Sorry, this chapter took a long time. I believe the next chapters will take even longer: they are more annoying to write, but I will try. School is getting busy as well, life is tiring. I know these are all excuses, but I really am trying. This chapter nearly killed me while writing it, my brain is currently completely useless. But still, please enjoy!
X
Sometime during the insanity clashing in her mind that night, Clarisse fell asleep. When she woke the next morning, she was buried under her tangled blankets, and Chris and his pendant was gone.
She dressed quickly, throwing on the simplest dress she could find and a pair of flats, and hurried out her room.
Dawn had only just broken out over the horizon: the air was still chilled, the halls were still empty. Only a few servants had risen to begin tending to the hearths and tugging the curtains open. They bowed as Clarisse rushed past, but she barely acknowledged them, searching for that corridor she had stumbled across on accident nearly a month ago.
She realized too late that the corridors look mostly the same, and was starting to get lost when she spotted two guards slumped against the wall next to another branch of hallways.
There it is.
When the two guards saw her, they straightened hastily, but Clarisse gave them no time to react in any way as one hand shot out, pressing hard against the pressure point on one guards neck, before she pivoted, elbow slamming into the back of the second guard's head and knocking him out cold. She didn't hesitate to run down the halls as quietly as she could, wondering which one was the chamber of the Crown Prince.
And then she remembered: sun shining directly into his room during the mornings, the young moonlight washing the walls silver… His room faces dawn.
After a few more turns, she found it. It was the first time she entered his room through the front door, and honestly, she didn't find it as exciting as barging in through the window.
It didn't shock her enough to find that Chris wasn't asleep either.
He was sitting at his desk, wearing casual clothes, peacefully reading a book until she had stormed in. He looked up with a startled gaze, and it turned a little confused when he saw that it was her.
"Clarisse?" he sounded so puzzled that Clarisse wanted to knock his head- "Is something wrong? What's happening?"
"I'm going to kill you," Clarisse announced, slamming the door shut behind her. "What is wrong with you?"
There was a long stretch of confused silence while Chris continued to stare at her, baffled, and she waited for his response.
"What happened?" the Crown Prince finally spoke, except it wasn't the answer she was looking for.
"Don't you remember?" Gods of Olympus, if he actually forgot-!
"No. I'm sorry, Clarisse, but whatever I did last night-" He knew, but he didn't know. Yes, he better look ashamed!
"You," Clarisse stalked up to him, cornering him against the wall when he tried to step back, "You are utterly, completely MAD!"
Silence met her statement, and she allowed her anger and frustration to leak off of her as she waited for a response that Chris was so reluctant to give. He was wearing that damned pendent around his neck again, the chain somehow fixed, and the colours swirled and changed rapidly as an uncomfortable expression flitted across his face.
"Yes." And then he visibly deflated, shoulders slumping and head bowing. "Yes, you're right."
Clarisse felt her anger begin to ebb away. "At night," she added softly. "It only comes at night."
"I don't remember anything the next morning," Chris murmured. "But when I woke up in your room, on your bed, I panicked, and… and I don't remember anything," he repeated. "The voices only come out at night, and they lock me in a place where I can't see, hear, or feel anything. So tell me, Clarisse," a begging tone began to crawl into his voice, "What happened last night?"
"Nothing of high importance," she answered curtly.
"It can't be not important if you sneaked into the royal quarters just to talk to me," the Prince pointed out.
So Clarisse inhaled deeply and slowly through her nose before demanding to know, "Why don't the King and Queen try to cure it?"
"It's not like they haven't tried," Chris answered. "They hired doctors and physicians from all over the continent and even some outside of that, but no one seemed to know what to do about it. So-called sorcerers and witches proved to be no use either. They've given up."
"That's a ridiculous thing to say," the former assassin declared. "When did the… insane stuff start?"
Chris thought for a moment, unconsciously fiddling with the pendant. "When I was around ten. We travelled to the neighbouring kingdom for some business and I was exploring the forest when suddenly… I can't remember. Everything was dark, and when I woke up, it's just like this."
"Well then, you're not born with it. If you got it somehow, you should be able to get rid of it as well!"
But the Crown Prince shook his head sadly. "It doesn't work that way, Clarisse."
"Of course it does!" Her temper was flaring again. "How dare your parents give up so easily when you're the one who is suffering?!" How dare the royal family waste all the resources they had when Clarisse was working herself to death just to pay one physician to come to their insignificant town to give her mother one bottle of medicine to save her a little longer?! "I know what is happening to you: you can't let this go on any further!"
"Does it look like I have a choice?" Chris didn't raise his voice like Clarisse did, but there was obvious annoyance in his tone. "I didn't ask for this!"
"No one asked for anything!" Clarisse was shrieking. "No one asks, because they can't! This gods-damned kingdom is rotting from the inside out and it's not just you who doesn't have a choice! No one has any choices anymore because people are simply trying to survive!"
When Chris gets angry, a dark blush crawls up his neck and infiltrates his cheeks and ears. As if sensing his emotions, the colourful mist in the pendant around his neck began to swirl faster, until it was a tornado of white and red and green and blue, its twisting form warping and arching like a beast in agony. "Don't bring the economy into this!"
"And you're ashamed!" Because he so obviously was! "You're ashamed, and whose fault is that?"
"I'm not-" he tried to protest.
"The King and Queen! Your parents drained the kingdom dry and they don't know what to do about it because they can't! The people consider you as their only hope, Chris! They think that you can bring them out of this dark age and save the kingdom, but you can't! Why? Because your parents aren't even bothering to save you from this!"
She moved without realizing that she had moved, but that was because her mind was clouded and distracted by ire. The pendant was hot to the touch, the colours inside dizzying and so distractingly annoying and the chain snapped as easily as the last time she had broken it. Chris wasn't even given the chance to react before Clarisse raised her hand high above her head, and with a dramatic whip of her arm, the glass of the pendant shattered the way glass does, its golden frame denting in connection with the stone floor, the mist and colours and mysteries vanished in the air.
Chris gave a cry of what could only be described as pure anguish and he fell to his knees, snatching up the snapped golden chain with the broken charm because it was something important to him. "How dare you?!" he cried, eyes blown wide and horrified.
"How dare you?!" Clarisse crowed, a strange triumph clawing at her chest. "That's why I hate people like you! You have power, you have money, and you don't even appreciate it in the very least!"
"And how can you appreciate something you've never actually had?" Chris shot back, almost snarling. He was clutching the pendant's gold remains to his chest. For some reasons, his dark hair seemed to have grown longer. Had it always brushed the tips of his eyes like this? "You kill for a living: the money you make is artificial – worthless!"
"I kill," Clarisse interrupted shrilly, "Because I have no choice! You've never had to work for your money, you inherit it! A spoiled brat like you-"
"Becoming king is not as simple as you think it is!" Now Chris was shouting, and he had gotten back on his feet, brandishing the gold in his hand like it was a weapon. He looked different somehow, strange, like something was missing, or something had appeared, but Clarisse just couldn't figure out what.
"Then enlighten me, please," Clarisse sneered. "I'm a little peasant who doesn't know anything, having never gone to school because your failed government system doesn't offer that kind of service to the people it's supposed to help!"
Something was definitely wrong now. It would've felt comical if it hadn't suddenly become so painstakingly obvious.
One thing Clarisse noticed was that Chris would look horrible if he ever decide to grow a beard.
But then she realized that those fine, dark lines spreading from his temple was not actually hair, but something that resembled a spider web, crisscrossing and forming an unique, elegant pattern; the lines had spread quickly at first, but it soon slowed down. Clarisse had been so enraptured by it that she hadn't realized Chris was ranting until he suddenly stopped.
Silence drew Clarisse back to the physical world and she was confused about the sudden emptiness in the room before she noticed how black the Crown Prince's eyes looked. Those black eyes stared at her, but didn't actually see her, and it was so dark and endless that Clarisse found herself stepping away because it felt dangerous.
But what really snapped Clarisse back to herself was when those soulless black eyes rolled back, and Chris collapsed onto the stone floor, unconscious. She rushed forward immediately, dropping to one knee and frantically checking for his pulse. His hands were ice cold, as was the rest of his body, and his tanned skin had been drained unnaturally pale.
He looked dead.
But – ah! There is was! His pulse was near nonexistent, but it was there, and he breathed, though weakly and scarcely, something that scared Clarisse more than it should have. She watched as poison leaked from his tortured mind into his veins, slowly but surely spreading to the rest of his body. Judging by the lethargic process it was making, she estimated that it might take one week, more or less, for it to fill him completely. But catching a glimpse of gold clutched in his hand, Clarisse realized that everything had been its fault. The source of Chris's insanity must've come from there. Except now, it was her fault. Chris wasn't insane anymore, but he was dying, and it was Clarisse's fault.
For the first time in her life, the assassin felt guilt twisting inside her, and she didn't even know where it erupted from. Maybe it was the fact that she hadn't actually meant to kill him, or maybe it was because she realized that she couldn't. She would kill herself before she allowed herself to kill him.
Clarisse felt disoriented, she didn't know what to do. She didn't realize what she was doing until she blinked, and realized that she was standing in front of her room, her hand already on the knob. When had she gotten here? Her mind was a mess, her thoughts in chaos. Her body moved on its own accord, and she found herself wearing a tunic and pants originally used for horse riding but she had never actually used. Flexible leather boots were pulled up to her knees, and she discovered weapons everywhere: around her hips, her waist, in her shoes, in her sleeves, in her braided hair and everything she had used before, guarding her. When they find Chris, and discover that she had disappeared, they might very possibly think that she had tried to poison him. The guards had seen her face: they'd be able to testify.
If she left the castle, she might never be able to return. Chris was going to die, Clarisse would be found out, and she is leaving right now.
The castle was just beginning to wake up now, but she didn't care. It had been so long since she had moved like this, feel her muscles straining and the wind on her face as she ran. She ran and fled until the road was nothing but a small path worn into the rock, the castle was several toothpicks reaching for the sky, and her legs couldn't take it anymore and her lungs strained.
When she didn't feel as completely exhausted and overwhelmed, Clarisse began to walk. She didn't know how long she walked, but when green appeared, the first glimpse of a rare forest, the sun was falling and Clarisse was starving and dehydrated.
Green was a rare colour to see in their kingdom. The abundant forests surrounding them marked the territory of another ruler, and though there weren't many guards situated around the borders, no one dared or bothered to cross. People from other places were happy where they were. People from Clarisse's home did not have the strength or necessities to survive the journey.
Something felt different the moment the moment she stepped into the forest. The air was suddenly cooler, cleaner, moister, and the dying sunlight was filtered to be pleasant and soothing instead of scorching. It felt like something was suddenly eased from her shoulders – she had never felt so relaxed before.
Her feet ached, and Clarisse slumped against a tree, its bark scratchy but alive, and when she sat onto the ground, she found the grass impossibly soft, not coarse or rough at all, and there were flowers. Real flowers, with roots and soft, velvety petals, unlike the sprayed-wet, soggy blossoms that often flimsily decorated the houses that could afford them. She felt like she had entered a dream, except she was so, so tired and her mind was calling at her to stay awake but her body resisted.
Her thoughts wandered to the land she had abandoned behind her, then to Chris, and another pang of guilt flashed through her.
But she was too tired now to worry. Tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow, she would wake up, and she would figure out what to do. Just… not today. The world was too dark, and comfortable, and warm, and her eyes slid shut. Tomorrow would be good.
And with the darkness came the spirits.
They weren't really spirits, but little forest creatures who came out in the night. They were strangely made, shapeless, their heads like small, white potatoes with crude black holes for eyes and a mouth; they made no sounds as they walked, popping out on branches of trees, a dim glow around them that lit the forest up with little fairy lights. Their heads tilted at random timings, and there were a strange series of clicking sounds when the heads snapped back in place. It was a strange sight to see, but stranger to them was the intruder upon their forest, and the Spirit Fae crowded around the newcomer to get a peek of her. Despite the tiny racket they made around her with their excited clicking, she did not wake, and continued to slumber on like a sleeping beauty who had sleepwalked out of her castle.
And in some aspects, she really was.
