Chapter Text
Mother was running away.
"Mama, where are you going?,” Aaron asked from the doorway, still in his nightgown. He had his hand me down teddy clutched in his tiny five-year-old grip, but he’d been awoken by loud crashes and yelling from down the hall and had gone to investigate.
Mother paused in her packing, turned to look at her son with red-rimmed eyes. Her normally flower-braided blond hair was messy and hanging about her shoulders. As he continued to stand there, she stared at him, frozen, eyes glazed over like she wasn’t actually seeing him at all.
“Mama?,” he asked again, and she made an aborted movement, then finally looked at him. In two powerful strides she crossed the room and clutched her son’s tiny hands in hers. Her green eyes bore into his with a strange intensity.
"I can’t stay here anymore,” she told him quickly. Her voice shook. “Baby, Daddy did something very bad and had to go away. Some people are going to try and take me away too, so I have to go, okay?”
He didn’t understand. “What did Daddy do? Where are you going?” When she didn’t respond, his lip started to tremble. “Can I go too?”
“No, baby. I’m sorry.” She kissed his hair, touched his cheek, like she was trying to memorize every aspect of his face. Then she touched the back of his neck, fingers skittering across the raised and burnt flesh like she was afraid to touch it.
"As long as you have this, I will be with you, always,” she told him, and he felt the back of his neck pulse in response. “You will do great things, Aaron. I love you.”
And then she was gone.
Aaron awoke with a start, breathing hard, crying, and with his mother’s face fresh in his mind.
Moonlight shone through the window. Aaron had a brief moment where he didn’t know where he was, and he started to panic, but then he remembered defeating the Hydra, the celebrations that took place in their honor afterwards, and the small hotel room that had been awarded to them for free by the thankful townspeople. He was fine. He was safe.
After a moment, his breathing subsided and he relaxed the grip he had on his heart, unaware that he’d clutched it in his sleep. On the opposite bed Call was snoring loudly, arm thrown across his face. Through the blur of tears Aaron could see his chest rising and falling softly, obviously still deeply asleep. Good.
He took another breath. Then another. Underneath the high collar of his tunic, the spiral on the back of his neck pulsed softly in tandem with his heartbeat, warm and stagnant even after all these years, but he supposed that was part of his mother’s promise. As long as he had it, she would be with him forever. No matter what.
He closed his eyes.
He didn’t have any other dreams that night.
A couple of hours later, he was awoken by a toe poking his cheek.
“Hey, Sleeping Beauty,” a voice said grumpily, and he opened his eyes to find Call there, staring down at him sourly. His black hair was mussed up from sleep. “You know, for a Hero you’re kind of a bum.”
Aaron sat up and winced, rubbing his spine. For some reason he was on the floor. He must’ve rolled off the bed in the middle of the night again.
“What time is it?,” he asked groggily.
“Right. Lemme just check my handy dandy pocket watch,” Call said sarcastically, pushing up his sleeve to look at his bare wrist. “It’s about...five minutes past Get Your Ass Up O’ Clock.”
Aaron ignored him. “What are you wearing?”
Call scowled at him, which Aaron thought was unfair since it was a pretty valid question. And if the other boy thought that prancing around the room in a pair of sweatpants and a baggy T-shirt with the words “funky girl” written across the front in hot pink cursive wasn’t out of the ordinary, then he needed to get his life re-evaluated.
“My pajamas,” the wizard told him.
He squinted. “Did you steal those from someone else’s room?”
“What? Of course not. What do you take me for, some sort of criminal?” The Prince, wisely, did not answer this. “Anyway, I thought I’d wake you up before you sleep the day away. There’s breakfast downstairs in the tavern.” He limped over to the door and called over his shoulder, “So get up, I want pancakes.”
The door closed behind him. Aaron carefully rose to his feet and stretched, wincing when his back popped. He needed to get back on track with his training regimen.
Deciding to forgo his armor and cape today, Aaron pulled on a loose white tunic, a purple vest embroidered with golden swirls, and black pants and socks instead; which was, unfortunately, the simplest outfit he owned. Hopefully Call wouldn’t make fun of him.
He looked in the mirror. A regal prince stared back at him, confident, straight-backed, and most importantly, heroic. But beneath all of that, a young, scared boy was stood in his place, inexperienced and too deep into something that he shouldn’t have been involved with in the first place. He pressed his palm against the glass.
“Hey, Cinderella, let’s go! ,” Call’s annoyed voice floated into the room, and Aaron quickly dropped his hand and made his way downstairs.
“So,” Call said once they were seated at a table. He leaned in on his elbows. “Level 2 Hero. I just have one question: how?”
To be honest, a crowded restaurant probably wasn’t the best place to be having this conversation, but Call wanted answers and he wanted them now .
Aaron took awhile to answer. He looked downright miserable. This whole ‘not being a legitimate Hero’ thing was probably a huge ego killer.
He said, “I don’t really know what to tell you. I didn’t have a lot of training before they sent me off on this Quest. It was kind of a last minute thing.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” he argued. “If you’re a level two Hero, how did you even make it to Panopticon Castle? How did you defeat all of the monsters and complete all of the tasks before making it to my checkpoint?”
“I don’t know, luck?” Now he just looked mad. “Look, if it’s a problem for you-”
“It’s not,” Call told him. Aaron didn’t look like he believed him. “It’s really not. I’m just...worried that this Quest will be too much for you to handle.”
His face darkened. “Well, I’ve gotten this far, haven’t I?”
Call just kind of stared at him. It made you wonder how a kid like Aaron, a prince no less, got tasked with doing something like this when he clearly wasn’t prepared for it. Was Magisteria really that desperate to get Call? And if so, why? He had so many questions. He wanted to ask all of them.
But he stayed quiet.
Aaron stabbed into his pancake like he was trying to make sure it was dead. Call eyed him warily. “You okay there?”
“Fine,” he gritted out. He chewed violently and stared out the window. “We should probably stock up on supplies before we head out again. We won't reach the next town for at least a week or so.”
“Okay.” A tense silence settled over the table. Neither boy seemed to want to look at each other.
Havoc interrupted the growing awkwardness by suddenly landing on the table, making Aaron jump. This morning he’d asked Call to transform him into a cat so he could go “hunting”. Call hadn’t really known what he meant, but now, as he deposited a dead bird onto Aaron’s plate (and looked totally pleased about it), he understood.
Good protein will make the tall puppy grow big and strong , Havoc meowed, while headbutting Aaron’s chest like what he’d just done wasn’t the worst thing ever. Birds are good protein. They will give you flight powers.
“I'm almost certain that's not how that works,” Call said, shooing the cat off the table while Aaron just kind of sat there in frozen disbelief with his hands raised in front of him, trying to both avoid looking at and touching the dead bird. Call pointed at the plate. “Hey, are you going to finish your pancakes?”
Later on, the two boys decided to go shopping in the town’s market-place for items before they set off and continued their Quest. They got basic things like food and clean water, and Call even bought a thermos for his coffee (which might've been the best and worst investment of this entire trip so far), while Aaron got some polish for his sword. It's not like they couldn't afford it. With both of their Gold combined, they could practically buy out an entire kingdom.
The only hiccup they ran into was at Starbucks, where Call decided was the perfect place to get some quality, healthy, non-GMO liquid death. Unfortunately, the barista wouldn’t let him buy out the entire store’s supply of coffee, which quickly developed into an Issue™.
Multiple threats and a shouting match later, (that ended with Aaron physically dragging the wizard out onto the street by the back of his robes as he hurled insults at the poor terrified barista) Call left the store with only two boxes of instant coffee and a tattered ego. Going by the look on Aaron’s face, he had no sympathy.
Around three o’ clock the two of them were finished shopping and decided to take a walk around the town for a bit, since they still had a couple of hours to kill. Eventually they stumbled upon a little trinket shop near the hotel and Call abruptly stopped in front of it.
He announced, “I want a souvenir,” then walked into the store. Aaron had no choice but to follow him.
The only other person inside the store besides them was a teenage girl behind the checkout counter who looked like she’d honestly rather die than have to help another customer. When Call walked in, she gave him a look full of such pure loathing and disgust that it was almost impressive.
But then her eyes widened when she caught sight of Aaron. And then- get this- she straightened up and threw him the biggest smile ever, completely transforming into a different person.
“Hi! Welcome to Ye Old Trinkets and Things! My name is Gwendolyn,” she said in the fakest, high-pitch voice known to man. “But you can call me Gwenda.” This was directed at Aaron, who turned a little pink. Oh god .
“What can I do for you boys today?,” she asked, even though she clearly only had eyes for the blond prince. Call almost gagged.
“We’re just looking, thanks,” said Aaron. He avoided her intense gaze while the two of them walked around the store and peered at the various toys and sculptures and other bargain items.
There wasn’t really anything particularly exciting, which was kind of disappointing. Call was about to leave the store when something caught his eye in the next aisle.
It was a tiny china doll, maybe about the size of a hairbrush, with a glossy finish and delicately crafted features that looked a little too realistic to be on a doll. It was wearing a red and gold dress with beautiful detailing, and its eyes were closed. With its dark hair and skin, it kind of looked like-
Aaron grabbed him by the arm and pulled him aside. “Don’t steal anything.”
Call scowled at him. “You’re not the boss of me.”
A warning look. “Do you want to get thrown in jail before we even make it to Magisteria? No? Then behave.”
“You boys are from Magisteria?,” the store clerk asked, materializing next to Aaron like a ninja in the night. She bat her eyelashes. “You’re pretty far from home. Are you staying for long?”
The wizard came very close to telling her to go away, but Aaron beat him to the punch. He said, “We’re just passing through town. We’re leaving tomorrow.”
An unnecessarily exaggerated pout. “Aw, that’s too bad. Well, let me know if you need anything. I’ll be right over here.”
Aaron threw her a million watt smile and this time Call actually gagged, sound effects and all. The prince kicked him. “Thank you, miss.”
This seemed to please her, and she flounced back off to the cashier desk. Call turned to the other boy with the world’s biggest shit-eating grin stretched across his face.
“Oh, gosh golly, thank you miss!,” he mocked in the worst impression of a southern accent. “Gee whiz, a little ol boy like me doesn’t know how to properly thank a lady like you! Why, I’m just redder than a tomato in the spring.”
“Do you ever shut up?,” Aaron huffed, but his cheeks were red with embarrassment. “Let’s just go already.”
Call was about to agree and follow him out of the store, but his eyes fell back on the little doll sitting serenely on the shelf. It really did look like her. He wondered if it was a relic from before. It surely looked like it.
Without thinking, he gently took the doll down and brought it to the front desk, where the cashier was still eyeing Aaron up like he was a slab of meat and she was a starving tiger who’d been living off of carrots since birth. “I’d like to buy this.”
“Okay.” She briefly tore her eyes away from Aaron and looked at the tiny object, exclaiming an, “Oh!,” as she seemed to recognize it. “This is a doll of Princess Tamara! You don’t really see many of these around nowadays. Especially one that’s in decent shape.”
So it was her. Call felt a sudden sadness wash over him, but he kept it pushed down. “It’s very detailed. I wonder who made it.”
“Not sure. There’s no inscription on it anywhere.” She turned it over, but came up empty. “It’s really beautiful though. It almost looks like a real person!”
Yeah , Call thought bitterly, watching as Gwenda roughly scanned the object and handled it into a plastic shopping bag like it was nothing. Almost. But it’s not her. She’s never coming back.
“It’s sad what happened to her,” she continued, and Call absently nodded. “I mean, jeez that legend always gives me the shivers whenever I think about it.”
Call frowned. “What legend?”
“Oh, you know, how she got stuck in that castle with the evil wizard,” she explained. “Legend says that one day the princess had been walking around Panopticon, which used to belong to the King and Queen, and found a Chaos Ridden in the forest. She tried to fight back, but the monster kidnapped her and took her to the evil wizard, who held her for ransom and told the King and Queen to hand over the castle and the kingdom in exchange for their youngest daughter. Then, as soon as he got the castle, he killed everyone in the kingdom and kept her captive for thousands of years.”
Call was appalled. “That’s not what happened!”
The girl gave him a weird look. “Well, that’s how I learned it.”
“Me too,” Aaron piped up. He glanced at Call really fast, as if gauging his reaction. “But no one really knows what happened. It’s all just speculation at this point, since all documentation of the incident has been lost to time. I bet the story’s been twisted around a lot too.”
He seemed to be trying to cheer Call up (for some reason) but Call wasn’t listening. He felt sick to his stomach. He’s been accused of countless things in the past, but this...this was just despicable.
Valiantly fighting back tears, he threw a handful of gold at the startled cashier and snatched the doll off the counter. Then he took off out of the store.
Aaron didn’t know where Call went and he was starting to get anxious.
After the wizard’s episode and miraculous vanishing act, Aaron apologized to the cashier for his rudeness and went looking for the other boy, who had managed to completely disappear in the thirty seconds it took him to reach outside.
Literally; Aaron walked up and down the length of the street, checked all of the alleyways, asked a couple of people if they saw a short, goth-looking kid with a permanent scowl walking around anywhere (they hadn’t), and even went back to the inn they were staying at, wondering if he was hiding under the bed or something. A quick scan of the room revealed that no, he wasn’t there, and Aaron had lost his one chance of redemption in a matter of minutes .
This was bad. This was really really bad. If Aaron didn’t have the wizard with him when he got back home, how was he going to prove that he accomplished his Quest? What was the King going to say? Oh god, the King -
He was so busy internally freaking out they he didn’t even notice the old lady walking across the street until he subsequently ran into her, causing her to drop her shopping bag.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry!,” he apologized, bending down to help the old woman to her feet. He bent down a second time to retrieve her bag, which, thankfully, hadn’t come apart during its descent. “Are you alright, ma’am? I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
She straightened, and he realized that the woman wasn’t really that old, but her long white hair made her appear that way at first glance. It cascaded down to her knees and over her face, which was almost as pale as her hair, and combined with her white dress and shoes, she looked like a straight up ghost.
“I’m fine, darling. Such a gentleman,” she said, her voice barely more than a breath. She accepted her bag with a smile. “I cannot thank you enough.”
Something about her was really off-putting, although it was hard to pinpoint exactly what. Maybe it was the way that icy mist clouded in the air every time she spoke, even though it was the middle of summer. Or maybe it was how everyone else seemed to be ignoring her, like she didn’t even exist.
“It was my fault for running into you,” he lamented. “Here, I’ll carry your stuff home for you.”
“Oh, there’s no need for that.” She placed a dainty hand on his arm. It was ice cold. “I couldn’t ask that of you, darling.”
“I insist.” His tone was firm. She chuckled and shook her head. It was at this moment that Aaron realized the woman was blind. Her cloudy white eyes were blank and unseeing. “Come then honey, my shop isn’t too far from here.”
And because Aaron could not, in fact, say no to anyone ever, he allowed himself to be escorted by the blind woman through the crowd of townsfolk. Eventually they came upon a small house on the edge of town that had fairy lights strung across the front door. A sign on the porch read “Madame Tarquin’s Fortune Telling”.
Somehow, she managed to unlock the door without struggling with the key, then led Aaron inside. “You can leave the bags on the table, Dear.”
Aaron was just about to do that, but then he took in the interior of the house and stopped dead in his tracks, mouth hanging open.
“Whoa...”
Compared to the outside of the cottage, the inside looked like a completely different house altogether. Shimmering white draperies criss-crossed the ceiling, hanging low enough to create an ethereal appearance but not low enough to touch the top of Aaron’s head. On the walls, which were black as midnight, were an array of finely cut crystals and gemstones of varying sizes and colors that reflected the light of the hundreds of candles placed throughout the room. In the center of the floor was a table covered in a white cloth, which housed a crystal ball.
Now, normally Aaron would be suspicious of a place that looked like it belonged to an eldritch abomination, but a strange sense of calm had settled over him the moment he walked into the shop, like the walls themselves were whispering assurances of safety to him, their voices lulling him into a sense of security...
“Your sword,” said Madame Tarquin quietly. “May I see it?”
Dazed, he handed it over. Her ice cold fingers barely brushed his in the exchange, but he shivered regardless.
“A beautiful weapon.” She ran her hand up and down the blade and he, vaguely, wondered how she didn’t cut herself on it. “A golden blade with silver infusing. Forged with obsidian.” She smiled. “I wonder, how did you get ahold of such a thing?”
The question temporarily snapped him out of it. The smallest trace of suspicion rose.
“It was passed down through my family,” he told her.
Her withered fingers continued to trace the blade, stopping briefly to run her fingernail into the jagged swirl that had been etched into the hilt. “I sense powerful magic inside of it. Very old and powerful magic. Who in your family gave this to you?”
“My mother.” The lie was smooth on his tongue.
She hummed. “Was your mother a Witch, by chance?”
Aaron swallowed. Flashes of green fire and screams flitted through his mind. “No.”
She didn’t press further. Calmly, she handed him his sword and he slipped it back into the sheath.
“Come, have a seat.” She took her place at the table, sitting adjacent to him. Looking into the crystal ball that sat in between them, Aaron couldn’t tell if his reflection was just distorted from the glass or if his face really looked that uneasy.
“Would you like some tea?,” she asked.
“Um, no thank you,” he declined politely, because, well, he didn’t exactly feel comfortable with a blind woman handling scalding hot liquids within his general radius.
As if she’d read his mind, she chuckled. “Alright, sweetheart. Let’s begin, shall we?”
Aaron blinked slowly. Begin what? , he wanted to ask, but he was slowly becoming more and more dazed, and thinking was becoming an increasingly difficult activity.
Reaching blindly (ha) behind her, she produced a stack of tarot cards and began shuffling them. “You aren’t the only one with relics from the past, little one. These cards belonged to my mother and my mother’s mother, and her mother before her. I think you’ll find that they are scarily accurate.”
He might’ve been intimidated, if it hadn’t been for the wink she sent his way. Of course, none of this was real. Fortune tellers like her have been around for centuries, but none of them use actual magic. Not these days, anyway.
She’d really gone all out though. He wondered how she managed to get the scarves hanging above to sparkle like spider silk, or some of the candles to float in thin air. It was a cool trick, even if it was fake.
“Pick three cards, please.” Aaron obeyed and withdrew three cards, but before he could look at them, she took them away again. And then instead of reading them herself, she set them aside face down on the table and turned to her crystal ball which was, right before their eyes, slowly filling with white smoke.
She placed her hands on it. Then whispered, “Show me your secrets. ”
It might’ve been his imagination, but he could’ve sworn the candles dimmed a little bit. There was a display of what Aaron could only call some serious lighting and sound effects from the crystal ball, which included strange flashes inside the mist, that sort of looked like lightning. After a moment, though, everything seemed to go back to normal.
That is, until Madame Tarquin lifted her head to reveal clear, attentive eyes, which were faintly glowing silver.
“I see great things in your future, Aaron Stewart,” she rasped, eyes pinning him in place. “Powerful things. However, great may not always mean good, and evil may not always mean bad. You should know this well; after all, that mark on the nape of your neck makes you a walking contradiction to everything associated with Heroism.”
Aaron stilled. His neck pulsed with warmth. “How did you-”
“Magic users aren’t persecuted and hated here like up north.” Her voice was still kind, but her expression was now cold. “Surely you must have realized that not every kingdom holds the same despicable virtues as yours, little prince.”
His hands started to shake. “You know who I am.”
“Of course. I am able to see not only your future, but your past and present. Every act of heroism you’ve accomplished. Every bad deed you’ve committed as well.” She smiled icily. “Here in Hamelin the people are much more accepting of magic folk, but not everywhere is like here. Tell me, what business do you have bringing that young wizard to a kingdom full of those that would murder him on the spot if they knew of his power? Surely nothing very heroic .”
He tried to stand, but it felt like icy hands were trapping him in his seat. He couldn’t move his hand to his sword either; he was completely frozen.
“I know your intentions, Aaron Stewart,” said The Seer and her hair floated upwards out of her face, revealing a ghoulish expression. “And I do not approve.”
Aaron left Madame Tarquin’s shop in a daze.
“Where were you?,” Call demanded when he saw him. He was flushed and heaving, face twisted in pain. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”
“Where was I? Where were you? ,” Aaron shot back, coming back to his senses rather quickly. “You disappeared after running out of the store!”
“Don’t try to pin the blame on me,” Call scoffed, even though that was clearly what he was trying to do to Aaron here. “At least I haven’t been gone for five hours . It’s nearly eight o’ clock, dude!”
And just like that, a feeling of dread started to build up inside of him again. “I’ve been gone for five hours?”
He tried to remember what he’d been doing before this that would take up that much time, but he...couldn’t. He had been talking to someone. About what, though? And who had he been talking to? He vaguely recalled a woman, but he couldn’t remember her name or what she looked like or anything about her. His mind was drawing a complete blank.
He turned and looked at the building behind him. Nothing special, just a tiny, nondescript cottage on the edge of town. In one of the windows an elderly lady waved at him like they knew each other, even though he’s pretty sure he’s never seen her before in his life. Weird.
“Yes, you’ve been gone for five hours, you butt,” Call continued. “I had to walk all over town looking for your stupid ass. I even gave Havoc some of your underwear so he could sniff you out and we find you here of all places. What gives?”
“I don’t really remember. I was probably doing nothing.” His eyes narrowed. “What was that you said about my underwear?”
Havoc, this time a wolf, made a whining noise that kind of sounded like “uh oh”, although Aaron couldn’t be too sure since he could not, in fact, talk to animals.
“Let’s just go home,” Call groaned, effectively changing the subject, and Aaron didn’t even protest because he could already feel his eyes drooping.
Although, as the two walked back to their hotel room, he couldn’t help but feel like someone was intently gazing at the back of his neck. He unconsciously lifted the collar of his shirt, protecting it from prying eyes.