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The platform shuttered to a halt and the doors slammed shut before her, plunging them into darkness. Lilith looked down at the small palisman she held in her hand, readying a spell to bind it just as she had done to its larger owl counterpart. But it had already reverted back into its non-sentient form. Looking out at the corridor ahead of her, the one that would carry her to the emperor, she saw a long narrow tunnel stretching forward for what seemed like miles, shrouded in black. There were no torches. No artificial or magical sources of light. Only darkness. So unnervingly still.
Behind her erupted a stentorian roar that echoed down the passageway. More growls and snarls followed, each one more distressed than the last.
Lilith slowly forced herself to turn around. Her body felt heavy, tired, and she knew it wasn’t from the magic. She flinched, hearing that thing on the ground before seeing it. There it was in chains, thrashing and writhing furiously on the floor. And Lilith knew it wasn’t the cursed beast lying there gnashing and screaming; it wasn’t the beast that was the one raging against her magic. It was her sister. It was Edalyn. Outraged that Lilith had finally caught her. Anger boiling in her cursed blood that after years, a whole lifetime of running, hiding, outmaneuvering, it was all over. But most of all, all her painful thrashing, all her beastly screaming, was because now she finally knew that Lilith was the one who cursed her. Her own sister.
Eda didn’t feel the binding magic slowly tightening around her figure. She didn’t feel her massive form struggling against the magical chains that were starting to eat into her flesh. All she felt was betrayal. And the eyes of Lilith as they bore into her fur and sunk deep into her skin, burning.
As Lilith watched her sister, couldn’t look away from...that thing, that creation of hers, that monster, she felt burning too. But not the burn of betrayal. Her eyes were burning. They were burning and stinging so fiercely that she began to wonder if somehow Eda had found a way to regain control of her magic even in her cursed form and started to use it against her. But then something fell from her eye. Something wet. Lilith looked down. It was too dark to make out upon her dress. Taking the stiff hand that was gripping her staff, knuckles pale from grasping onto it with all her might, she wiped her cheek. More wetness. Tears.
Lilith’s body then did something that it hadn’t done in a very long time. Her knees began to tremble, limbs suddenly shaking under the weight of her thoughts, her guilt, unable to support either of them any longer. Her paled knuckles clenched once and then released their crooked joints, her staff clattering to the floor with an empty hollow ring. Her legs gave out from under her, causing her torso to collapse with them, folding over her thighs as her lungs wretched up quiet sobs from the back of her throat. Her sister’s palisman endured the clenching and unclenching of her hand around it, as a small part of Lilith subconsciously knew not to let go of it when she fell, or to squeeze it too hard, or to loosen her grip on it too much. She was sure that there was no one else in the corridor there with her, yet for some reason she still couldn’t find the strength or familiarity to release her sobs fully and loudly. Even if there was someone else present, she knew her cries would have been drowned out by the incessant roars of a sister who had been betrayed.
“Blast it, Edalyn,” she managed to choke out quietly when her tears had become less insistent on raining down her face.
Lilith couldn’t help but replay the scene of her blurting out to her sister that it was she who had cursed her all those years ago. And the look on Eda’s face, the treachery, the rage, all twisted into an expression of furrowed eyebrows and clenched teeth and pure hurt. She could not lie and say that she did not feel instant regret, immediate guilt. But glancing back at the mess that was her sister, she knew Edalyn would never understand, that she had never understood. She had never known what it was like to constantly be in the shadow of a younger sibling. How shameful, how embarrassing it had been to have constantly studied, and worked, and practiced, to have followed every rule in the book, memorized page by page how to perform a spell, just to have her younger sister master it with the flick of her finger. Sure, Edalyn had joked about “perfect Lilly,” always studying, always working, always taking things too seriously, trying too hard. But as often as Lilith had to hear those words over and over again without end, she also had to hear the constant praise strangers gave Eda, had to witness the pride in their parents’ eyes every time Edalyn mastered a spell faster than her older sister. And Lilith knew all her tricks. She knew Edalyn was a cheat at grudgby, knew that she never did her homework. But somehow, even worse than that, what made Lilith feel the most worthless, was that Eda never even tried. She had never put in the effort to be a better witch. She just was. And Lilith had to pay for her lack of natural skill with the constant fact that no matter how hard she tried, no matter how hard she studied and worked to be the perfect witch, it would never matter. Because Edalyn was always going to be better.
Lilith shifted backwards, so that she was now facing her sister, or what remained of her sister. She brought herself closer to her, so that she was inches away from Eda’s snapping jaws and painful cries.
“Oh, Edalyn. I never wanted this. I only ever wanted us to be equals.”
Suddenly, Eda’s thrashing stopped. The angry enraged sounds echoing in the corridor slowly faded away, until Lilith could only hear the ragged panting of the beast before her. Something about her sister’s deep black eyes seemed...softer. Like some chaotic flame had suddenly been quenched. They stared up at Lilith’s guilty, tearful expression, as if willing to hear her.
“If only you had listened when I told you to join the emperor’s coven with me. We could have spent the rest of our lives together. Making up for all of our pointless childhood squabbles. Rose in rank as equals. As sis…” Lilith faltered, feeling another wave of sorrow coming on, the burning behind her eyes building up faster and more intensely as she stared into Edalyn’s eyes. No color in them. All color, light, and sanity stripped from her pupils by her. By some stupid, jealous teenager who couldn’t accept the fact that she would never be the best. Her own sister morphed into a monster at her hands because she couldn’t deal with constantly losing.
“...As sisters…” she forced herself to finish, “All I ever wanted was a sister.”
Eda the owl beast’s eyes widened, or at least Lilith thought they did; it was hard to tell past the blurriness of tears. Eda let out some heavy sigh or whimper, and the corner of Lilith’s mouth twitched into something that could have almost been a smile. She reached out, all at once forgetting caution, forgetting duty, forgetting past hurt and jealousy and current situations, and placed a gentle hand on Eda’s cheek, stroking the fur softly with a sigh of her own.
Beast Eda closed her eyes, seemingly cherishing this silent moment, this touch of sisterhood that neither sibling realized they were even lacking until they had wasted each of their lives, one pointlessly chasing after the other, always fighting, never resolving. Eda always getting away. Eda always outsmarting her. Eda always defeating her in every single duel she challenged her to. Lilith returning to the emperor time and time again empty handed, always having to answer for her shame with an excuse as to why she could still not bring in her ragtag, junk collecting sister. Even in her new life, working for the coven she had always dreamed of, Eda still always found a way to ruin her.
Lilith’s hand was sharply drawn away from Eda’s cheek, leaving Eda to grunt in confusion, flashing her eyes open instantly at the loss of contact to see Lilith with her eyes still closed. But something was not right. Her eyebrows had deepened their position above her eyelids. Her jaw was clenched shut. The hand she had drawn away was now balled into a fist.
“I just wanted a sister,” she repeated, but something about her voice was tight, as if straining to maintain composure, “but you were always an obstacle.”
Eda groaned deeply in distress and confusion, couldn’t stop the rumbling noises in her throat as she began to struggle against her chains once more.
“I know what you were doing now. You made yourself an obstacle. Our whole lives. Didn’t you? But I wasn’t going to let anything get in my way of joining the emperor’s coven. Not even you.”
She flicked away the last of her tears, rising from her bent knees with eyes closed, determination flowing in her blood as strongly as the curse was flowing through Eda’s. She opened her eyes, staring at the great, black, gaping hole before her. No light to guide her. Only her anger. Her desire.
She held out her hand, calling her staff to her silently. She extended it outwards, illuminating a path of her own, a quiet blue light emanating from the tip. She began to take a step forward, dragging Edalyn’s struggling body with her. She roared in protest, thrashing more fiercely now. Lilith did not look back, did not stop walking. Something new was flowing through her. Something burning.
She smiled, “Now there is nothing in my way,” and walked into the darkness.