64 | ACT IV, SCENE III

P R E V I O U S L Y

"I'm sorry," a tear spilled down her cheek as I buried her head in my neck, the salty moisture soaking my shirt, knowing that I would never, ever let her go.

HARTINGTON CASTLE, ALNWICK, STORMHOLT.

EDWINA

I WOKE UP AT MIDDAY, to the soft sunlight filtering in through the heavy curtains.

Beside me, the bed was empty, yet the rumpled sheets and the dent in the pillow showed me that it had been slept in.

It had been real.

Yesterday had been real.

A mournful sigh escaped my lips as I thought again about the dead babies. How could one be so cruel as to kill such innocents? That too my sister's children? She was a sweet, sweet girl - what problem would a person ever have with her?

The misery slept in me like a living monster as I soaked in a bath of steaming hot water, considering the consequences of stepping out of the room. On probation, and as an accused murderer and a woman who was cheating on her husband...

...a Queen. Was I even one now? How could Amphitrite even have considered I had done this? After all that trust, all that love I gave, she returned it with this.

Stripped of my privileges, bound to the castle, watched every minute until the day they would bring me to Trial and break me with cross questioning.

A prisoner made to wait until Judgement Day.

I tried to work it out, I really did - tried to work out why the universe would do this to me. Perhaps I was the result of just some huge, cosmic joke.

I could even hear the stars silently mocking me.

I sighed deeply, straining my ears to hear. Everything was dead silent. No sounds drifted from downstairs, barring the tinkle of crockery and a bout of hushed conversation. None of the early hustle or bustle of the morning. I knew the Valmonts - with the exception of the terrible Apollo - had taken the deaths deeply to heart, seeing that Amphitrite was Tristan and Llewellyn's first cousin too, just like me.

My reflection stared back at me, a pale face looked back. The eyes had turned a darker and deeper teal, the cheeks had lost all their colour. I did not have the heart to dress myself in the richly embroidered golden gown awaiting me on the dresser, instead reaching out for a plainly worked robe of deep black. I dreaded going downstairs, having to face everyone. But I was a Queen, and this was what Queens did.

Be strong.

Painfully, I shuffled downstairs, my feet treading heavily on the carpet, as if bound with invisible, heavy, chains of iron. The corridors were empty, dead still and I silently walked to the doors of the hall, my heels echoing on the floor. The guards near the great hall said nothing, only respectfully lowered their swords and opened the doors.

"Of course, Amphi was such a sweet little girl-" a voice drifted in from the room. "I can't imagine what kind of beast would do that to her own sister-"

Celinette had been talking.

She was dressed in black, as was everyone else. Llewellyn was sitting with an arm around Vanessa, who was crying bitterly, and her face twisted into a sneer as she saw me. Celestina had been wiping the tears in her eyes over the coffee service. Tristan was reading a letter with a frown and arguing with Daniel as Halette and Vincent quietly watched them all.

The moment I entered, everyone fell silent.

"I'm not hungry," Celinette hissed angrily, flinging her fork down into her unfinished plate of food. The silver in her eyes had turned colder than ice, piercing and probing.

"Neither am I. I find it hard to eat in the company of filthy murderers!" Vanessa spat, pushing off her chair. She began to walk out, Llewellyn followed her, and cornered me on the way out.

"You're a fucking piece of work, Edwina. God forbid, look who we elected as Queen," he whispered in my ear, furiously glaring at me and leaving the room.

"I'm sorry, I need to go after him," Celestina said apologetically, giving me a sweet smile but leaving the room nonetheless.

"Anyone else wants to walk out and give me the silent treatment?" I asked out coldly.

Tristan's eyes were full of the pain of understanding, lingering to me and then to the table. Vincent got up, nudging Halette. She gave him a look that could kill, and he shrugged, leaving, closing the door after him. Her pine green eyes flickered to mine, but she said nothing as I felt myself crumble. Would no one believe me? Even people I cared for?

"Woman, you need to eat," Tristan said gently.

"I'm not hungry."

"Starving yourself won't help you fight back," Halette said from across the table, her voice soft.

"Even a person with the mental capacity of a walnut would not forget to eat their breakfast, but you! You refuse just to show that you can!" his voice mocked me.

"Mental capacity of a walnut, is it?" I angrily muttered, a bitter hiss.

"Fine, then. Once you starve to death, we'll bury you and come dance on your grave," Halette murmured, raising an eyebrow. "Edwina," she said softly. "I don't believe you did it."

"Everyone believes it," I said numbly.

"But I don't," she said, as I looked at her with surprise. "I don't think you are that kind of person, Edwina. You barely know me, but you risked your life to come and rescue a stranger. And killing the children of the sister you love so deeply, no. I don't believe it."

I pointedly glared at them both for whole minute.

Then I picked up an orange wedge and popped it into my mouth.

They both relaxed slightly.

I clenched my fists, trying to work my way through the anger, trying to channel it, and most definitely not trying to set the table on fire. I saw the colored cube Tristan had been turning over in his hands, the cube containing the Logogram. I picked it up and ran a finger down the ridges. I had spent day and night trying to figure out what arrangement of squares would unlock the wretched thing, yet none of my efforts could succeed in cracking it open.

He quietly placed a hand over mine, reassuring and warm, before placing a soft kiss on my head. I hardly moved, just staring into the distance.

"I believe you," Tristan said, his voice soft and caring. "I believe you, and we are going to get through this together, okay? You don't have to do this alone."

My heart clenched even tighter, and it was all I could do to not fall into his arms and hide my face in them and cry. I managed to squeeze out a small smile, continuing to toy with the cube, just to have something to do.

"I have to get to work. Will you be okay?" he asked, worried.

"Hmm."

"Don't hurt yourself, yeah?"

"Alright," I nodded sadly, holding his hand a little while longer. Concern was shining in his blue eyes, but I urged him to go.

My eyes brimmed over with tears when he finally left.

• • • • •

I walked along the gardens, making my way to the Castle gates. Perhaps a long walk to Dracnesse would clear my head, maybe help me think about how the cube could be opened.

A hand slammed squarely into my chest, sending me reeling back and almost tripping.

"Where the fuck do you think you are going?" Eric shouted, livid.

A wave of anger rose in me like a beast, boiling my blood.

"I asked you," he demanded, wrapping a hand around my wrist in a steel grip, "where are you going?"

I jerked him forward by the collar, glaring into his eyes.

"I'm not answerable to you, Eric fucking LeVane!"

He pulled himself up, grey eyes blazing to pure black.

"You are. You are on probation, Edwina Valmont Tremayne, and I am the King. You are answerable to me. And you will answer me when I ask you where you are going!"

A nearby tree burst in flame, and so did my hands, exploding in fiery tendrils that attacked the silk of his robes.

"I'm going to see my father, you dumb, thick headed idiot! I'm going home, going to my father - and I don't need your permission to visit my own Castle!"

"You don't have an escort," Eric pointed out, seething. "As far as I recall, the terms of your release were stated quite clearly. I will not let you leave Hartington without permission."

"Let me?" I screeched. "Let me? Oh, you are going to let me? YOU DON'T OWN ME, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

"You-"

"-AND I AM NOT SOME GOAT OR COW THAT YOU KEEP IN YOUR SHED, SO THAT YOU'LL LET ME GO! YOU BASTARD! I AM NOT YOUR PET. LET ME," I snarled. Then I spat right at his feet.

And then I disappeared.

• • • • •

DILSTON CASTLE, KNAVESMIRE, DRACNESSE.

"What have you done, Edwina? What have you done?" father demanded. His eyes were steel. His gaze was stone. And he looked at me with pure disdain. "She is your sister. Does the name of your House mean nothing to you? All these years, all these centuries I spent and invested in grooming you to become Queen, and this is what you give me back? I can't believe that you are my daughter!"

"Oh, really!" I spat. "Who gave the order to assassinate Elodie Valmont? Who started this war over your stupid river? A river worth more than my mother's life?"

He said nothing, but ice crept up his eyes as I hit the mark.

"I can't believe you think for even one moment that I did this. I love Amphitrite! I raised her while you were so busy ogling other women!"

At this he turned around with fire in his eyes, and I knew I'd gone too far. Gone was the patient and calm man I had always known, and in his place was the brutal warrior that had tempered his sword on the blood of his enemies.

"I..."

"Yes? You get to put all the blame on me, and when I try to do it, I'm the bad one? Blaming everybody is great and all, until you've got no one left to blame but yourself!"

"I am your father, Edwina!" he bellowed, finally losing his temper.

"A fact that you seem to have forgotten, Lucius Tremayne!" I roared back, veins popping in my eyes. "You have no idea how worthless you make me feel-"

"Worthless?" he screeched, "do you even know-"

"-what I know?" Let me tell you what I know," I broke in quietly, my voice betraying the pain in my heart. "What I know is that nothing hurts more than being disappointed by the one person you believed would never hurt you."

I trusted him.

And he betrayed me.

• • • • •

My brother was hardly able to manage the little child bawling in his arms, even as Irina tried to coo over their son to stop the crying. The child began to hiccup and cry even more, sucking his thumb as I approached them both.

"Aidon," I said quietly. "I need to talk to you."

"So there you are," Irina hissed angrily, moving away from me and clutching Dustin protectively in her arms. "Get away from me!"

"What are you saying?" I demanded. "I delivered your child, Irina! I gave him his first breath of life and you accuse me?"

"It was all a clever ruse, but now I see - I see you for what you are," she scoffed. "A Queen who murders innocent children is no Queen of mine!"

"Really?" I asked. "All these years you've known me, one mistake, and you forget all of that?"

"I saw you give it to her. I will never forgive myself for not stopping you that day. Never. And I will never, ever, ever trust a woman like you again," Irina hissed poisonously. Rubies and garnets flew from her fingers, clattering down to the floor. "I should never have helped you get into Allington. I should never have trusted you with my child. Who knows if tomorrow I wake up and find that you murdered my son? And know this, murderer: you might take my life but you will never kill my child!" she screamed, clutching her son to her bosom and walking away from me.

Not Irina, I had prayed. Not her. But even family and friends could turn against you in an instant.

A small mistake was all it took.

"Edwina," I heard Aidon step beside me. His eyes were dark and clouded with pain, and his red hair shone dully in the candlelight, shrouded in shadow.

"Not you too, brother," I pleaded. "Please. Believe me."

"You shouldn't have done it, sister," he said regretfully, and before I could speak another word, he started walking away.

"You don't get to do this!" I shouted. "It isn't just about me. It isn't just about Amphitrite. It's about all of us! You can't just walk away from your family. You can't just throw people away!"

Father, Irina and Aidon, all three heard it.

But no one came back.

• • • • •

"Your Grace..."

"Yes, Francis?"

My sharp eyed minister worriedly looked at me, concerned. He put aside the pile of letters we had been writing, looming closer to look at me.

"Are... are you alright? You don't look good. Perhaps you'd like to take a day off. Your Trial-"

"Can we not talk about the Trial, please?" I asked coldly. "For the next thirty days, I do not want you to speak a single word of it to me. I did not do the murder, and I will attend the Trial and testify." My voice was faint.

His eyes suddenly filled with tears.

"Your Grace, your father-"

"-my father and brother and sister and every other immortal in the goddamn fucking world have forsaken me. They are blind. They do not care, Francis, and I will beg you to stop mentioning it again," I croaked.

"Of - of course."

Someone knocked at the door.

"I will open it," Francis said sadly, closing the account books. He opened the door by the fraction of an inch to find a green eye peeking in, suspiciously looking at me. I nodded carefully and he opened the door fully.

"Edwina," Vincent said in a deep baritone. I noticed that he had dropped my title by which he always addressed me. A huge book was held in his hands, but his eyes clearly betrayed that he did not want to be within a mile of me.

"Vincent," I said curtly. I nodded to Francis, and he left with a forlorn expression on his face.

"You... asked me about the - about turning the nature of an object," he grimaced, wincing slightly, clearly uncomfortable.

"Yes."

Again, he wrung his hands, setting the book down on the table. But he didn't look up to meet my eyes, and instead chose to stare at the dusty cover of the ancient book. Golden lettering was embossed on the cover, now shrouded with a fine layer of dust.

"You murdered those children," he said quietly after a long moment of awkward silence.

I knew better than to refuse it, because every time I did, the response was so painful that it hurt sharper than knives. So I said nothing to defend myself, just closed my eyes and let out a small sigh.

"You can leave if you are feeling uncomfortable. After all, I am a murderer. You shouldn't be in a room alone with me."

Without waiting a second, he left, save a single word.

Sadly, I sat down and picked up the thick book, wiping the dust off to read the text on the cover.

A Historie of Dark Magyck.

The pages were falling to dust, crumbling to pieces. They were filled with old, ink stained diagrams, fading away. Numbers and letters filled the pages to the brim, with footnotes on the margins of the pages and minute detailing on the figures.

The more pages I turned, the darker were the things I read.

Until I finally reached that one page near the end, finely lettered with notes, but those words were there. The words.

The words which would change everything.

The gears began to turn in my brain, over and over, over and over again.

Finally, I picked up the Cube. And when my fingers started turning the edges again, I knew I was going to unlock it this time.

• • • • •

Y'all... Edwina has now found something in this book. It's not gonna be pleasant, no - but it's a dark journey and it's one we're going to have to take. I just feel so bad for my babe, literally everyone has left her (Eric, I hate you!) Though all darkness ends some day, Edwina is just born with tragedy in her blood :(

Btw, the cover we have on now is the 25th cover of COG, and although I've never selected a specific person to cast as Edwina, I like to believe the person on the cover is her - tall, powerful and confident in her own skin ❤ have a look at it yourself!