Disclaimer: I don't own DP.
Thanks to all for reviewing last time! If you have an account, then you should have received a thank you message from me. :) Some quick replies to anonymous reviewers:
Vguy:*cyber hug* I don't at all think you're a swamp monster! Thanks for your reviews. But it seems like there are several others who don't want to read kid!fics either. So I'm hoping the chapter warnings will help you decide which threads you want to read going forward so you're not disgusted by core content, and so that I don't feel bad for making you feel bad. Does that make sense?
Kikicat:Thanks for the review! To answer your question, any review posted without an account is technically considered a guest or anonymous review. But since you always write in your name "kikicat," I know you and always appreciate your continued support of Deliverance!
ALFREDAWESOME:Thanks for the review. As a writer and editor in real life, I understand people have the right to like and dislike whatever they want. But since the general critique against kidfics is regarding core content instead of style (something I can't constructively improve unless I wanted to scrap the whole idea), and given how polarized reviewers are with requesting more or requesting it to stop, I suggested the use of a chapter warning. People can now better filter what they want to read and what they don't. That way, everyone wins. I hope that clarifies the intention.
To all my other anonymous reviewers:I really appreciate you all. Thank you for the encouragement and your commentary on Deliverance and what these stories mean to you.
Okay, guys. Since I like my drama to stay in fiction, let's keep it in fiction. If people don't like the idea of kid!fics, that's okay (and it's not the opinion but how it's stated that I sometimes found painful, if that helps?). And if you do like kidfics, that's fine too! That's why I've suggested the chapter warnings.
Aftermath Miniseries Summary: In his insanity and lust for Valerie, Dan Phantom rapes her, and she ends up pregnant with his child. She chooses to keep the baby so she can raise it to defeat its father. But when Phantom returns months later as the newly-crowned Ghost King, he takes great interest in his unborn baby as the fulfillment of his desire for an heir to train and rule with. He kidnaps Valerie to the Ghost Zone, where she gives birth to Phantom's son and is forced into the role as the Queen of the Ghost Zone. Valerie and Dan then find themselves in a new kind of battle to gain control over the other, with their baby in the middle of the war.
Aftermath Part 10 Summary:The Ghost King Dan Phantom is at a stalemate with his unwilling Queen, Valerie. But that stalemate lasts only for so long.
Chapter warning: KID FIC KID FIC! Nonexplicit references to rape. Very unhealthy relationships. Suggestive and offensive language. This work not meant to be read by young'ins looking for fluff or model relationships!
Deliverance
Shot 52: Aftermath Part 10
Two years passed.
The Ghost King Dan Phantom did not hold Valerie's previous agreement against her. He never touched her in that time, even though she maintained her respected position as Queen. It seemed Phantom had taken Clockwork's warning to heart—which was that if he did not learn to control himself, Valerie would suffer and die, and their child would rise against him.
Meanwhile, the Crown Prince of the Phantom Dynasty, Jaxon Alexander Gray, had grown terribly strong and curious. He was a handful as a two-year-old. The halls of the castle often echoed with his voice, with an exasperated Dora flying after him.
"My Prince!" she cried out desperately. "Please, slow down!"
"Why?" echoed his mischievous, high-pitched voice. He turned his small body invisible as the hallway opened up into the great feast room, diving behind one of the flowing fabrics of a tapestry.
Dora appeared in the room, huffing and frazzled. She ran a shaky hand down her golden braid, realizing some of her hair had fallen out of place. "Prince Jax," she begged. "Please. You are not even dressed to be outside of your room!"
The toddler's green eyes flashed in a wicked, delighted mischief as he hid behind the ruffles in the tapestry. He watched Dora as she began to search for him, looking in all the wrong places. He bit his small lip to hide a giggle.
"Your mother will not be pleased," Dora moaned as she peered underneath the dining table, narrowing her eyes in hopes of seeing a familiar, little boy. "She will think me a terrible governess, and you an unruly son." Then she bumped her head against the table as she tried to move out from under it, and she winced, her pretty face twisting in pain as she pressed a delicate, green hand against her injury. "Ooh, and your father would have my head if he saw you like this!"
Jax's smile began to fall. He watched all of Dora's patience bleed out as she sat back upon the stone floor in exhaustion, her pretty skirts in rumples around her. An anxiety came over him, in which he realized that he had perhaps taken his game too far. His mother and father both had a wicked temper—he did not want Dora to be punished on his behalf.
For a time, there was silence in the room. And then one of the ripples in the tapestries began to move, and a small boy peeked his head of white hair out guiltily. His green eyes were wide in fear. "Hurt?" he called out softly, voice wavering. "Papa hurt you?"
The crown prince had always been intelligent beyond his years. Although his voice strained with occasionally incorrect pronunciations and syntax, his immature vocal cords often frustrating him, he understood far more language than was natural.
Dora's expression softened as she stared at the boy, whose glow had dampened. Her irritation with him began to disappear, especially as he stood there in his plain white pajamas, looking for all the world as if he were guilty of a high crime. "No, my prince," she lied politely. "It is simply a saying." She winced as she stood up and dusted off her sleeves to hide a nervous cord in her. "But you should know your father is returning tonight, and as his heir, you must wear clothing that befits your station."
The boy looked up at her, green eyes wide. Bright rings suddenly appeared over him, and they swept down his body, leaving him in his human form of blue eyes and dark, curling hair that was messy. "No," he complained. He pulled at his plain silk pajamas. "This fine."
"It is not fine." Dora gently touched the bump on her head once more, her lips turning with pain. "Your father is expecting to see a young prince—not a pauper clinging to the Queen's skirts."
Jax face-faulted. "I am prince."
"Yes, but you certainly don't look it now."
He looked down at himself, not sure he quite understood why he didn't. He huffed again, "This fine. I choose this. As prince."
Dora managed a small smile at the child's opinion, which seemed to reflect Valerie's general distain for ornate royal refinery. "I'm sorry, my prince. But a king's wishes override those of a prince. Your father will be pleased to see you well kempt."
Jax gave her a bit of a miserable expression. "No," he whined. "This comfy. Papa crazy."
"Don't let him hear you say that." The dragon ghost dropped her hand from her head. She kneeled down and opened her arms. "Now, come on, dear. I don't want to fight over this."
The child hesitated for a second, and then he reached out to her, slowly accepting his fate that he would be shoved into itchy clothing on behalf of his father's demands. "No fight," he agreed glumly. "Sorry."
Dora grabbed onto him tightly and pulled him close as she stood back up, her precious cargo in tow. "I know it's hard being royalty," she mourned playfully for him. He nuzzled against her as he always did, offering free love.
Then he reached up to her head, and his fingers grew cold as he passed some of his energy to her, the already healing injury disappearing entirely. "No hurt," he sighed in her ear, his fingers slipping down her golden hair. "Tired of hurt."
Dora's eyes softened as she held the crown prince closer. For most ghosts, sharing healing energy meant a loss of their power and therefore a weakness—but Jax seemed to have an unending supply of both love and power.
The elfin ghost supposed that, in the past, she would have been horrified to serve a human woman and her half-human son. And now, she desired nothing more than to serve them forever. She leaned her head against his. "You are most gracious, my prince."
Comfortable silence wrapped between them for a bit. Then a new thought hit the child. "Where mama?" he asked softly, voice muffled against her.
"The Queen is…busy researching at the moment."
"Wanna see her," he begged.
Dora paused. "…Yes. But only for a short time. She is quite busy, and I know you are just stalling for time before we put you in your tunic."
"Stall," he agreed. "We stall."
Queen Valerie Gray the Ghost Slayer was in one of Dan's private studies. It was a large library of sorts, the walls lined with books detailing the tributes and taxes of the expanding Phantom empire. Upon one wall was an increasing map of the Ghost Zone, linking dimensions together that had been long thought lost.
But that was not her target of interest. Instead, she was rummaging through one of the filing cabinets. She was half-dressed as well in preparation for Dan's arrival from battle, her silk robe tied around her form and her long, ringlet curls pulled back in a simple ponytail. She was 27 now but looked hardly a day over 20, her body lithe and stretch marks from pregnancy faded beneath her clothes.
"Come on," she muttered. Her teal eyes scanned document after document, looking for one in particular.
She'd spent the better half of his campaigns searching. Most of what she'd found were tax agreements and records of tributes to the empire, but every so often came across odd things, like the location of an additional armory. It seemed that Dan must not have trusted her. All of the important records were hidden in strange places she did not think to look.
"Dammit." She slammed the cabinet shut with increasing irritation, running a hand down her hair. "I don't have time for this." If she didn't find it this round, then she would have to wait for Dan's next campaign. And she did not know if it could wait that long.
The document was a survivor's list. She remembered him speaking of human survivors he'd scattered across the Ghost Zone, and she knew that Dan, in his obsessive-compulsive habits, had every citizen of his empire numbered. But she had a sinking suspicion that he knew she was searching for the list, and that he had been changing its location every time he reappeared at the castle. Or perhaps he even carried it on his person—in which case she'd never get it.
Valerie bit her lip. She'd spent two years searching for the last of her own race, scattered across infinite dimensions. It seemed Dan had held his vassals to some vow of silence about the whole thing. "This is the last damn room—it's gotta be here somewhere."
She began to look up, noting the portraits of the past Kings of the Ghost Zone. And then she began peeking behind the pictures one by one. Nothing. Tears of frustration began to burn her eyes.
But there, beneath the final picture frame, was a small document with the seal of Dan Phantom. She blinked for a second, not sure of what she was looking at it.
And then it hit her. "Oh my god."
With shaking fingers, she pulled the folded document from its hiding place. It was a heavy-weight paper with Dan's wax seal as King. She broke the seal and unfolded the paper. Human Servants Under Loan to Vassals, it said in his bold, scripted writing. And beneath it was an extensive list, with a reference to the vassal that each mentioned human worked for.
Valerie's knees grew weak as she read through the list. These were her people, the last of the human race.
And then one particular name stood out in the list.
And she began to cry.
Jax, as a naturally born half-human ghost, had a unique connection with his mother. It was maintained by his cells that had protectively embedded into Valerie's heart and brain when she'd been pregnant with him. Now, if he focused hard, he could feel her energy state.
And it was unsettled.
His grip upon Dora tightened. "Mama," he called out. There was a worry in his tone. "Mama!"
Dora's eyebrows flew as his small fingers suddenly dug into the material of her dress and as he began to squirm. "Hold still, my prince," she said. "What is wrong?"
And then the child pulled away, rings of light shining over him again as he activated his full power. He floated up and then surged forward, fearful. "Mama!"
Dora began to fly after him, picking up on his fear. "What on earth—?"
The child was a streak of white, his tan skin unnaturally pale. As they flew through the halls, stopping at the door of a private study, they began to hear the sound of crying and hitched breaths.
Jax pressed his hand against the door, his body glowing a soft red. And then he phased right through it, quickly followed by a wide-eyed Dora.
"Valerie?" Dora called softly.
The sound of her uneven breaths were coming from the corner of the room. And there the Queen of the Ghost Zone sat on the floor, her back leaning against the King's desk. Her silk sleeping robe was twisted about her long dark legs, her eyes red-rimmed as she stared at a document lying beside her on the rug.
"He lied," Valerie's breaths were hitched. She stared up at Dora and Jax in joy and fear and confusion and anger. "My father's alive. So many are still alive."
On the document of survivors was her father's name, who Dan said had not survived his attack on Amity Park.
Jax did not quite comprehend the concept of his mother having a father, but he began to tear up in response to the pain he felt from her, reaching out to her in a blur. "Mama," he cried.
Valerie embraced him tightly, squeezing her eyes shut as she felt his great warmth and humming power core.
Dora kneeled down beside the Queen, red eyes soft. She gently grabbed onto the document and placed it in a safer location atop the desk. "Damon Gray is your father, yes?"
In that moment, the Queen, who was known as a ghost killer and as a steeled woman, looked like a young and lost child herself. She opened her watery eyes and nodded, her tears streaming down her face. "I thought h-he was dead," she whispered, leaning her head against Jax's and threading her shaking fingers into his curling white hair. Her heart cracked open hard at the thought.
Her father. Her living father.
"Mama," Jax begged, voice wavering. "No cry." He held tightly onto her, digging his small fingers into her silk robe, as if in fear he would be taken away from her. He feared her tears. It meant bad things, mostly to do with his father. "Please no cry."
His small voice seemed to prompt more tears from her. She ran her fingers down the back of his small head, in that moment feeling a cognitive dissonance that she was a mother. All she could think of was her father and the memories she'd suppressed of running into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder—
Dora, reached out with her elfin fingers, gently brushing back Valerie's loose locks to see her eyes. "Oh, my dear," she whispered, voice swelling with pain. She did not have to ask why the King would hide such information from Valerie. She could guess well enough that Dan wanted no competition for Valerie's attention, for the same reasons he'd deported the remainder of the human race. "Where is your father now?"
Her breath hitched. "In the 131st quadrant, enslaved under some ghost n-named Walker." She blinked, and tears slipped down her cheeks. "I d-don't remember who that is."
Jax's small body quivered in her arms as she held him. She realized in that moment she could feel his fear. That she was feeding into it. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly, trying to control herself.
Dora's eyes widened a fraction. "Walker?"
Valerie froze at the sharp tone, and she stared at the ghost in fear. "Is that bad?" she dared to whisper.
Dora pressed her lips together before she said slowly, "He is…a jailor. A very strict one and a close ally of the King, although I believe it is simply out of desire to keep the control he has."
Jax squirmed a bit in her tight grip, and she released him. He pulled back, his own face a bit red from crying. "Please no cry," he begged. Her swirling emotions of pain and fear were nothing he could control for her. He touched her face, which was warm and wet. He tried to wipe away her tears with his small fingers. "Papa not even here!"
Valerie stared down at her son, a guilt overcoming her. She gently grabbed onto his small hand and enclosed it in her own. With her free hand, she touched his face. "It's about someone else." Tears rose again to her eyes. "Someone I have to save."
The boy's head tilted as he sniffled. He carried a question in every line of his body, even as he leaned into his mother's touch. "No hurt?" he whispered to her.
Valerie looked back up to Dora. Her eyes searched hers for a time. "Just…a lot of things to do now." She tried to wipe her face. "And none of it has to do with just sitting here and crying over it."
Dora was no stranger to the Queen's attempts to undo the King's work. "What are you thinking?"
Valerie pulled away entirely, wiping her face of tears. Her heart pounded with a fear and an anger and a longing to see her father alive, knowing that it would be impossible. "What I've been planning for months," she said quietly, "If anyone's still alive, I can't bring them here. Dan would kill him." Her breath hitched as she fought down her emotions.
She twisted her arm a bit and grabbed onto the paper edge hanging off the desk to gaze at it once more. Several names on the list were familiar to her, among them Paulina, Dash, and Kwan. Her people were all enslaved under Dan's reign—and here she was, moping about in a fine castle while they struggled under the burden of hard, manual labors. "I can't let another day go by without doing something."
"But how can you help them without raising the ire of the King?" Dora asked softly. "I do not want him to hurt you, or them."
Valerie pressed her full lips together. Despite the tear tracks down her face and her red-rimmed eyes, there was a dark glint of calculation. "I think I know how. But I'll need your help."
The ghost hesitated for a moment, then said, "What do you require?"
The Queen moved to stand up from the floor, grabbing onto one of the shelves to steady herself, her silk robe swirling about her legs. In that moment, she looked every inch the Red Huntress. "I need his seal," she said, almost in a murmur to herself. "His favorite pen. I'm going to forge some letters. And you—you're going to make sure they get to where they need to be."
Dora's eyes widened as she stood as well, wringing her hands. "Forging the King's signature? My Queen, that is treason by law. If he discovers what you have done—"
"—He will," Valerie interrupted. Her voice was stronger now with determination. "That's the point. And it would be too embarrassing for him to admit to his vassals I forged his letter and defied him, so he'll keep quiet."
"That does not mean he will not punish us," Dora said nervously. She stared down at Jax, who was trailing after his mother now, holding tightly to the silk material of her robe. "Especially if he believes you are inciting revolution against him while he is away. He could legally limit your power at best, or he could have you imprisoned, or—"
Dora knew of the dungeons beneath the castle, where many had been tortured in the past. She did not want to think of Valerie—or herself!—chained down there in squalor.
"—He could try it," Valerie said, "but he knows he'll never get what he wants if he does."
"And what is that?"
"Me."
Dora's jaw dropped, and she floated forward in panic. "What? You cannot mean to sell yourself in exchange for his mercy on your people," she hissed in fear. "I know you desire to protect your kind, but you do not know what he would do with such leverage over you."
Valerie leaned over the desk, grabbing a pen and twirling it expertly between her fingers. "He's been asking me to walk with him on ground patrols. I'll play into his requests to spend time with him, and I'll make him regret it. You can't want someone you can't stand to be around, right?"
Dora wrung her hands as she said, "My Queen, there are too many risks—"
"—I know the risks," Valerie interrupted distractedly, sitting down on the desk chair. She grabbed a piece of blank paper. "He won't kill me, not with Jax between us. And if I'm ever gonna get a real resistance going, I need a base of operations outside his control. I might get him to agree to a separation if it means me tolerating him better when I see him." She wiped her eyes again, and as she did so, felt Jax pull on her robe. "Not now, Jax. This is important."
"But, mama—"
"—Not now," she said. She narrowed her teal eyes at the survivor list, taking in Dan's familiar, bold calligraphy. She'd seen copy after copy of it—the pattern recognition of it now deeply ingrained in her mind.
Jax huffed at her in worry. "I feel him."
She paused. "What?"
"Papa coming," he stressed again. His nose twitched. "Very fast."
Valerie's commander instincts kicked into place. "Then Dora—get Jax dressed. He'll want to see him first."
Dora asked, "But what about—?"
"—Just do it. Please." Valerie put pen to paper and began the first, sweeping stroke—an exact copy of Dan's handwriting. "It doesn't matter whether he finds out now or later." The dark side of her, which enjoyed challenging Dan, began to rear its head.
The servant gave her a worried look. "Very well, my Queen."
And then Dora gently shooed Jax out with her, leaving Valerie by herself in the study. She continued to write the first of many messages:
I have acquired a need for the human slave, Damon Gray. Send him immediately to Frostbite, of the Far Frozen, who is in possession of the Infi-map. Their instructions are to hunt for whatever humans eat on behalf of my Queen, the Ghost Slayer, who does not take well to the average ghost diet. My personal entourage will collect their findings every seventh day at the entrance of the Far Frozen lands. Do not speak of this to anyone, on behalf of the Queen. -DP
She stamped the royal seal onto the letter and gently blew on the ink. She had not spoken to Frostbite since that day of Jax's Naming Celebration, nearly two years ago. But he had been kind and intelligent, not at all fearful of or impressed by Dan. He'd gazed upon her son with such wonder and had afforded her the most respect out of anyone else who had attended.
Surely, this would be a better place for her people. Although she could not free her father, she could give him a lighter sentence through Frostbite—and the arrival of human food at the castle would be a weekly confirmation that her father still lived.
And for a father, a sign that she still lived as well.
If she played her cards well enough, Valerie hoped to even sneak messages to him.
The Ghost King Dan Phantom materialized into the throne room of his castle. His armor was splattered with ectoplasmic blood, his handsome face dirty with the soil of conquered dimensions. He carelessly tossed a broadsword to the floor, and it clanged loudly, as if to proclaim his presence.
At the front of the throne room, the young and well-dressed Jax flinched at the sound. Dora's delicate hand clenched tightly around his.
"My King," she greeted, her face stretched wide with a false smile. "Welcome home from your conquests."
Sharp, red eyes landed upon her passively, then moved to stare at his two-year-old cherub of a child, currently boasting his human form.
Jax met his eyes, apprehensive.
A brilliant smile stretched the King's face as he gazed at his son. "Ah, my heir." He pulled off his helmet, shaking out his hair. It'd grown longer, the weight of it keeping his hair flickering about his shoulders. "And now, the future king of a thousand quadrants."
Jax swallowed hard, his blue eyes wide. "Hi, papa." His voice was a sweet sound, but it was strained.
Dan caught the nervousness in the boy, and his eyes narrowed to slits, though not in anger at Jax himself. "What is this?" he asked suddenly. He looked down at himself as he unlatched the heavy spikes of his shoulder armor. "I sense fear in you."
The small boy inhaled a bit shakily, half-expecting his father to throw a tantrum in the throne room—as he had done in the past. "No fear," he disagreed quickly. He tried to smile.
Jax had memories of simpler times between them, in which his father coddled him in great joy, murmuring soft things to him in his resounding, baritone voice. But he'd seen one too many fights between his mother and father—fights he simply could not stop. It was getting harder to ignore and easier to anticipate.
He knew things he shouldn't.
Dan cast away the last of his sharp battle armor, face In an odd twist. "Do not lie to me, Jax. You are afraid of me. Tell me why."
Jax moved a bit closer to Dora, blue eyes wide. "No fight," he said. His voice cracked as his breath halted. "Please no fight with mama."
The King paused for a moment. "If your mother fights with me," he declared petulantly, "then it is by her own prerogative, over which I have no control." At that time, skeleton servants began to slip into the throne room, bowing silently as they picked up the dirtied armor. "I do hope you show her the same level of hesitance as you do to me. She is the one you should fear, if you are to fear either of us." He stood up tall and the demanded, "Speaking of, where is my Queen?"
Dora's voice was tight as she smiled. "She, ah, stated she had business to attend to. She regrets her inability to greet you at your arrival."
Dan scoffed. "Oh, I'm sure." His lip curled in a strange way, as if he were both irritated and depressed by the response. Then he added under his breath, "Nearly a month of absence, and she cannot even say hello."
He gave a brief, final glance at Jax. The child had grown a bit, and suddenly there was an awful gnawing within him—that his war expeditions were resulting in the increasing distance between himself and his only son. He remembered times in the past when the boy's whole visage lit up in love at the sight of him. Now, he suspicioned Jax's fear and distance was the result of Valerie poisoning the boy against him, night after night.
Dan said distractedly, "This will be the last of my expeditions for a while. I should like to spend time with my son, before I find him a stranger."
"Very good, my King," Dora bowed, mostly to hide her look of fear. "I shall alert your servants of your extended stay."
The King then kneeled down before the boy on the steps, looking up at him in a searching way. Jax's eyes were always a terribly familiar blue—a haunt of the past. In some way, Dan felt as if he were staring at himself. "Now, then," he said. "I have a tribute for you from our newest lands. Would you like to see it?"
The small boy hesitated, and then he nodded, a relief coming over him that his father was in a good mood today.
It was sometime later that Valerie heard Jax's peals of giggles echo through the castle, followed by the amused baritone of one Dan Phantom.
She was still hunched over the desk, her fingers now stained with ink as she worked on her letters to each individual captor of the Amity Park survivors. She had not taken the time to change from her bed clothes and robe, and there was a streak of black ink down one of her temples where she had scratched her head. She huffed as she worked to sign Dan's name once more.
Then the doors to the study slammed down in a burst of power, and in strode Dan and Jax.
The boy sat upon Dan's shoulders, clinging tightly around his neck. "Mama," he called in delight, something about him buzzing a bit in extra energy. "Mama, look!" In his free hand, he waved about a brown bar with teeth marks at the edge. "Choco-ch—"
"—Chocolate," came Dan's smooth voice.
Valerie looked up from the desk, raising a sculpted brow. She stared up at her delighted son first, and at the melted chocolate stains around his mouth, then at Dan, whose hands were clasped tightly around their son to prevent him from falling.
She paused at the sight of Dan. He wore simple black clothing, his handsome face still smudged with a bit of dirt from his battles. The air in the room cooled a bit with his presence.
"…Chocolate?" she said hesitantly, the word almost foreign after years without it.
The powerful ghost looked upon his Queen in a great puzzle. "Yes. It appears sector 1001 of the Ghost Zone contains a chocolate cave. A rather strange thing to find, much like finding you here, at my desk, using my royal seal." His voice turned in curiosity, noting the ink staining her skin and her sleeping robe. "In such a strange state, no less."
Jax gnawed on the chocolate bar in a buzz of energy, his blue eyes wide at his first experience with such concentrated sugar. He bit down on the bar and held it between his teeth as he readjusted his balance on Dan's shoulders, his gooey, chocolate-covered fingers suddenly landing upon Dan's temple and leaving brown fingerprints. He began to bounce a bit in excitement.
Valerie huffed in amusement. Dan did not even react to the assault upon his personal dignity, taking it in stride as if a chocolate handprint upon his face was the most natural thing to happen. "Between the two of us," she told Dan, voice dry, "I think you look stranger."
Dan stepped forward, his hands still clasped tightly about Jax's wiggling legs. "I will not be made the enemy to him," he said, a double-edged meaning in his tone. "If I must parade about with his chocolate spittle, then I will do so."
"Good." She looked down and then dipped the fountain pen in the inkwell once more. "That's one thing we agree on."
"And what, pray tell, has you so enraptured that you just avoided an argument?" His sharp brow angled. "Surely, you would otherwise desire to keep Jax away from my influence."
"Oh, we're having an argument," Valerie said dryly, not looking up. "It's just on paper."
Dan gently grabbed Jax by his torso and swung him up and over, his expression unreadable as the boy giggled. He set him on the ground and patted him forward. "Go offer your mother some of your chocolate," he demanded.
The two-year-old blinked and then nodded, nearly bouncing to Valerie. He held up his slightly melted piece of chocolate with his sticky fingers, the edges of the bar wet with his spit as he waved it in front of her. "Choco-late?"
Valerie stared at her messy son, and with great courage, pulled the chocolate bar from his hands. "…Thanks, Jax."
The boy caught her tone, and his smile faltered. "You no like?"
She set the chocolate bar on the priceless wood of Dan's desk. As she did so, she looked up at Dan and took great pleasure at the twitch of shock upon his face. "As a matter of fact, I do."
The King glared at her and protested, "That is three-thousand years old, and you dare to—"
Jax turned around to Dan and pulled on the loose material of his pants. "—Mama like it," he said happily. "Mama like choco-late."
Over the course of two years, Dan had sought to woo Valerie with various spoils from his expanding empire. So far, her dismal reaction to the chocolate was the best response she'd given him. "Yes," Dan gritted his teeth to hide his irritation. "It appears she does. And destroying priceless property as well."
She flashed a dark smile, her white teeth glimmering in a way that suggested danger. "That's not all I like destroying." She wiped her chocolate fingers on Dan's chair and returned to her task of forging a letter. "I like destroying your lies just as much."
"My lies?" Dan leaned forward, his presence a cool chill beside her. She could hear the huff of his breath as his eyes roved over the text she'd forged in his handwriting, then at the pile of letters bearing his seal. The gears in his head turned as he realized what she was doing. "You little bitch," he murmured to her, almost in appreciative awe. "You've been studying my writing, my actions."
She turned to look at him, eyes hard. "Andyou lied." She struggled to control the emotion in her voice, knowing that Jax was listening attentively, his small body jumping up in an attempt to reach the chocolate bar again. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his eyes begin to glow green, and suddenly he disappeared. Then she saw the chocolate bar rise in the air, only for Jax to reappear, levitating cross-legged as he munched happily. She turned to Dan and hissed in a whisper, "You said my father was dead."
"I told you your people were servants," Dan hissed quietly. "Your father is dead to you."
"Don't try to act cute," Valerie snapped, fire flooding into her eyes. "That's not what I meant, and you know it."
Jax paused from his snack to stare between his parents once more. He began to whine. "Choco-late," he offered to them both, holding out his even more mutilated piece of candy. "No fight. Eat choco-late."
Dan waved him off. "Not now, my son. Your mother is attempting to justify treason and forgery."
Valerie stood up. "And your father is attempting to justify lying and enslavement."
Like this, there were inches between them—the closest they'd been in over two years. Dan huffed, and his cool breath caressed against her face. "You are sending them all to Frostbite?" he murmured to her. "For what reason? Are you planning a revolution with him against me?"
Her teal eyes narrowed. "And what if I were?"
He hesitated, feeling the distant between his own lips and hers. He'd not touched her in two years. "Well. You know what they say. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."
She smelled of sand and exotic flowers. "This is too close," she said, staring up into his eyes.
They held that distance for a moment, attempting to read the other.
Then Dan pulled away. "I do not understand you," he complained. His voice was sharp and halted. "You wanted me to find you here, in the middle of this—or else you would have hidden the evidence."
"No shit," Valerie crossed her arms.
"Why?"
"Because I know you," she said. "You would've killed everyone the moment you found out what I was doing." Her jaw set. "Like this, I can offer something in exchange for the safety of my people."
At that, the King's elfin ears perked. It'd been some time since Valerie had engaged in a deal with him. He did not want to endanger his already slim chances of winning her favor. "…I'm listening?"
Valerie pressed her full lips together, pulling her arms tighter around herself. She looked over at Jax, who had taken to hiding behind a bookshelf in fear of a fight. "I'll…accept your request to walk with you. In the evenings, when you do your patrol of the grounds."
The King said nothing for a time. Instead, he leaned back on the shelves, even as Jax curiously peeked his head out.
Jax's eyes looked back and forth between his parents. "Walk?" he echoed.
Dan stared at her with a bit of shock and suspicion. "How unexpected of you." But he tilted his chin, not desiring to waste such an opportunity. "I will accept this as an equivalent exchange, on one condition."
She raised a brow. "What."
"That you hold your people to the duties you mentioned in your letter." His red eyes were sharp with turmoil. "I will not tolerate a revolution."
And then Valerie agreed to a deal with the King for the first time in two years, nodding her head.
Over the next several days, the human Queen of the Ghost Zone met the King in the throne room, and they walked together in silence over the expanded castle grounds. The outer sector of the white-stone castle flourished with flowers that Jax liked to pick on occasion and hide in strange places for his parents to find. Everyone bowed out of their way, surprised to see the Queen willingly in the King's presence.
Dan wore his finest clothes, bedecked in jewels fit for an emperor. Valerie wore the simplest silk and velvet dresses that Dora had dared to sew for her, remaining plain-faced and refusing to wear her headdress. Dan said nothing of it this time.
"My servants say you are an immaculate ruler in my absence," he said, staring ahead to the green glow of the Zone swirling before them.
Valerie wrapped her arms around herself. She felt uncomfortable. "Are you trying to small-talk me?"
Something in his expression tightened in irritation. "It was a compliment."
"Yeah? Well." Her face flushed in turmoil. "Thank you."
"You're welcome."
They fell again into a silence that stretched for minutes.
"Jax seems to like chocolate," Dan tried again. His voice was strained.
Valerie snorted. "You probably gave him a bad habit. Now it'll be all he wants to eat."
"He still ate his dinner tonight, did he not?"
"Hardly. And only after you promised him more chocolate."
Dan raised his nose a bit. "You made him fearful of me. I will undo your work soon enough through my gifts, and then he will love me more than you."
Valerie's face twisted. "What? No. You can't just give a kid everything they want. Or he'll end up like you. Always taking and demanding things, no matter what."
The King face-faulted. "In what way have I not offered you everything I own, or afforded you deals of great value?"
"You're not doing it because it's the right thing to do," she retorted. She stopped walking. They were in the outer gardens now, away from the guards at the doors and from eavesdroppers.
"I am trying to make peace with the mother of my child." His tone was exasperated. "What more must I do?"
She hissed, "You haven't done shit." She poked him hard in the chest, eyes narrowed. "You hurt your own kind and then throw their stolen belongings at me, like I'm supposed to be thankful. And then you think somehow that's an equivalent exchange for what you did to me."
Dan jerked back, almost in fear of her touch—that he would lose control of himself with it. His face darkened. "What? After all I've done and put up with, this is your response?"
"—Don't you start with me," she snarled.
A twist of hate stormed through him, and he curled his lip in a growl as he stared in disbelief at his Queen. This was not at all how he wanted the walk to go. He'd assumed some measure of awkward silence, but by now, surely Valerie should have softened up to him. "You have already broken one deal without consequence," he snapped. "I will hold you to this one."
"Go ahead," she raised her chin. "At least this deal doesn't make me sick."
The King's fist clenched.
And then suddenly, he disappeared in a sharp inhale of fury.
The next day followed the pattern of their first walk, as did several days after. Valerie maintained her deal of walking with Dan through the castle's grounds, and Dan attempted to speak the words he knew Valerie wanted to hear—to manipulate her emotions into softening for him—to no avail.
As she discovered, it was still just as difficult attempting to ruin Dan's dream of a unified family.
One night, nearly two weeks later, ended with Valerie slamming the door shut to her room, steaming in a frazzle. She paced the floor and fought the temptation to knock a priceless vase to the floor.
On the other side of the hall, Jax was asleep. If she made a noise to wake him up, he'd know something was terribly wrong and would cry or worse. And about the only thing she and Dan agreed on during their walks was that their fighting disturbed Jax, and that it was best kept out of his range of sensory perception.
She ran a shaking hand through her hair, teeming with anger. "That man," she complained to the walls. "That stupid—stupid—"
Suddenly, a dark form phased through the walls. Dan, in all of his kingly splendor, floated in stark contrast to the simple, defiant threads of Valerie's dress. His velvet cloak fanned down behind him as he stalked toward hard, his baritone voice a low snarl. "I would have words with you, woman."
Valerie turned around. Her eyes were fiery. "And these are my private rooms. Get out."
"No. I demand your presence to complain about your—" he waved at her, struggling for words— "insane behavior. I will not leave until I've said my peace."
She scoffed, pressing a hand to her heart. "Oh, my insane behavior? Take a look in the mirror." Her voice tightened. "You say you love me. You don't know what the hell that word means."
"And you are incorrigible," he snarled, his eyes glowing a hot orange. "I have suffered your insults and your inconsistencies. I've allowed you to raise Jax, in large part without me. I've given you full control to reign in my absence, and I've not touched you once of my own volition in two years." His voice strained. "Is that not love?"
Valerie's face twisted, "Oh, don't start with this again. You think you can win me over." She crossed her arms. "Well, you can't. You never will. I can see right through your games, and I'm not playing."
The darkness in the lines of Dan's body began to sharpen as he inhaled. "You are my Queen," he said. There was a terrible finality to his tone. "The mother of my child. Your blood is tied to mine in ways that are irreversible. You are supposed to love me, and I am supposed to shower you with affection and power."
"I never wanted it," she clarified, voice hard. "Any of it."
His eyes were wild. He stalked up to her until they were inches away from each other. He snarled in a low hiss, "I cannot reverse time and deny my child his life, simply for your mental security. I would not, even if I could."
She was trembling in fury. "You leave Jax out of this. It's not his fault that you're fucking bastard." She pushed him back in a rage. "And get out of my face."
He caught his footing, the edges of his vision beginning to bleed red. "You will not speak to me like this," he demanded lowly. His body burned with her heat where she touched him.
"I'll speak however I want to!" she snapped, eyes hard and pained. All attempts to control her emotions were fading out under the pressure of her hatred. "I don't love you. I will never love—!"
"—Shut up," he hissed. "Dammit, shut up. For two weeks, you've bent my ear with your whining, and I cannot take it anymore."
"No!" she cried, her voice a little louder. Something in her broke. After two weeks of suffering him, she couldn't take it either. "You can try whatever the hell you like—I'll never love you. I'll never accept your stupid gifts. I hate you! I hate—!"
Dan lost it, his vision red. He swung his fist. His knuckles crunched solidly against Valerie's face, snapping her neck sideways. Her body jerked backwards and slammed into the wall, and the back of her head hit the stone.
Her legs gave out from under her at the concussive force, the world spinning. She did not even realize it when she collapsed to the ground in a tumble of skirts, just barely missing the sharp edge of a table.
For a time, there was a great silence as she lay there, eyes wide and dazed. He'd clipped her nose with his punch, and blood began to trail down her cheek. Her entire face felt as if it were on fire. Her thoughts were a scramble of pain. Suddenly, Valerie was struggling to remember her own name.
"I am done playing your game," he hissed, his face demonic as he unclasped his cloak. His nerves were lit were fury. "You lead me on with your deals and then provide me disobedience and insult as recompense."
Valerie looked up at him sightlessly, seeing nothing but stars. She bordered on unconsciousness and hardly realized it when Dan kneeled over her, straddling her body with his powerful limbs.
His vengeful, fury-lit face swam above her.
"If you will not be my Queen in toleration of me," he snarled softly, "then I will remind you of your alternative place. Beneath me. Like the bitch you are."
She was gasping for air, his words hardly registering in her ringing ears.
His cold hand grabbed the collar of her dress, and he ripped it down. The material made an awful sound as it tore under his strength, exposing her body to him. In her pained confusion, she did not realize what was happening until it was too late.
She tried to scream, but he grabbed her neck, squeezing the resistance out of her.
On the far side of the hall, Jax slept. He had a small bed of his own now in the place of a cradle, the sheets made of a pure silk that reminded him of his mother's robe. He'd clenched some of the material tight in his sleep, his eyes moving in REM sleep beneath his eyelids.
His dreams were usually pointless or random things—his father's face appearing in a flower, the castle walls turning into vines.
But tonight, he dreamed violent things.
Jax saw his father appear in the great throne room, wearing his spiked armor. But instead of the blood of ghosts, the armor was streaked with a red blood. At Dan's feet was an odd lump that had been covered with a blood-stained sheet. His father did not look at it, nor him, but instead stared ahead as if in a trance. He began to pull off his armor as he always did, silent.
In his dream, Jax floated up to the strange lump on the floor, making out suddenly the outline of limp arms and legs. He dared to pull at the sheet and reveal what was underneath.
It was a dead body. With his mother's face.
Suddenly, Jax's blue eyes snapped open, his tiny lungs gasping for breath. His body was a covered in a cold sweat as he suddenly began to tear up, feeling a strange aura in the air. He sat up in bed shakily. "Mama," he cried. "Mama!"
Unable to separate fact from fiction, he pulled off his covers and fairly stumbled to the floor.
He made it only a few paces outside the room before Dora's hands grabbed him from the air and pulled him tight to her. "No," she said. Her voice was tight with fear. "Jax, no."
He struggled against her, confused and scared. "Mama—want mama!"
Dora did not body, her delicate body a cold steel as she held him. "You are not to see her," she whispered. "Do you understand me?"
"Mama hurt!" he cried, now wildly struggling. He did not understand why Dora would be so against him so suddenly. He needed to see his mother. Something was wrong.
Dora's face was stricken with fear when he looked up at her. "You need to go back to bed, Jax. Please."
"No!" And then he turned himself intangible, swooping out of Dora's arms before she could protest.
Her red eyes widened, and her voice broke, reaching out for him as he quickly disappeared down the hall. "Jax! Please! She cannot see you—it's not a place for you to be!"
The small child sped all the faster, his heart pumping madly. In every fiber of his being, he could feel that something was wrong. Dora was trying to hide something.
Jax came to the shut door of his mother's chambers and stopped for a second, afraid.
Dora appeared, grabbing his hand and near-forcefully pulling him back. "Please, Prince," she begged, eyes watering with tears. "This is not a place for you to be now. You don't need to see this."
He slipped through her grasp again, phasing through the door. His blue eyes were wild as he scanned the room and saw rumpled, black sheets on the bed. A flash of a bare, limp leg.
"No," he said, eyes watering. "No—no—!" He flew past his mother's simple dress, which lay in wrinkled tatters on the floor. He could feel the remnants of his father's cold presence in the room, which was usually so warm with his mother's. His small fingers reached out to her as he floated up to the bed.
His strong mother lay broken in the sheets of her bed, trembling as she stared up at the ceiling, shuddering out one breath at a time. Her beautiful features were distorted by a dark bruise across her face and swollen fingerprints around her neck. Her nose and lip were crusted with dried blood.
And then Jax began to cry harder. His fingers glowed blue, and he pressed them to her cheek. "…Mama?" he whispered. She was breathing. He knew she was not dead. "Mama, up. Up!"
When she did not respond, her eyes only blinking, Jax began to wail. "Mama? Please. Wake up, please!" He nearly hyperventilated as he looked around the room. He could sense the remnants of his father's presence, but he was nowhere to be found. On some level, he understood that his father had done this.
"…Jax?" came a weak, hoarse whisper.
He looked back down at his mother, blue eyes wide.
Valerie winced to turn her head, her matted curls half in her eyes. For that small moment, her teal eyes focused, searching. "Get out," she whispered in a plea. "Go."
Jax's hot tears slipped down his face. "No—no go. Stay here." He sat down upon the bed, activating a barrier around them both. "Protect."
"Go," she begged shakily, tears welling in her eyes. She did not want him to see her in this way.
He blinked, struggling with her order. "But you hurt," he cried. He placed his cooling hand against her bruised face in an attempt to wipe away the damage his father had done.
That did it. Her breath hitched, and then she began to cry silently against his small fingers, closing her eyes. She could not hide this. She knew he would have found out sooner or later. Something in her broke again as she realized the trauma in her son's voice. "I'm s-sorry," she whispered shakily.
Jax pressed his lips together as he cried with her. "No fault," he argued, pained. "You—no fault."
Valerie opened her watery eyes to search his eyes. In the back of her scattered thoughts was an ongoing repetition of, You deserved this. You asked for this. It is your fault. It's your fault, you bitch.
Dora approached Valerie's bedside on the outside of Jax's barrier, eyes wide and horrified. "I could not stop him," she said, voice soft in fear of hurting her Queen more. "Please forgive me."
Valerie whispered to her son, "Go." Her breath hitched. "Please."
The small child's lip quivered as he searched his mother's eyes. She was injured and hurting. But she was alive, unlike his dream.
It began to hit him that perhaps she truly did not want him there.
He turned to Dora, confused and afraid as he dropped his barrier, and she gently pulled him into her arms. "Come on, child. You will see her again soon."
Jax grabbed onto Dora tightly, frozen. He did not want to leave. But then he swallowed hard and nodded. "Promise?"
"Promise." Dora gently turned his head away, a bit fearful that Dan would appear out of nowhere and do something even worse than he already had. "Let's get you back to bed, and then you'll see her tomorrow."
His face screwed up as he began to cry again, afraid to leave her. He nodded once more, confused at his mother's rejection of him.
And then the two of them disappeared for a few minutes, and the Queen closed her eyes as she fought to breathe steadily, caught within her shock.
Her thoughts wavered. Even inhaling and exhaling felt like herculean tasks.
She flinched suddenly, feeling a pain deep within her. A gasp escaped her as she tried to move—suddenly recalling Dan's fingers tightening upon her hip—
Soon enough, Dora returned. "Jax is in bed, although he's not happy about it," she said hesitantly. She shut the door behind her with a soft click. "My dear, I know you won't want to, but can you…sit up? I've already called for the doctors."
Valerie struggled to sit up, only to wince once more at the multiple pulls within her body. She meagerly held the black sheets up to her chest, clutching at them as one would a life line.
Then the light of her bedside table turned on.
Valerie lifted miserable eyes to the ghost. The side of her face that Dan had punched was now dark and swollen, the bruise storming from her eyebrow and down the side of her nose to the edges of her cheekbone. She could not look Dora in the eye, knowing what she would find. Tears squeezed from her eyes again, which made her breath hitch even more.
For a time, neither said anything. Valerie stared off at the edge of the bed, and Dora waited for her to break out of it, fearful to touch her.
Then Valerie doubled in on herself, leaning forward to hide her face in the sheets as she began to sob. The action splayed out her matted locks and exposed her bare back. Numerous red scratches marred her skin all the way down her spine, some of them deep enough to have scabbed with blood. Dora winced, pressing her lips together to stop a cry of her own.
"Oh, my dear," she whispered in shock. She reached out to the woman, some kind of motherly instinct overcoming her. She gently touched Valerie's bare shoulder, but then pulled away in fear when Valerie recoiled.
The human woman burrowed herself further into the sheets, and her breath hitched. "He hurt me," she said shakily, voice muffled. Some kind of self-betrayal overwhelmed her at her memory that she'd eventually stopped struggling beneath Dan, simply in hopes of an end. "I c-couldn't…even breathe…"
Dora felt her dead heart squeeze, and she felt all of her words catch in her throat, unable to provide any sort of comfort.
She looked up at Dora listlessly, pleading for reason and escape. "I thought he'd l-let me go," she said shakily. "A divorce. And then it'd get better." She gently pressed at her throat, which appeared more swollen and bruised in the light. Her thoughts swirled, I pushed too far, what have I done, I deserved it, I asked for it, I ruined everything—
Despite Dora's best efforts, the fire of Valerie the Ghost Slayer sputtered out, leaving but a dazed and catatonic woman behind. None of the doctors could resew Valerie's broken mind back together. She simply laid on the bed in the silks fit for a Queen, staring up at the golden inlays, thinking of Dan staring down in vengeful satisfaction at her as he forced himself upon her.
She began to realize that Dan would never have honor or decency. Now, she did not know if she were still even Queen—or if, in his anger, he'd make good on this threat and rip away her last measures of dignity.
On the far side of the castle, proportionally the farthest room from Valerie's, the Ghost King Dan Phantom paced. He'd cast aside his velvet cape, its heavy weight almost suffocating. His clothes were disheveled, his tunic still unbuttoned down the front. He'd lost his hair tie from running his hand through his hair too many times, red eyes haunted.
He'd been so furious with her. He'd desired her for two years in complete abstinence—and all she'd had to express was her hatred.
He'd lost control, the final threads of his sanity broken.
"Dammit," he said under his breath, eyes wild. He stared down at his hands, thinking of the heat of her skin and the force at which he'd held her down—the daze in her eyes as she stared beyond him, her breath a disjointed shudder.
Now, he felt dirty. He felt the same as he had that night almost three years ago, anxious and irritable and afraid that someone had seen him. He had no desire to show his face to anyone, or brag that he'd finally tamed his Queen.
Dan had remembered Clockwork's warning the instant he began to see the light die in Valerie. He worried that this was it. That he'd truly broken her this time, and that—
—His ghost sense triggered, and suddenly he turned around in surprise to see Jax floating at the door. The child was in his ghost form, wearing his simple, white pajamas. "Jax," the King breathed. His voice was strained and quick. "What are you doing here?"
It was then he caught the red-rimmed look of the child's eyes and the odd hitch in his breath.
And for the first time, Jax's eyes narrowed to slits in hatred, and his breath quickened with an anger that shook his little body. In a blur, he launched at Dan.
Before Dan could react, he suddenly felt great pain from his head,
Jack cried out as he pulled at his father's fire hair, his small hands fisted deep at the roots. Dan snarled in pain, reaching for his son to throw him off. He stumbled backwards in the attempt. His hands grabbed onto the boy's arms, and in a quick, instinctive move, he pulled Jax off of him and threw him to the ground.
The two-year-old slammed onto the stone floor in a flail of limbs.
And then there was a brief silence as Jax struggled to stand, his mind lit with pain despite the quick healing of his bruised elbow.
Dan huffed breathlessly, staring at Jax with wide eyes. "What has possessed you?" he demanded, feeling the top of his head and nearly wincing at the sore places on his scalp.
Jax's voice was strong as he wavered before the great power of his father. "You kill mama," he gasped hard, green eyes wide. "Bad. You bad." He looked pained and ill.
Dan looked just as sick. "You don't talk to me like that," he demanded suddenly. "She is not dead, and you will not attack me again. Or I will punish you."
For the first time, Dan realized he felt fear. A genuine fear against this small child.
Jax's lips pressed together as he floated up to view his father eye-to-eye. "Mad," he whispered tightly. There was something unsteady in him—a long-suffering temper on the precipice of explosion. The look of betrayal. "Very mad."
The father moved to grab him, but Jax went intangible.
And then the child disappeared completely, his signature dematerializing into another sector of the castle, perhaps to keep watch over the movements of Dan's aura from a distance, or to protect Valerie from him.
The father half-expected some sneak attack, only to realize that his son was more devious than that, and likely he was biding time until Dan himself suspected nothing.
He stood in the silence of the room, stricken. "…Shit," he breathed. He held his head, rubbing his head where Jax had pulled his hair. "Shit." His mind's eye replayed the image of his son's body hitting the floor, his son's eyes lighting with the fire of hatred.
Clockwork's warning resounded in his head again and again.
"No," he said. "No, no, no—I was—" He was losing words.
He was losing thoughts.
Except for one.
Dan looked up at the ceiling in desperation. "Clockwork!" he cried out. His voice was ragged, his eyes wild and frantic. "I know you are there! I would speak with you!"
Several seconds passed with no change.
The young King tried again. "Clockwork, I know you have witnessed this night." His eyes burned hard. "It must be reversed. We must erase it."
Still no response.
"Dammit, I just—she made me do it!" he called to the ceiling. "You know what she's been like, defying me at every turn! She deserved a reminder of who was truly in control!"
Then his sense returned, and he added desperately, "But I do not want her to break as she did. And I will not have my son rise against me. Make it stop."
Nothing again.
Dan blinked, and glowing tears began to brighten his eyes as he realized he was utterly alone. "Please," he whispered. "I will offer you a wide expanse of land, the riches of kings. Reverse this night."
But Clockwork never answered.
And Dan began to slowly feel cold, understanding that his future had been written long before he'd even dreamed it. That, despite all of his actions and extravagant attempts to win Valerie's favor, Clockwork's prophecy had likely accounted for those very actions. That he had done nothing to genuinely circumvent the prophecy.
Dan wrapped his arms around himself, feeling paranoid and naked. "You," he whispered to Clockwork, "son of a bitch." He swallowed hard, then gritted his teeth. "You foresaw this. You wanted this to happen, didn't you?"
Valerie's pained breaths echoed in his ears. His eyes burned with the image of the dying of the light in her eyes, his body tense with the feeling of hers going limp beneath him in defeat.
He looked back up at the ceiling, and then he roared in pain and anger, unable to realize that his fury with Clockwork was born from fear.
Fear that he had sealed the fate of himself, Valerie, and Jax—all in one night.
Valerie fell asleep in exhaustion after the doctors left, her body sinking hard into the pillows. She seemed in that moment much younger than she was, her body dwarfed by the expanse of the bed, her curls covering her bruised face. Dora had helped her into a simple nightgown and a warm robe to cover herself. But the entire castle held its breath in the Queen's dazed silence and the disappearance of the King.
Everyone knew what had happened, the rumors confirmed by the whisper of the doctors, who had no medication or salve—ghost or human—to lessen the Queen's pain or the mute, defeated tears that slipped down her ruined face.
Now, Dora stood beside the Queen's bed, pulling a small letter from a pocket in her skirts. It carried the seal of Frostbite, the leader of the Far Frozen. She set it down upon the bedside table and then turned around to keep watch on behalf of her Queen.
She already knew what the letter held, scanning it over in fear that it held bad news instead of good. It'd been addressed to the King, given that Frostbite was ignorant to Valerie's forgery.
All 234 humans are in my possession and accounted for, as seen on the second page, Frostbite had written. We will address the Queen's needs at once. And we will do so in great secrecy, per your request.
On the letter's second page was the list again of surviving humans, this time each name written in the handwriting of the living survivor. It was a cacophony of style, but it served as living confirmation—likely for Valerie's benefit.
One name stuck out to Dora, her heart squeezing in a hope that it would rekindle the Queen's spirit. The writing was of a sharp, thin style, almost reminiscent of the Queen's own hand.
Damon Gray.
A/N: So, just to put this chapter into context, I'm not writing Aftermath to glorify violence, rape, or abusive relationships. I'm not doing it for the shock factor or for purposely corrupting minds. What I'm trying to do is glorify grace and morality in the midst of total oppression—to affirm the very real need for ethics and the rippling consequences of a life without it.
I think Dan is a very messed up person, who is more likely to give into impulses than to control them. When I tried to outline this chapter, it seemed the events therein were the most realistic for his mindset.
All that said, I am very interested to hear your thoughts and requests as the Aftermath thread moves forward. I may write a second installment for it before I move onto a new one-shot or different thread?
Please review with your thoughts, questions, ideas, or constructive criticism. Thank you!
