.o~O*O~o.
Cedric
.o~O*O~o.
Tilly's Highlander placed the body gently on the ground in front of Cedric and began walking away backwards.
"What happened?" It was Rolland.
"When the Shadows passed through the village, they got real close to this one house. There were people inside it, and she come out. She had her wand in hand. She thought the shadows were there to hurt them.
One of them engulfed her, but I was close. I yelled to it that it wasn't supposed to hurt anyone but Magnus's men. It seemed angry, it…it screamed at me, but it let her go.
Once the shadow moved on the people from the house, they come out screaming and crying and surround her. I heard them call her Princess Sofia and beg her to wake up.
Only it was too late, she was already dead.
I…I knew I should bring her to you, your Majesty."
Cedric heard the words, but they hardly registered.
All he could do was stare at her.
It hadn't drunk her soul. The highlander hadn't given it time. And so she hadn't turned into the dried out husk the shadows would normally leave.
Sofia looked just like herself.
Sofia looked beautiful.
A lifeless doll, the blush still in her cheeks, her lips still pink as rose buds, her skin peaches and cream.
Cedric tore his eyes from her face to see his family wand clutched in her hand where it lay over the tiny swell of her belly.
They'd only been separated a week.
He hadn't known, hadn't even suspected.
He'd done this for her, to save her. Because he cared nothing for kingdoms and power any longer, but the thought of living without her for even another hour had been intolerable. Because he loved her with a love so all-consuming every breath he took without her felt like breathing death. Because without her he was lost to darkness and hatred and evil.
He'd done this for her.
And in doing so he'd killed her.
"Nothing comes without a price in this world….But one day I'm scared the price will be you."
Cedric heard the long ago words as if they'd floated to him on the wind.
Sofia had been crying in his arms.
She'd told him she was so happy she was scared.
Her mother and father had loved each other like this and she'd believed her father's life had paid the price. She was terrified one day fate would take him from her as it had taken her father from her mother.
But Sofia was so young, how could she know.
Fate never takes the evil.
Cedric didn't know how long he knelt there in front of her body. Time was meaningless without her anyway. But eventually he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Cedric we should take her inside," Rolland again.
Take her inside.
They meant to take her away from him again!
They meant to shut her up in a cold, dark cellar under the castle.
Before shutting her up in a cold, dark box.
Sofia was the light.
She had no place in the dark.
She would wither away in the dark.
Cedric jerked his shoulder away from the hand, his voice rising to a bellow of anguish.
"DON'T TOUCH HER!"
Even without looking he knew the other men had recoiled from him, their fear hastening their movements.
It was then he touched her.
One hand cupping her face, the tips of his fingers tangling into the silk of her hair, as the other caressed the slight swell of her stomach.
He'd killed them both.
His beautiful, brave wife and the baby she carried. The child he hadn't even known existed, his child.
The tears came then. Tracks of them slid down his cheeks, and clung to his chin before dropping onto her face. Wracking sobs followed, shaking his frame even as he shook his head, trying to convince himself she wasn't truly dead.
"Please Sofia, don't leave. I'm here. I came for you. You can't leave me now." Cedric heard someone pleading pathetically only to realize it was himself.
But still she lay there, dead.
When he could bear to look at her no longer he bent down, the hand at her belly, sliding up her side, fingers splaying wide, as the one at her face slid underneath her neck.
His lips touched hers and he felt himself break a little more.
Her lips were still warm.
He heard gasping sobs leave his mouth as he kissed her again and again, trying to take the last of her warmth, the last of her light into his body. Trying to keep this final piece of her forever, even as his mind kept begging her not to go.
Later, Graylock would tell him as he kissed her he'd begun to glow. It had started at his left arm and soon his entire body had given off an eerie light, the aura so bright it was blinding even in the waning light of the afternoon.
And when he was entirely engulfed in this light, it began to bleed to Sofia as well.
All Cedric remembered was kissing her, lost in his grief, trying to memorize the sweetness of her lips, when suddenly they parted on a moan.
He froze, his mouth still touching hers, and it happened again.
Cedric recoiled; sure the last bit of his mind had broken, when he felt her neck shift in his hands.
Pulling her into his lap, cradling her body against his, he called her name.
"Sofia?"
Her eyes were still closed, but her lips began to move.
"Cedric," it was a sigh, the softest sound he'd ever heard, as though his name was a prayer.
They heard it too, and a moment later they were on the other side of her.
Her father, her brother, Graylock and Bartleby, all looking from him to her and back again as her eyelids fluttered.
When they opened, and he saw her beautiful sky blue eyes once more, it sunk in.
Sofia had been dead.
Sofia was alive.
She looked dazed, puzzled as she stared at him and he realized the sun was behind him.
All she must see was a figure in shadow and to her the figure was not the one she expected or wanted.
With his face obscured all she could make out was his hair, which she would deem the wrong length, the wrong color. And his frame, not vastly bigger, but she knew his body, every inch of it, every contour as well as she knew her own. Perhaps better since she knew him not just with her eyes but with her hands and her mouth too.
She would dismiss him as too big, too broad to be the right man and so she turned to her family, gifting them with one of her radiant smiles as she all but ignored him.
"Dad, James, Bartleby. You came!"
"Of course we came sweetheart!" Rolland words were sputtered, tears coursing unashamedly down his cheeks, wonder in his eyes.
Sofia nodded, momentarily contented, before a frown creased her face.
"Where's Cedric?" Her voice was suddenly anxious.
Rolland, James and Bartleby all shared a look between them, before turning back to her.
Cedric saw her anxiety turn to fear.
"Where is he?" Her voice had risen in pitch and she began trying to sit up, to move out of his embrace. "Is he hurt? Is that why you won't tell me?"
James opened his mouth only to close it again without saying anything.
"Oh God! Say something! Is he…is he dead?"
She was up like a shot now all weakness forgotten in her panic. Looking down on her father, brother and uncle and willing them to speak.
"No, he's here Sofia and he's alright." It was Graylock who finally spoke.
Sofia looked at the other sorcerer and he saw her visibly relax.
"Where is he? Can you take me to him?" Sofia was pleading now.
Cedric stood then and backed away slightly so his face would be caught by the light.
"I'm here Sofia." He finally spoke.
She whipped around at the sound of his voice, her face lighting like Wassalia night.
But still she barely looked at him.
As she moved closer, he realized she was trying to see around him, thinking the man she was looking for must be behind him.
When she saw there was no one there she stopped, shock crossing her face. She began to shake her head.
For long moments she just stood there staring at him.
"Who are you?"
Cedric felt his heart, which had only pieced itself back together moments ago, crack a little under her gaze.
They'd told him when he put it on it would change him, but he hadn't understood the changes would be physical as well as internal.
And when it was done, when the thing was bonded to his arm, he'd looked in the mirror for hours, watching as everything familiar melted away.
Cordelia had been behind him. Her arms wrapped around him, her form pressed to his back, giving him the strength to stand the pain, whispering that soon it would be alright.
"This is who you really are," she told him. "Who you would have been if you'd been given the light of day instead of Goodwin's freezing shadow to grow up in. Don't fear it my beautiful brother, this is who you were meant to be."
How often in his life had he dreamt of being strong, of being powerful, of being attractive? How often since he'd fallen in love with her had he looked at Sofia and felt shame at the differences between them.
And now he was all those things he always dreamed of, she looked at him like a stranger. She was trying to make him disappear because all she wanted was her skinny, awkward, ugly husband who she inexplicably loved and somehow thought perfect.
"Sofia it's me." He finally answered her.
He knew it was his voice which caught her.
His form was different but his voice was the same. And she loved his voice.
Moving closer to him she reached out a hand only to pull it back.
She was so near him now he could feel her heat. It made him want to grab her. To press her to him and burry his face in her hair, to kiss every part of her, because she was alive and she was his, and he needed her.
But he was afraid to frighten her.
Her hand came up again, and he watched it as it brushed against his shoulder, the ends of his hair running through her fingers.
Then it moved to his bangs, fingering the dark strands there, before slipping to his cheek.
His eyes met hers then and suddenly he saw recognition in her face.
"It…it is you." Her words were tiny puffs of breath against his face as her other hand came up to cup his cheek.
His face was in her hands now as she closed the distance between them.
Sofia held his gaze, her own still trying to understand what was going on.
"How?"
"I found magic strong enough to defeat Elliot, to bring you back to me. I had to leave some things behind for it, but he's dead, Magnus is dead, your father is king again, and you're alive."
She nodded her head. Her face inching closer to his.
It was like the first time they kissed all over again.
No, that wasn't true. It was like a first kiss, but not theirs. Their first kiss had been explosion of desire. There had been nothing soft or tentative about it.
Sofia had declared her love. She'd broken down his barriers, and their mouths had met as though they were starving for each other, because they had been.
This was nothing like that.
This was full of uncertainty, full of hesitation and unease.
But he wouldn't turn away from it.
When her lips finally pressed against his, he stayed still for agonizing minutes as she explored.
Then he felt it, the moment his mouth opened at her request and she tasted him.
He felt her shocked intake of breath, felt her hands tremble against his cheeks.
She began to press herself against him, as if to try and figure out how their bodies would fit now.
Cedric felt sudden sadness when he realized it wasn't the same. She was so much smaller against him. His body was so much harder now, not seeming to yield and mold itself to her curves at it had before.
He didn't know how long they stayed like that, but eventually it wasn't enough.
He'd been without her so long. She'd died and come back to life in his arms. He'd feared she wouldn't believe he was himself or that she would recoil from him.
He still feared it.
But she was in his arms now and he had no intention of letting her go.
Putting and arm around her back and one under her knees, Cedric lifted Sofia into his arms and began walking up the palace steps, heedless of their audience or what they thought.
But when he would have gone in her arms tightened around him.
"No, please, I can't go back in there. It feels like a prison." Her eyes pleaded with him.
"Where do you want to go?" He asked, his eyes devouring her.
"Our garden."
Cedric didn't jostle her to find a wand, he simply thought of her beautiful little garden.
The place where she'd taken her friends for her tea party, the one he'd had to wear a yellow ribbon for. The garden where she'd taken him for picnics and tea and simple lying about more times during her apprenticeship than he ever remembered being outside the entire rest of his life.
And suddenly they were there.