There were no clocks ticking on the wall of her room, but had they been there she'd have seen their hands moving swifter by the day. A whirlwind of faces passed by the palace, seamstresses, tailors, shoemakers, expert perfumers; she was passed around from hand to hand, dressed up and posed like a doll, getting her ready for the Mystae.
The celebrations were in full swing by the time she'd begun to receive the craftsmen. She'd missed the inauguration – quite on purpose, as her presence was not required, it was held at dawn and she'd be damned if she made an effort to wake up early to attend what was essentially the opening ceremony to her jail sentence. She spent the initial days by herself, accompanied only by Calliope and the occasional red butterfly from Hyperion. Aurelius had been absorbed completely by his duties as he held baptisms during the day and met with the representatives of the Pleroma at night.
"Don't feel obligated to stay here," Ophelia said to her maid as she came back, exhausted, from two hours of trying to deal with the nobles in the Temple who wanted to see her. "Escape for a bit into the city, enjoy the festivities. I will be fine."
"My place is by you, your highness," she replied with a weak smile as she took a seat. "But thank you."
The nobles are positively besieging the Temple right now, she remembered Hyperion's last note. One of my clients is Count Volusus, who I might say is rather fond of drink, and has mentioned that he's tried to put in word so that his daughter enters the palace as your attendant. Should you not be aware, I might say that your current one is a rather unpopular character – since before the Mystae began there's been complaints raised at the Pleroma about the character of this poor girl, whose only crime seems to have caused you to drop into Byzantium for a few weeks.
Ophelia wanted to ask Calliope if she'd been dealing with the nobles' attitudes, but she found every question reflected. "It is par on course that every father wants the best for his daughter," the girl said, "and my position is the most enviable one. I foresaw this happening, so please don't worry your highness – I am not bothered by their nagging."
The day before the grand wedding was held started with a butterfly landing on her nose, very early in the morning, which carried a small note from Hyperion: may Fortuna bless your feet before they touch the floor today. As if he'd possessed an aether capable of restoring one's mood, she felt all her worries ease immediately. Calliope commented on her bright face, smiling to herself as she prepared the strange black satin robes for the ceremony.
It would all be held in the evening while the city was ablaze with the lights from the lantern festival: she'd been told that the Knights would make a display at one of the seven hills with their Dorian fire, summoning figures of all sorts for the enjoyment of the crowd. In the city, the canals and the streams that ran by the side of the streets would receive the barrage of reed barques and other figures that would be set on sail, downstream, to where an expectant priest would collect them all and burn them in seven bonfires. It was a practice normally reserved for summer festivals, but given the occasion the priests had deemed it safe for borrowing.
Ophelia would miss it all. Her day would be spent taking the ritual seven ablutions that Aurelius had instructed Calliope to prepare for her: she did not understand why they were needed, and neither did the younger woman. For the expectant mind that was trying to figure out what the surprise of the night would be this was an important clue: if an Elysian didn't know about it, then it followed that it was either something Aurelius had invented or had brought from the time of Byzantium. So perhaps, she was to prepare for something entirely novel or something that was reserved only to those who were not native to Lygeum.
She took a regular cold bath, then a hot one; followed by a light breakfast of fruit, which would be the only food she'd have for the day. Then, alternate between steam and cold baths of progressively longer durations until she felt like she was more water than flesh. The incense and the perfume were strong, and combined with the fasting it made her head slightly dizzy. By the time the sun had begun to set and she emerged from the last one already enrobed in black, she felt like she was floating more than walking and her head was at least two feet away from her body at all times.
"You'll have to take care of me," Ophelia asked Calliope, "I feel very strange."
"Don't worry your highness," the girl said nervously, "it is exactly what I intend to do."
She was led into the Temple, where Aurelius was already sitting behind the drawn screens. He was wearing similar robes to hers, black satin with a fiery red sash. The golden glow of the Lyre's tears they both wore turned the smile on his face warmer, more welcoming. He took Ophelia's hands in his when they entered, and led her to sit on a throne chair that had been placed next to his. "Whatever happens tonight," he whispered in her ear, "remember it has to be done for the greater good."
Ophelia, even in her dazed state, shot an anxious look at the man. He had sat next to her, while Calliope hung behind, hands clasped on her lap, thousand-mile stare fixed on nothing. Again, that strange transformation happened in front of her eyes, where every muscle and every bone rearranged itself so that there was nothing in Aurelius of Orion: beside her sat the famous Emperor of Elysium who many regarded as almost a deity, looking forwards with a heavy, fiery stare at the men who gathered beyond the screens.
"It's been a long time since you've felt my generosity;" he said, voice deep and thunderous commanding the attention of everyone in the room. "I feel like I've been a neglecting father in the last few centuries; I must say I was reticent to admit the successes achieved without my direction. Call it the inability of a father to recognise that their children are ready to leave the nest and forge a life of their own," he chuckled.
"But you've done splendidly for the Empire, for yourselves; you've shown me that we have a nation of cunning, powerful people, and our vision has been confirmed by fate. And perhaps it is time that I impart a secret of my own, something that shall seed the future of generations to come. The Empire must not simply thrive on its own, growing fat and indolent in its own success – it must share the pains of the chaotic world beyond, bringing order and civilization until all life on Lygeum is at peace."
"But for this I will need even stronger warriors, more fearless and daring than any beast, more cunning than any thief, wiser than any hermit. It is not aether alone that begets this; it is time, experience. Today, I shall show you all the biggest of my miracles – eternal life."
As murmurs grew excitedly amidst the small crowd, the entire hall was swept in bright blue light. Dorian fire ate through the screens that separated the emperor from his subjects, dramatically flaring away when nothing was left. The white hall was inked blue – and then, after centuries of anonymity, the ten or so members of the Pleroma in attendance were able to see their Emperor face to face. They all fell down to their knees, hands over their heart and heads bowed in respect. In unison, all shouted: "AVE AURELIUS".
"What I will show you tonight cannot be done by anyone but those from Byzantium," he warned to the kneeling crowd. "Try as you might, you will fail. You could lose your life. This is to say that one should not covet for more than what is their lot in life – I am here to provide, and that is what I shall do, to the right people, at the right time. Now, rise."
Ophelia had grown increasingly anxious since the words 'eternal life' had been uttered. She shot a look towards Calliope to gauge her reaction to it all – and found her stony-faced, bearing no mark of surprise on her expression. That was enough to confirm her suspicions – try as she might the girl had no ability to hide her emotions, and a bomb being dropped like that was hardly the type of thing anyone could be blasé about. She knew; Aurelius had shared it with her before hand, which prompted the question: what for?
Aurelius raised a hand; a signal for Calliope to come forward. Ophelia watched as several dark stares were thrown her way, perhaps wondering why she'd been allowed to take part in Aurelius' company before they had. With the girl merely a foot away from him and with her back to the crowd, the emperor touched first her heart with index and middle finger, then her lips and forehead and lastly her belly. Each time the fingers made contact with her, a golden light flashed as his aether shot into her. This was a supremely unpleasant experience for her, who began to tremble; it became so bad by the time he touched her stomach that she had to hold on to his arms to remain on her feet.
"You have pledged your life to Ophelia, haven't you?" Aurelius said softly to her. "It is time now to carry your duty."
She nodded; in spite of her best efforts she could not stop the grimace of pain creeping into her face. Even the tiniest movements brought her agony, with muscles protesting the energy that had invaded her body. She slowly walked towards Ophelia, who rushed to her side.
"What is happening, Calliope?" Ophelia felt a trickle of terror break through her anxiety. "What does he mean?"
The younger girl looked up; she was in Ophelia's arms, trying as hard as she could not to crumble into a shivering mess on the floor. Her eyes were unfocused, crazed with devotion: "your reign of peace will last forever, your highness. This is my gift to you."
And then from within her robes she produced a small knife, and with it she stabbed herself in the neck with such violence that a sickening crunch was heard as the blade went through tendons and hit the bones. Blood spilled onto the floor, rained onto Ophelia's black satin robes. In a moment of deliriousness afforded by the long-running seconds after a great shock, she thought that the strategy perhaps had been to choose a colour that would not show the clear stains of blood. This thought, like many others that mocked the nature of what was happening, flooded her head: and then, she sobbed: "Calliope…"
Calliope, barely holding on, weakly raised her hand and smeared her blood on Ophelia's mouth. The shock had turned her into stone, immobile; she felt the persistent fingers trying desperately to push into her mouth. Someone's aether carried through what was still spilling from her neck, and Ophelia's mouth became filled with tangy metallic blood. She choked, and the motion shook her awake: with a cry, she half spat out what she hadn't swallowed while at the same time catching the girl's crumbling body in her arms. She tried her damnedest to stop the bleeding, shouting Calliope's name over and over again.
It was a futile effort, a symbolic act of desperation. Calliope laid limp in her arms as Ophelia's body was wracked with sobs, hunched over the corpse of her attendant. Something was burning in her chest, which was wet and sticky with Calliope's still warm blood. Her mouth, her neck, her hands were a reddish mess, and she must've looked like a wraith when Aurelius gently grabbed her shoulders and pulled her away from the girl's body.
"This is not a gift easily given," she heard him say to their audience. She'd forgotten they were not alone; but it all looked and sounded distant, as if it was happening on a stage hundreds of miles away. "A costly price must be paid for it. Let us remain faithful witnesses to Lady Thanatos' great service to the empire. In great light a star shines bright for her."
"In great light a star shines bright for Lady Thanatos," the men of the Pleroma echoed; a common ritual phrase for honouring the dead.
Ophelia's sobs had not stopped. They echoed around the room, roaming like lonely ghosts that wandered unseen and unheard by the living. Aurelius' grip on her shoulders was almost bruising, and it did not falter as he continued giving his eulogy for Calliope. The men of the Pleroma barely had any mind for anything that wasn't their emperor: almost as if they were hypnotised by his presence, they spared no glances for Ophelia or even the corpse of the girl laying at her feet.
"Let this be the start of a golden era," Aurelius promised confidently, despite the grieving woman in his arms. "Glory to Elysium!"
"Glory to Elysium! Ave Aurelius!"
The men of the Pleroma did not stop their chants. They repeated them enthusiastically while Aurelius and Ophelia took their leave – the former picking up the latter in his arms as she was unable to do much but stumble out. She felt weak, sickened, almost delirious – it wasn't just the shock or the grief, it was that combined with the burning in her chest and the ritual that she'd gone through beforehand.
"It's normal," Aurelius reassured her. "It's your first time – your aether is adjusting…"
Outside of the Temple, in the little room that led to it and still hearing the chant go on behind them, Ophelia mustered up all her strength to grab Aurelius' collar and look at him in the eye:
"What – what have you done to me?"
"I made you like me," he said with a soft smile. "Gave you youth eternal."
"You made Calliope kill herself," she spat out. "Why did you do that?"
"It was merely a suggestion; she stepped forward quite willingly. She really did adore you."
"She wouldn't…" Ophelia could not bear it and broke into tears once more. Feeling exposed and vulnerable, she tried to hide her face against his shoulder.
"Never doubts the depths of loyalty from your subjects in this Empire, Ophelia," Aurelius murmured as he held her tight, trying to comfort her. "And do not reject their sacrifices. She was very brave in doing what she did, braver than many warriors I've seen."
He took her into his chambers. Sophia could be seen in its entirety from it; it shone brightly under the dark starry sky that night more than any other, as its streets were covered in colourful lanterns. Bright blue flames could be seen emerging like silent fireworks against the speckles of stardust above; as the Knights began their demonstration soon other nobles began joining in. That such joviality enveloped them when her heart was in agony felt almost sacrilegious, and for a second filled with irrationality she hated everyone: Aurelius, the Pleroma, the nobles, the people of the city of Sophia who dared to celebrate while Calliope's corpse lay like a broken doll on the floors of the Temple.
He laid her on the bed, and she felt exhausted: anything could've happened and she wouldn't have done anything to stop it. Her mind was far away, in a dark little room where her fingers twitched remembering the cooling corpse of her friend in her arms.
Aurelius had a chair move in front of her and he took a seat. A bowl landed on his lap the moment he did so, water filled it up as if fed from a tap. Slowly and with great tenderness, he dipped a cloth in the water and began cleaning the blood off Ophelia's face and neck. "I must sound like a forgetful preacher by now, but time does tend to ease the pain. You shall see the sun rise again on the east, the moon shining bright during the night, children grow up, become fathers and mothers, wither and die, you shall see their grandchildren become adults, and understand that life goes on. One person's death is, sad as it may seem, like a single pebble falling off the tallest mountain."
"But," he continued, "a pebble might find itself making more noise, or causing a great avalanche in the right circumstances. Calliope could've lived a full life as a nobody, forgotten right after she died as an old woman, but she chose to immortalize herself through you. She will now live forever in our collective memory as the one who sacrificed herself to give Empress Ophelia the key to eternal life."
"Eternal life?" Ophelia reacted with a deep, bitter laugh. "You keep saying you do things for my benefit; or maybe it is for the Empire's benefit. But you keep the strings around my neck and my limbs very tight, and you're not afraid to yank hard enough to make me bleed; and it does make me wonder, what kind of puppetmaster tries to convince their puppet that one day they'll pull their own strings?"
"I could answer you should you choose to change your analogy," Aurelius continued his ministrations as if nothing had been said. "One day I pray you will believe my sincerity. I do hold you very dear in my heart; it gives me no pleasure to see you like this."
The grief had slowly trickled down inside of Ophelia, settling into a deep pit of anger. Quick like lightning, she grabbed the arm that reached to clean her throat, and yanked the man towards her. The bowl fell to the floor with a loud noise, spilling reddish water everywhere; Aurelius could've resisted her, yet he simply let her do as she pleased. It was as if he knew where her mind was going.
"Say no more," she asked him. "If I'm dear to you, just cease all this talking and hold me. I need to get through tonight."
He nodded, and climbed into bed to hover just above her. Calliope's blood stained them both, and was quickly drying into crust, crystallizing Ophelia's resolve to do something insane. She took off her robe, and so did he; there was nothing passionate about it, no invitation to any further business – it was merely for utilitarian purposes, to wipe themselves clean with their aether. And, laying in bed together, Aurelius held her as she cried herself to sleep, both hidden under the covers of the bed while the night sky was still ablaze with blue fire.
Before she settled in for the night, however, she directed one venomous glance to the bloodstained robes she'd unceremoniously discarded on the floor, and knowing full well there was an antidote for her to take inside of them, she burnt them into a crisp.
A tiny part of her, her rational self, worried for what her rash decision would mean for Hyperion's plans. But most of her was submerged deep in grief, deliriously fighting against the cages of the destiny that seemed to trap her: she panicked that, at the end of it, there would be no escaping it. That she would become the Elysian Empress, that she would fulfil the fate Aurelius had set out for her; and worst of all, that she'd grow to become like him in the future, only half-human, deluded into seeing people as pawns for a greater good than the living, unique beings they were.
She'd witnessed Aegyr's transformation when he was freed of his assumed fate with a keen interest: the sombre, dry man had transformed into someone more lively. He who had only seen people according to the caste system of the Elysian empire was able to find solace in Byzantium, in London, where he was anonymous, where no great expectations were placed on him or anyone else. He had become free. She, on the other hand, feared the shadow that lengthened over her as all the roads seemed to lead her the opposite direction. She saw herself becoming like him, and despaired.
On the floor her two Lyre's tears laid forgotten, the blue light from outside firing sparks when caught by the delicate crystals. She turned away from them, borrowing her head into Aurelius' chest so she wouldn't see them.
-
Daylight bathed her bare skin. Where tears had left their mark the previous night a tingling arose when the sunlight caressed her. The warmth of Aurelius' body next to her had disappeared, and she felt empty. As her eyes had dried out, her feelings had drained out of her, leaving her feeling tired, anxious, sad. The initial shock had worn out, and as it did it put out the burning sensation in her chest; the edges of her sadness had been smoothed out, leaving her with a cold, deep anguish that would simmer in the back of her mind for days.
Aurelius was sitting at the edge of the bed, looking towards Sophia. There was something very unassuming about the way he was poised, as if he wasn't the ruler of the lands before him; and she wondered what was on his mind. "Good morning," he said, turning around as he heard her shuffling in the bed. "How are you feeling?"
"I'd be glad to hear the sun had decided to stop its journey across the sky for a few weeks," she sighed, grabbing her head. "Sad, I guess. Angry. Confused. Anxious that I feel confused."
There was a flash of something in his eyes, a slight grimace. Was it, perhaps, remorse? Guilt over what he had orchestrated? He said nothing, choosing instead to stand up and once again school his features into something else. "Do you want me to remain silent today as well? Or would you like me to prod further so that you grow number to the pain?"
There was no hint of mockery in his tone, even if his words seemed so strange as to come off as jeering. Ophelia searched his eyes for a moment before settling for another sigh. "I am in no mood to discuss anything," she eventually said. "I'd rather be alone with my thoughts, if I'm honest."
He walked until he was before her, and knelt to take her hands in his. "I'm rather afraid you'll convince yourself to do something stupid. Let me stay in the background, I will say nothing."
There was genuine concern in his eyes, and she hated him for it. She found herself nodding, if only because it'd be easier than trying to argue against it. He was afraid she'd be impulsive enough to try something, and he was right; he just didn't know that she'd chosen not to do what she was meant to do, and that this was her revenge.
They shared a silent breakfast; he pretended to concentrate on some papyri that had been sent to him, sneaking glances at her every now and then. She had no appetite, but nibbled on some fruits on autopilot. She could barely think, mind so foggy with exhaustion and grief that it did not occur to her that her self-immolation would be hours away.
There were no second-thoughts; later, she'd think it irrational and unhinged that she'd chosen to commit suicide in such a round-about way, and so easily. Perhaps, at that time, it was more that she couldn't think of her self-preservation when she'd seen someone close to her die, perhaps it was pure rebelliousness at the immortality that had been imposed on her. Burning the antidote with the blood-stained robes felt vindicating, like taking back control over the narrative of her own life. And the morning after she still wasn't in a state to think any differently.
So the motions went on; she said nothing as the tailors and the seamstresses arrived and fitted her and Aurelius with incredible reverence their wedding outfits. Layers of fine, bright coloured silk enveloped them; delicate, shining pieces of jewellery decorated their hands, their necks, their hair. The twin pair of Lyre's Tears shone golden on their ears, bigger crowns than the ones they were supposed to wear.
Then, the Knights came to escort them: the ceremony would be performed at the gates of the Temple, in front of all the nobles of Elysium, the diplomats and envoys from other nations, and the commoners who'd managed to grab a space to see it. Ophelia followed the motions; she spoke when she had to, she walked where she was meant to go. Her face, covered by a black veil, showed no emotion.
"There are no beginnings without sacrifices," Aurelius whispered to her as they waited to come out. "But this is the end of suffering, I promise you that."
The crowd roared outside. It was like a voracious beast, anxious to eat a bite of its favourite meal. She lamented in her head, quite sarcastically, that they'd come to learn that day that some horses die as foals before their first gallop.
The bright sun and the blue skies were like the background of a dream; everything seemed to glow under them, the whites in people's smiles too bright, their blue robes moving ethereally as they hoisted their hands up in the air, saluting them. At the feet of the stairs that led to the Temple, the crowd stretched to the bottom of the hill and beyond: all of Sophia was there, plus some more.
A black and gold carpet had been laid as a path between the entrance of the Temple and the wedding altar. On either side, the double row of colonnades had been adorned with the royal blue of Elysium using arrangements of fake flowers and heavy, embroidered banners. Guarding their path were twenty knights; the others were below, mid-way through the stairs, patiently watching the crowd below. The fourteen attendants Ophelia knew would be waiting for them were already on either side of the altar, with the high priest and a child, who she guessed was playing the role of Fortuna, beside them. They were all wearing simple white tunics, a porcelain mask with no features firmly fixed to their face.
As Aurelius walked her to the altar, and as the crowd's fervour grew at seeing their Emperor for the first time in their lives, the haze in her mind began to clear. It had begun as a stray thought, a simple observation as her eyes roamed the scene, but it stuck, and acted as a trigger to wake her up: she was amazed at the size of the attendants. Perhaps it wouldn't be out of place in Lygeum, perhaps they'd purposefully gone out of their way to find the biggest Elysians they could; whatever it was, they were all tall, with a majority sporting a strong, built physique.
She knew Hyperion was amongst them, the slender one. The others, she knew, were equally part of the plot, and foreigners. She was suddenly captured by the reality of what was happening, and what would soon come to pass; she had a moment of panic, of doubt, and then her grief erupted like an angry volcano, and buried it all in ash.
It was all for the best. She felt Calliope's blood crawling inside of her, and she wanted to stop that feeling in any way she could.
She knew what she was meant to do; first through Hyperion, then from Aurelius' own instructions. She stood beside him as he stepped in front of the altar to address the crowd.
"Today it's a glorious day for our nation," he said. "It is not the first time I see your faces, my loyal children; I've hidden amongst you when it was necessary to protect you from the shadows. But it is certainly the first time I appear in front of you as your Emperor, at least in this generation; this is my wedding gift to you all, that you may know me, as it is now the time for me to come forward to lead us into our Golden Age."
"Joyous day it is," he continued, lifting into the air his and Ophelia's joined hands. "That we celebrate the union begotten by fate; that this Empire now welcomes her Empress. Rejoice; you had a father, and now you shall have a mother as well."
The chanting and the cheers voraciously attacked the silence he left behind; deafeningly they echoed through the hills as Aurelius took a step back and motioned Ophelia to begin her journey tasting the offerings from the attendants.
"The seven provinces present their offerings now to his and her imperial majesties," the high priest called over the cheers. His power amplified the power of his voice so that even those at the bottom of the hill were able to hear.
She went left to right: the motions were similar, each attendant carrying a porcelain casserole of sorts enveloped by a golden cloth that they would uncover to show her the contents. She'd take the food and eat it, the little glass with wine or beer and drink it. She spied a wisp of blond hair on the fourth attendant, and despite it all; despite the grief and the abandon, the anger and the frustration, she smiled. Hyperion offered her a poisoned pomegranate and she took it almost happily, biting into the ruby red seeds with voraciousness…
She moved on to the fifth, the sixth… and then as she took the seventh's offer of wine, the poison embraced her. Like a flash of lightning had hit her, she felt herself fall as her limbs lost all feeling and her body began to convulse. A noise like thunder ran through the crowd as the cheers died a violent death. Around her, the attendants came forth to her aid; a porcelain mask shattered against the floor as Hyperion dropped to his knees next to her.
"Ophelia" he whispered urgently in her ear as he cradled her body. "Princess…!"
Ophelia would've whispered a soft 'do not worry' in his Chaldean tongue, but when she opened her mouth only blood came out. Her body was in agony; fire was running through her veins, drying up her insides, scorching her heart.
Around her, chaos reigned. When the crowd roared, Aurelius had taken notice that something had gone wrong, and had turned back to see Ophelia on the ground. He stepped forward, a pained expression on his face.
Then, the unthinkable happened.
Porcelain masks fell to the ground, shattering away to reveal tanned bodies and red hair. Like panthers all too eager to devour their prey mid-flight, the Phrygian warriors leapt towards the Elysian Emperor with a frenzied abandon. Aurelius could've held his own against all of them had the circumstances been different, but caught in his worry for Ophelia, it was too late when he noticed them. Two of them, those that had come at him from the front, burnt up in Dorian flames almost instantly. But it was the rage of one specific warrior that brought him down, one that came up to him from the sides.
Phobos' seax glinted in the sunlight; this was the only way to take notice of what was happening, so fast were his strikes that they became a blur to the naked eye. Aurelius was able to fend off the initial blows with some confidence before one got through his defence and slashed through his arm. An attack from another Phrygian had him turning his back on Phobos for a split second, which proved to be a fatal mistake.
The prince was unrelenting: he fell on top of the Elysian emperor, and one after the other, dozens of stabs pierced him. A cacophony arose from below, like cries from hell, as the commoners howled for their slain emperor. It had all happened in a manner of seconds, and only after Phobos' successful attack the Knights were able to reach them at the altar.
From within the Temple more Phrygians swarmed in, hidden amongst the decorations, carried into the palace complex as luggage brought in by one Chaldean merchant. Blue was stained red as they engaged into bloody battle; it was a suicide mission at best, but one that would deal the biggest blow the Elysian Empire would ever feel in its history.
In the centre of it all, a gory body lay in front of the altar. Hyperion was shouting at Ophelia, still somehow conscious; Phobos, covered in Aurelius' blood, ran to them.
"Did she not take the antidote?" he asked, eyes wild with the satiated bloodlust of his recent kill, now even more frantic that he thought she might die.
"P-phobos," Ophelia smiled precariously, "you f-fool. W-why are you here…"
"I came here to rescue you," tears were gathering in his eyes. "What did you do?!"
A trembling hand placed itself on Hyperion's lips.
"Hy...perion," Ophelia said with some effort. "Phobos… it will be alright. It will be better this way… Be...lieve me..."
She felt her strength fading away. She lost control of her gaze, which went everywhere, unfocused and uncaring. In its last journey, it saw the gory lump to which Aurelius had been reduced move. Amidst the blood a hand twitched, and a spark of gold ran through the air.
An Aurelian miracle; perhaps, the last one. With the vengeance of one who's not yet ready to walk into the underworld, the seax that had reduced him to pieces arose on its own and flew through the air – with so much force than rather than a simple stab it ran through the body of its owner, leaving a sizeable hole behind. Phobos had no time to react; no one had seen it coming. He simply opened his mouth in shock and fell forward, his blood spraying Hyperion and the unconscious Ophelia.
Phobos, crown prince of Phrygia, was dead, and his last act had turned the royal Elysian blue into red. Much would be said in copious chronicles about that day, but none would mention the tears in his eyes, or the peaceful expression on the would-be Empress' face as the poison ravaged her body; certainly no mention would be made of the craftiness of one Chaldean who, never one to give up easily, managed to sneak away with her body amidst the bloody fighting atop the Temple. But they would say that no Phrygians would survive their attack, giving up their lives to take down the Emperor and sixteen of his Knights.
They would recount the events that came immediately afterward; of the panic that took hold of the masses, the stampede that would claim the lives of more than three hundred Elysians as whispers of a suicide bombing in the manner of Arqa rushed through the crowd. They would say that in the following weeks the streets became rife with the preaching of the end of times; jingoism turning villainous as they called for the eradication of the dangerous foreigners that had taken down their Emperor and Empress. The Pleroma fought to find a leader to navigate those turbulent times; the commoners self-organised pogroms that left a few hundred of foreign merchants dead. Those who had been flocking to the Empire in search of a piece of its prosperity now fled towards its neighbouring nations seeking refuge from the violence.
In the depth of the mountains that separated Thracia from the Elysian empire, a camp had been set up three days away from the nearest Thracian village to the border. It was along a famous yet perilous route, one that was famed for the gangs of fearsome bandits that would every now and then assault the unsuspecting merchants that would travel though it. Thracia as a nation was an example of the exotic and the mysterious for its neighbours; its terrain was rugged and agriculture scarce, and in its absence they traded their precious gems and iron ore in exchange for cured meats and preserves. Its people were hardy and reserved, and had developed a reputation for being incredibly skilled and fearsome warriors, noted for their skill in riding horses. They also possessed the cunning of one who by virtue of their complicated relationship with their surroundings developed a keen sense of how to use them to their advantage, and because of it, they'd succeeded at fending off invasions with little more than a well-organized coalition of villages.
It also was noted as the perfect hiding spot for anyone looking to escape from the watchful eye of the Elysian empire, as they didn't answer to it in any way or form, and had successfully repelled their offensive in three different occasions. So for a Chaldean merchant wanting to hide an unconscious almost-Empress it was an ideal destination.
Two full days would pass before Ophelia opened her eyes. Hyperion had put her in his tent, afraid that someone would come snatch her if he wasn't careful. The less practical side of him whispered that, deep down, he also was looking to be the first person she saw when she awoke. This, however, wasn't a given at first; Eon and Freya, his cousin, warned him that it could very well be that she would never wake up again.
"One learns to trust a gut feeling," Hyperion replied every time. "She won't keep me waiting."
And she didn't. It was early in the afternoon, and the winter was in its infancy; at the foot of the valley they were in, this translated into frigid cold winds and the first inches of snow. Not that anywhere within the camp anyone noticed: portable ceramic stoves had been assembled to ensure the tents were all perfectly warm throughout the entire day. Before even becoming fully conscious, she reached for water, and drank cup after cup.
"I'm… alive," she said, eyes wide and unfocused as she stared at Hyperion. The Chaldean had been so surprised by her sudden, chaotic awakening, that he'd simply frozen in his seat. He blinked once, twice, and then shot up to embrace her.
"Oh in the name of the goddess and everything she favours," he exclaimed, squeezing her tightly. "What have I ever done to you that you do this to me?"
"How…? I didn't… drink… the antidote…" Ophelia's mind was hazy; arisen violently from the depths of unconsciousness, it struggled to form a coherent thought. It was all jumbled; the bits and pieces of what had happened after she'd collapsed, the feelings of the night before, the explanation for her survival.
"I doubt I will offer a more satisfactory explanation than whatever you can come up with," Hyperion stated. "I could hear your heart beating, and I knew you were not dead; that's all I cared about."
Hyperion's smell, the scent of myrrh was like a balm to her senses; it calmed her racing head, it ordered her thoughts. A sense of peace descended upon her, and beyond anything else she knew she was home. They held each other in silence for a few minutes; it felt almost like they were trying to make their hearts beat in sync as they rested in the security of each other's presence.
"Should I venture a guess," Ophelia finally said, putting some distance between them, "it would be that Calliope, my lady-in-waiting, saved me."
There was honest curiosity in Hyperion's eyes. Ophelia shook her head, ready to warn him: "the night before the wedding, that special ceremony… Aurelius wanted me to be like him, to never age. It is pure wickedness; through someone else's sacrifice, one can gain eternal life."
Like a vampire, she wanted to say, unsure if such a thing existed in Lygeum. "Calliope…" she choked up, remembering vividly the moment she stabbed herself. "She was led to believe that she had to sacrifice herself for me. She followed through and died in front of my eyes by her own hand… and I was forced to drink her blood. I do not know what the effects were, or will be; but perhaps, the poison failed to kill me on account of this."
Ophelia's hands balled into fists. "I dare say this is the reason behind his eternal youth; paid for by the blood of his own descendants."
She could not help herself, and began to cry. Hyperion pulled her flush against his chest, letting her shout out her grievances in the warmth of his embrace. "It became clear to me, as the days passed, that he'd come to obsess over the reality of his vision. That everything ought to be according to his design, that outside of a select few everyone else were pawns. Perhaps this is what time does to mortals; it blinds you from seeing the uniqueness of each moment, and time and time again it convinces you that the world can be reduced into a series of patterns. I feared that I would become that, a king in an ivory tower, uncaring of those I ruled over."
She pressed her face against his shoulder. "I wanted so badly to escape that place… I wanted it so badly… to escape him."
"It's done, princess, do not worry…" Hyperion said, his hands soothingly tracing patterns in her back. "He has disappeared. His body was taken by the Knights after the Phrygians had been dealt with, but he hasn't been seen in public since then. There's been a few caravans passing us by that have spoken of trouble in the capital and in Sophia; the Elysians are quite incensed, looking to place the blame of what happened on any foreigners they see. And their Pleroma has said nothing. He might as well be dead for all we know."
He laid his cheek against her head. "But even if he wasn't dead; even if by the same powers you lived through the poison he survived the stabbing, I will make sure he never finds you again. You're safe, Ophelia."
She looked up to stare in his face. She must've looked like a mess; puffy eyes swollen with tears, a red face, messy hair. It didn't matter: he was her lifeline, the one anchor holding her in the middle of the storm. "Thank you, oh thank you so much," she said. "You foolish man, you keep giving and giving and asking nothing of me. Won't you be a bit selfish?"
"There's enough of that already," he sighed. "But you hold me like this, and you come to me every time; who else is lucky enough to brag about it?"
He softly pushed her away, so that they'd be facing each other. There was a serious, almost haunted look in his face. "But, this time, I will ask for compensation: you must promise never to do something so foolish again. Do not throw away your life; that Emperor might have gotten to you, might have led your mind into strange paths – but remember yourself, Ophelia dear, when have you ever done what other people wanted? You could never, in a million years, become like him. That was, and forever will be, his delusion; do not entertain it."
He placed a kiss on her forehead. "As the merchant that I am, I am wicked enough to see the glint of treasure in the midst of the ashes; you should do that too. Now that the Elysian empire's spell is broken, the myth of Byzantium and its people can turn a new page. There can be something else written about it, something unique to you."
"But this was always the case, Ophelia; your story was always yours to write, not the Emperor's, or Lord Scipio's, or Irkalla-guide-his-soul, Phobos'. Now, I will leave you to make sure some food is prepared for you; now that you are awake we should make preparations to start our journey. The winter will not be kind to us in the height of the mountains."
Ophelia nodded. The tears in her eyes were drying, and although the events of the days before were not fully gone from her mind, she felt somewhat at peace. She was still wearing her wedding robes; stained in blood, from her and from the carnage that had exploded around her, they carried the smell of death and sacrifice – Calliope's, Phobos'… even the brutal stabbing of Aurelius. Almost ritually she let them pool slowly around her feet; the smooth silk taking the emperor's touch away from her skin as it slid off her body. Naked, with only the weight of her feelings from the past days pooling deep inside of her, she was for the first time in a while just Ophelia – not the woman from Byzantium, just her.
As she bathed, her sense of time and place distorted; surrounded by the warmth of the tent and the lingering smell of myrrh and spices, it was as if nothing else had been real, as if she'd spent weeks there rather than a few days, unconscious. The present became infinite as every emotion she had separated from each other, like drops of oil in water, rising to the top looking for sublimation. She didn't cry, there was no point to it anymore: she let the feeling of being home, of feeling like herself wash over her.
Had she really been so crazy as to try and meet her doom? Had she really let Aurelius' words permeate her like a dogma, becoming the only reality she could dream of? Had she really surrendered to his vision? It all seemed so strange, like she hadn't been herself; but she didn't fight her memories, she didn't try to bury them in shame. What had happened had happened, and all that was left was to look forwards to try to make sense of the future.
What Calliope had done would never be undone; but Ophelia would live to remember and honour her memory. And should Aurelius' shadow loom over her again… she'd shine her own light on it.
She came out of the tent feeling like a different person. Hyperion's retinue stopped what they were doing when they saw her come out, breaths held in expectation for what they would see. She caught Eon's eye near one of the tents and waved at him.
"You sure let your master do the most foolish things, mister Eon," she said with a tentative smile. He nodded; as usual, he showed very little emotion.
"One cannot reason with a man whose heart is so lost in its own paradise," and then, almost as an afterthought, he added: "I am glad to see you've made a full recovery."
Ophelia's smile widened. "The underworld is not yet ready to take me in."
A woman walked up to them then; she was as pale as Hyperion, with the same amber eyes, but with distinctly white hair rather than blond. Not the product of age, Ophelia noted, as her skin was as smooth as hers; just one of those traits that made those born in Lygeum so distinctive.
"Would you look at that? It is veritably freezing outside, my dear sister, what are you doing in such thin clothes?" she said, making a gesture at one of the men who were chopping wood by the campfire. "You've done a marvellous job of surviving a deadly poison; please do not let the snow take you away instead!"
"Ah," Ophelia looked down at herself. She was wearing a simple Chaldean dress with no outer robes; her arms were exposed, yet she didn't feel the cold. "It is alright, thank you. I think my body must believe it's still spring."
The woman asked the servant who'd approached them for a shawl. "Byzantine strangeness; this is a first for me. My name is Freya, by the way. I'm one of Hyperion's distant cousins, although we decided to revise that relation given that we do good business together. We've decided we're first cousins now."
"Pleased to meet you," Ophelia smiled at the woman's quirks. "You might know my name already, but I'm Ophelia. I'm a stowaway that Hyperion picked up in Caudiceum."
"Oh I've heard the tale, very riveting! And I must say, your drusi is a marvellous thing."
"Part of that Byzantine strangeness, I think," Ophelia answered with a lopsided smile.
"Let's go inside, dear; it might be spring for you but I'm a southern woman; I can't stand all this bloody snow."
The three of them entered the tent to find Hyperion at the side of a table with all manners of dishes laid out pouring a tray of tea. Ophelia suddenly remembered a certain something that had been forgotten amidst the confusion of her life at the palace in Sophia.
"I had brought some chai from Byzantium to share with you," she lamented. "It must still be at the palace with the rest of my things."
Hyperion raised his eyes and smiled mischievously.
"Sit next to me, then; your company will sweeten my chai and make me forget about my disappointment."
Ophelia laughed, and they all sat down to enjoy the food and the tea. The conversation, however, was not to be light and carefree: she had many questions still.
"Will you tell me how was it that the Phrygians turned up at the ceremony?" she asked. "I was not expecting that to happen."
"Perhaps it is better I mention first that the goddess shows us favour when it comes to you, princess. By happenstance I received word that Freya was coming into town," Hyperion raised his glass at his cousin. "And she brought with her a number of acquaintances."
"When the news of your arrival at Aurelia reached the northern shores of the Free Cities, the Phrygian prince approached me," Freya continued. "We eventually made a deal so that I would transport him to Sophia. It wasn't a popular opinion with his acquaintances, but he argued, quite strongly I must say, that they ought to confront their enemy directly at the heart of their empire. It is one of those Phrygian quirks, their honour and all that… they all seemed quite satisfied when he explained he was duty-bound to you, and that he had to repay a life-debt by rescuing you."
Ophelia closed her eyes and let her head fall into her hands. "That fool…"
"He died a hero, sister," Freya pointed out. "He honoured his duty as a warrior, and he slayed the one who'd oppressed his people. It may seem like a tragedy that he should die in the process, but if one is to be fair; neither you or I are Phrygians, but we should afford him the compassion of looking at it the way a Phrygian would look at it. It was rather impressive what he accomplished."
"Quite foolish of us to afford him that business," Eon pointed out. "Even if the payout was substantial, the Empire is now in chaos. How many of our trade routes are affected…?"
"It will pass," Hyperion pointed out. "And perhaps, trade will change. Freya might be right in that it might be good to focus on carrying passengers…"
Before the conversation would veer towards the commercial implications of the meltdown that was happening in the Empire, Ophelia decided to ask another question: "how was it that you were able to sneak them in and yourself as attendants?"
Hyperion smiled deviously. "The Emperor did not run as tight of a ship as he thought he did," he said. "There's not many of them, and for obvious reasons they're very well hidden from sight, but there are those who do not view him favourably at all within his own Empire. It was quite surprising but they found us before we found them: they seemed quite happy to pull some strings to let us in."
Ophelia was shocked. "That is… surprising. They wanted Aurelius dead?"
"They wanted an opportunity to change things in the Empire," Hyperion clarified. "Although the Pleroma is quite independent, it still answers to the Emperor. As I understand they were quite resentful of his meddling at random, and thought it was time to reduce his influence. They also knew that you had not been brought in of your own volition, and seemed quite partial to your plight as well."
That made Ophelia wonder if perhaps one of the Knights that she'd met in Arqa had been part of that group; it could have also been one of those that had seen her fight with Aurelius when she tried to flee Sophia on her own. Either way, it felt reassuring that not everyone in the Elysian empire was captive to that worshipful madness most of the people she'd met were prey to.
"Is Aurelius truly dead, then?"
"'Tis the question of the hour," Freya offered. "No one knows. He could be recovering, or he could be truly dead. Only time will tell."
"And Phobos? I saw him fall... What about all the Phrygians?"
Hyperion smiled sadly. "All fell, as well. I should say for your benefit that Aristides followed the prince and was amongst the warriors at the ceremony. A large panic gripped the audience at one point, and that is how I and Eon manage to sneak you out. Many were trampled, and with the Knights busy trying to fight off the Phrygians or contain the crowd, we were able to take you and Phobos' body to safety."
He anticipated Ophelia's question: "once we crossed the border in Thracia we gave him burial in the Phrygian manner. I thought it appropriate that he's not laid to rest in Elysian territory."
Ophelia took some solace in the thought that Phobos' death had come after he'd laid the biggest blow to the Empire anyone had ever accomplished. His name, undoubtedly, would go down in history as that of a mighty, honourable warrior, and that was the best someone like him could've wished for. In her mind she thanked him for coming to her rescue, and saluted him for achieving what he had so desperately wanted.
"What are we to do now, then?" she asked the three Chaldeans. "Where to, next?"
"I had a thought earlier that we should take advantage of your Byzantine strangeness," Freya proposed, excitedly. "Thracia is notorious for being a dangerous terrain to travel, but under your protection we could travel inwards and easily procure some of those precious ores to sell at the coast. They will fetch an incredibly high price in this time, when few will be able to make the journey."
Hyperion seemed ill at ease with her suggestion. "Perhaps, making use of Ophelia's powers at this point would not be prudent. She's had enough grief because of them."
"I don't mind," Ophelia said. "Didn't you say I have my own page to write? Well, perhaps let's start it this way: a savvy businesswoman. Well, perhaps not very savvy; I will rely on you all to do the trading. But I can do some heavy-lifting."
"Yes!" Freya exclaimed. "I like this!"
It did not excite Hyperion as much as she'd have thought given their earlier acquaintance. A melancholic air followed him whenever the topic was brought up. When the two of them retired to his tent later that day, she asked him what his thoughts were.
"While we were away from each other the thought occurred to me that much has happened because of what you're capable of doing," Hyperion said quietly. "That Byzantine strangeness, as Freya puts it, begets greed. And should I do the same as the others, and value you only on the basis of what I want you to be, I would only do you a disservice."
Ophelia walked up to him and laid a hand on his cheek. "Just as you said I'll never be Aurelius; you'll never be like the others, Hyperion. I have not had any thoughts about this, yet somehow I am as sure as if I had been reading it every night in the stars that whenever I'm in your presence I feel at home. And that is why I don't mind giving you my powers to use; with you I see many paths open in front of me, rather than a single one."
Hyperion smiled in spite of himself, and grabbed the hand on his cheek. "I thought you were my calamity for the longest time; Eon, bless his heart, warned me many times that I would meet disaster should I follow you. But still, I did it, I kept offering my hand to you because I longed for every smile you would throw my way. Isn't that strange?"
He kissed the back of her palm. "Let me be greedy this time. Stay with me, let us go together from here onwards until we're tired of each other. As a Byzantine or as Ophelia or as someone else entirely; I don't mind. But I beg you not to leave me this time – I will gladly meet my fate, I will gladly walk into my own undoing if it means I get to kiss your hand every day."
Ophelia giggled; "I don't know what will be of us in the future, but right now, I want to be here with you. Is that enough?"
Hyperion pulled her into his embrace. He brought their lips together for a quick kiss; his eyes were full of warmth, and some relief. Ophelia would've thought that she'd be anxious, unsure, too confused about her feelings to understand if she was making the right choice, but nothing mattered in that exact moment. It just felt right. It was as if the stars had finally aligned and she was standing at the right place at the right time.
"Let us write a story together," she said against his lips. "One of a stowaway from another world that did not want her, that made her place at the side of a sneaky merchant who would not yield to his destiny."
He laughed, and rested his forehead on hers. "You ought to improve your calligraphy, first."