[attr="class","vesstestbody"]
IN THE AFTERMATH OF THE FIRST DECADE
The years performed their terrible dance, but while many around her changed like the autumn leaves, Elisabeth felt herself stagnate. Others like
Isaac Merlo,
ana fell,
jayden cross,
Felix Gallagher -- and yes, even
Cillian Quinn -- had found happiness in this new world. All had, perhaps, save for her and
BARNABY FINCH, though he hid his unhappiness better than she ever could.[break][break]
Elisabeth felt how his resentment bled through his skin in the night, rendering the masked smile the courier wore useless. To him, and only to him, did she confess her Avatarship to Tapu Fini and the tangled strings that had bound it to her and
FERNANDO SILPH.[break][break]
But when she offered him the peace of oblivion, Barnaby silently rejected her
MISTY TERRAIN. Quietly, she wondered if she had the willpower to do the same.[break][break]
His mind was stronger than her own.[break][break]
One insignificant night out of many thousands of such nights, Elisabeth stared out her window at the stars that guided their future and asked herself for what purpose she yet lived. The darkness of such thoughts summoned the anger of both her patrons, their fury a maelstrom that held her back from daring to linger on such bleak melancholy.[break][break]
She may have given up hope of returning to Hoenn, but neither Wo-chien nor Tapu Fini had lost their resolve. Gods did not hold time with the same weight as mortals.[break][break]
So if she was to be trapped here, in this hell she had stumbled into, she no choice but to find purpose.[break][break]
And she found hers in an unexpected place.[break][break]
I. THE ELEVENTH YEAR
The young girl was a sullen creature, her blonde hair covering her eyes as she stubbornly avoided facing her new, dark-haired mistress. The memory was all too vivid, still: her own mother collapsed on the ground in that pitiful state, begging for the pink mist that plumed from this cruel woman's fingertips.[break][break]
"You resent me," Elisabeth spoke, and it was not a question, but an observation.[break][break]
"I know what you do to people," the girl replied, and her blue eyes shone with defiance. "I will not let you control me the way you have controlled others."[break][break]
"Is that what you think I do?"[break][break]
A quiet laugh left the older woman's lips as she gestured for her new ward to follow her inside her home: that ivy-wreathed manor with the gloomy towers. It was a vast place, empty of people save for them both. There were no servants, because servants were a luxury in times of war, though the girl suspected that such solitude was preferred by her new guardian.[break][break]
"Your room is upstairs," the witch said instead. "You may go anywhere you please, save for the west wing. That is where my chambers, and the chambers of the courier, reside."[break][break]
Red eyes settled on deep blue, thoughtful.[break][break]
"You will be expected to earn your keep. This is an apprenticeship. Do you understand?"[break][break]
No, the girl thought, though her face remained blank. I don't understand you at all.[break][break]
"What's your name, girl?" the witch asked sharply.[break][break]
"Lisette," the blonde replied. "Lisette of Motostoke."[break][break]
She had no surname. People of such low-born houses never did.[break][break]
"You may call me Elisabeth," the witch replied. "Or Elisa, if it pleases you."[break][break]
The girl said nothing, biting her tongue. What she truly wanted to call this woman was too dangerous to voice aloud.
[break][break]
II. THE TWELFTH YEAR
[break]
Their Majesties
Isaac Merlo and
Caleb Harcourt had both expressed concerns ever since a child had been welcomed into Elisabeth's home. The blonde girl had been anxiously watched over at a distance, waiting to see what darkness might encroach upon her in the company of such an ill-natured woman.[break][break]
Having found the addict that was her mother in that dark hovel of a home, however, few could question Elisabeth's decision to house Lisette elsewhere. Reluctantly, the monarchs relaxed their guard over the witch and her ward, their visits tapering off as nothing too damning revealed itself.[break][break]
The woman and girl grew used to each other, in the way that moss and ivy become resigned to the buildings that invade their forest. There was no pleasantry in this familiarity, for the girl resented being sold by her mother to this new life, and the woman seemed to find joy in nothing at all.[break][break]
The witch was an exacting guardian, with unpredictable moods. There were times Lisette wondered what she had done to anger the woman so, and other times that the witch seemed peculiarly surprised and pleased by how quickly Lisette took to understanding her lessons: of toxicology, of herbology, of astronomy.[break][break]
Nothing pleased the courier. He tolerated the girl with a silence that dignified her as equal to a statue: present, but unworthy of his notice beyond the first vaguely curious glance.[break][break]
Lisette waited for him to return from his travels before attempting her escape. That man would prove a valuable distraction, but he was not the true reasoning for her delay.[break][break]
Tentatively, her shaky hands attempted to rein the Spectrier in the stables, whispering reassurance to the beast as she tried to lift herself upon its back. Nightmarish hoofbeats shot her forward in an instant, leaving her breathless with fear as they catapulted together into the night.[break][break]
This creature will kill me, she realized as despair took hold of her, the world careening on its axis.[break][break]
Vines wrapped around the Spectrier's hooves, arresting it in place as two ochre eyes glittered in the wilderness.[break][break]
"That was foolish," the witch said, clicking her tongue as she took the reins. Only when she had them in hand did she release the horse from its thorny binds.
"To steal from a dangerous man is thoughtless enough, but know your place, child: you are not yet ready to command a god."[break][break]
Indignation burned through the young woman, though it faded into wondering at the witch's choice of words:
Not yet ready.[break][break]
"When will I be ready, then?" Lisette asked, swallowing back her complaint.[break][break]
"That is not for mortals to decide," the woman said simply.
"Gods, and gods alone, decide who they are willing to obey. And they decide in their own time." Behind the witch, the shadow of a demon followed her, dragging rot and decay behind her every step.[break][break]
In the morning, no punishment was given, nor naming of the incident voiced aloud. The courier treated her with the same indifference he always had, no trace of anger to be found on his face.[break][break]
How strange, Lisette thought, that this cruel woman had not betrayed her indiscretion.
[break][break]
III. THE THIRTEENTH YEAR
[break]
"If this place is meant to be my home," the girl announced one day, "some part of it should feel mine."[break][break]
"Oh?" came Elisabeth's faintly amused reply. "And what would you have, child, if you could have anything at all?"[break][break]
For a long time her young ward considered the question, at last declaring, "An aviary. I would like an aviary for my birds."[break][break]
"You may have the garden for that, then," Elisabeth said, airily waving the concern away. "Nothing can grow there, and nothing has for some time. Change it as you like and call it your own."[break][break]
How refreshing it was, to be spoken to with such irreverence. Whatever fear had held the girl fast had long fallen away from her, reserved for the rare moment she encountered Barnaby in the halls. He had yet to warm to her young ward; likely, Elisabeth believed, he never would.[break][break]
Not for the first time, he'd questioned Elisabeth's decision to house the mongrel in their home. What precious little peace he had in Motostoke was stolen away by this unwanted creature, and Elisabeth knew he resented the girl's presence all the more for it. "Why?" he insisted. "Aren't we enough, as we are?"[break][break]
She'd never wanted motherhood, Barnaby knew. Even now, that fact hadn't changed.[break][break]
"Because when you are gone," she replied, leaving a soft kiss on his brow, "I forget myself. I have nothing left here to anchor me." Elisabeth smiled up at him, and her eyes reflected his own like a mirror, their emerald green no longer clouded in the mist of a blood-red haze. "This is not forever, Barnaby. It is for now, that's all."[break][break]
It was like being reunited with someone he had lost years and years ago.[break][break]
Nothing in his demeanor changed, but Barnaby ceased to question Lisette's presence after that night -- if only for his own selfish reasons.
[break][break]
IV. THE FOURTEENTH YEAR
[break]
The girl was not meant to fight, but it did not stop her from recklessly running forward when the opportunity struck.[break][break]
"You don't understand what it's like to be powerless," Lisette snapped angrily at her guardian's rebuke, nursing the wound that had eaten away at her flesh. Sludge had worn away at the skin, a poultice applied to the gash on her arm.
"How could you? You're the most powerful being in Motostoke."[break][break]
The girl's petulance received no answer but cold disdain.
"Are you done feeling sorry for yourself?" the older woman asked at length, and the girl sulked, refusing to answer.
"Power is not given. It is earned. If you wish to cease being weak, then find a means to defend yourself first."[break][break]
Elisabeth would not entertain the discussion further.[break][break]
It took some time before the girl reached out to
Aurelie Lefevre at her forge, looking at the many weapons she had amassed for the people of Motostoke. Her own was not so powerful, for it lacked the materials that had made for such weapons, but she chose a bow -- something to wield with her guardian's poison-tipped arrows while flying the Pokemon she herself favored most.[break][break]
Birds, for some reason, had always called to Lisette. She admired and envied
Oliver Shrakes every time he soared overhead on his Galarian Articuno, longing to know what it felt like to be as empowered in flight as he.[break][break]
There were many opportunities to train -- for the adults, at least.
Belial Stone's leadership had transformed ordinary men into weapons, and Lisette would watch in awe from the sidelines as they trained in one-on-one combat, sometimes joined by others who wished to likewise sharpen their skill. The
DYNAMAX phenomenon especially fascinated her.[break][break]
Lisette was not so impressive, but she practiced sparring with the other children of the village, their varying ages all united by the fact they wished to cease being useless in the relentless siege against their city. Sometimes she glimpsed the royal children of
ana fell and
Isaac Merlo here, but what surprised Lisette more was the way the monarchs stared at Elisabeth when she arrived to monitor her ward's progress.[break][break]
It spoke of something heavier than the mantle of infamy that this woman wore.[break][break]
"Do you know them well?" Lisette dared to ask her, once, when they departed.[break][break]
"I did, once," Elisabeth said after what felt like an infinite silence.
"In a life where I was not so powerful as I am now."[break][break]
Elisabeth would not elaborate on that point, not now and not ever.
[break][break]
V. THE NEXT FEW YEARS
[break]
The world opened up at last, like a flower unfurling in bloom. Life was breathed into Motostoke again as the roads parted to offer route to the other cities, and with them, new faces joined the familiar cast of this mechanical city.[break][break]
It stunned Lisette, how many people both
Elisabeth Fiorelli and
BARNABY FINCH knew. It stunned her more to see how intimate some of those relationships appeared to be. [break][break]
She could not read the tension between
Felix Gallagher and her guardian, nor translate the way his emerald eyes passed over her with quiet wondering. His wife, Queen
luka chêne, seemed to have stepped out of the fairy tales that were by Lisette's own bedside table. The queen was beautiful, kind, and so very, very different than the hardened 'witch' who raised Lisette now. Silently, the girl suspected the two women tolerated one another, and nothing more.[break][break]
Lisette felt herself tense in the pressuring audience of King
Cillian Quinn, despite the relaxed way he and
Tempest Quinn approached the courier and her mistress -- as if they were old friends, and not bound by lofty titles. They had adopted children of their own, and upon seeing Lisette, assumed that their old friends had done the same.
BARNABY FINCH had been especially quick to remedy this misunderstanding, and the awkward moment passed in a blink.[break][break]
King
jayden cross and
fern delaney visited sometimes, too, and she found herself able to strike conversation with the latter about the herbs in Motostoke. It made her feel useful, like she had been paying attention to her lessons, and she appreciated the way that Jayden, despite his royalty, listened to her as if she were just as important as the others present in the room.[break][break]
Secretly, Lisette liked when
mint frost visited most of all. He told the funniest stories, making her laugh suddenly and brightly in a world that liked far too much to be dark and dour.[break][break]
The world felt bigger, suddenly. Less oppressive, less stifling. She felt a sort of excitement that she couldn't explain as she saw the worry lines that had characterised her guardian and
BARNABY FINCH both begin to fade, little by little, until something like hope dared to spark in their eyes.[break][break]
Or so Lisette believed, anyway. It was what she wanted to believe.[break][break]
When Elisabeth returned from a journey to the other cities, appearing severe and downcast, she did not at first answer when Lisette asked after her. She dismissed the young woman, choosing instead to meet with
BARNABY FINCH and speak in hushed whispers of omens and ill portents shared with
freya morningstar and gained from hearing from
MATIAS SILPH in Hammerlocke. Something about the Winter Solstice, about the earth feeling wrong.[break][break]
No one explained it to Lisette. In that moment, she felt very much the child that she was.
[break][break]
VI. THE NINETEENTH YEAR
"You are nearing your sixteenth year, are you not? A coming of age."[break][break]
The soft chirping of birds in the aviary filled the surprised silence that followed as Lisette blinked at the Pokeball her guardian had handed her, its contents spilling open to reveal a Galarian Rapidash that nuzzled her fondly.[break][break]
"Now you can travel the roads more freely, without having to share the company of others," the older woman explained, watching to see the girl's reaction. Genuine pleasure and disbelief made its mark on the girl's face, before its emotion was replaced with something else.[break][break]
"I never told you my birthday," Lisette said at length, pointedly looking up at her for an explanation.[break][break]
"Didn't you?" The answer came distracted and disinterested as Elisabeth turned away. The remnants of the courtyard garden that this place had once been were still visible underfoot, and Elisabeth knelt to inspect one of the few plants that had survived her neglect. She studied a browning shrub with a careful hand. "Regardless, on the subject of your age, I should add that I am not blind to the company you bring here at night. You are not as subtle as you pretend to be."[break][break]
The blonde shrugged, the diversion successful as her face flushed with heat. "Why should you care what I do? Or with whom, for that matter?" Lisette peered down at her guardian, running restless fingertips through her Rapidash's mane. "You don't have any say in who I love."[break][break]
"No. I don't." There was a pause, an interlude that conceded her point. "But I would caution you against being reckless with love, and against holding the concept of it too highly. You'll find it rarely is what stories proclaim it to be."[break][break]
A thought occurred to Lisette, far too late and with far too much curiosity: she had never heard Elisabeth express love towards any person, not her and not even the courier that she knew shared many of the woman's nights.[break][break]
"Do you not believe in love, then?" Lisette dared to ask, pulling away from her horse to kneel down beside her. "Or do you simply not love anything yourself?"[break][break]
Elisabeth stared for a long time at the leafy plant in front of her, eyes unfocused as they clouded with the distance of thought. "Things I love," she said finally, "have a tendency to rot when I dare to hold them too close. And things unfortunate enough to love me," she continued, "tend to find themselves cut down by thorns when they approach. It is better to keep a safe distance, either way."[break][break]
It was an answer that was not an answer. But it was more than Lisette had expected her to say.[break][break]
Before the girl could prod her further, the woman moved to retreat, murmuring farewells as she returned to the west wing where she could not be followed. But when Lisette turned around, the previously shriveled buds of the plant Elisabeth had touched blossomed into bloom, shy flowers unfurling their dewy white petals.
[break][break]
VII. THE FINAL YEAR
[break]
It was inevitable that the girl would ask.[break][break]
It was inevitable that Lisette would venture into the forbidden chambers of Elisabeth's home, investigating the letters that had been penned to her guardian and the secrets that might be found buried within. Too many pieces had not added up over time; the simplest answer to a riddle, often, was the correct one.[break][break]
"What am I to you?" Lisette prompted, staring into the emerald depths of the woman's eyes. The courier had long left for business of his own; no one would interrupt them, now, in the solace of their conversation.
"My mother told me she had named me for a woman who'd saved her, but... I never believed you were capable of mercy. Not back then."[break][break]
Elisabeth pursed her lips, her green-eyed gaze flitting towards the window. Outside, Motostoke seemed peaceful, despite the truth so often being otherwise.
"Your mother lost her firstborn son shortly after her husband passed in the war," she said at last.
"In her grief, she sought me out. She'd heard I could make people forget the things that ailed them. And she begged me to take away that pain."[break][break]
Fingers tapped the armrest of the chair, restless and uncomfortable as the words trailed off.[break][break]
"But you did more than that," Lisette finished, pinning her target down with her eyes -- cobalt blue, piercing and brilliant and far, far too familiar for Elisabeth's liking.
"You gave her something to replace that pain. Didn't you?"[break][break]
It would explain so much. The reason this infamous recluse would take in a ward of her own and tolerate her presence. The reason she remembered a birthday that had never been given to her, not once. The reason that Elisabeth had held such contempt for a mist-addled woman, to the point of seizing a neglected daughter for herself, despite her own aversion to humanity.[break][break]
"...Does it change anything for you," Elisabeth asked finally,
"if this story proves true? Does our relationship to one another become something more than what it already is?"[break][break]
Lisette contemplated this for a moment, biting her lip.
"I don't think so," she admitted uncertainly.
"It just, explains things, I think. It explains... you."[break][break]
"I have and had no intention of being a mother," Elisabeth interrupted, and the words rang with cold sincerity.
"I have no unconditional love to give you, child. But I was a daughter of parents who failed her, and the least I owed you was a better existence than the one I saw you lived."[break][break]
A hesitant beat passed, and the woman's expression darkened.[break][break]
"He doesn't know, and I have no intention of changing that. If you tell him what you think you know, I will deny it, and I will deny you. Do you understand?"[break][break]
"I do," Lisette said softly.[break][break]
And that was that. The book closed abruptly on this chapter as Elisabeth, as always, moved to leave the moment the conversation veered near anything that unmoored her. Lisette had become so used to this it didn't surprise her in the slightest; the dark-haired woman seemed to vanish like smoke at the faintest glimpse of discomfort.[break][break]
For all her intimidating nature, Elisabeth was a surprisingly fragile creature, Lisette thought.[break][break]
Perhaps it was this that made the girl daring, breaching the distance between them with quick, eager steps.
"Wait," Lisette insisted, reaching for the mother that she knew she'd never have.
"Wait! Please, I just... I just, once..."[break][break]
It was easier to ask for forgiveness than permission.[break][break]
Arms wrapped around Elisabeth's waist as Lisette hugged her close from behind, expressing this first gesture of filial affection between them. The regal woman froze in place like a statue, all of her becoming stiff and rigid as a startled look flashed unbidden across her face.[break][break]
She did not hug Lisette back, but she did not shove her away, either. Elisabeth instead endured the embrace in baffled silence, unsure if she liked to be held in such a manner, or if she resented the innocence of the gesture.[break][break]
It was... confusing.[break][break]
"You have chores to do," Elisabeth reminded her with a quiet click of her tongue, and the vice-grip of the girl's arms fell away as Lisette nodded. Oddly, there seemed to be a spring in the younger woman's step that had not been there before -- something so abrupt in its manifestation that Elisabeth wondered if she had imagined it.[break][break]
It didn't change anything, Elisabeth reminded herself as she secluded herself in her bedroom. Their circumstances were the same as they always had been. Her life was no different than it had been the day before, or the month before, or even the years before, ever since bringing that girl into her home.[break][break]
And
she hadn't changed, either, Elisabeth reminded herself. She had remained ever much the same since the decade began.[break][break]
Hadn't she?[break][break]
That night,
BARNABY FINCH would return to see Elisabeth's tousled curls spilled across her pillow, glimmering threads of gold now weaving through the silver that had begun to pale her ebony hair.
[break][break]
Spring turned to summer. Summer turned to fall. Fall turned to winter. And no matter how long and lonely a winter might seem, or how dark the night of the Winter Solstice might be, eventually the world was reborn in spring.[break][break]
All things cycled and reverted to their true nature, in the end.[break][break]
|F8rEGwG
By the end of ten years, a large stone smashes through the observatory. Similarly, in the other kingdoms, other stones land suddenly and violently. These are WISHING STARS: multi-faceted stones with protruding pentagonal pillars. These are remnants of the first fight between THE BLACK KNIGHT & THE SKELETON: residual energy that has coalesced in the atmosphere before descending in their calcified forms. These WISHING STARS share some of the same qualities as DYNITE ORE and the poison.[break][break]
The funny thing about prophecy is its vagueness; rely on it too heavily, and you find yourself lost until the promised time arrives. Yet completely ignore it, and you would be left unprepared.
[break] 
