Wild Card

♥
O N E ♥

I’ve never believed in magic. It didn’t matter how many books I read, about myths of mages creating worlds with a flick of their wrists, or horrific tales of monstrous creatures beyond the realm of my imagination. It didn’t matter how many rumors of legendary immortal beauties circled about my kingdom, or the hushed gossip about fish-tailed half-naked women dwelling in deep waters. Magic wasn’t real, and as much as I enjoyed diving into the stories that described it in detail, I refused to believe any of those stories were true.

That was, until one evening, after a traumatizing night terror had wrenched me from my peaceful slumber. In my woozy state, as I stood before my mirror and inspected myself for the wounds I’d received in my dream, I was nearly certain one of the books on the floor near my bed had spoken to me.

“You know son, you might want to be careful when holding candles up to mirrors.”

With a screech, I stumbled into the mirror, nearly dropping the candle to the floor and sending my room into flames. It took several minutes for me to compose myself and to realize that, no, it wasn’t a book that had spoken.

“Father?” My heart wouldn’t settle in my chest, my throat constricted. Why did he have to sneak up on me like that? A multitude of massive castle corridors separated us, but he still wandered to me? “W-what are you doing here?”

Clutching the brass candle-holder with both hands, I pivoted from my reflection to see him. As usual, he seemed frail, in his thick winter night-robe, its frayed edges swaying over the marble floors. He carried a lantern—a safer choice—and though I caught his narrowed gaze, he smirked.

“I needed something to drink… and I didn’t want to wake Benson. Poor thing had a handful with the new squires this afternoon.” Benson, Father’s chief squire, wasn’t so young anymore, and earlier that evening, I’d heard him snoring from his comfortable chamber across the hall.

Taking a few steps towards Father, I noticed the shadows shifting over his face—he had a long day, too. All his days were long since Mother’s death.

“But… the kitchens are in the opposite direction,” I said, peering behind him, past the open door and into the dark corridor. It went on for what felt like miles. I would know, I had to walk it every morning, and that was just to reach the cupboards that contained my favorite snacks.

Father winced, though he might have meant to smile. Standing there half-garbed, his caramel tresses tangled and unfastened, naked without his crown and the usual array of sashes and medals… he wasn’t a king. He was a man, grieving for his queen, and finding excuses to check on his only son in the middle of the night.

“Yes… I saw a flickering light and… I wanted to warn you—candles and mirrors don’t mix well. Though if you had a cup, too, I’d have interfered sooner.”

He padded farther into the room and lowered onto my maroon sheets, thrown to and fro from my fits and nightmares. The giant blanket dangled off the copper frame, and three of the six pillows were on the floor where I had tossed them after screaming from my feverish dreams. Several books piled at the foot of the mattress, some open, some lying upside down. Books I shouldn’t have been reading in dim candlelight before attempting to sleep, as they were what prompted me to race to my mirror and make sure I hadn’t developed red and blue dots all over my face.

“A cup? What would that have to do with anything?” I huffed, still regaining my wits as I meandered to the other side of the canopy-bed and searched for my goblet of water. “And why is it bad to hold candles up to mirrors?”

Father chuckled, a half-hearted sound, and not the intimidating booming it used to be. A laugh from him would have once silenced an entire room… but now it came out as more of a wheezing choke.

As I at last retrieved my drink—and guzzled down half its contents—I spun on my heel to watch him.

He turned his upper body to meet my gaze and patted the space beside him. “Come, Teo. Let me tell you a story.”

I wanted to roll my eyes—King Baines’ stories usually drawled on for hours, and at this rate, we may see the sun rise from my balustrade.

“It is late, Father… would you like me to take you back to your rooms? Or I can lead you to the kitchens—” I bit my tongue to bar myself from offering to begin such an exhausting trip across the castle.

“This will not take long, son. Please,” he patted the spot again, “indulge in an ailing man’s request, would you?”

If I refused, he’d use his I-am-the-king voice and wake the entire wing. So, clutching my candle in one hand and my cup in the other, I trudged around the bed and dropped at his side.

“Fine. What is this story?”

He cleared his throat, and a faint tobacco and liquor scent swished from his mouth—things he shouldn’t have consumed.

“When I was sixteen… ah, your age, coincidentally… my father told me this tale. It was one of caution, one to heed and not to disobey.” His hand wrapped around my upper arm, and he squeezed. “He made me promise.”

I glanced into my cup, swirling the remaining liquid, wondering how long it would be before I could snuggle under my covers and pretend like I hadn’t had a nightmare of transforming into some mythical spotted beast.

“Yes?”

He squeezed harder. “The tale is a legend, Teodric. A legend that says if you stand in front of a mirror holding a cup and a candle, you… can open a doorway between worlds. Dimensions.”

“Worlds?” Unable to stop myself, I scoffed and lifted from the mattress. “Dimensions? Father, enough. This is from some book, yes? One I have yet to read?”

King Baines shot up and snatched my wrist to turn me to him. “It is not from a book. It is real, son.”

“But…” I tilted my head and squinted at him. Light flickered over his blotchy but milky skin. His once velvety smooth eyes had become like ashy pits, dreary, dreadful, diminished. “Dimensions? What sort of nonsense magic is that?”

“Nonsense magic, you say,” he let me go and motioned at the novels by my bed, “yet you read such stories, no? Why would you not believe them to be true?”

With a groan, I stormed to my bedside table to deposit the goblet. “Enough.” I dragged a hand down my face, finding I had started sweating, and winced. “Most of us aren’t like you, persuaded Mother died from some witchy curse—”

“—she did!” He stomped to me, one side of his robe slipping to the crook of his elbow. He had lost a lot of weight. He barely fit his regular clothes anymore. I swallowed a glob of acidic saliva at the sight of him. My father. The king of Springport. A disheveled, mourning man. An exhausted monarch losing his mind.

“The healers couldn’t explain it, and they…” His chin quivered, which told me I’d taken it too far. I’d pushed too much.

I couldn’t let Father break. “Come, I will take you to bed. You shouldn’t be up so late… you shouldn’t be wandering alone.”

He didn’t dispute it, but as I guided him into the hallway, my candle illuminating the gold molding lining the walls, he seized my forearm and dug his nails into my night-shirt.

“Promise me, Teo. Like I promised my father, and he promised his—” he coughed, and I had to heave him up before he lost his footing, “—promise me.”

“Promise what?” We’d only made it a quarter of the way, and already I regretted suggesting I’d accompany him.

“Promise… that you will not try to reenact the legend. No matter what you believe… promise.”

Filling my cheeks with air and glaring up at the ceiling plastered in floral designs that I’d memorized in all my years of roaming the halls in daylight, I rubbed his back and forced a smile.

“Sure, Father.” I fought against my eyes wanting to roll backwards. “I promise I will not hold a candle and a cup in front of a mirror in an attempt to open a doorway.”

♥ T W O ♥

“He’s dead.”

I didn’t cry as I said it, because it was no surprise. Father’s health started draining after Mother’s death, and each day his skin turned a paler hue of gray. It surprised us all he lasted so long.

For five years, he pretended to be fine. But he battled his night-walking insomnia, his allergies to foods he once enjoyed, his growing inability to amble about with ease as he used to. His limbs weakened, his eyesight worsened, and soon he even stopped talking in full sentences.

The physicians couldn’t quite explain it. “It is grief, Highness,” some told me. Others tried to claim magic abuse, as they had with Mother—but I shut them down at once. Magic didn’t exist, and if it did, why would it attack my kind, good-natured parents?

“He’s dead, Teo, and you must live up to his name,” I said to myself, my reflection making me nauseous. Gazing at the thick lines under my eyes, the new and deepening wrinkles forming on my forehead, I swallowed several sips of my wine. A fine vintage—Father picked it out himself a few months ago, when he became bedridden but thirsty for anything to numb his agony. “You must find a spouse, find your inner strength, and be the king.”

I snorted. Me? King of Springport? It felt unreal. Yes, I had accepted Father’s death. Yes, I had moved into his decadent, velvet and satin inlaid chambers a few days after the funeral. And yes, I was his one and only heir… but this? Sleeping in his bed, sitting on his throne, wearing his crown? It wasn’t true.

The copper designs outlining the mirror morphed into faces, and they seemed to laugh at me. The vivid paintings in the background, hanging over and around the canopy bed, snickered in silence as they pointed at me. The wind whispered through the half-opened balcony doors, and even it mocked me, reminding me of my ineptitude.

Me, Prince Teodric of Springport, an overgrown boy obsessed with books about monsters and yearning to play cards with squires and butlers in the basement. A child seeking to fill in the shoes of a giant.

It made me recall my eighteenth birthday, three years prior, when rows and rows of ladies from around the world sprawled at my feet, begging for me to choose them. They weren’t there for me, not really. Not for my basic looks and my easily-lost-in-a-crowd height. But Father insisted it was customary, and that he had chosen Mother in the cluster of suitors that came for him at the same age.

Glaring down at my glowing golden breeches and matching shoes, I had wondered how he did it. How he had the strength to stand atop a dais and let others ogle him, hungry for his power. These women fanned out below like colorful feathers of a peacock, their radiant necklaces blinding me, their hair piled so high their curls touched the ceiling. And they were starving.

Their fathers wanted them to seek alliances. Their mothers sent them to make babies. And somehow, by some strange twist of fate, they showered me in attention.

“Oh, Highness, your eyes are the most beautiful shade of brown I have ever seen!” said one of them, her plump cheeks reddening as she batted her heavily coated lashes.

On the inside I choked—beautiful shade of brown?

“They say I am identical to a goddess,” said another, twirling a strand of my ash-and-raven curls around her gloved finger. I nearly gagged as she pouted her violet-colored lips in some seductive trick that had no effect on me. I wanted to ask her who said such a thing—she looked nothing like a heavenly creature from the skies—but I couldn’t stand her overwhelming vanilla musk and preferred to breathe out of my mouth so I wouldn’t have to smell her.

Father had chuckled, assuring me he had a tough time picking at first.

I didn’t pick at all. Three years passed, and most of the ladies left court, depressed and disgusted that the Prince of Springport still hadn’t made a decision. A few lingered, desperate to attract me, to sway me into marrying them, bringing fame and fortune to their fathers. And I would have continued to lead them on, to watch them squirm for my affections as I postponed my choice, day after day, year after year…

But Father died.

“Now you must choose, Teo.” I sneered at my floor-length night-robe. Striped and lined with thick fur, it tasted like luxury. It was Father’s, and I had planned to get rid of it after my inauguration, but… I had to admit, it was comfortable.

The sight of anything that belonged to him sent shivers up my arms, but his things comforted me. They were the last remnants of his soul, like his favorite bejeweled wine goblet, sticky with crimson liquid, still stuck to the bedside table. Or his balcony slippers, worn-down and riddled with holes, but a gift his queen crafted for him. Or that tattered, stained leather journal of his—

“Oh.” I clutched my cup to my chest at the memory. The words he whispered on his death-bed, four weeks ago.

“My journal,” he coughed up blood, “I tucked it into my desk drawer, but I want you to take it. It… it is a royal tradition, from father to son.”

King Baines begged me to take possession of it, to write my name in it after his last entry. And he also urged me to read said passage, as it would define my entire reign.

“Fine.” I swallowed a few swigs of the alcohol and wrapped the robe tighter around myself. Its rope was a tad constricting, as Father was smaller than me in the middle, having lost all his muscle from being unable to eat.

I strode through the vast quarters to his desk, nestled in the corner by the balcony. His favorite place to sit and write, he always claimed, and I could tell why. The views from there were splendid, overseeing the port where our kingdom got its name. Now, with stars sprinkled across the heavens, peering down onto the navy waves, the world appeared at peace. Quiet and asleep, resting before the festivities of tomorrow.