Perhaps it is fitting for such stories as this to end in a wedding. A ringing of church bells filling the air on a spring afternoon. The sky cloudless, the air filled with the faintest scent of lilacs and freshly cut grass. A celebration filled with wine and glorious food and dancing well into the night.
Yet this particular wedding was not an end, Lucy knew. And as she looked on from the crowd of family and friends at the Baron and his bride, she found that this would be an entirely different beginning for the both of them. Their lives diverging in an entirely different way than how it had all begun.
For a long while they had tried; coming to know one another after the events of that night within the carnival. Wondering perhaps if they might kindle some spark of affection. Yet in the end they found that they argued far too much. And while they remained fantastic friends forever bound by a single magical night, their plans of a wedding were quietly pushed aside in favor of several years of adventure. Their friendship woven through countless mishaps and wondrous memories that they shared together.
Nevertheless, romance had not abandoned Edward entirely, and after much coaching from Lucy on how to talk to girls about anything other than earthworms, he found success with the charming person of Miss Elena Montague.
She was a petite brunette that had caught Edward's eye not long after; her demeanor gentle, her smile like the soft glow of the sun, and with her only fault being that she was a distant cousin of Agnes Montague.
Nevertheless, this could be forgiven as it was no fault of her own, and after much goading and teasing on Lucy's part, she had finally convinced Edward to approach her.
It had transpired far better than either of them could have imagined, and that very summer the two were married, with Edward insisting that Lucy be his best man.
"Am I fated to be the grumpy old aunt to your children as well?" she had asked, a sense of delight filling her as he had flushed a deep crimson, his reply a stuttered mess.
"Well, I only meant-- Not unless you wish to."
Jabbing him playfully in the shoulder, Lucy allowed a light laugh to escape her lips. "I'd love to, you oaf. Now do straighten your tie-- you can't have your misses seeing you looking like a rumpled mess."
Indeed, the wedding was as magnificent as he deserved, Lucy felt. Her heart warming at the sight of the two standing before the altar. Cheeks dusted a bashful rose, shy smiles gracing their lips as they were lost in one another's eyes during their vows.
It seemed then, that Edward would have his happily ever after, his life moving beyond his death. And though he had been changed by the night in the Carnival of the Lost, he hardly ever spoke of it again-- daring not to venture outside on the eve of its arrival.
Yet as for Lucy herself, she never forgot the carnival. Waiting for it year after year whereupon she stood at its edge, never once daring to enter even as the music beckoned her in. Instead she would watch them as the guests filed in one by one beyond the silver gates, their expressions filling with wonder at the sights of magic around them.
Once, as she stood in silence and darkness nearing midnight, there emerged a dark figure from the tents beyond and her heart ceased to beat for a moment as she looked upon Azrael coming too to stand at the carnival's edge.
He did not seem to see her, his vision perhaps hindered by something she herself could not see. A barrier between worlds. And yet perhaps even still he knew she was there, the faintest of grins shadowed upon his lips.
"Have you come to find me once more, Miss Caramonte?" she heard him whisper into the night. "Have you come to set me free?"
"Perhaps one day, you miserable fool." she whispered back.
The smile upon his lips grew then as though he had heard her promise, and a moment later she watched as he returned to the carnival, to its shows and magnificence. His steps seeming lighter than before.
Indeed, it was such a promise that Lucy vowed to keep. And in the years that followed she poured her mind into books of the ancient magics and the old powers that remained beneath the earth, long forgotten.
Even as the town of Hawthorn Vale grew, its meager town houses turned to countless shopfronts, the forests around torn down and hills leveled to make way for manicured parks and bustling streets, she never once forgot the ancient power that lingered in the air.
She searched for a way-- any way-- in which the performers of the carnival and the carnival master himself might be set free from their curse. For if souls could be released from the throes of death, perhaps they could as well.
She would free the man with the mask of bone. She would free the Lord of the Dead. And one day, his silver eyes would once again watch the rising of the morning sun.
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The Mortal And The Wicked-- ONC 2023
FantasyONC 2023 Shortlister His features had haunted her for years; a boy with silver eyes peering out from beneath a mask of bone. His body cloaked in darkness, a wicked grin upon his lips that spoke of treachery-- a smile that had broken countless hearts...
