The Veiled One

Chapter Eleven : Freedom can be Captivity

I guide Sibyl out of the training room and back into the foyer. She stares at the sparkling colors on the floor as if she's never seen them before.

"Why this window?" I finally ask her. She shrugs.

"I always liked that story when I was a girl. The notion of basically dying for the purpose of trying to find the entrance to the land of the dead used to fascinate me. I loved irony even as a child."

"I always hated the story," I reply, heading for the stairs. Sibyl lingers for a minute longer, the light casting colors onto her veil. I swear that it's almost as if I can see her face for a single, brief instant. And then the moment is gone, and I'm left standing on the stairs as Sibyl starts to climb behind me.

"Why did you hate it?"

"The parents in the capital always used to use that story to force their kids to do something. I came to associate the Well at Dunkill with trickery and tyranny."

"What story did you like?"

I pause in the midst of climbing to consider the question. Most of the stories I liked were swashbuckling tales my father used to make up, ones that involved dashing, debonair pirate captains who were suspiciously like me and seemed to always win the fight. My grandmother told me stories, too. I used to love them all, but my favorite story was the one I'm living right now.

"Yours, I guess."

"Mine?"

I start climbing again to help dispel the awkwardness.

"Yeah. I loved anything that had magic in it. My grandma used to tell me that you were walled up in this castle because you tried to be like the gods, that you tried to use magic. She might have been a little off on the details, but she was always a firm believer in magic."

"I think I would have liked your grandmother."

I think of her warmly, remembering how much she loved Endor and me, and how much she had hated dying. The fever had been quick but decisive, the kind of illness that didn't make her suffer, but didn't give Endor and me a moment to prepare either.

"I'm sure she would have liked you. You have the same sort of spirit."

I take the stairs all the way to the eighth floor, where there's a great room that overlooks the entire village. There are overstuffed leather sofas and chairs that are arranged around a great river-rock fireplace, as well, as stunning floor-to-ceiling windows that allow an amazing view. A few tables with chairs are set up for games or reading or writing, and there are tapestries hung on the walls that must date back three hundred years or more.

I settle on a sofa underneath the chandelier, which is crafted from caribou antlers. Sibyl settles beside me, leaning tentatively against me. I shift so that my arm is around her, and she leans against my side.

"You know, when I was a kid, I used to hear all the stories about the Veiled One," I continue. Sibyl tips her head up to look at me, and I try to address her directly as much as possible. "As I got older, I realized how things were. There are lotteries held in every village every year, and all the villages rotate through so that too many don't get taken from one place. It's supposed to be fair, but everyone knows that certain families can buy their way out of the drawings, or even not be entered at all."

"Did you know when you came to the Unchartered Territories that my castle was here?"

I shake my head. "No. It's not common knowledge outside of this region. And even the people who live here have their doubts about who and what you are."

"What did you believe?"

"That you had magic. I didn't know much else beyond that." I chuckle, thinking about how I'd stared at this very castle that day with Leo on our way home from work. "My best friend thinks that you're a spoiled princess who's a million years old."