I was raised on spite. 

When you’re the eldest, you have a set of responsibilities. 

When you’re the eldest daughter, you have emotional labor tacked onto that. 

It’s a sentiment shared with many of the friends I’ve made who are like me. 

It’s not a job you willingly sign up for. Nor is it one that is rewarded. It’s a job you have no choice but to take up or else your family’s unstable foundation will crumble because no one else sees that the cracks are there and if they do, they ignore it. 

To be fair, I had a pair of loving parents but their demons always stood before me and Bolin. 

My mother’s demons in particular. 

Torn apart by a betrayal from someone she thought had her back, she never recovered. People called her bitter because she wasn't the next Empress when that’s nowhere near close to the truth. 

If my uncle had just asked, she would’ve given up that responsibility without question. But it was the mere fact that he needed to defame her, that she really never had gotten over. 

Not even leaving the Regina Empire had shirked the demons off her trail…and it showed. Especially in parenting. She did her best but she wasn’t all there. She held on tightly to me and my brother. Always scared that the moment she looked away from us we’d be turned against her or worse.

And it was I that was the only one to ever actually reassure her that our love for her was unwavering and true. And that’s when the labor truly started. 

“You can never trust your uncle. You can never trust anyone who lays with him. You can never trust the demons he spawns.” 

My job was clear. 

Maintain the flame of spite and hatred. Do not falter. No matter what pleasantries they dangle in your face. 

It’s all a facade. 

I believed it because of the state of my mother.

But I still needed to see it for myself.

So when my parents were extended an invitation, my father saw a business opportunity. There had been no one from the Republic of Peony that had established themselves as premier dressmakers and my mother, despite her obvious reservations, wanted to see my father’s business grow. 

I was eleven when I officially met my cousins. 

Apollo was older and distant, Selene was younger and meek, and Solomon…was the bad apple of the trio. 

When the adults left us alone, Selene invited me to a tea party with her stuffed toys. 

My younger brother, Bolin, had wanted to play with Solomon. 

I had never really known fear until I heard Bolin scream. 

It was one of those screams that haunt you. 

When I had gone to see what was wrong, Bolin was holding his arm.

His now broken arm. 

I tried to make him apologize right then and there. 

Do you know what he told me? 

“Your brother’s just being a baby.” 

So I punched him. 

Punched him right in his face.

And he wailed. 

And his mother came to his side. 

Then it became clear to me what this family’s dynamic was. 

Solomon cried and the world must stop, all on the orders of his mother. 

So I told mine. 

She yelled at my uncle. 

And my uncle swore that Solomon would be dealt with. 

To this day, I don’t think that talk ever happened between them. 

From that day, the line was drawn between us…and them. 

And we both maintained this line. 

Even when I had to go to the same school as him. 

Where he made a showing of berating me in front of his schoolmates, his cousin from “some weird place where they eat differently and have weird customs”. 

As far as the other kids were concerned, I was free game for them to flap their lips. 

I was a foreigner. The “half-breed” daughter of the “Queen of the Loony-Bin”. 

But I endured it all…because I had her. 

Elvira was a light. 

It didn’t matter how many dirty looks we’d get, it never looked like they ever got to her. 

We bonded so quickly. 

Both of us from different worlds, looked down upon. It was only natural we stuck by each other. 

So when he came to take her from me, I was pissed off. 

He didn’t deserve her time and attention but she fell for him. 

She thought he was genuinely interested. 

I thought I was being a good friend by warning her but ultimately letting her do what she wanted. 

Who was I to forbid her from talking to him? 

He only saw her as a toy. A shiny toy that lost its luster the moment he felt he had gotten all of the mileage out of it. 

She was never the same when he tossed her aside without warning. She would never admit it, but there was a piece of her taken. But he knew and he dangled it over her. 

And I think it was that piece that turned her passive. Someone who could only smile and tell you that everything was gonna be ok as if no one saw the scars and bags underneath their eyes. 

I should’ve stepped in. 

I thought I was being a good friend by letting her make these choices on her own. I thought I was respecting her person by letting her deal with matters in her own way and in the end…she died. She died and I never stopped feeling like I could’ve done more…that I should’ve done more. 

He took her from me. 

And I’ll do anything to get her back. 

“And that is why you’ve come to me, child, is it?” 

The crone’s voice was like fingers being rubbed against leather. The only thing I could see about her appearance through the covered holes of the confessional was the spaced-out sparkling of her jewelry. It gave off the air of a woman that’s been around and has seen much in her time. 

I shouldn’t be here. 

At best, this woman’s arcane is a farce. At worst, I’m communicating with an unregistered arcana. The penalty was imprisonment and maybe death if you got a judge having a bad day or grandstanding their crusade. 

But in the speakeasies and juke joints of the night, whispers of this beldam flowed from people’s lips like the wind. This was a chance I needed to take. 

“Is it possible?” I ask her. 

She’s quiet for a moment before letting out a contemplative hum and clicking her tongue. “Possible? Yes. Perfect? Not quite. Do you have anything of the girl?” 

I perked up, fiddling around my tiny bag to pull out a discarded lock of Evie’s hair, sticking it through the grate. The woman casually accepted it. 

“Elvira Khanna the Fifth…such a lovely girl…shame what happened to her.” There was a pause. “I’ll do it.” 

I felt relief before she quickly spoke again. “But there are some things you need to know.” 

“Yes?” 

“This spell is not bulletproof. It involves asking the universe and if the universe agrees then it may make changes you’re not ready for.” 

“Changes? Like what?” 

“Like…going back further in time than you had intended. That’s a major one.” 

Going further back doesn’t even sound like a bad roll. “I don’t care. I’ll be fine with it.” 

“There’s also the chance that the universe may not accept your wish. What will you do then?” 

“......I’ll figure something out.” 

“Very well then. Well, I’ll get to work on it tonight and maybe by the time you wake up, you’ll be back to where you either need to be or wherever the universe wants you to be. Is that all?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

“Good, have a nice evening.” 

One of the woman’s acolytes opened the confessional door, guiding me outside of the church and back into the slim backends of the slums. No one would recognize me here in this get-up as I looked more masculine than my normal style. Even equipped with a little hat that the paper boy’s like wearing. 

Weaving through the alleyways and sloppy streets filled with noises of children running around and adults working away. It had gotten worse since Solomon had taken the throne. Not a single governing thought in his body. The execution of Elvira, the arrests of political adversaries, threats of new stifling laws, something was brewing in the air…and everyone could feel it. 

Here’s a question: if you notice a mass exodus of a country’s wealthier denizens, what does that tell you? 

Answer: Something bad’s heading your way and you need to either buckle down and get out of dodge. 

Everyone felt it and everyone was preparing.

“Wonderful to see you again, madame.” My guard, Bilal, said with a dull expression as he stood at attention in front of the car. 

In a sea of murky browns and off-whites, the sleek black of his suit and car stood out like a sore thumb but he was big enough to warrant that no one tried anything when he was around. 

“I assume everything went well?”  

“You assume right.” 

“Shall I take you home?” 

A simple question with answers that weren’t so clear-cut to me. Do I really want to go home right now? If the spell works, then this’ll be the last time I see certain people as they are now…in misery and mourning. 

“No, take me to Ginny’s house?” I asked him. 

I certainly didn’t mean for it to sound as meek as it did. Bilal took note of it still, however, making his response softer. 

“Of course, madame.” 

He opened the doors to the backseat for me and I crawled in. The stress of recent events and the anxiety of today was gradually growing on me like mold on abandoned food. 

But if I wanted to sleep with any sense of weightlessness tonight. I needed to see Ginny. Was she the only person that could understand what I was going through? No. But she was the only person I could face without guilt drenching me.