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The missive comes with maybe a little more flash and flair than would be typical of something like this, which is what makes Katherine sit up in her throne. Two messengers, in gold and green, with an ornate scroll in one man’s hands, and a banner in the other’s.
She takes the paper, unrolls it while the two men wait, heads high.
To the esteemed Royal Family of your Glorious Empire—
You are hereby Invited to bear Witness to the most Excellent of Games, which is the Trials of Marriage for our Lady the Queen Pearlescent Moon of Helianthia. These shall be held in the Gilded Quarter of the Capital City, in the Week which precedes the Summer Solstice, with intent to determine the Victor on the Seventh Dawn which is the Solstice Dawn and for a great Festival to be held thereafter.
If you shall Attend, if it please you, return this Paper to the City with its two Men and your distinguished Presence at the day which is known to the Men. If you shall not Attend then send them on their Way and we shall Mark this Absence without displeasure.
Your Presence in this Period of Joy and Union is greatly desired and anticipated.
Yours in Faith,
Helianthia
Oh. Katherine did hear that Pearl’s father had died, now that she thinks about it. That was, like, a season ago, though. She’s more surprised to find out that she didn’t miss the marriage and the coronation than anything else.
“Thank you,” she tells the messengers, “at ease.” And then to the hall, “Will some guard help these two gentlemen, get them a room for the night?”
Somebody does, and when they’re gone, she studies the scroll again. A week of games and challenges; a victor determined at the solstice dawn; revelry, into the night, and for another week after if the marriage is fortuitous. That’s how Helianthia has always rolled - like the seasons, they will go quiet for so long that you might be fooled into thinking they’d died out, only to explode into life and vibrancy when another cause to celebrate arrives.
One of her ladies-in-waiting, the Lady Shelby, peers over her shoulder like she thinks she’s being inconspicuous. She jolts back again when Katherine looks up. “No, it’s okay,” she giggles, “are you excited?”
“I don’t know what it says!”
“Okay, I’ll read it,” and she does, and Shelby’s eyes grow brighter, gleaming with interest. “Now you’re excited!”
“That sounds amazing,” says Shelby, awe in her tone. “Are we going?”
“Is there time?” the Lady Elle points out behind her. “Their Majesties the King and Queen are still away; I don’t know if they’ll be accounted for by the time you’d have to leave.”
Katherine frowns, nods thoughtfully. “They should be home soon.”
“Your Highness would know better than ourselves what important business occupies them.”
She tries not to let her frown turn into a grimace. Yeah, she knows what occupies her parents. They’re on another one of those kicks where they try to find a physician who can fix her again. As if it’s something a doctor can just prescribe the right poultice for, and not woven into her blood and bones by birthright.
“But it’s at the Solstice,” Shelby argues, “that’s plenty of time to see them. We could always just… be late?”
“We can’t be late,” says Katherine, “that’d be rude. This is the biggest week of Pearl’s life - she’s getting married. If she finds out that, like, I turned up the day before it ends? That’s so disrespectful.”
Shelby hums. “Yeah, I don’t know. Maybe we just wait another two days and see if your parents get back, and then you can attend!”
“That might be the only way for it,” Katherine sighs, and she honestly believes in that moment that she’s telling the truth.
When the rest of the day passes with no sign of her parents’ imminent return, Katherine elects to ask for her dinner early, and go to the bathing pools after. The springs that run clear and unusually temperate at the edge of the forest are her own little secret - well, hers and her ladies-in-waiting, because she’s not gonna bathe without an attendant there to make sure nobody with unscrupulous intentions comes across her while she’s naked.
(They are unusually temperate for Katherine, at least. More than once her ladies have touched the water and found it unbearably hot or icy cold.)
It is there that she comes up with her alternative plan.
“I like Pearl,” she says, half to the air, half to Shelby. “I really do. I want her to marry well.”
“Of course, your Highness.”
“And I know that this is Helianthia’s whole thing with coronation - with everything, they make everything into a sport, but…”
“Uh-huh?”
“I don’t know. It makes me worry she’s not gonna like whoever wins. Pearl’s a smart woman, she can probably just have the guy killed if he’s really bad, but… I don’t know!”
“You want the best for your friend,” says Shelby.
“Exactly,” Katherine gestures. “And the other thing I’m thinking about is that my mom and dad would definitely come back home and be here to preside over the kingdom again… if something scary happened. Like, a political emergency.”
“... Like a war?”
“I - well, I mean, yeah, that’d do it, but that’s not what I’m thinking.”
“Oh, no,” says Shelby, “what are you thinking?”
“I was thinking maybe more of a missing persons case?”
Shelby’s face drops. “You’re going to kidnap Pearl?”
Katherine breaks out into laughter. “No! No, I’m not kidnapping Pearl. I was thinking more just going to her and… not telling anybody?”
“What?”
“Come on, don’t tell me you don’t see it! We tell the missive that we’re not coming, and then we sneak after them and follow them to Helianthia, and then I compete in the tournament, and -”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Shelby puts her arms out, “this is a whole new part of the plan I wasn’t expecting. You’re gonna compete? For the Queen’s hand?”
“Sure!”
“I… didn’t even know you were thinking of marriage,” says her lady carefully.
“Well, I wasn’t, but what better opportunity than this? I can put together a disguise, I’ll use all my training to thrash the competition, and then when they declare me winner, I come clean about the whole thing. And wouldn’t it make my parents happy, for me to marry so well?”
“Well, sure, your Highness, but -”
“And think of what this would do for the kingdom! Glimmer Grove is -” crumbling, languishing, likely to die out as a dynasty in a generation if only-child Katherine doesn’t get a move on with the whole process of producing an heir “- not doing too hot these days, you know. And it’s my fault, I know that.”
“You can’t help being… what you are, Princess.”
“I know, but I can still do my part to make sure we hold on to our power for another couple decades!”
“I’m not sure…”
She grasps Shelby’s hands between her own. “And think of how cute our kids would be.”
Shelby jumps. “Ah! Too cold!”
“Oh, sorry!” The water again. Katherine forgets that it has a price sometimes.
That, in brief, is the curse of Glimmer Grove. Its changeling princess prospers, her magic favouring any life she calls her own, and her parents’ land decays around her in its turn. She will stay eternally young and beautiful so long as she has other life to draw from; if she ever gives herself up, the withering will take her home instead. Because of this, she hasn’t been allowed to visit the courtyard in a decade, confined to the sterile halls of the blackening half of the palace - and she’s only allowed to bathe at the springs because her parents consider it far enough away from their seats to be permissible.
The bids they made for an heir were ill-advised and selfishly intentioned. The fae have made sure, in turn, that the letter of their wish was granted.
(If they wanted it to stop, they could allow her to ascend to queendom early, so that the land was Katherine’s in full. They are never going to do that.)
“But, uh…” Shelby plays with her hair, “I really think - y’know, this idea is, it’s -”
“It’s amazing, and you’re gonna come with me to Helianthia tomorrow?”
“I…” She scrunches her face, a big long blink and wrinkled nose, then lets it go. “If you’re so dead set on going, then I’ll come. I don’t want you running off alone. That would be even worse.”
And so it is decided. Lady Shelby returns to the servants’ quarters in the early evening with the message for the two travellers that Princess Katherine sorely regrets her absence, but she simply cannot afford to leave the throne unguarded in the unknown length of time before the King and Queen’s return. Since beds have been prepared for them already, they are welcome to stay the night as promised, and make their journey homeward in the morning, with the long hours of summer to aid their way.
Princess Katherine sits awake all night, sewing together an overshirt and a cloak and a pair of breeches. She braids her hair in the common style and tucks her tiara into a sling bag, underneath a couple of sets of underclothes and a good amount of money. The necklace of bone, hand-threaded, ordered trophies of her prowess in combat, ties around her neck and finds its home against her breastbone. Her soft calfskin shoes are switched for the heavy duty boots she uses for all long journeys, cobbled for her with reluctance in the days where she’d first made it clear she would be going where she might, with or without the blisters. In her chamber, she ruffles her sheets to make it look like she’s slept, and in the wee hours of the morning she slips outside to the servants’ quarters.
“Ugh,” mutters Shelby against the dawn, “too early.”
“We’ve gotta be ready!”
She sees Katherine’s new getup for the first time, then. “Why, your Highness, I’d hardly recognise you.”
“Really?” She’s very proud of this new look. The princess has worn a similar getup, dark to cover bloodstains, layered to protect her against the chill of the night where her prey were hiding, many times before. It won’t be familiar to the people of Helianthia, though, and hopefully the missive will convince the officials that she has to be somebody else so there’s no chance of the scheme being revealed before its time.
“Of course!”
They dawdle for a while, behind the wall where no one ever goes, which smells a little unsavoury but isn’t an uncomfortable place to await their targets. It’s not until the sun has climbed a little higher in the sky, pale yellow giving way to sunny blue, that the two men in their green and gold jackets reappear and point themselves in the direction of the stables.
Shelby and Katherine follow. It seems the men arrived on a carriage, and their two beautiful golden-brown steeds have been well taken care of by the stablehands while they were unneeded. They hook their horses back up to the vehicle, take seats behind them, lift the reins, and -
“No!” Katherine hisses. “It’s not big enough for us to stow away!”
“... Princess, you have, like, five horses.”
“Oh.” She does, doesn’t she? “Let’s just take Sardonyx.”
The mare in question isn’t her favourite - that honour goes to Hyacinth, the gorgeous grey she’s had since she was a girl - but Sardonyx is younger, and sturdier, and will take the weight of two women on a journey all the way to Gilded Helianthia. Besides, if her parents are going to notice that a horse is missing, too, it wouldn’t do for it to be Hyacinth. That would give the game away in no time.
“Your Highness?” the voice of one of the attendants comes from the other end of the stable.
“I - um - yes! Just me! Going for a, uh, an early morning trot, is all!”
“Oh. Well, enjoy yourself, your Highness.”
“Thank you!”
“Why’d you tell ‘em?” whispers Shelby, while she’s climbing up onto Sardonyx.
“I didn’t want them to think I was stealing my own horse! Then they would’ve definitely come to see what I was doing.” As it stands, she’s made it clear she doesn’t want to be disturbed, and that she doesn’t have anyone with her. Katherine’s so good at making daring escape plans.
“Alright, I see. So, uh…” she ducks down, leans into the body of the mount. “Which of us is gonna sit in front?”
“I have to hold the reins,” says Katherine, “you hold my waist.”
It shouldn’t be too uncomfortable, considering that Shelby’s not a very big lady, and Sardonyx is used to having Katherine on her back with all her weapons besides.
Although Shelby does seem to have a lot in the bag that’s hanging off her back - “What’s in there?”
“My bag?” Shelby shifts back while Katherine straddles the horse and gets her feet settled in the stirrups. “Uh, food? I figured, if it’s an all-day trip…”
Ugh. This is why Katherine needs ladies-in-waiting. They pick up her slack with all the smart ideas when she has all the cool ones.
They head out, the morning air still fresh enough to be invigorating, and catch up with the Helianthian messengers in good time, though trailing far enough that they won’t think they’re being followed necessarily. Shelby’s arms around her are a comfortable warmth, if a little uneven with their pressure, squeezing tight at any shift in balance.
“Are you okay back there?”
“Of course, your Highness! I’ve just, uh, never rode a horse before.”
“What? No way! I should have brought you out riding before, that’s so sad!”
“It’s fine,” says Shelby, “I’m holding on tight, I won’t fall.”
“I wouldn’t let you fall,” Katherine agrees, “but you’re totally safe as long as you stay how you are. Sardonyx wouldn’t buck you, she’s a sweetheart.”
“Uh-huh,” Shelby says, the warm air of her breath and the change in pressure making it evident that she’s elected to bury her face in the small of Katherine’s back.
They follow the missive for a couple of hours, the road running by a stream that Katherine knows finds its mouth at the Eversea a few days southwest from here. Whenever the men stop to eat and drink, to let their horses rest, Katherine and Shelby copy. Sardonyx seems content enough with her lot, especially as the bag on Shelby’s back slowly lightens with the lost weight of tossed apple cores and chewed-up bread. Before they know it, the golden light of late afternoon is heralding their arrival in the streets of Helianthia, heading through an unmanned gate towards the gilded quarter.
She watches the carriage disappear through palace gates, which are not quite so unmanned. “Wait here,” she tells Shelby, swinging a leg to drop down with bent knees to the cobbles, “I’m gonna find out what the deal is.”
“You’re talking about the Trials for the Queen’s hand?” asks the nearest soldier, when she approaches him with her most winning smile.
“Mhm! It’s not too late to sign up, right?”
“You’re lucky. Entries close tonight, for the first round two days hence. I can point you in the right direction, but you’ll need to find your own way, and your own place to stable your horse. These are for the royal steeds,” he tells her.
“No problem!”
They follow his directions, ending up at a nondescript little building just outside the castle walls. Inside, attendants are evidently busy writing up big plans.
“I’d like to put myself down for the royal trials,” Katherine beams.
A scribe looks her up and down. “Just you?”
“That’s right?”
He sighs, and pulls out a new piece of paper. “Your name, then?”
“I’m, uh -” she shoots wide eyes at Shelby “- Erin. Eliza.”
“Erin Eliza,” says the scribe, “hailing from whence?”
“From Glimmer Grove.”
He pulls a thoughtful expression. “There’s a name I haven’t heard in a while. How are things, out there? Still got that cursed princess, or was she dispatched of?”
“Um - no, she’s still alive.”
“Pity. I heard some terrible things about the famine in her youth. They had us eating lean for months to cover the alms our government were sending.”
Katherine can’t find a response. Shelby steps forward. “And we’re very grateful to your people and your royal family for helping us survive those years. And if my - my friend here is successful in the contest, then, uh, then I guess our princess won’t have to worry about any more famines any time soon, right?”
The scribe chuckles. “Right you are. You wouldn’t happen to have a name yourself, miss?”
“Shhhhubble,” Shelby says, conspicuously.
“Pleasure. Name’s Jack. Although you get a lot of Jacks out here, with the great stalk and all, so you won’t find me if you ask for me.”
“I see,” she nods. “So, what else did you need to know about Erin?”
Once they’ve got her (entirely fabricated) details, and let her know where and when she needs to show up for the qualifying round, Katherine and Shelby head back outside to find some place for themselves and Sardonyx to stay the night. It’s lucky they came with a few days’ notice, because not quite all the inns are booked to capacity yet; a little tavern called The Golden Goose has space for them to share a bed, especially at the rates Katherine can afford with her stash of gold.
“You sure you don’t need me to take the floor, Princess?”
“Nonsense,” says Katherine, “I don’t want you to hurt your back and have to walk around like that all week.”
“Of course,” Shelby sighs.
It’s a comfortable enough sleep, and then they have a free day to explore the city before they’re bid to come to the southern gates on the second morning. Katherine wakes again excited and prepared to take on the world, Shelby trailing behind her far more drowsy and sluggish. She supposes that it’s only fair - Shelby has no cause to be excited about posing as a commoner. On the other hand, this is Katherine’s only way to feel like herself most days.
They wander through the market, sellers shouting and ringing bells, all desperate to make a tidy profit from the swell of spectators arriving in the capital. Helianthia’s propensity for falling asleep between momentous occasions, looking dead to the world until it blooms in full force again, must mean that summers like these are a golden omen for her people.
She oohs and ahhs over pretty bangles, trades two golden pieces for a pair of folding fans that will keep them from ending up too sweaty in the heat of the day, has to be dragged away from getting a little portrait of herself done (“What if somebody recognises it, your Highness?!”). Silken scarves and lacy petticoats draw her eyes at every turn, and Shelby has to keep reminding her with pointed glances that her budget is not infinite in this land, in this guise.
Their breakfast today is two enthusiastically buttered morning rolls between them, topped with some of the exotic fruit preserve that you can only get in other lands much further south. The people of Gilded Helianthia can afford to eat luxuriously, and Katherine is… well, not unwilling to give up luxury, but certainly hesitant.
Shelby downright moans around her mouthful. “That’s amazing,” she says, mouth full, “what is it?”
“The sign called it mango chutney.”
“I don’t even know what that means.”
“I think the mango is the fruit!”
“Well, whatever it is, I want a jar.”
“Maybe when we’re leaving,” Katherine grins, and finds herself absently scanning the marketplace, and it’s then that she notices a figure she knows all too well.
Pearlescent Moon of Helianthia, Crown Princess when Katherine last saw her, now Queen and due to be married on the summer solstice next week. Sculking around the streets of the city she owns, with a mask that doesn’t cover her eyes and a rough brown fabric getup.
Katherine’s jaw falls. “Pearl,” she calls across the square.
Pearl’s head darts to see her, and she does a double take. She approaches, stealing between passing groups of people, and crouches where they’re sitting by the wall. “How’d you know it was me?”
“Because it is you, you’re just wearing different clothes.”
She pushes the mask up, rebalancing it against her nose. “And what are you doing here? I thought they said you weren’t coming!”
“Princess Katherine of Glimmer Grove won’t be in attendance as a spectator, that’s true, I didn’t lie about that.”
“So what’s goin’ on?”
She feels her mouth curl into a wicked smirk. “The eligible bacheloress Miss Erin Eliza will be one of the contestants at your trial thingy.”
Pearl’s eyes flash with something. “Suns above,” she sighs, “you’re an idiot.”
“What? It’s a good idea!”
“Would it not have been a better idea to just enrol as yourself?”
“No! Nobody’s gonna root for me if they know I’m a royal. Like this, I can make it an underdog story!”
“... And then, what, merge our empires? We don’t have any siblings, Kath.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound so bad to me!”
Pearl holds out a hand, gesturing for her to take it, and levers her to a standing position. Shelby quickly shoves the rest of her roll in her mouth and does the same. They’re led away from any prying eyes that might be looking, settled in an alley round the back of a tanner’s shop. (What is it with Katherine and standing right by walls that smell real bad today?) The whole time, Pearl is muttering about her short-sightedness.
“I thought it was weird that I heard about so many dead fish piling in the river,” she grumbles, muffled by the fabric. “I didn’t link it back to you, because they told me you weren’t coming, but obviously I should have. And - Kath, you can’t do the second challenge, because the groundskeepers are gonna kill you if you wilt the hedges, they’ve been growing those for years to make the maze… I don’t want you getting burnt at the stake, they wouldn’t do it if they knew that you were Katherine, but if you’re - whatever you said your name was - then they’re not gonna hesitate, so I’d have to step in on my own authority, and then it raises questions about whether I’m biased about the Trials, and -”
Katherine interrupts, “Well, sure you’re biased, right? It’s your marriage, it’s your future.”
“Yeah, I can have opinions, but it’s an important part of the tradition that I don’t meddle with the results. The winner needs to be the person who genuinely passes every test the Empire can throw at them, without any unfair advantages, and their reward is a fair shot at my hand.”
“And I get that,” Katherine says, “I just don’t want you to go through all that trouble just for some guy you don’t even like, when you could have somebody you already know you like.”
Pearl brings pressed-together palms against the bridge of her nose. “Did I mention you’re an idiot?”
Katherine studies Pearl’s own take on a commoner’s disguise. Definitely not the work of a practised tailor - in fact, she’d wager that these are clothes that Pearl has stolen from her personal staff. The rough brown of her overalls looks like it’s made from a burlap sack, woven to keep a bag of flour together rather than keep a person warm and comfortable. And the shirt she’s wearing underneath is clearly oversized, stained at the short-sleeve, totally undignified.
“What’s your name,” Pearl asks flatly.
“Lady Shelby, your Majesty.”
“Lady Shelby, why didn’t you tell Princess Katherine that this was a bad idea?”
“I-I tried, your Majesty! But she’s…” Shelby clears her throat “... very determined, when she puts her mind to something.”
“Okay,” Pearl says, “your maids are useless, got it.”
Shelby flushes. Katherine frowns. “Hey, it’s not her fault she’s doing what I told her to! That’s her job!”
“Of course! A-and you were making a very convincing argument, in the baths.”
“And it’s not even so bad that we have to share a bed!”
Pearl’s eyes dart between them. “You’re both useless.”
“So, what, I’m not allowed to do the thing? I have to go back to Glimmer Grove, is that how it ends?”
“You’re not competing in the Trials, if only because I care more about the hedge maze than whatever stupid plan you cooked up in an afternoon. You don’t have to leave - I can tell the staff there’s been a change of plans, get you a last-minute room, or you can have the chaise in Princess Gem’s room or something. But you’re not gettin’ yourself killed in the Trials just because you want to marry me.”
“Getting myself killed?”
Pearl looks up at her through a stony lowered brow. “Yes, Kath. Participants are put to death for not succeeding, if they don’t resign. And then the last trial is a fight to the death between the final two contestants, and they come to collect the loser’s body from the arena at dawn, and the one that’s left is the one who gets my hand.”
“Oh.” She hadn’t heard about that part.
“And, I mean, it doesn’t matter anyway, ‘cause I was plannin’ on goin’ into the arena myself and making sure the winner’s got the chops to fight me too, but -”
“Well, I can fight,” she pouts.
“Can you fight me?”
That’s a more difficult question. All of her expertise comes from hunting animals, beating back the creatures of the night, the spirits that’d have her dragged back to the fae world she first came from if they got the chance to grab her. Princesses are not supposed to spar in Glimmer Grove; she’s not sure her mother has ever even held a knife. Helianthia’s not like that. Pearl has been wielding a sharpened scythe since she was toddling, or her sickle blades for close-range combat, or that pretty bow with the emerald inlay…
“Exactly,” says Pearl, “you can’t. You probably didn’t even bring your axe.”
“They didn’t tell me I had to!”
“They told you to come as a spectator, Kath!”
It’s… okay, well maybe it’s a little stupid now that she thinks about it. “Wait, did you say Princess Gem’s here?”
“Yeah,” says Pearl, cocking her head, moving into bemusement, “we had a lovely evening yesterday. She knows more about the rose bushes than I do.”
“Well, that makes sense. You’re a sunflower person.”
“Stop changing the subject!”
They end up moving out of the alley again, heading closer to the city limits. It wouldn’t do for some guard or another to run into the Queen and a foreign Princess, whether they see through their disguises or not. Any way you spin that possibility ends badly.
It’s a gorgeous day, the sky completely stripped of clouds, baring its naked blueness to the whole continent. Sweat under her carefully constructed competitor’s clothes is wicked away by smartly chosen fabric. Pearl pulls at her collar; Shelby shifts her bag strap across her shoulder and into her neck.
“That’s why I invited you to spectate,” Pearl says, breaking the silence after a long time. “Best way to make sure you’d survive the bloody festival.”
Katherine doesn’t say anything in return.
“I know you don’t… do things like this, in Glimmer Grove. I know when you get married it’ll probably suck. But this is important to me, and my people, and my ancestors, and - and I don’t need one of my friends comin’ in and messing the whole tradition up.”
Beside her, Shelby shuffles from foot to foot. It can’t be easy, being a fly on the wall for this.
“But you don’t have to go back empty handed, y’know? Like I said, you can crash with Princess Gem. And then you can come sit with us, and watch a bunch of stupid people kill themselves for the chance to be Prince-Consort, and drink mead, and it’ll be fun.”
“Yeah,” she says, eventually. “Although I did kind of leave the kingdom unattended. So I should probably do something about that.”
“... Pardon?”
“Yeah, my mom and dad are out of the country right now.”
“Oh. Lookin’ for cures again?”
She sighs. “What else?”
At least she has this, if nothing else. The understanding she and Pearl share, the unspoken commiseration between she that was blighted and she that withers. (That was a rough couple months, long enough ago now that she hardly remembers the specifics. And it’s a story for another day, if Shelby has wit enough to notice and courage enough to ask.)
Pearl turns, her mask pulled down now that they're far from the crowds, and gives her a token smile - close-lipped, squared at the edges. Katherine can see her dimples when she puffs out her cheeks like that.
“Let’s go call a messenger, then,” says Pearl, “before you get too close to any sunflowers. And cross you off whatever list you got yourself put down for, too.”
She leads again, and Katherine and Shelby trail behind. When she looks over, she finds Shelby making wide-eyed, nervous eye contact. What? she mouths.
Shelby sweeps a pointed hand in the air between her and Pearl, as if that’s a signal that Katherine can understand. Then she makes a thumbs down, which is annoyingly a lot more comprehensible.
It’s fine, Katherine keeps mouthing, although even as she says it, she feels a part of herself wilting.
(The changeling princess prospers, her magic favouring any life she calls her own. Promising her heart away to another, then, was always ill-advised, if selflessly intentioned.)
A palace of green and gold, of ivory-cream marble with clinging vines that shy away from her touch, awaits. Katherine will watch the Trials, and try her best not to falter when Pearlescent Moon is promised to their victor. There’s nothing else to be done about it, she concludes, and knows in that moment that this is the last layer of truth.
Beneath her deftly crafted disguise, the first few wisps of black begin to curl their way across the Princess’ chest. But that story need not be told, for you can already decipher how it ends.