The Bride of the King in Yellow

I. Rebirth

Salt repleted my lungs the day I was reborn.

Carried to shore I saw an angel who at first I thought bore wings of satin. When I opened my burning eyes she was nothing but a girl of youth, slender and small. Her brown hair traversed down the side of her tan neck, drenched in water along with the rest of her clothes. The two of us breathed in this renewal, my lungs choking in desperation for air and her breath steady yet strained. Her physique blocked the sun from my gaze but in my confusion I saw a ring of light around her head, shining as the brightest star on a black sky. As I looked at her attempting to blink the pain away, she merely smiled as if I were a miracle. There was a haunting mark of destiny in the way she stood over me, her hand caressing my drenched hair from my eyes.

"Welcome back, dearest soul. You are quite the miracle."

Her sweet voice put me to sleep in an instant and I neglected the fear I once held, knowing that if Death were to come for me once more, it would wrestle first with her.

I know now, readers, that I almost failed to do the same for her.

A boy cannot often boast about his guardian angel that stayed, but mine did. The entirety of the truth was it was rather I who remained in the Landor House through her charity. It was a large property on the highest of ocean cliffs, the water ravaging the stones beneath as the air was cleansed with a morning and evening mist. Through constant prayers and murmurings of the servants, I quickly learned this was a House of God, and admitted only his most willing disciples through a vast generational legacy. Landor was a prominent wealthy family of the Church with decades of priests, ladies of charity, supplicants of holy wars, and ministers of the truth. It was my angel, Clementine, who pleaded my purpose here, for they would have rather depicted my arrival as the mark of something sinister.

My saturated clothes gave my position away as a diminutive youth of little means and talents. They did not ask from whence I came- rather if my parents were still bound to this mortal realm. I shook my head full of saltwater- a feeling that has never truly disappeared and continued to muddle my thoughts for years. They did not ask another question for a fortnight. There was talk of a religious blessing that might bestow a mark of propriety on my life, yet her Father never spoke nor regarded me as a person in his House, much less a servant. I was a ghost to all of the family and workers, but not to Clementine. My angel bid me rest but never entered the small quarters where I was stationed, and there I waited for the new person I was to be. It was a room of little consequence and while my memories were polluted, I acknowledged the sentiment of pride to have a space of my own for the first time.

One morning I was eating the serving of figs the maids brought for my breakfast when a strange man appeared. He reeked of alcohol and animals, his mustache and beard devoured by grime. His countenance left me unsettled but I met his grim gaze, awaiting his orders.

"How old are ye, boy?"

"Ten," I answered honestly, for this I knew. My name and recollection of memories distant in the stars were mine to recollect, but when put to focus they dissolved as a mere reflection over ocean water- never truly there or too far from my reach.

"Ye know about horses?" I shook my head. "Ye don't know what a horse is, ye dumb-witted clodpate?"

I soon realized my mistake but was given no chance of recovery. Before I spoke he grabbed me out of bed, thrusting me down the luxurious halls to the paltry stalls.

My new life was admitted as a dense boy of little talent, of no consequence.

Same as before.

The brightest news was that Mr. Harren was not a monstrous man, but rather miserable and disinterested in life. He fulfilled the daily tasks of grooming, picking hooves, tossing the hay bedding, saddling or dismounting the Landor riders and guests - yet there was no fervent desire for anything. I saw him as a shell of a man, and as a young boy with a second chance at life, this troubled me greatly. I feared to become him- to become something so unlike myself that I had no love or desire in this life.