A hundred years ago, a strange phenomena came upon the kingdom of Aetheria, namely that those between the ages of ten to twenty-five did not always die. Or, rather, they touched death and returned with magic abilities. Not all children were so lucky, however. Some truly did die; in fact, most died. Scholars said they had no clue what could trigger the lucky return, but that didn't stop certain individuals from trying their luck. The best way to gain power and move up in the world was with magic, so why not try to cheat the system?

Hence why twenty-four hour vigils upon the death of a child became the law. Hence why some began to bury their children alive, blindly hoping to trigger the event. Hence why children became pawns of death and clung to bells to ward away not evil spirits but men of flesh and blood and evil.

Most of us feared death. Most of us would not risk life for magic. Most of us were content to lead small, unimportant, nonmagical lives.

But I should have known it was always my destiny to be called upon in such a way. I was expendable by nature, the daughter of a dead king and his secret mistress. Out of obligation, he had brought my mother and I to the palace to live when I was a small, squishy child. All I remembered of that time was how cold he was, how cold the court was, how cold everyone was. They hated my mother and I—the queen, rightfully so I suppose, hated us the most. Mother and I fled one night and never looked back.

I thought about fleeing now as I paced in my tower bedroom. It was the same I had used when I was here before, only it was dirtier than I remembered. And the door had locked behind me when my grouchy guard had shoved me inside. The colorful bedspread and carpet I had as a child had been removed, and now everything was a dingy, forgotten gray. Occasionally, I found my way to the window and wondered if I could make the jump. My leg ached as it took my weight. A second fall would only aggravate it, and I couldn't run if it broke.

I would crawl away if I had to though. My uncle's words were still ringing in my ears hours later. "After your return, you will be dispatched to Aetheria Academy south of here. It is a school for magic, and I need a spy."

I tried to argue that magic was not guaranteed and I would most likely stay dead, but he didn't care. Two birds with one stone, he seemed to say. I would either be a spy or I would be out of his way. "Why me?" I ventured. If all he wanted was to get rid of me, there were easier and cheaper ways. Surely no one was crying for my death. Most people had forgotten about me or never knew I existed. The late queen kept her husband's scandal a closely guarded secret.

"As much as you might try to deny it, you bear the crown no ill will," he said. "I can trust you to serve your duty well."

How foolish he was. "If I don't?"

His beady eyes glittered. "Your mother... I wonder if my late brother misses her. Perhaps I might be inclined to reunite them. Or, if you prefer, I can have her brought to the dungeons where I will easily forget about her."

It was me who was foolish then. "So you wish to use me because you can buy me with threats instead of coins."

"Do not think of it as buying you, Celestine. I need someone young. I need someone who will not be missed or recognized. I need someone easily controlled. You fit the description, wouldn't you agree?"

He had then spilled far too many details—how I would have six months to find and report my target, how my failure would mean the last of my undead life would be snuffed from me, how my mother would be tortured and killed if I tried to dismiss my task or betray the crown. When I tried to ask about the falsified thievery, the elaborate setup for my arrest, he had only laughed at me before sending me away.

At first, I'd tried not to think about it. I'd sat numbly on my dull bed and stared at the empty stone walls until the sun had gone down. In the darkness, my skin crawled, my numbness gave way to anger, and for some reason, that made my eyes itch. I had gotten up to pace then. It didn't matter how my aching leg begged me to stop because I couldn't.

The more turns I took about the room, the more my panic grew. When the sun rose again, I would die. Even if I returned, my life as it was would be over. I would hardly be Celestine Elythier anymore, but a creature forged anew.

My bells tinkled. They were the only thing I had been able to bring from home, as the clothes I had come in had been burned. I was still in that silly dress, looking more alien than I ever had.

As I paused at the window, I realized nothing on the horizon was familiar. There was the sprawling palace, of course, and its great glittering city below the hill. In the dark, it was painfully bright, its streets alight with aggressive white lights. It was nothing like the quiet, dark streets of home. I couldn't even see home in the distance.

For all my loneliness, I might as well have already been buried. The room was so small, my lungs so tight, my tears so hollow that perhaps I had already died.

It was laughably absurd. I was not a spy—not any more than I was a thief—and I certainly wasn't an academic either. I was an amateur, barely an apprentice jeweler, more of an errand girl than anything.

You fit the description. With my uncle's words ringing in my ears, I turned to find myself in the mirror. The girl there certainly did look young, missed by no one, and perfectly easy to control. Her blue eyes were too round, too full of life. Her blonde hair, though dirty, had an innocent look to it as it curled delicately about her face. The dress she wore accentuated a certain dollike quality to her, obscuring her arms in poofy sleeves and her legs in an overly long skirt. This was a girl to be dragged around, a girl to be sacrificed, a girl to be fashioned into something else. She was, of course, a girl to be used.

I straightened, hardening my expression. I had already promised myself that I would be a thorn. I had already promised myself that I would not be cowed. Let that girl die. A sharper, meaner, harder one must crawl out from her shell.

That was the girl who would fulfill her mission, rescue her mother, and disappear forever.

~~

Dawn came, bringing news: that I was not the only petty criminal scheduled to be executed that day. There were twenty-two of us, all charged with a variety of crimes ranging from theft to unlawful burial to assault. As it turned out, my dear uncle was striving to prove his goodness to the kingdom of Aetheria by rounding up criminals and killing them for show. I was merely caught in the cogs, a girl with other uses but no good alternative to get her there (at least, not for the king and his men, who were not the most creative types. Thinking was, perhaps, beyond them). What a grand beginning to his kingship.

I learned all this from the dirty woman who was hauled from the dungeons this morning and shoved into the cart beside me. Her charge? Theft, of course. Except she was a real thief, unlike me. She said she stole from ten different shops in three different towns, raking in several thousand pouches of gold before she was finally caught. In her good opinion, my dear uncle was doing this to quell the anxieties of the public.

"What anxieties?" I asked. Mother and I were unfortunately prone to burying our heads in the sand when it came to the politics of Aetheria. The more ignorant we were, the less we thought people would care about my half of royal blood. Though for me, it was because I truly didn't care.

She answered nonchalantly, "Folks loved King Varius. Lots of 'em wished he left an heir on the throne, but alas, you know the story. His queen was barren, so the crown fell to the other brother. Not much good opinion about the new king, Urias. What better way to raise it than cleaning the streets of trash?"

I dug my fingers into my skirt—for I was still wearing that awful dress—and tried to recall what whispers I had heard. There might have been a few unhappy murmurs in Aeil, some rumors and the like, but I'd never heard of anything drastic. Maybe I had been too far on the outskirts, my hometown too small.

We were wheeled away, me and the thief woman, to a new dungeon-like waiting room where the executioner could be seen sharpening his blade. Behind iron bars and hidden from the morning sunlight, I paced across dingy stone. Slowly, the room was filled with more and more soon-to-be dead criminals. Of all of us, I was the only one of age to return. They eyed me with disdain and pity. The most frightening were those who still had blood under their nails and splattered on their clothes. I liked to think my bells kept them away.

After some time, a willowy scholar, marked by his gold robes, came down the hall and paused on the other side of the bars. From the brooch on his chest, I assumed he was in service to the court and likely came on my uncle's orders. He looked nervously about the crowd before his gaze found mine and he beckoned me to him. The cold steel was frigid as I pressed against it.

He took my hands through the bars and crushed a stone flower into my fingers. It was similar in size and shape to the one that had been hung at my waist the night before (I had lost it somewhere along the way, as it was only made of ribbons and sadness). This one shimmered with the faint whisper of power. As it touched my skin, its cool petals turned blue and a crystal appeared at its center.

"What is this?" I whispered. I was almost tempted to pull away and chuck the thing. It felt odd in my palms, as if it had once been alive.

"For good luck," he said. Then he left me there, feeling even stupider than I had before, only now with a flower.

I didn't need luck. I needed to not die. Of course, there was no way to guarantee that I wouldn't. Aside from being removed from the whole scenario, but that ship had already sailed.

"What's that?" The thief woman appeared at my side, her interest absorbed by the flower.

"A parting gift," I said, pinning it to the cloth at my waist. It did fit nicely with the string of bells there and the remnants of pink ribbon.

She whistled, still eyeing it. "Stone flowers. Expensive things. Suppose someone is wishing you'll come back. You are the right age for that."

I frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I've heard it said that—"

A horn blared and silenced her, then we were all of us bustled out into the blinding sunlight. There wasn't much of a crowd, only my uncle, his wife, and a few nobles beneath him. The soldier who brought me all the way here stood guard beside my uncle. The sight of him made my blood boil just a little.

Much of the rest was a blur. Someone tried to escape, one of the men whose hands were still tinted red, but he was dragged up to the dais and met a cruel end at the tip of the executioner's blade. I think I lost my breakfast after that.

Even if I wanted to, I couldn't recall the wait, slow though it was, nor the slice of the blade and the spill of my blood. There was an unnatural chill, the weight of the stone flower in my hand, and the press of earth against me. There was darkness, silence, and complete stillness. An eternity passed while I spread thinner and thinner. I remembered that I began to think I would die, and only then did fear creep up my throat.

Then I saw Death, and he was so terribly like me.

Wow what a ride. How we feelin? :D