom.
She watches as the beast closes and bolts the door, turning to rest its back against it; watches as Alex wakes up a few minutes later, scrambles to her feet, bangs and shoves and throws herself at the doors; watches as the beast turns its head, growling something inaudible, and as Alex continues until she's bruised and bleeding, until the sun sets and the snow piles up to her shins and deep shivers shake her frame. She watches as the beast calls something through the door, and as Alex bares her teeth, shakes her head, crying tears which freeze on her cheeks. Finally, she stops pounding at the door, resting her cheek against it instead, shoulders slumping, the picture of defeat.
She says something, and Kara curses the mirror for providing no sound, curses herself for never learning to read lips. The image of the beast in the mirror responds, and slowly, slowly, Alex detaches herself from the doors, and picks herself up, and walks away. She stops once to say one last thing over her shoulder, and is gone.
Kara looks up from the mirror to find the beast watching her silently, completely still, a patient predator lying in wait. It looks blurry and distorted, and Kara blinks to clear the tears from her eyes. They leave warm trails down her cheeks. Here in the castle, the frost outside doesn't touch her.
"What did she tell you?" Kara asks the beast. Her voice comes out stuffy and rough.
"She warned me not to hurt you," it says neutrally. "And she promised she'll be back."
"But she can't come back," Kara says desperately. That noble idiot, of course she'd plan to get herself imprisoned again. "Can she?"
"She can't reenter the castle after leaving it once," the beast confirms. "But she can certainly attempt to freeze herself to death out on the front lawn."
"If she comes again, could I speak to her? Like you did, through the door?"
The beast shakes its head. "She won't hear you," it says. "Nothing gets out of the castle without a sacrifice, not even sound. Mine only carries because I am part of this place, but even my voice cannot travel beyond the walls. Your sister could only hear me by pressing her ear to the door, catching the vibrations directly."
Kara looks down at the mirror, where Alex is trudging steadily through the endless snow, one step at a time.
The beast makes a loud snuffling sound; its monstrous version of a sigh, perhaps. "Would you like to keep it?" it asks; Kara looks up at it sharply. "The mirror, I mean. It can show you anything you wish. Anything in this world that is or ever was."
Kara clutches the mirror in her hands. Like everything else in this place, ugly but magical. "Yes," she answers the beast's question.
The beast nods. "I must warn you," it says. "Everything the mirror shows is real, but none of it is possible for you now. Down the road of fruitless yearning only pain awaits."
Again, that feeling of numb, surreal incredulity washes over Kara; a feeling like she could laugh at the absurdity of this situation, the hilarity of an enormous ugly beast delivering grave, melodramatic words of advice, chasing away Kara's family with a straw-headed broom. Instead, she's crying helpless tears, clutching a magic fucking mirror in this magic fucking castle that's to be her prison for the rest of her possibly very short life.
The beast watches her quietly, blinking dumbly for long moments. "I'm sorry," it says at length. "I think you are likely in shock. You've lost so much today, your family and your freedom. Your whole life, really. I know that I'm to blame. I'm sorry."
It's Kara's turn to blink wordlessly, uncomprehending.
"I understand if you don't trust in my sincerity, but I want you to know I won't hurt you. Not intentionally, and likely not at all. More than I already have, I mean." The beast drums its claws against its leg, a shockingly unbeastly gesture. "I think I should probably leave you alone for now. I'll answer your questions tomorrow, if you'd like. You should stay in this room for the night. All right?"
Kara can't think of any kind of response. The tear tracks on her cheeks have started to dry and itch, yet she cannot summon the will to move at all.
"I'm sorry," the beast says again, rising to its feet, its chair groaning. At the door, the beast turns to Kara. "Good night, My Lady." And then the beast... curtsies. Bending its large, inelegant body at the knees, gripping the edge of its robe in its claws.
Kara stares after it even as it leaves the room and shuts the door softly behind it. It thinks she's still in shock, it said. Perhaps she is. She feels unbalanced and vague, and bewildered most of all. The more she learns of this creature and its castle, the less she feels she understands them.
She slumps back on the bed, picking up the mirror and watching Alex's image sharpen her old axe with a whetstone. Does she plan to hack Kara's way out of here? The thought makes her chuckle.
Maybe Kara should be working on an escape attempt of her own. But she can still feel the magic tingling under her skin, pressing down on her from all sides; better wait at least until she's recovered completely, and ideally has a better understanding of the workings of this place.
Instead, she opens the glass cabinet, and examines the pieces of machinery inside. An herb grinder, a simple mechanism that threads needles, what appears to be a small windup automatic broom. Quite impressive craftsmanship for a monster with such unwieldy paws.
She spends an unknown amount of time taking the various devices apart and putting them back together, her respect for the beast's skill growing with each complex, delicate mechanism that's revealed, and falls asleep at the beast's worktable.
.
.
Kara is woken the next morning by a soft knock on the laboratory's door. If she had a human's hearing, the sound likely wouldn't be enough to wake her at all. She takes advantage of this fact to feign sleep and ignore it. If the beast wants her attention, it can work harder for it.
It doesn't seem to be inclined to do that, however. Rubbing the sleep from eyes, Kara uses her x-ray vision to watch the beast lay a small object down on the other side of the door, and leave. Minutes pass, and it doesn't return. Meanwhile, the smell of fresh coffee and syrup and baked goods fills up the entire room.
Carefully, Kara opens the door to reveal a tray piled high with breakfast foods: toasted bread and muffins and sliced fruit and coffee, some sort of bean spread, and a liquid that looked like milk at first glance, but upon sampling proves to be made of nut paste and water instead. Kara opts to leave that one aside, and devours the rest.
It doesn't take her long to begin feeling restless in the small lab; she takes a deep breath, steels herself, and opens the door.
The beast isn't sleeping outside the room, this time. Instead, it's curled up in the very same armchair Kara had found Alex in when she first entered this cursed place.
"Oh! Hello!" the beast says at Kara's approach, scrambling to its feet. "I was hoping to have a short talk with you before you got out and about."
"Out and about," Kara repeats. "Not quite the words I'd use."
The beast makes a breathy sound—its beastly version of a chuckle, perhaps, or a huff of impatience. It gestures to the wide room with a paw. "This is the main foyer," it says. "As you can probably tell. The kitchen is that way, the functioning bathroom is on the second floor, although there are several less functioning ones, if you're interested. The library is on the second floor as well. The laboratory, is, of course, where you've just been sleeping, so I assume you remember where it is?"
"I'm not sure. Remind me?"
"Oh, it's over there, right behind you," the beast says helpfully, pointing. "You're welcome to wander freely, of course, and claim any of the rooms as your own," it continues. "My private chambers are at the east end of the third floor. I keep them sealed, but if they aren't, please don't enter. The castle is large enough I think for both of us. If you're hungry, just go to the kitchens. I will make sure to cook for two. Leftovers will be left in the ice box. I'd appreciate if you cleaned up after yourself, but I suppose I can wash up for you if you'd rather not, I certainly have the time. Just leave the dishes in the sink if you don't mind. If you need to reach me for any reason, whisper your request to the furniture or the walls, they'll make sure I receive the message. The laundry—"
"Hold on," Kara interrupts the lecture; the beast stops mid word, its mouth hanging comically open. To her shock, Kara finds herself struggling to contain a snort. "What do I call you?"
The beast closes its jaws with a clink of teeth. It blinks at Kara for a moment, its monstrous features slack, softened. "Lena," it says, quiet, strangely solemn. "Please, call me Lena."
"Lena," Kara repeats mindlessly, and the thought hits her all at once—obvious, it should have been so obvious, but she'd been scared, and angry, and desperate, and never considered the possibility that— "Were you once a person, Lena?"
Lena laughs a croaky, alien laugh, neither human nor Kryptonian. "I was a woman, once," she says. "Actually, I like to think I am one, still."
"Did you eat those people? In the pictures?"
"Did I eat them? Lex and Mom?" She laughs again. "I wish. But no. I don't eat people, I promise you that. Not animals either, for that matter."
"Huh," says Kara. "If you don't need me here to eat, what do you need me here for?"
Lena frowns at her. "I'm explaining this all out of order, aren't I?" she says, her ears twitching. As humanizing as these past few exchanges have been, Kara is reminded that she's still a beast. "I'm sorry. I'm not used to speaking to people, or out loud, particularly. My name is Lena Luthor. I'm under a curse. This castle as well. My mother, Lillian Luthor, placed this curse on us. Uh. The curse ties me to this building, physically and spiritually. We're connected, and I can't leave. I can control various aspects of this environment, though. Watch."
Lena flick her paw—hand?—and the ceiling tears itself apart, a rectangular object slipping through the gap and landing with a thump on the floor by Lena's clawed feet. She leans over to pick it up. The ceiling seals itself back up with a disconcertingly organic-sounding noise.
"It's a cookbook," Lena says. "That's not very interesting. Do you want it?" she asks Kara.
"I don't think so," Kara says dazedly.
"Do you like books?"
"Some of them." This conversation is getting more and more disorienting by the second. "Have you got any astronomy texts?"
"I do," says Lena, sounding pleased. "That reminds me. Which planet are you from?"
"I don't mind telling you," Kara says, trying to keep her voice calm and even. "But I'd really like to know to what purpose I'm here, why you wanted my blood, and why I cannot leave."
Lena straightens up at that. "Of course," she says hurriedly. "I'm sorry. It's been—a while since anyone was here. And then… then it hadn't gone very well."
"I'd like to know about that too," Kara tells her firmly. "And I'd like you to use less vague terms than 'didn't go very well'."
"You're right. I apologize. The last person who'd come here had died," says Lena. A beat of silence passes between them. A chill runs down Kara's spine. "But that's the wrong order again. To answer your questions: You aren't here for any particular purpose. You're here by unfortunate accident, I assume. I don't really know what brought your sister here, but I promise you it wasn't me. You can't leave because no one who sets foot in this castle can. It's part of my mother's curse. As to her reason for that particular flourish… I don't know. Maybe she didn't want me to be lonely. She always had shown her affection in the most painful and destructive ways."
"And my blood?" Kara presses.
"When I said no one can leave… that's inaccurate. You approached me asking for a bargain, so I assumed you knew this. Leaving is possible, but it requires a suitable sacrifice that will satisfy the echo my mother left in these walls. Your blood—alien blood—is a very good sacrifice. It's thanks to you that your sister was able to escape the curse as whole as she had." Lena glances at her, her ears perking up. "I can show you the room where I splattered your blood on the walls, if you'd like."
"Huh," Kara says again. "Not at the moment, thanks."
"Would you mind, I have a question of my own," Lena says carefully.
"Yeah?"
She hesitates for a brief moment, the long slits of her nostrils flaring with a deep breath. Finally, she asks: "What is your name?"
Kara feels herself tense. "It's Kara," she says slowly, unsure exactly how this admission could put her in any more of a disadvantage, but feeling that it would, nonetheless. "Kara Danvers."
"Kara," the beast murmurs, as if this name is of some awful significance to her, and Kara feels her tension rise. "May I call you Kara?"
"I—yeah?" Kara says, not sure what to think of that question. It should be obvious that she isn't some sort of noble or any such thing that would require the use of a title, she thinks.
But Lena says, "Thank you," ever so softly and slightly breathless, like she's received a precious gift. "Kara."
.
.
Kara spends the next few days quietly exploring, managing somehow to avoid running into Lena altogether. She wonders whether Lena spends one hundred percent of her time locked in her room, to seem so absent in what is essentially a rather large and luxurious prison. And yet, every day there's fresh food in the kitchen, new clothes in the laundry, washed dishes drying on the rack. Lena must simply be rather skilled at avoidance.
Kara isn't quite sure what to think of that. Lena is a strange and slightly unsettling conversationalist, and she might very well be manipulating Kara and keeping her captive for some sinister clandestine purpose. Kara has no reason to take her at her word when she claims to be under a curse, conveniently absolved of any culpability in Kara's imprisonment. She might be lying. She just might be the sort of person who is gifted with the ability to lie so awkwardly that they appear painfully sincere.
And if Kara is lonely, if she misses her sister, if she aches with the need to talk to someone, out loud, a lot—well, she has a magic mirror, and a magic castle to explore, and magic furniture that appear sometimes to move, and otherwise don't mind being spoken to.
Five days into her stay, there's one thing she realizes she can't postpone any longer, though she's been trying to avoid it. But the odor really has become uncomfortable by this point. Kara has no choice; it's time to suck it up, and go take a shower.
On her search for the bathroom, the thought strikes her that perhaps Lena's been avoiding her by her sense of smell alone. Kara chuckles to herself. She had mentioned something about Kara's stench at one point. Kara conjures up an image of Lena, fanged and large and looming, wrinkling her nose daintily and spraying the air with some subtly floral perfume. The idea is surprisingly endearing.
The bathroom, like all the rest of the castle, is huge and garishly decorated and not particularly well maintained. But there's running water, and it isn't below freezing temperature, and those are two things Kara could never say about the bathing situation back home—not since Krypton, at least. There are also clumps of black fur gathered around the drain. Something about that fact is oddly endearing, too.
"Don't think I'll clean up after you, just because you make me breakfast," Kara says to the empty room. "And lunch, and dinner. And dessert, once." She really, really likes Lena's cooking, actually.
Sighing, she scoops up the fur, and throws it in the bin at the corner of the room. She wonders what Lena does with all the waste. If nothing escapes the castle, it must all still be in here. A decade's worth of garbage. Is there a special trash dungeon somewhere around, filled with banana peels and used paper and… other sorts of waste? Does Lena compost?
For that matter, where does the water go? If none comes in and none goes out, there must water filtration and circulation systems in place. Kara closes her eyes and listens carefully. She can hear the used bathwater flowing beneath her feet. She follows the sound to a room filled almost entirely by a large device, connected to several copper pipes. She can hear water churning inside the machine. This might be some sort of sanitation device.
The pipes branching out from it all lead in different directions. One turns downward, likely headed for the kitchen. Another is headed up. Kara decides to follow that one. She hasn't had occasion to explore the upper floors yet.
She traces the pipe all the way to one of the castle's spires; she wonders how Lena managed to get the water pressure strong enough to get it to flow that high. This system is cleverer than she'd assumed.
Sunlight is streaming out of an open doorway. Kara steps inside, and has to stop and stare. This room isn't a room at all; it's a garden.
The floor is covered in soil from end to end, dotted with flowers and bushes and plants. Tall trees cast shade in the corners. There are platforms layered over each other, carrying more earth and vegetation. Hanging from the ceiling are wide metal nets, weaved through with colorful vines. And in the middle of this mess of life and color and beauty, crouching in the soil, is Lena, wearing a bright yellow apron and inexpertly stitched gloves and holding a tiny little trowel.
She looks up. They stare at each other for a moment. "Ah," Lena says finally, in far too dignified a tone for her frankly ridiculous appearance. "Hello."
"What is this place?" Kara asks, her voice laced with wonder despite herself.
"My garden," Lena says simply.
"It's… incredible."
"My greatest achievement," Lena agrees fondly. "It's my sole source of nourishment. If I didn't have this garden, I'd likely die of starvation. Or possibly the curse's magic could sustain me, but then I'd just die of boredom. Probably half my time is spent either cooking or eating or working here. I don't know how I'd entertain myself otherwise. I can't really take up embroidery." She flexes her hands; the sharp points of her claws poke out through the material of her gloves.
Lena's never used such a light and silly tone with her before. Kara is startled into laughter, and Lena smiles at her shyly, exposing rows of white fangs.
Kara really can't help returning the smile. "Well," she says. "Wanna give me the tour?"
Lena's whole body perks up at that. She definitely, definitely does, it appears.
Lena's garden is truly incredible. It has apple and almond trees, tomato and maize plants, rows of beans and lentils and chickpeas, little bushes of mint and basil and coriander, cauliflower and potatoes and watermelon and oats. They spend the rest of the day in the garden, and Kara leaves it with an armful of herbs, nuts and fruit at Lena's insistence.
.
.
Eight days into Kara's imprisonment, she's awoken by a deafening, metallic banging sound. Sticking her finger in one ear, she scrambles to shove her spectacles back on her face. With her senses free and unhampered, the noise is pure torture. Even with the enchanted glasses, it's almost unbearable.
Kara stumbles out of her room in search of the source. She follows the noise to the castle's entrance, where somebody is somehow thrashing the doors with a very heavy and loud object, without damaging them at all.
"Hey!" Kara shouts over the noise. "Stop that!"
There's no response, and the hacking continues. Kara recalls Lena telling her that sound doesn't travel outside the castle. Covering her ears with her hands and leaning her forehead on her bent knees, rocking back and forth slightly, Kara wishes the reverse were true as well.
Finally, the awful banging sound stops, replaced by harsh breathing. The person on the other side must have tired themselves out.
A long moment passes. And then, "Kara!" the person calls.
Kara jumps to her feet. "Alex?!" she exclaims, pressing up against the doors.
"Kara! Are you there?" Alex continues, oblivious. "Can you hear me? Kara!"
"I'm here," Kara says desperately, clinging to the door. "I'm right here, Alex, I hear you."
"I guess not," Alex says. "I'm so sorry, Kara. I can't break this door, no matter how I try. The axe doesn't even leave a scratch."
"It's okay. You'll get me out of here, I know you will." Kara presses an open palm to the door, willing Alex to sense her presence. "I believe in you."
"I'm not giving up on you, Kara. Do you hear me? I'm never giving up on you!" Alex screams.
Kara bangs her hands on the door, clenching them into fists, longing, frustrated tears running down her face. What she would give only for Alex to hear her.
"Kara, don't worry! I'll be back! With a bigger axe!" Alex vows. "Wait for me, do you hear? Don't you dare die. I love you. Wait for me."
"I will," Kara whispers. "I will. I will."
She waits until she hears the soft scuffs of Alex's fading footsteps, then slides down the door, and cries.
.
.
Kara spends the entirety of her ninth day in the castle curled up in bed, watching Alex harvest flowers, sort herbs and brew medicines through the magic mirror Lena had given her.
She wakes up the next morning to half a dozen bouquets of beautiful, fragrant flowers and an overflowing breakfast tray waiting outside her door.
.
.
The next day, Kara wakes early, and scurries quickly to the kitchen, intending to ambush Lena. When she enters, however, she finds Lena already there, chopping and whisking and grating various things.
Kara walks up behind her, peering at her handiwork. "What are you making?" she asks.
Lena jumps. For a big scary monster with such impressive ears, her awareness of her surroundings is abysmal. "Oh," she says faintly. "Hello, Kara." She still says Kara's name as if the syllables have some secret meaning. "I'm making lentil stew, eggplant casserole, garlic roasted squash, carrot cake, sunflower seed bread, and pancakes."
Kara whistles. "And what's for dinner?"
Lena looks distressed, mixing the batter in the bowl she's holding faster. "They are for dinner. Most of them, I mean. Not the pancakes. I always cook in the mornings. If you prefer your food fresh—"
"No, no, Lena, that was a joke," Kara hurriedly cuts in with a chuckle. "Sorry. That was such a long list of food, that's all."
"Oh." Lena puts down the bowl and picks up a plate. "I see."
"Thank you for the food this past week," Kara says sincerely. "I've wanted to tell you this for a while. You're a really good cook."
"That—You really think so?" Lena asks, clutching the plate to her chest. It looks like a tiny saucer in her hands.
Kara nods enthusiastically. "You're amazing. Chemistry is my stock-in-trade, but I'm hopeless in the kitchen. Alex wouldn't let me brew tea for fear I'd burn it."
A short, throaty sound escapes Lena. It takes Kara a second to recognize it as a laugh. "No one's ever complimented my cooking before," Lena says. "Well, not too many have tried it, I suppose. My brother used to—Ah." She cuts herself off, and angles her body away from Kara. The folds of her face deepen in a frown, and her ears droop.
Kara is surprised how much easier reading Lena's body language has become. So, there's a brother. And a painful history there. Kara had guessed as much, assuming the stiff family in the paintings really was Lena's.
Kara has no intention of poking old wounds, though. "Could you show me how you do it?" she asks lightly, as if the conversation had never stalled. "I've never seen anyone cook using nothing but plant matter before. I'd like to learn."
Lena looks surprised. "Sure," she says at length, and gestures to a bowl of legumes covered in water. "See, I've soaked the dried lentils overnight so that they'll cook faster. Now I'm simply sautéing some onions, garlic and carrots, and then I'll add the lentils and spices, cover with boiling water and let it simmer for an hour. After that..."
Kara feels herself lose interest almost immediately, the words washing over her without bothering to process them. Perhaps this isn't the right way to approach this. She waits for what she deems an appropriate lull in the conversation, and interrupts.
"Lena," she says. "You don't have to keep avoiding me, you know."
Lena turns her head, refusing to meet Kara's gaze. "I'd like you to feel as comfortable and secure here as feasible. No one wants to be constantly hounded by their captor."
"I don't want to think of you like that," Kara tells her resolutely. "I don't think of you like that."
Lena keeps her back to Kara, chopping carrots silently for a long moment. Kara lets her.
Finally, she rests her knife. "You're a chemist, you said," Lena says quietly. She glances at Kara over her shoulder, and Kara nods in answer. "I tend to my garden every midday, afternoon, and evening. You could, if you'd like, at any time, uh. Join me. If that's something you want. I'm sure there's a great deal I could learn from you."
Kara feels a slow smile spread across her face. "I'd like that," she says. "Now give me that knife. I may not be a great cook, but I am very talented at tearing things apart."
Lena gives her a long look, then picks up the knife by its blade, presenting it to Kara handle-first.
As Kara takes it, she feels as if something passes between them. Possibly just a bit of static electricity.