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“I know what you’re here for,” I sighed.
“Lebkuchen,” Elise responded, her voice shaking. “I’ve never said anything about…”
It was the mundaneness of the day that bothered me. A day I had waited years for, and Elise was nothing like I’d pictured. Muffy told me later that afternoon that Elise had come and gone on foot. “No entourage, no carriage,” she grinned, eyeing the plate of pretzels I was holding.
But first there was this moment. I looked Elise up and down, noticing her aged face, her simple gown. Creases everywhere. I shook my head. “I don’t need you to tell me, Elise,” I said coldly. More coldly than I had intended, and her gaze flickered guiltily to the ground. “Take it,” I continued, and pressed the pocket mirror into her palm. “Keep it close to you. It will keep you from harm, or whomever carries it.” Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. Part of me wanted to burst out laughing. “You, crying? What about me?” I almost shouted. “Stuck in my suffocating habit all this time, wondering where you were, whether you were happy. Maybe I didn’t even want you to be happy. Sipping tea in the mornings. Waving commands to your maids. Lying in bed with that faceless man. All in that grand, faraway castle of yours. And now you’re back and only I can save you from Asmodeus. Only me. You should be grateful to me for once in your life, Elise Liedl.”
But I didn’t say anything. I still had my pride.
“Lebkuchen, I…” she whispered, clutching the pocket mirror harder than necessary.
“You’ve chosen your path, Elise,” I tilted my head. “But tell me. Did you get what you wished for?”
Elise met my gaze, and for just a brief, singular moment, that fire in her eyes was back—the fire I fell for when I was thirteen and didn’t know anything about the world and its evils and she was my sun, my escape, my everything. But even then I saw it in those eyes of hers, how they lit up like fireflies when she spoke of faraway places, ambitions I could hardly understand. I humoured her, laughed with her, but I was never enough for her.
“I did,” Elise replied. “Nothing more, nothing less.”
“I see.”
I waved her goodbye. I told her never to return.
I didn’t tell Elise the whole story. I didn’t tell her that the years after she’d left were the most difficult, that she left an irreplaceable void in my heart, that I saw her literally everywhere: at the bell tower, the swing, my bedside. I didn’t tell her how three years passed before I figured everything out. Her contract with the demon Asmodeus. The fate of that poor girl Rozenmarine. Father Hans and how he’d been responsible for Walpurga.
I didn’t tell her about my nightmares either. Terrible ones, like me being eaten alive by Asmodeus, while through the pain I could see Elise kneeling uselessly as I screamed of her betrayal. I had that nightmare again recently. “I’ll never forgive you,” I heard myself cry out. “I loved you! Oh, how I loved you, Elise!” Then the distinct sensation of being pulled away somewhere. Cold sweat seeping into my nightgown. Being unsure of where anything was until I recognised the mild scent of the daisies Freya had tucked underneath our pillows. She’d taken up trying different flowers every week.
“Leb?” she murmured sleepily.
I must've woken her with my thrashing. A flicker of guilt coursed through me; how would she react if she knew all my nightmares were about Elise?
“It’s nothing, love,” I whispered. “I’m fine now.”
Freya squeezed my hand and I squeezed hers back. I smiled softly, even though she couldn’t see my face in the darkness. Once upon a time, I would’ve referred to this time of night as witching hour.
I knew Elise would visit soon because of that nightmare. The Lord has a funny way of showing us these things.