I turn my eyes from my newest appearance (black hair, red eyes, how predictable, how boring) and onto my maid.
She is the closest thing I have to a friend. She was always there. Always loyal, always there to help. There was little she could truly do to help me in my struggles, being a servant and a commoner, but her presence was always a balm. Always there to listen, to bring me a cup of tea, or run a bath.
No matter what I did, what I was accused of doing, what I was convicted of doing. Her faith never faltered. Not once in all my lives had she betrayed me. Even when she really should have. Even when I had told her to, that she should leave me in order to save herself she refused. She had stayed with me right up until the moment I had been killed, pleading with the knights. I always wonder if they killed her too, probably (I am selfishly glad I did not have to see it).
During the life where I played the cruel evil villainess to the fullest, bullying, backstabbing, and blackmailing (though i could never direct it at her) she saw what I did to others but never once did she waver. Never once did her devotion falter. No matter how awful I was. It drove me a little mad, that she is always able to see me so clearly. That when asked why she stayed she told me it was because she knew that I was only doing what I felt I had to do. Even now it makes me want to cry, to be known so thoroughly is terrifying.
I allowed myself this one comfort. It was selfish, I knew. Being close to me would only ever bring her misfortune. Would only ever drag her down into my own tragic endings. My inevitable defeats at the hands of the heroes, the light of the heroine. It was awful of me, I should send her away, somewhere safe from the inevitable fallout. Where she would not have to watch my execution again, where she would not be slaughtered alongside me once more.
Yet I don't, because I am a selfish, evil person. Because if she left I think I would simply shatter, if the only good thing I get is gone I would simply collapse and never get up again.
It is the reason that for all my tactics I could never bring myself to commit suicide. I knew she would be the one to find my body and I could not do that to her. Which sounds so hypocritical considering I am willing to drag her along to my catastrophic end time and again.
I study her now. She has freckles this time. Dotted across her nose. Plain brown hair and eyes. A side character in the grand story. Plain and meant to be unimportant.
She is anything but unimportant.
Her name is Anne. Sometimes that is short for different things but it is always Anne.
She steps back a small smile directed at me. Her eyes kind (always so kind), she bows.
"The Duke awaits your presence in the dining hall." When she straightens she reaches out a hand and squeezes my shoulder so lightly it might not have been there at all. A show of support that could never be too open lest someone notice and take exception. (Lest any of the heroes learn of the one thing that could actually hurt me.)
There must be something important my father wants to discuss. He would never bother going out of his way to eat with me otherwise. That never changes.
This is likely the beginning of the plot. I usually wake up just as it begins. Usually it starts with a ball of some kind. A gathering where the heroes will meet and begin their love stories.
I enter the dining hall with a grace perfected over so many lives it requires no thought. A curtsy, a greeting, take your seat, wait for him to take the first bite, begin eating, wait for him to say whatever it is he came here to say.
"The royal family is hosting a ball in honor of the crown princes birthday. It is also so the prince can choose a suitable match for betrothal. You will be attending."
Right on queue. How dull. At least there is no mention of a school, those lives were always the most tedious.
"Of course father." Nothing but the quiet clinking of silverware on plates was heard in the empty hall for what felt like a small eternity.
"You will do everything within your power to make sure it is you he chooses to marry."
A demand. No room for argument, or protests. A task given to a pawn, with the expectation of complete obedience.
"I will do my best Father." What else could I do but agree. There was never any point in arguing with him. He would always get his way somehow.
It would never work of course, the prince would never marry me. How could he when he was destined to fall for the holy light of the heroine.
The story was as unchanging as always. I stood, having finished my plate, bade farewell to my father and was rejoined by Anne on my way back to my room. Slipping from some shadow to fall into step with me in the familiar way she always did.