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“You’re sunburnt!” Lorelei giggled, bringing her hand to her face.
“Badly sunburnt,” Roland smirked, “perhaps you should have stayed inside where you belong…”
“Don’t tease him!” she scolded, “sorry, Cedric. I honestly can’t believe I’m betrothed to him…”
“Better me than Prince Magnus!” Roland countered, jumping further up the hill, “besides, I thought you loved me.”
“I do-” Lorelei said, pausing, “but this being decided for the rest of my life? It feels weird.” She shrugged and pulled the wicker basket she held further up her arm, “I’m glad we have moments like these, though. Away from all the diplomacy. Just us and the strawberries.”
“...I don’t like strawberries,” Cedric said.
“You don’t like anything,” Roland said.
“I’m allergic to the flowers…”
“Sorry for my inaccuracy - you’re allergic to everything, and you dislike everything.”
“I like you guys!”
“Aww,” Lorelei said. Her hair was golden hope, contrasted with the blue sky. At that moment, it caught the light perfectly, “You’re too mean, Roland.”
“Why are we picking strawberries, again?” Roland asked.
“You idiot,” she rolled her eye and grabbed his hand, pulling him up the hill, “for your sister, Tilly, remember? For her cookery class? We’re doing her a favour so she doesn’t tell your dad about the vase.”
“Couldn't we just blame Cedric for the vase?”
“...” Cedric tried to make a point with his silence.
“We could,” Lorelei sighed, “but that wouldn't be very nice, would it? Besides, he’s our friend. Friends stick together.”
“Friends stick together,” Roland did a mock sigh, then grinned.
“Thank you, Lori,” Cedric rolled his eyes.
***
“Cedric. Can I speak to you?” It was Lorelei, in the library, she was behind a bookshelf.
“Sure. Do you want me to come round to the other side-”
“No. I think that this will be easier if I don’t see you.”
“...oh?”
“Roland wants to have a baby.”
“Oh.”
“And I don’t,” she said. There were audible fractures in her voice, “I mean, really. The thought terrifies me. Cedric, I’m not the strongest person; I - I think it might kill me… and I’m not ready to be a mum.”
“Shouldn’t you be telling this to… Roland?”
“I can’t!” the fractures grew wider, “If you heard him. If you could see him - if you could see how excited he was about the idea… if I told him, it would break him.”
“I’m sorry, Lori,” Cedric said.
“I was hoping that you could… you could make me a potion?” she shuttered, “one that fakes infertility. I would just take it long enough until he loses interest. We’ll find some other solution to an heir. Just… I can’t do this.”
“That’s…”
“I’m sorry - please don’t tell anyone.”
“No, wait, don’t go!” Cedric realised he had been too loud, then lowered his voice, “I know of such potions. Highly illegal, but the ingredients are common. Are you sure you want to?”
“Gods, yes, I am sure,” Lorelei’s voice splintered into tears, “thank you.”
“It’s no problem, Lori.”
***
Screams. Blood. “Why can’t you save her? Isn’t that what sorcerer’s are for?”
“The potion-” Lorelei said, in her last moments of life - eyes wide and pointed with red, she lowered her voice so only he could hear, “why didn’t it work? Why didn’t it work?”
Why didn’t it work? Cedric didn’t know. It had worked for years but maybe… maybe the ingredients were off? Or maybe a parallax error? Or maybe… or maybe… oh, the queen was dying and. And. And Lori was dying. “I’m sorry.”
A slow, rattling breath escaped Lorelei’s lips, and she brought a blueish hand to his face, “you look like a ghost. Go get sunburnt.”
***
Sunburnt . Joining the the order of the wand… taking over Enchancia… ha. That was pretty bloody ‘sunburnt.’ Cedric laughed to himself, as his head was forced into the gallows. It was a fitting punishment, really. Death for treason. Death for letting the queen die. What would Lori say if she was here now? Would she beg for his life, or chant curses with the crowd?
Would she stand with him, or with her husband?
His eyes scanned the crowd. There was Miranda, Cordelia, Goodwin, Winifred was nowhere to be seen, Sofia stood in the centre, shouting something meant to be for his benefit, and then Roland…
Roland. After today, Roland would be the last one left. The last of the three of them. And on that hill, would the strawberries go unpicked? Would they wilt, and rot, and fall?
An axe hit a rope. A blade hit the wind. The wind picked the hairs on his neck.
***
“An unmarked grave. Even for treason, that’s a harsh punishment,” Lorelei said, leaning against her grave, a gorgeous statue, carved from white marble, depicting an angel with a basket of strawberries. “I enjoyed your visits, really I did. You brought flowers, enchanted them to stay fresh, long after everyone else had… forgotten.”
“Lori… where am I?”
“You’re a ghost, Cedric,” she smiled, “the guillotine didn’t miss.”
“I am?”
“There’s so much I’ve been wanting to say to you. I come and visit you sometimes, in the tower. It’s about the only part of the castle within my territory (the places ghosts can travel within, exempt every hundredth Halloween). And the crown… the little crown made of all those magelights? The one you used to wear when no one was watching. That… that wasn’t Roland’s crown. It wasn’t the king’s crown. It was my crown.”
“I suppose it was,” Cedric didn’t have blood to speak of, but he swore he felt himself blush. “Lori, I’m so sorry about the potion, how it didn’t work-”
“...about that,” Lorelei gave a hollow laugh, “about my bastard husband. Let me show you something.”
She took him through a badly kept hedge maze, to an old brass wishing well with an eerie grin. “It’s evil,” she explained, “Roland, ever the idiot, wished to have children,” she looked at him, “that’s why I got pregnant. There was nothing wrong with the potion.”
“There was nothing wrong with the potion?”
“And I’m glad you’re here, because I’ve been alone for a while. And now that you’re dead… you and I can go to the strawberry hill all we want. And you’ll never get sunburnt.”