I know it's been longer than expected, but my boss had symptoms from her vaccine so I've been filling in at work more. I worked 9½ hours today 😅. That and I'm having a tough time writing a scene...
Liam felt ironic in his guard gear. It was a size or two bigger than he had once worn; age and contentment can make you need a larger size than you once measured to. But that he would wear something so... conformist - and to signify something so menacing as the king's guard - felt dirty. And shiny. So very shiny.
Romeo seemed to be having the same agitation. He had always wanted to be a good guard, but after years of living on the islands in loose, comfortable clothing and living a life he cherished, he no longer had the desire to ever don a guard uniform again. He had worn it to sneak in to talk to Gloria roughly two weeks ago, but hopefully this would be the last time. Liam didn't foresee any possible reason they would need to. Either this would go very wrong and they wouldn't have to wear this garb again, or things would go very well and they also would never have to wear it again...
"I wish I could dress like Anwyn," Romeo grumbled. "Midshore sure decked you out. You look so comfortable..." he whined teasingly. Anwyn wore a sensible pair of trousers and a belted blouse with a vest. She still had her hair covered and her face covered in a veil in hopes to hide her identity, but Liam still felt anxious knowing that she was going to be in the palace at all. She could be recognized, and if something went wrong they would have to worry about saving both her and Gloria, something that could become very difficult very quickly.
She hadn't fit any armor available, or else they would have had her look like a guard with them. A helmet would have concealed her face much better, but a woman just wasn't built like a man, especially not a pregnant woman, and she couldn’t fit men’s armor.
Midshore came up beside them. "It's getting dark, and I can see the boats coming closer to the shore. We should get into position. Let's go."
Liam and Romeo didn't hide themselves as they walked with what they hoped looked like purpose. Making their way over to the side wall of the Palace, they opened the little gate, ushering in Midshore and Anwyn who had followed in the shadows. Liam knew the palace grounds like the back of his hand, and he and Romeo led the way to the side door near the guards’ wing. It would be heavily guarded, but hopefully with the approaching conflict they would be able to get around without being noticed.
“Midshore, is there any way that you can hide us? Make them not think we’re here or something?” Anwyn asked as Liam peeked around the door.
“I don’t specialize in deception magic, so, no,” she said bluntly with a smile. She was stressed, so Liam wasn’t going to hold her negativity against her.
Romeo took a large breath. “Ok, I guess I’ll just go along and if it’s clear I’ll knock three times on the wall. Wish me luck.”
He walked down the hallway, and as soon as he got to the corner he looked, then knocked on the wall. Liam knew sneaking was only going to get harder, and with every minute he was in the palace and nothing went wrong, he was worried the danger was getting closer and closer to them. They just needed to get up to the old queen’s quarters and get Gloria free, then they could leave this whole mess of a monarchy behind them.
They inched through the palace like this, with Romeo and Liam playing leapfrog over and over, signalling when it was clear. The rebellion would be here any moment, and they had to move quickly.
The foyer was the most intimidating room to get through. It was a double story room with large windows and the possibility to be seen from the floor above.
“All right, I’ll go,” Romeo whispered only loud enough for the team to hardly hear him. He took a step forward, then another, casually looking to the balcony as he made his way across the room, nodding to a passing guard on the top floor. He was nodded at in turn, and once the other guard was gone Romeo waved the team over, not wanting to make a knock to attract the guard to look back.
Midshore and Anwyn, dressed in soft soled boots, darted over nearly silently, but Liam couldn’t be that quiet in his armor so he walked over as casually as he could.
Anwyn started to walk up the main stairs, but Romeo grabbed her arm, stopping her. “We can’t go that way!” he hissed.
“Why not?” she asked, pulling her arm free but setting foot back on the floor.
“Montoya told us that if we go that way we’ll be stopped by the guard outside her door. We have to go up the back way. There are stairs just like the ones on the King’s side of the palace; we’ll take the back way and go right up to her wing.”
“But that takes us through the Duchess’s wing, and we’ll be caught for sure,” Anwyn said.
“I’ll shield the door,” Midshore assured, “we won’t be caught by surprise. Our only foe would be ahead of us, and I only sense one person on this side. Most people are in the back of the Palace.”
Liam and Romeo looked at her as if she had grown horns. “You could sense if there were people, and we’ve been peeking around corners this whole time?”
She blinked at them, pulling in her lips. “It’s not the most accurate. But now that we’re more in the middle of the building I can tell which direction they’re coming from better. Ok? Let’s move. I don’t want to catch Illia.”
Nodding, Liam grabbed the knob of the Duchess’s wing and pushed it open. Immediately in the hall, pacing, was Blake. He was dressed in fine, clean clothes that were fit for a prince. He had always been clean when they were on the Islands, a bit more than the normal person, but seeing him in clothes like these it made perfect sense why he had never been comfortable being dirty. He was raised in a pristine environment.
Blake looked up at the two men dressed as guards, then he noticed Midshore and Anwyn behind them, but not recognizing them. “What is the meaning of this?!” he asked, facing them, a scowl on his face.
Midshore turned and placed a shield over the door, sealing them in. Romeo pulled off his helmet and showed his face, eyes narrowing in on his target. “I was hoping I’d find you,” he said. He remembered toddler Lucian, bumbling his way around the palace 19 years prior. If he had known then… He may have stolen him away with them and raised him right. He couldn’t have hurt a child, but he didn’t mind giving what this fully grown young man had coming to him. “I’ve got a fist with your name on it.”
A dawning look of recognition came across Blake’s face. “That’s touching, Fredrico Romeo,” he said, “But no matter how many times you put my name on your body it won’t make a difference,” he sneered, grabbing for his blade, only to find that he wasn’t equipped with one. With shocked eyes, he picked up a pot and threw it at Romeo, but Romeo was faster. Shattering the pot against his blade, he tackled Blake to the ground.
“We don’t have time for this. We have to go and find Gloria before we’re discovered,” Anwyn rushed. “Love, Midshore and I will go ahead and grab Gloria, can you stay here and make sure that Romeo doesn’t kill the poor boy? I’d rather he rot in prison to an old age than get out of this so easily as to die now.”
“Of course, we’ll watch this end, you hurry,” he said as Anwyn and Midshore hurried around them and up the hidden staircase.
Coming out the top of the stairwell, Anwyn was surprised by how tacky it was. It was nearly bichromatic, everything being white and red. All of the flowers were red, the curtains were red, and the wallpaper was busy and dated. Or maybe it was in style- how was Anwyn to know? She hadn’t cared about Mainland style for over 18 years now.
She remembered when this wing had been lush and teal, the colors that the previous queen had loved and cherished from her home. Now she wondered if she had loved those things at all or if she had been locked up like an animal in a synthetic enclosure on display.
She went to the door knob to the bedroom and tried to push it open. Though it wiggled a bit, it was very much locked.
“Oh, think I remember a spell to unlock doors, give me a moment to remember what it is…” Midshore placed her hand on her chin, wracking her memory.
Anwyn didn’t have the patience for this, her little girl was on the other side of this door and she was going to get her out. “Out of the way!” she hollered, picking up a chair and throwing it at the door. It burst open as if the lock had been paper, but the chair hitting the door and floor made a loud noise. Midshore jumped, cursing loudly, and Anwyn rushed into the room to find her daughter.
Midshore went to the window, pushing aside the curtain. She could see a skirmish already taking place on the front lawn of the palace, with guards pouring out of the front door to stop the rebels, but from what she could see, there were more rebels than guards. They had a real chance of winning this fight.
“Gloria! Gloria, are you alright?” Crouching next to her daughter, she went to wrap her arms around her, but Gloria recoiled. Her hands were bruised, her wrists too. Anwyn bristled. “If they hurt you, we’ll burn this whole place to the ground. The whole building. Make all of this marble crack and crumble.”
“I’m so happy you’re here,” Gloria said, trying to hold back tears. “I really needed this today. I can’t stand another day here, I just want to leave and never look back,”
“And you don’t have to, but we need to keep moving,” Midshore urged as she went to the other door, listening for footsteps. “That chair may have gotten us in the door, but someone’s going to have heard it and worried about the princess. We need to hurry before things get hairy.”
“Midshore? When did you get here?” Gloria asked, blinking away tears, getting to her feet.
“That’s another very long story that we don’t have the time for. Now, get moving,” Her eyes moved to the door again.
“Mom, can you take these things off of me? I can’t use my power with them on, and I can’t get them off,” Gloria held out her hand. It was shaking.
“Yes, I can definitely do that,” Anwyn looked at it a bit puzzled for a moment, then adeptly twisted a knob and the whole thing fell off of her hand. Gloria turned around for her to untie the necklace while Gloria fished the rings off of her hand, shuddering as they fell off, and Anwyn thought she saw the bruises already starting to rapidly fade. Gloria looked at her and gave a weak smile.
“Someone’s coming-” Midshore said abruptly, grabbing Gloria’s shoulder and pushing her out the rear door in the direction they had come.
Anwyn followed closely behind them, but her head scarf fell back and her face veil with it. She hadn’t had enough hair pins to secure it when they’d left the cabin, and she’d feared this would happen. As she scrambled to pick it back up, she heard the lock of the exterior bedroom door turn and click. Anwyn’s stomach dropped as she froze in place. It was too late, they were going to be caught.
“My rose?” came a deep voice. “My rose, are you all right? I heard a noise from my office in this direction, I wanted to check and see if you were-”
The king broke off as he saw Anwyn standing in the doorway. “My love, Annie, you’ve come back.” A smile spread across his face.
“My- my king,” she said, straightening her shoulders as her blood went cold and her stomach dropped. Signaling behind her back for the other two to continue on without her. With the same hand she drew a knife from her belt, out of view from the king.
“Annie, you’ve hardly aged. You’re still as beautiful as you were when last I saw you.” He wandered closer to her, closing the few feet between them. “My love, you’ve returned. Now we can be happy…”
He placed one hand on her shoulder and the other on her waist to pull her in gently, craning his neck to kiss her.
Knife in hand, she placed the weapon between the two of them, stabbing him in the chest as he closed the distance. She hadn’t expected it to work. He wasn’t wearing armor, just a fine shirt. She couldn’t simply kill him like this, could she? He had been such a horrible, unstoppable force, she hadn’t expected to be able to pierce him as easily as you pierce a fish. Was he really just a man, formed from flesh?
She stared him in the eyes as he stumbled backwards. “You can’t hurt me any more,” she said, “And my daughter will never be a part of your games again. My family will not be a part of your hatred.” The king sank to his knees, then fell back onto the floor.
Anwyn looked down at him, “There were times when you made me wish I was dead, but now, at the end of things, it is me who lives, and you who dies. I am finally free of you.”
“Annie…” the king wheezed, “I never wanted to… to…”
She blinked and took a breath, looking at his choking face as he breathed his last breath. Her aggressor- her demon- could never hurt her again. He could never hurt Liam again, and he could never hurt her family again. Could it really be this easy? To just walk out of here and never have to fear him again? It didn’t feel real. He couldn’t be dead.
She picked up her scarf from the floor, looking at the rough weave of it. Looking at the still body of the king on the floor, she threw it at his lifeless form. “I will never hide who I am again.”
OOOooo! It took so long to figure out How I wanted this scene to go. I didn't know what emotion I wanted Anwyn to convey, and my editor friend gave me some insight on how someone who's experienced recent trauma (Gloria) would react to contact.
I must have edited this part four times over, and I'm finally happy enough with it to post it. Now the next part has more editing that's needed, so that'll eat some more time. And Midshore wasn't doing her normal magic stuff so I hope her sim isn't borked...
Thanks for reading, and I hope you all are having a better week than me! Oh, And I got my second Vaccine!
OH MY GOD. That heist to Gloria's room was the most nerve-wracking thing that's happened in a while. Good thing only Blake saw them
And yaaaaassssssss. That was so satisfying. After almost two decades, Anwyn got closure
I'm afraid that Gloria got pregnant though. Rule of drama states that it did form a baby. I'm guessing this will be a new arc, and she won't be free of Blake just yet. I think Ilia will become the next main antagonist, and the fact that the baby has Blake's genes will give her some control over it
Don't manhandle the urchin. He's not for sale. FIND YOUR OWN! - Xenon the Antiquarian, Dragon Age II
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Fingers crossed that part two can come out on tuesday, bar any emergencies. I've got it written, but the 'production' is a bit higher, so it's not as easy.
Midshore paused at the bookshelf, pensive, scanning it. Gloria didn’t understand, she had been in a hurry five seconds earlier, why was she staring at a bookshelf? This wasn’t the time to read!
“Aha!” Midshore exclaimed softly and pulled on the spine of a thick leather-bound tome. Gloria gasped as the door swung inward, revealing a secret stairway behind it leading down. “Come on,” Midshore urged, pulling her along.
“These were here the whole time?” Gloria asked, baffled. “I could have left my wing at any time?”
“The duchess’s wing is directly beneath yours. You wouldn’t have gotten very far,” she responded. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she pushed open another door, revealing Liam and Romeo standing over a restrained Blake.
“Dad! Pops!” she ran to them and held them close. “I’ve missed you so much. This is all my fault, I should never have left. I was so scared that I wouldn’t see you again,” she let the words come out of her, not bothering to wonder if they were coherent or not.
“Hey, sweetheart, I missed you too,” Liam said softly. “But we’re not out of here yet. We need to get to a safe place so Midshore can teleport us away. She can take one of us at a time, and it’ll be hard, but we need to get out of the palace. Stay with me-”
“We have to get Seneca,” she said, pulling away from him. She noticed that Blake was unconscious on the floor. Oddly, she wasn’t used to seeing him asleep. He was always on high alert, watching. Now he was limp. She could feel his energy, so she knew he was still alive. She also realized she never wanted to see him again. “He’s in the dungeon, we have to save him.”
“Seneca, the son of the king?” Romeo asked. “You told me he had died in the fire.”
“He didn’t, though! Blake lied to me, told me that I was the only survivor. He captured Seneca and has him in the dungeon.” Gloria said. Liam shivered at the thought of the dungeon.
“His people are coming, they’ll save him for us. We don’t have to worry about him,” Midshore weighed.
“No! I need to make sure he’s ok. I owe him that much. He’s saved my life twice now, and it’s time I return the favor.” Gloria stared at the group.
Liam, Romeo, and Midshore looked at each other. “What’s one more stop?” Romeo asked.
“One more stop could get us all killed!” Midshore said. “We all have kids! None of us should go through any unnecessary risk. Especially not for a boy who has a whole rebelion here to put him on the throne. This isn’t our job!” Midshore pointed out.
“But the lad’s only a boy, and the dungeon can be hard to find if you don’t know where to look. What if he’s killed before he can be rescued?” Liam said.
“Romeo’s wife is taking care of five children by herself,” Midshore emphasized. “Anwyn is expecting another. We can’t risk our lives for the heir to a doomed line. We need to leave!”
Liam looked around, “Where did Gloria go?”
She was standing at the door, still shielded by Midshore, just short of pounding her fist on the barrier.
“Gloria! I asked you to stay by me!” Liam shouted as the group jogged over to her. “You can’t just leave us like that. You’ll give me a heart attack.”
“I will save Seneca if I have to break through one of Midshore’s impenetrable shields. I’m not leaving until I know he’s all right. Besides, I can summon fire so don’t try to stop me,” she said.
“Good luck,” Midshore said under her breath.
Liam tilted his head down at her, remembering her when she was a little girl. “I can see there’s no fighting you on this one, so we’ll go,” he said. Anwyn came up behind them, wiping the King’s blood from her hand.
“I highly disagree-” Midshore turned to look at him.
“If we don’t, she’ll go alone, and that’s even worse. We go as a group,.” Liam said. “Now, Midshore, please lower the shield.”
She glared at him, then dissolved the shield with a wave of her hand. Gloria pushed open the door, opening to the entrance. It seemed the rebellion had already come through here. The walls were marked, there was rubbish on the floor, and smoke hung in the air from a distant fire.
“Where are you going with my heir?” A woman’s voice came from beside them, and Illia stepped out of the shadows. “I need her, now more than ever. Once she has a child, I have no need for her, but I need a male heir!” Sparks flew from her hands, and Midshore blocked them.
“We’re taking Gloria home, and you’ll not stop us,” she said, measuredly. Her anger that she had been speaking with not two minutes before was replaced with eerie calm. “Illia, your crimes against humanity and the pain you’ve caused other spellcasters with your selfish use of magic is too much to be answered for.” she said with a face devoid of emotion.
“Mirri, your skin would crawl if you knew everything I was responsible for. But are you up for this? I can tell you’re powerful, but you're younger than I am, and you have less experience, less willing to take what you want, and to take lives.”
She lashed out with her power, reflected back by Midshore but blocked harmlessly. “Get going, I’ll hold her off,” Midshore urged over her shoulder. The trio darted towards the direction of the dungeon, but Gloria held back. She may not know the full extent of Illia’s power, but she knew that if Midshore, the strongest spellcaster the Islands had, was intimidated, it was going to be a hard fight.
“That’s quite a bit of illusion magic you’re using, Illia. How old do you really look?” Midshore volleyed an attack, hard enough to partially get through Illia’s defenses.
“In 200 years, you won’t look this good, darling. Nor will you have had as much fun!” She shot a strong spell at Midshore, a perpetuated blast that Midshore tried to fight off, but it just wasn’t enough. Illia’s spell was getting closer and closer to her.
“The amount of strings I’ve pulled over the years, the power I've tasted. I’ve influenced the most dedicated men to turn from their partners and lives to follow me to ruin, and I’ve savored every moment of it! I will have an heir to this line, if I have to use all of Blake’s hair to have it be done, then so be it! He’s so weak willed, it took me only three days for him to come to my bed by his own free will. Imagine what I could make him do over the next twenty years!” Illia crooned as the blast finally struck Midshore, knocking her to the ground.
“NO!” Gloria jumped in front of Midshore, shooting her own attack at Illia. It hit her in the shoulder, making her recoil. “I’ll not let you harm someone I love,” she vowed.
“Honey, you’re due for a rude awakening,” she said, rolling her shoulder. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to have your son by my side. No one I wouldn’t hurt. No one I wouldn’t maime. No one I wouldn’t pull every bit of life out of. Because in the end, the only person out there who’s going to get me what I want is me.”
Illia sent out a hail of fire, but Gloria deflected it easily but a pit was forming in her stomach. “Why do you need my heir, when you’ve known this whole time that Seneca is the true heir?” she asked, realization dawning across her face. “Why did you say that a new heir must be made?! There’s already an heir to the throne!”
“Even with your power restored, you can’t tell that lover boy is dead?” Illia sneered.
“You’re lying to me!” Gloria said, throwing an attack at her. “You lie about everything!”
“Just because a truth is hard to hear doesn’t mean that it’s a lie, dearie. But don’t worry, you can join him as soon as you give me a son!”
She volleyed a strong attack at Gloria, but she brushed it off as if it hadn’t happened.
“No, your time of power and villainy ends here.” Gloria said, steel in her eyes. With all the power she could muster, she shot a blast at Illia. At first, Gloria wasn’t sure she was seeing it correctly. Lines started to form on her face, then her posture started to sag. Her hair, already white, came out of its knot and wrapped about her. Her clothes, always so flashy and stylized, transformed into rags.
“What have you done to me?!” she shrieked in a warbling voice, that of an old woman.
“I’m protecting those I love, something that you’ve never done.” Gloria said, finally pushing through and breaking Illia’s last defense. She shrieked again before crumbling into a pile of dust.
With effort, Midshore pushed herself up off of the floor. She looked at the pile of dust on the ground. “I guess that’s what we’ll look like in 200 years,” she joked. “Come on, let’s get this done. Let’s go home.”
But instead of going out the entrance door, Gloria pushed towards the direction they’d been going, towards the dungeon.
Anwyn grabbed her hand. “Gloria, we all heard her. She said that Seneca is dead,” she looked at her with regret in her eyes. “Let’s go home, love.”
“No, not until I see it with my own eyes.” she said, pulling away. “I have to know for sure.”
“To what end?” Midshore asked.
“If you heard that Dad had died, would you leave without him?” Gloria asked Anwyn. “Or you?” she turned to Romeo. “Or if Everstar was down there, in the dungeon? I love him, mom. He wanted me to run, to get as far away from here as I could, but I couldn't do that. Not without him. And I’m the one who made this mess.”
“It’s this way,” Liam said, leading the way. The other three adults looked at him, spellbound, but he didn’t care. He knew what it was like to be parted from someone he loved, and the desire to do whatever it took to make sure they were safe. This whole mission had been one of love, who were they to decide where that love ended?
The two of them hurried down the corridor to the dungeon entrance. The door had been ignored by the rebellion, and it was unlocked. With no other prisoners down there, there was no need to keep the door secure.
They rushed down the stairs, and Gloria kept searching for him, for his feelings. She hoped that the distance and the thick walls between them had been inhibiting the sense, but the closer she got the more worried she was that Illia was right and that he was dead.
She blew open the door to his cell area, praying to whatever powers there were that he would be sitting there, and look up and smile at her when he could see her.
He didn't stir.
Surrounded in a circle of blood, his skin had started to change color and his chest drew no breath.
“No no no no no,” Gloria ran to the bars of the cell and disappeared a set of them, as if they were a toy from when she was younger. “No,”
She crouched beside him. The blood on the ground was dry, but the powder of it stained her dress. “I- I’m too late.” She pulled him up onto her lap, the way she had wished to hold Henry when he’d died. Blake had taken more from her than anyone had ever taken from her. He took her youth, her faith, years of her life, her trust, Henry, and now Seneca. Her Seneca.
“No, I was born for a reason. We are tied together for a reason,” she said to him, gently. Tears were starting to cloud her vision. “You are my other half, the one I've been inexplicably tied to since I was old enough to read,” she smiled a small smile, remembering first meeting Seneca in the greenhouse. “You were so full of yourself, demanding that I remember who you were. I was so horrible with names, so in my own world that I never thought you were important enough to remember. But you never forgot me.”
She closed her eyes, feeling calm come over her. “And I refuse to let you go.”
She had been afraid to love this deeply, to let it consume her, to fill her up like the way fire spreads through a firework, exploding and firing into beautiful shapes and colors. Or the depths of the ocean, where you couldn’t see the bottom, only imagine that it existed but unable to fathom how deep it was. She had been restored before. She had gone from dead to living, but the reason and source for her powers had never been explained. And what are gifts if you don’t share?
Illia was right to be afraid of her power, because for once in her life she was going to put it to good use.
With her hands burning from the intensity, Gloria pumped energy into Seneca’s limp body. I love you. Come back to me. I love you, Seneca, come back. Come back to me.
“What’s she doing?” Romeo asked Midshore quietly.
Midshore stared on in a mixture of awe and horror. “She’s trying to restore him. But there are no runes, there are no crystals. The Spirits aren’t here, how could she restore him? It’s hard enough for Everstar and I to do it together- Gloria is a rookie at best and has never trained in restorative magic.”
Queen Rosa and Barnabus stepped into the room, not sure what they were witnessing. She recognized Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo, but had no clue as to why they were here.
“Come back to me, my love. I have enough for the both of us.”
The lights in the room were all suddenly extinguished, replaced by an ember glow that seemed to have no source.
“I’ve seen this before, only once.” Midshore said. “When I restored Anwyn, the room shone gold. It has never happened that way before.”
“I thought that was part of the process,” Romeo answered.
“No, it was unique,”
The light intensified from the dim glow to a growing blinding light.
“Come back, my love.”
The audience stood, not making a sound, watching as the light began to fade, waiting to see if she had been successful, not wanting to breathe less they missed a sign.
With a sharp breath, Seneca arched his back, coughing. His skin started to blotch back to the correct color, and while his breaths were labored, they were there. He was breathing.
“Seneca, Seneca, is that you?” Gloria asked. She wanted to make sure she hadn’t restored a monster or demon instead of the correct soul.
“Who else would come back here?” he asked, turning to look at her with admiration.
Gloria grabbed him and held him tight, smiling like a child who had been given a puppy.
Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo all cheered, startling Rosa and Barnabus.
“What is going on here?” Rosa asked. “Why was my son dead? Who is responsible for this?”
“I’m- I have more details than anyone else here and I still have no idea, ma’am,” Romeo said, still applauding but turning his head to talk to the queen. “You’ve aged nicely. Good for you,”
Anwyn looked at Liam, love in her eyes. Her daughter was in love, she had pulled off a huge feat bringing someone back from the dead, and who knew what sort of consequences there would be, but right now, everything felt perfect. She pulled Liam into a kiss, smiling.
Midshore and Barnabus stood around, acting like they didn’t know what to do with their hands. Midshore wanted to go in and talk to Gloria and Seneca about what had happened, if they were feeling any different, any side effects from the experience, but it didn’t feel like the right moment to do so. They looked so happy as they were. It almost felt dirty watching them...
No one saw him come in, or knew how he had gotten out of his bonds, but with surprising agility Blake pulled Gloria away from Seneca and held her against him with a knife held out in defense.
“No!” shouted Anwyn and Liam in unison. Everyone else took a sharp inhale, not moving.
“Son, what do you think you’re doing?” Romeo asked.
“I’m leaving here with Gloria. You’ll let us both leave, without confrontation, or I’ll kill both of us, her then me.” Blake said with wild eyes.
“Son, you’ve lost. Let her go, we’ll talk this through.”
“No,” he said. “The throne must continue. The king must have an heir. I love Gloria, she loves me, we’ll run away together-” he was speaking as if he was stringing one thought to another, hardly making sense. Gloria tensed up in his hold.
“I don’t think so,” Seneca said, launching himself at Blake, hitting the table and falling to the floor. Seneca grabbed a blade from the table in the skirmish, and stepped on Blake’s hand to make him drop his own. He felt weak, not fully at the strength he had been before he died, and it was a fascinating feeling to feel your muscles rebuilding themselves, but he knew that with all of his strength he had to do this.
“Seneca-!” Gloria shouted.
“I’ve never met anyone who I’ve hated more,” Seneca said, standing over Blake. “You’ve been a thorn in the side of the rebellion, you’re the son of Lady Malice, you’ve killed dozens of people, but the worst thing you’ve done is harm such a pure thing. You told her you loved her, convinced her to leave her home for you, and all so that she could live in a cage. She had so many chances to kill you, and she should have, but she’s too kind to do that. Even with all of the pain you’ve put her through, she’d still probably want you to live out your days in prison. Gloria can’t bear the weight of killing you on her shoulders, but I can.”
With a plunge, Blake moved no more.
We did it! There were a bunch of bloopers in this chapter, so let me get to those!
^I don't magic duel a lot, and I didn't know that this was going to be the animation for a 'Heated Duel', and I thought it was hilarious because I can totally imagine Midshore mocking Illia like this.
^I thought this was a really pretty picture.
^Watching the trio as the audience was funny and I had to take pictures of it even if their reactions didn't fit the tone of the scene. More than half the time they were cheering for Illia!
^I had to have the spellcasters fight more than a few times so that I could get the proper endings to the fights I wanted, and Midshore won more fights than I needed her to, and Illia won more fights than I wanted her too as well, so when Gloria finally won the round she celebrated.
Also, I had to make a new entrance to the palace as a detached room because the original one is too small! If you look at the pictures, see if you can tell the difference.
^These are great pictures, but Seneca is wearing the wrong clothes! Thankfully I noticed before getting too deep into that scene.
^My little cinnamon roll.
This is the pose I wanted Gloria to use with Henry. When I said in the chapter that Gloria held Seneca the way she wanted to hold Henry, that was a wink at the fact I could finally use the pose pack that would have been perfect for it!
^I love the sims. They cheer when people kiss .
^Didn't use this picture because I don't know if I wanted Gloria to be sad that Blake was dead or not.
There are two more chapters I have planned for this story, then we're on to what ever comes next! I have plans, much more mundane plans than a medieval story. I've said before, but I want to do something more vanilla, take out all of the cc from my game, all of the poses. I want to do a bachellortette challenge and let my sims live normal-er lives! It'll be fun!
As always, I want to thank all of my readers for encouraging me to get this far. I would have never done it without you.
I'm still polishing the generation playlist, and there are a few songs on there that haven't had their story point reached yet, but I figured I'd let you guys chew on it if you like, and the explanation can come later, maybe with the next chapter.
Gloria is physically weaker than Blake, but with her powers are strong. She couldn't fight off Blake with the equipment still on.
Also, try as I may, I'm not very good at writing magic battles. I should have read Harry Potter or something before hand to warm up . I originally wanted Midshore to defeat Illia, But I needed a show of power on Gloria's part before she got down to revive Seneca so that her powers didn't seem to come from nowhere. So I had her fight off Illia.
“Good luck,” Midshore said under her breath.
Midshore can be sassy
Ooh, I was wrong about Ilia being the next main antagonist. I wonder what'll happen to Gloria's baby though. It seems that even with inexperience (and being restrained for several weeks), Gloria is still the most powerful spellcaster. That resurrection ritual really was something
Yaaassssss. All the loose ends are coming together. But what of the Queen and Barnabus? They're quite cruel as well. Maybe the fact that their only heir will get taken away to the islands to be with Gloria (presumably) should be punishment enough. But then again, the King didn't stop trying to get Anwyn and Gloria back, so maybe there's only one way to be safe...
Ooh, only two more chapters. After two years, it's finally ending. :0 Thanks for sticking it out. Some stories or challenges on this section of the forum tend to just die out, so I'm happy that this thing is concluding properly
Don't manhandle the urchin. He's not for sale. FIND YOUR OWN! - Xenon the Antiquarian, Dragon Age II
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
@icmnfrsh and I intend to write with this family for some time! I love plot writing so much, we're going to be with this family for a while. I'm already thinking of what I want down the line.
Gloria knocked on the Romeos' door, anxious. She had a lot to answer for.
"You're going straight home!" Anwyn had told her after all of the introductions had been made and the pleasantries exchanged between Queen Rosa and Anwyn's own band. "You're in danger here, the rebels will be looking to get rid of anyone associated with the king, and with you here they'll be looking to kill you too. So you're going home. Midshore-"
"On it. Hold tight Gloria, this is going to be rough." She wrapped her arms around Gloria, holding her close.
"But- Sen-" Gloria was cut off as the world fell away and she felt as if she were being spun at frightening speeds. After countless moments had gone by, the two of them dropped onto the pale sands of the Islands. Midshore stumbled, but Gloria tripped over her own feet and fell to the ground.
Looking around, she saw that she was on the Midshore's home island, volcano fuming in the background, the greenhouse standing just as they'd left it. Had Gloria really only been gone three months?
Midshore looked up at the house, yearning to go up there and let Everstar and her children know she was alright- that everyone was alright, but she also knew that she should return to Anwyn and the group to talk about their plans.
"Go to her. Mom, Dad, and Pops can wait," Gloria urged.
That extra push was all Midshore needed to get her bolting up the hill. Gloria chuckled as she dusted sand off of herself. She had been appreciating the lack of sand on the mainland, and at night the sand was very cold. She shivered. At least the air was warm, unlike the winter they had just come from.
Midshore bounded through the portal and down into her home. It had been night on the Mainland, barely touching dawn, so it was late at night on the Islands. If she thought about it, Midshore knew she should be exhausted, but she was so wired she couldn’t possibly sleep.
She opened the bedroom door and found her wife sleeping in bed. “Everstar, honey, wake up.”
Everstar rolled over in bed, hardly opening her eyes before recognising Midshore. She then leaped out of bed and the two held each other close, both nearly squeezing the air out of the other.
“I thought for sure I’d be a widow,” Everstar said. “You don’t ever get to leave me again. Next time, I go on the dangerous journey.”
“Deal,” Midshore smiled.
Gloria wandered into the little underground dwelling. It was almost a second home to her, and she knew every crumbling wall like the back of her hand, but she felt like she was a stranger here. She had changed in the three months she’d been gone and nothing felt the same even if her senses were telling her they were.
Everstar and Midshore came out of their bedroom, and a shocked look mixed with anger sprouted on Everstar’s face. “If I wasn’t so happy that you were safe, I’d slap you,” she said to Gloria, pulling her abruptly into a suffocating hug. “I’m so angry and happy,”
“I missed you too,” Gloria said.
After that, Midshore squeezed Everstar’s hand, and took Gloria’s. “We need to rescue Lily from those children. I’ll see you in a few days, if not sooner, darling.”
The trip to the Romeos’ was much smoother, teleporting just a few miles rather than a couple hundred.
“Time to face some consequences,” Midshore said as they approached the door. “And no, I will not knock with you. That woman scares me when she’s angry.”
Gloria took a steadying breath. She still felt light headed from everything that had happened. She had brought Seneca back to life less than two hours ago, and her legs were starting to feel like they were made of jelly. That was either the side effects of the magic or her fear of Lily Romeo.
“See you later, and good luck,” Midshore floated up off the ground then disappeared.
“This can’t be harder than bringing people back to life,” Gloria said as she knocked on the door. The lights were all out in the house. It was the middle of the night, no one would expect company now, especially from a girl who’d been missing for three months…
Gloria saw the soft glow and harsh shadows of a candle being carried around the house, and then the curtain part to see who was outside. The face was pale, but then most of the people in the family were, so she wasn’t sure that it was Lily or one of the twins. Or her brother Robin…
The door opened slowly, and the full form of Lily stood in the doorway. She wore a simple night dress, and Gloria was reminded that she was also wearing night clothes and how strong Lily was. She had been a nomad for a long time, and she had kept up her fitness even when in domestic life.
“Gloria, is that you? You’ve come back?” she asked.
“Yes, it’s me,” Gloria shivered.
“Where’s my husband?!” Lily let her voice raise, standing defiantly in the doorway, looking like she was ready to pull out all of Gloria’s hair if she gave the wrong answer.
“Pops is fine!” Gloria replied quickly. “They’re all fine. Mom’s fine, Dad’s fine, Midshore’s fine, everyone’s fine. I promise. They just stayed back to talk to Queen Rosa and everyone. They thought I should come back so that I wasn’t hurt.”
“Oh, well then,” She softened visibly. “You can tell me everything over a nice cup of hot juice, you look like you haven’t eaten in days! I want to know everything!”
Gloria ended up talking until her voice was hoarse and the sun dawned, but it felt so good to be able to talk about what she’d done, to share it all with someone and not have to carry it alone.
“The kids will be happy you’re here, and you can all go home. The house will feel empty with them all gone, I had just gotten a rhythm going, too, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t be happy your siblings are gone! That was a lot of food… You look exhausted, and you need a change of clothes. You can sleep in my bed, and you can borrow some of my clothes.” Gloria looked up from her mug and felt like she would crumble to pieces from the tenderness. “Oh, don’t you start that now, I’ll start crying too, and I’ll be 🐸🐸🐸🐸 if my boys see me crying. Come on, lass, let’s get you taken care of.”
~*~
Anwyn took Liam’s hand and turned to Rosa who was holding her son at arm’s length. He looked remarkably fine for someone who had been dead fifteen minutes ago. The king hadn’t kept many guards on the island, just enough to be comfortable, not fortified, and the sounds of the skirmish were coming to an end.
“Rosa, there are some things that I feel should be discussed. Perhaps we could meet in the dining room in fifteen minutes? I’ll try to find something for us to eat, and you can talk to your people, or whatever else you need to do?”
“Yes, that sounds fine to me,” she said, not looking away from her son.
“Very good,” Anwyn said as she stepped out of the dungeon and started up the stairs in search of food. The kitchen was always well stocked; hopefully the soldiers hadn’t been dumb enough to ransack it.
Liam let out a sigh. “Our daughter is safe.”
“Gloria is safe,” Romeo echoed, looking into the distance. “What do we do now?”
“Now we talk to Rosa and her team and we iron out an agreement. Didn’t Gloria say that Seneca doesn’t want to be king? We know who would be in line for the throne if he turns away from it, and something tells me that she isn’t up for the job on her own. So we need to talk to Rosa.”
The next few minutes were spent looking for food, which was a fruitful mission. They found plenty of ready-to-eat foods like bread and preserves. It wasn’t hearty, but it would fill the stomach.
“Queen Anwyn,” Rosa said as she sat down at the table, her people on one side, Anwyn’s on the other. “What is it that you wish to discuss?”
“You can drop the title, Rosa, we’re equals here,” Anwyn smiled. “And I am no queen. What I wish to discuss is that I know who can reign if Seneca wishes not to take that path. The girl doesn’t know that she is in line, so she’s no threat to you. She lives on the Islands, and has no knowledge of any of this, besides perhaps that Gloria ran away from home. Everyone on the Islands knows that by now,”
“Why would Seneca not wish to be king? It was what he was born for. He’s got the blood of kings in his veins,” Rosa said, looking at her son with skepticism.
“By the way, the king’s blood is on the floor in the princess’s wing… You may want to get that cleaned up…” Anwyn said quietly.
“Good for you,” Rosa said, looking at her out of the corner of her eye. “Seneca, you want to be king, don’t you?”
He looked at his mother, his mouth dry. All eyes were on him. “I- mother I think you want to be queen again more than I want to be king,” he stammered out quickly. “This has always been your dream, not mine. I- No. I don’t want to be king.”
“You don’t!? But all the work we’ve done over the years- all of your education- You’re primed to be the king! Anwyn said herself that the girl who would rule instead has no knowledge of government!”
“Which is why I think that it would be a good idea for you to rule with her. As co-ruler.” Anwyn said.
“Co-ruler?”
~*~
Seneca looked at his bandaged hand. There was nothing wrong with it, but it had started changing colors and while he was alarmed, he didn’t want to scare anyone else. Gloria had colored hands, maybe now he carried a small part of her.
Krista rushed into the room, throwing herself into Seneca's arms. He had no option but to hug her back, her arms were too tight around his neck to allow him to have any other response.
"I heard what happened!" she said. "I can't believe you were dead. Things were so close to going wrong! All I can think is that we're so lucky."
"Luck didn't have much to do with it," he said into her hair. "Just lots of bravery." He held her at arm's length. "Krista, there's something I have to say,"
"Me, first. Please." She sat down on the bed next to him. She seemed to radiate, and she was still so clean. The idea of things being clean was still a mystery to him. The palace was in ruin, they had only cleared out a few rooms to work from in the past few days.
"Seneca," she smiled, taking his hand in hers, "I know you're going to want an heir as soon as possible, or at least your mother will, but I want to wait. I don't want to have children right away. There was a little while after I visited you that I was sick, and I wondered if I was expecting, but that wasn’t the case." She smiled a small smile. "I was terrified. I know that there's much less to be worried about now, with our cause in power, and we have a whole island to have as our own, but I don't want to bring children into the world where their home is a building site and we're sorting out government policies."
"Krista," Seneca felt like he was about to jump off a cliff into an ocean. "Krista, I don't want to marry you."
"Oh," she took her hands from his, confused. "But our parents signed a deal. This was the deal. My father’s support in exchange for our marriage. You can't just back out of that,"
"Krista, I want to marry someone I love. I can't marry you,” he said gently. “I've found someone else who I love. You and I hardly know each other, Krista. We've seen each other a handful of times, and that may be enough for some people, but that's not enough for me. I don't want to spend my days regretting who I married. You're a wonderful girl though-" he covered. "You'd make any man very happy as a wife- any man but me."
Krista took a shaking breath. "Oh thank the Creator!" she said. "I don't want to marry you either."
"You don't?" he asked.
"No. I mean, if we're being blunt, you're never clean, you always have dirt under your nails, you're grumpy all the time, your hands are rough, and you're broody. I found a really nice man in the capital; he's a merchant selling jewelry. I haven't pursued it because I was tied to you, but now that neither of us want to get married, it doesn't matter!"
Seneca blinked in surprise, chuckling. "That's the best news I've heard all week!" he hugged her. "Congratulations on finding a nice man!"
"And I hope you're happy too, you deserve that much."
~*~
“I’m what?” Ember asked. It had been nearly 20 years since she’d had to think about her father or being locked in the basement of that manor, and she’d hoped to never think about it again.
“You’re the next person in line to be the ruler of the Mainland,” Anwyn said. Ember hadn't seen much of her in the past 20 years. She’d been taught by her, yes, but Ember had been well-read by the time she’d been in Mrs. Reed’s class, so she hadn’t had much to learn and had graduated early. Ember was 25 now, and she was happy where she was.
“Do they know I’m a mermaid?” she asked.
“No, but I don’t see why that matters. And between you and me, they could use some new perspectives in that stunted government.”
“But I’m- I’m happy here! There are other mermaids like me here. Peace! And I’m going to be married soon… I can’t leave just like that.”
“I’m not saying you should, but I am saying that you’d be a good fit for it, and it is your heritage. You’ve always been bright, Ember. Always. And you won’t be alone; the previous Queen will be there with you, ruling beside you. She’s a tough cookie, but I think you could teach her something about acceptance and kindness. And tolerance. If you ruled the Mainland, you could revoke discriminatory laws that were placed against all those who are different. Mermaids, Spellcasters, all sorts of people could live without fear,” Anwyn smiled and patted her knee. “It’s a lot to think about. Talk it over with your fiancé.”
“I’ll do that,”
AH! the next chapter is the finale! I have the feeling that you all know what's going to happen, but as always I would love to hear what you thought and felt. This story has been such a journey, and I'm so happy that you've all been here for it./b]
I have a few bloopers!
^ Get yourself a partner who looks at you like Seneca looks at Gloria.
^Or how Liam looks at Anwyn.
^A few unused angles
^My handsome boy
^A few pics that just didn't fit quite as well as the others did
Uh, Midshore, I don't think that's how you're supposed to back float... You look like you're sinking...
A small update: after the next chapter, which is the finale, I'm going to try my hand at an off-forums website to post my stories to. Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm also going to take the chance to change the title, unless you guys have your hearts set on this one. If it's ok with you, I want to change it to "The Last Forever".
Do you guys want me to keep posting to this thread for discussion and new chapter links or should I start a new one? We're still following the same family and many if the same characters are going to carry over.
Ooh, so it was the mermaid girl. I was actually wondering what happened to her. I only remembered her when I read back sometime ago, and it looks like it's all coming together. Better her than Blake at least.
Good thing Seneca got out of the wedding arrangement too. I guess he can finally be happy with Gloria.
Don't manhandle the urchin. He's not for sale. FIND YOUR OWN! - Xenon the Antiquarian, Dragon Age II
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
A small update: after the next chapter, which is the finale, I'm going to try my hand at an off-forums website to post my stories to. Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm also going to take the chance to change the title, unless you guys have your hearts set on this one. If it's ok with you, I want to change it to "The Last Forever".
Do you guys want me to keep posting to this thread for discussion and new chapter links or should I start a new one? We're still following the same family and many if the same characters are going to carry over.
Hmm...I've used Blogspot for one of my shows. The good thing about it is that the pictures will always be there, and it'll be easy to look things up, as opposed to going through the pages of a forum thread.
Personally, I would prefer something that had the format of the Sims 2 website's story uploads, where you click on left and right arrows to navigate through pictures and text. I'm not sure if there's something like that out there, but it would be nice.
Don't manhandle the urchin. He's not for sale. FIND YOUR OWN! - Xenon the Antiquarian, Dragon Age II
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Ok, I'm going to cross my fingers and hope that the chapter can be out on Friday. There are a few different scenes to it, so getting the right time of day, outfit, setting dressing, all that stuff takes deciding and time passage. But I think it's satisfyingly.
I've been trying out Blogger, and I'm still figuring it out. I have been in a school for 3 years or so, so it's been a while since I've had to learn new things!
Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo’s homecoming was well met by the community, and everyone was happy for their coming child. The council was more forgiving than anyone had expected after they heard everything that had happened.
“While we stand by what we said before,” the head of the council said, “that we didn’t want you to leave, we can say with honesty that we are happy that none of you were killed, and that you were able to save your daughter from what sounds to be a horrible life. We’ve talked at great length about whether or not to discipline the lot of you, but we’ve decided that we would have all done the same for our own family and no one can fault you for what you set out to do, and what you have accomplished. We welcome you home.”
The trio breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, we are happy to be home. Beyond happy. We’re so relieved-” Romeo sputtered.
“We understand,” one of the other council members said. “No need to thank us that much, Mr. Romeo. You may all go now.”
~*~
Gloria waited days on end for something that no one else besides Aunt Lily knew could be possible. She hadn’t thought to censor her story the first time she told it, and she had included the part where Blake had been influenced to create an heir, a part that she had struck from her other retellings. She didn’t need her parents looking at her with pity, or more mutterings about how they were all happy that it was finally over and how it couldn’t have turned out better.
It could have been better. She could have never gone on that horrible trip with a boy who told her he loved her. She had believed him and now she could be carrying his child? Was she pregnant? Would she have to live with the violence taken against her for the rest of her life?
She sat in her room for days, trying to read or draw, but all of the quiet time she spent alone was time that she spent in her own head, and she couldn’t get rid of the thought. She just had to wait, and waiting was the worst thing.
Gloria supposed that Midshore suspected something, but didn’t know what it was, and she didn’t pry. She was so busy blending back into her important place in the society of the Islands that she didn’t have time to pay attention to Gloria. She had cures to brew, bones to set, plants that needed harvesting before they were past their prime; the list was lengthy. Gloria didn’t blame her. She only blamed herself.
It would be another week before she could know for sure, and every day was agony, reliving the time she had with Blake. She saw his face when she let her mind wander, his cold, pale eyes unseeing as he held her there. It hadn’t been Blake, but it may as well have been. He’d done so many other things to control her.
She had barely been let off of the little island they’d returned home to in the past two weeks, not that she wanted to leave. She felt embarrassed, and everyone would ask her what happened even if they’d already heard. Rumors flew quickly in a small community like this.
Ember was doing well as monarch on the Mainland, or so Midshore told. Talks were open between the Islands and the Mainland now, though they were both being held at arm’s length. The Islands didn’t trust the Mainland for their power hungry and explosive ways, and with the amount of refugees that had come from there the Island government was wary to be open. But with the thought of returning to or visiting family and close friends lost on the Mainland, the council didn’t see why they should prevent the talks between governments that could one day bloom into a friendship.
“I think I’ll go to Mara’s house tomorrow,” Gloria said while they sat and ate lunch. It was a Saturday so there was no school to worry about, and wouldn’t have to tomorrow either.
A quiet mood came over the table, and no one spoke for a moment. Anwyn swallowed. “Are you sure? If you like, you can come with me on Monday and see her and Mabel in class. We’re talking about your favorite book this week. You might like it.”
Gloria had expected this. No one wanted her to go anywhere by herself anymore if she was leaving the island, and she understood why. But she wasn’t broken, and the Islands were incredibly safe now that Blake wasn’t walking around them.
“I don’t really want to go back to school, mom,” Gloria fought to smile. “And besides, distracting them at school would be impolite. I’m sure Aunt Lara would want to see me too, she’s my favorite aunt…”
“I don’t see why you’d want to save the trip and go with me, you wouldn’t be alone-” Anwyn started.
“Mom, I’m not going to wander off! I’m fine!” Gloria shouted. She was being irrational and she knew it, but it had been this way since they got back. Her room felt too small, her little patch of sand felt confined, and where she had once looked out to the horizon for inspiration she now felt like it was too wide. She both felt cooped up and exposed at the same time.
“Gloria, apologize to your mother,” Liam said calmly.
Gloria fumed for a moment, then relented. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have yelled.”
“Apology accepted,” Anwyn said, and took a bite of food.
“Why is Gloria angry?” Robin asked.
Gloria set her jaw, but it was Anwyn who spoke. “I think Gloria is frustrated, and we aren't communicating the way we’re supposed to. We all get angry sometimes, especially when we feel like we’re not being heard. It’ll be ok.”
Gloria stood up from the table, taking her plate with her. “I’m sorry, I can’t be here right now,” she said as she walked out to the porch and the sand.
~*~
Rosa looked at the body of her ex-husband who lay on his slab of hard stone, very much dead.
“You missed out on a great son, you know.” She sighed. “We could have been magnificent, if you had taken me as a partner instead of a trophy. Been kinder. I should have shown more kindness to Seneca, our son. Maybe he would have wanted to be the ruler more then. Now we have a half-blood mermaid who is the queen now. I can just imagine how you would have been enraged at the idea of a mermaid on the throne. You’d want to sleep with the girl before seeing her rule, but I guess times are changing.”
She sat down on a nearby chair. “Times are changing faster than we ever imagined they would. Talks are open with the Islands, laws are being repealed on spellcasters. You heard me right, Galant. We’re letting spellcasters live here out in the open. Who would have imagined? Apparently they’re not all bad.
“You missed so much by being on the wrong side. Who knew that little girl with the scar on her face would ever be able to stand up to you? I never imagined it; she seemed so timid, and to fall for that guard who spoke so little… life is strange. But it’s better with you not in it. Rest in hell, Galant.”
~*~
Anwyn met Gloria outside at the water’s edge. The ocean was calm tonight, and the waves were nearly nonexistent, but it was nice to have the soft rhythm of them back again.
Gloria was staring out at the horizon, a tear occasionally forming a trail down her cheek, her breathing slow but steady. Her hair was down, moving gently in the wind. She tended to wear more conservative clothes than she had once worn, Anwyn had noticed, but after everything that had happened she wouldn’t be surprised if Gloria had changed.
She sat down next to Gloria without speaking. She knew that if Gloria wanted to say something, she would eventually. Anwyn just had to be there to listen.
Out of habit, Anwyn counted the waves like time in a song. It was five waves before Gloria said anything.
“I’m not pregnant,” she stated blankly.
“Oh,” Anwyn said, not sure how to answer that. “Did you want to be pregnant?”
“No, I didn’t. It would have been Blake’s and I just- I didn’t want to- He made me-” Gloria pulled at the beginning of sentences, and Anwyn stared at her daughter. “I didn’t want to be pregnant, but I was worried that I was.”
“Baby, I understand, and I am so, very sorry that you had to go through that. It’ll never happen again, I’ll make sure.”
“I love you, mom,” Gloria smiled through her tears, “And I know it’ll never happen again, because I will never fall for the wrong man again. But that’s the thing,” she trailed off.
“What’s on your mind? Tell me.” Anwyn said softly.
“Mom, I love him. Seneca. I know you don’t want me to leave you, and I know that I could never leave you, not fully, but I... I love him. And I know that he would never hurt me.” She smiled like a love stricken girl.
“Gloria, you thought that about Blake. How could you be sure? He’s the king’s son, for the Creator’s sake.” Anwyn clucked.
“I can tell what he’s feeling, mom, and he’s only ever felt kindness towards me, unless I was annoying, but he’s never felt ill will towards me. He saved my life time and time again. Mom, we’ve been seeing each other in our dreams for years, and he makes me feel like there’s a future that I never considered. One away from the Islands, one with a partner by my side, not Blake pulling me through life. I swear, I love him,”
Anwyn sat on the bench, torn. She had just gotten her little girl back, now she had grand ideas. “What do you have in mind?”
“I want Midshore to take me to the Mainland and let me find him. I think I know where he’ll be, and I want to see if he’ll have me- if we can build a life together from the fractured pasts that we both have. If we can make it work. If he loves me the way I love him. It may not work. He could have gone back to Krista, or he could have decided to be a hermit, or he could have set to sea as a sailor, but I have to find out.”
Anwyn felt her heart rate pick up and her breathing become heavier. She bit her lip. “But, Glo, we just got home. I can’t lose you already. I love you too much,”
“Mom, I love you too.” She pulled her into a large hug. “But Pops always says that he learned from Dad that if you’re afraid to do something, you should probably do it. And this makes me terrified, but it feels right. And I’ll have Midshore with me- She can teach me to teleport that far. I’ll come back in the winters because I don’t know who would want to live in the cold like that,” Gloria said with a chuckle.
Anwyn sighed. “I’ll have to talk to your father about it,”
“I say go for it,” he said, startling them both.
“Dad, you weren’t a part of this conversation, you shouldn’t have been listening!” Gloria scolded.
“Sorry, I was looking for my wife and overheard declarations of love. And I think you should do it. I’m not going to stop you from pursuing your future. You have my blessing.”
“Liam, I thought maybe we would talk about this more…” Anwyn edged.
“Gloria’s been in a funk for weeks, Annie. We’ve both seen it. If this is a way for her to go forward and stop looking back, then I support her for taking that step.”
Anwyn took her daughter’s hand. “Apparently I’ve been outvoted,” she said as she kissed her forehead. “We love you and want you to be happy.”
~*~
It had been three weeks and some change since the insurrection at the palace, and Seneca had tried to build a life away from his mother and reputation. He was going to make a living on his own now, without the help of his mother, without the title of prince, without the safety of a body guard or anyone to have his back.
It was… quiet. The base had always been rather quiet to not attract attention, but for the past forever his mother had always had someone over to talk business with, and Barnabus and his wife were always bustling him from one thing to another. It was time to eat, or it was time to train, or it was time to learn. Being his own man was intimidating, and it had made his legs weak more than once.
He’d needed a home, and he’d been lucky. He’d found a place for sale near his home community, where he could see the ocean, and think of the loss and potential the waves had held for him, but he was done with the ocean. He was going to keep his feet planted firmly in the soil.
Seneca was exhausted by the time he fell into bed. The property had been cheap since the house was run down and the prior owner was a supporter of their cause. Getting the place suitable to be lived in was tougher than Seneca had thought it would be and he had spent the past three days just trying to clear out the broken furniture.
It took only a few breaths for him to fall into sleep, waking up to the swirling sky of the dreamscape. I expect I’ll be alone. I should never have told Gloria I loved her, I’ve scared her off…
The white violin was easily found in the greenhouse. Gloria’s box with strings, he thought with a smile. She was always being musical, maybe he could adopt some of that now that he was his own person.
“I’d love to see you play it.”
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as the sound tickled his ears. “I wouldn’t know the first thing about playing it,” he said, not wanting to turn around and ruin the immersion he had created. If he turned around, she wouldn’t be there, and he would be alone. Better to imagine her ghost than to have it disappear completely.
“I could teach you,” she said, walking around him and picking up the violin. Her hands were a vivid orange, and her white tattoos stood out on her skin.
“You’re…” he trailed, spellbound. You’re here.
She looked at him, curious. “If you tell me I’m no good, I’m going to hit you,”
“I’d never say that,” he said, still staring at her. She was beautiful, shining like an angel. When she had restored him, he thought that he had been in a dream, to see her all in white like that. She was always so vibrant, but she was only so pristinely dressed here, in the between.
“You’re talking a lot less than you normally do, Seneca. Cat’s got your tongue?”
“I’m- I’m surprised to see you,” he stuttered, his mouth dry.
“I had no doubt I’d see you,” she smiled, stepping closer to him, closer than was casual. “I’m hoping I’ll see you again very soon. Where are you? How can I find you?”
“I’m where I’ve always been. On the coast,” he breathed.
“Then I will be there.” She placed her hands on either side of his face, and just as she was looking at his lips to not miss, he woke up with a start.
“🐸🐸🐸🐸!” he shouted, hitting the covers. “I’m such an idiot!”
See him soon? What did that mean? It certainly felt like she meant to come here, but his place was a disaster! It wasn’t ready for company! Even though he had been exhausted not an hour earlier, Seneca now felt he had enough frantic energy to clean the whole house.
~*~
Gloria woke up on the floor of the greenhouse, with Midshore sitting nearby.
“That was... interesting. I’ve never had an experience like that before. The spirits are not as… decorated as your environment. You’ve seen the spirit’s home, it’s quiet, dark, gleaming. Yours is quite the opposite.”
“Yes, it is,” Gloria rushed, shoving her blanket she’d been sleeping on into her bag. “He’s living on the coast, and you got a feel for him, can you pick him out? Find where he lives?”
“I’m not a tracking charm, I’m not exact, but yes. I got a feel for him. It could take a while, but I think we could find him.”
“Let’s do it then.”
~*~
Seneca’s frenzied cleaning had worn off within two hours and his lack of sleep was starting to affect him more and more as the hours went by. It was hard to see without any fairy lights and just going by candles and moonlight. His eyes were starting to play tricks on him from the flickering of the candle light, but he breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the sky start to change with the dawn.
“Why am I worrying, it takes days to get here from the Islands. I have time… “ he said to himself as he trudged up the stairs to his room. Maybe now he would be able to get some solid sleep.
“It’s odd, I feel fine. Normally I feel sick after I have a dream,” he said as he kicked off his shoes and pulled back the covers.
Right as he was closing his eyes to sleep, a knock on the door downstairs roused him. “It’s not Gloria, it can’t be Gloria, '' he assured himself. “It’s probably Mrs. Grigham wondering if I’ve eaten this morning. Breakfast would be good…”
He shoved his feet into his shoes, leaving the warm fire in his room and stumbling down the stairs half asleep, something that was rather dangerous as the stairs weren’t the sturdiest.
A knock came again. “I’m coming, coming!” he replied lazily, shuffling a bit faster towards the door.
Reaching the door, he opened it, wiping away sleep from his eyes with a questionably clean hand. “How can I help you?”
“I love you.”
It wasn’t Mrs. Grigham's voice, it was Gloria’s. Seneca whipped his head up and blinked. Something was in his right eye, bugging him, and he was trying really hard to not let that bother him from Gloria standing in front of him. She was here! How was she here?
“What- how?- How did you get here?” he stammered.
“I had Midshore take me. She’s getting better at teleporting long ways, and hopefully she’ll teach me, but that’s not what I need to tell you. Sen, you’re-” she broke off, taking a breath, “I feel like you’re my future. I know that you don’t want to be king, and you may have gone back to Krista, and I’ll leave if you want me to, but I feel like you are my one person in life who is my equal, and I want to build my life with you in it. I love you.” she repeated.
“You rehearsed that, didn’t you?” he asked with a smirk.
“More than you would guess,” she nervously laughed.
Seneca grabbed her and pulled her into a strong embrace, squeezing her shoulders. They felt thinner than he remembered, like she hadn’t been eating enough.
“I don’t want to live alone. Live with me, Gloria. Never leave me.”
“I promise,” she said, smiling into his shoulder. Her soul felt like it was glowing, she was so happy, almost as if her heart were full of stars.
That's it! I finished the series! I did it! We did it!
Gloria and Seneca will return in The Last Forever, coming... i don't know when, but it'll come. My mood totally tanked today and I fought myself to post this all day and then Imgur kept not uploading pictures and I don't know why, but what matters is that it's done now. We got here together.
I'm really looking forward to what I have planned in the future, it's going to be a lot of un for me, and hopefully for you guys too! I couldn't have gotten here without you, and I'm incredibly grateful.
Comments
You release it when you feel you're ready.
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Chapter 68, Part 1
Liam felt ironic in his guard gear. It was a size or two bigger than he had once worn; age and contentment can make you need a larger size than you once measured to. But that he would wear something so... conformist - and to signify something so menacing as the king's guard - felt dirty. And shiny. So very shiny.
Romeo seemed to be having the same agitation. He had always wanted to be a good guard, but after years of living on the islands in loose, comfortable clothing and living a life he cherished, he no longer had the desire to ever don a guard uniform again. He had worn it to sneak in to talk to Gloria roughly two weeks ago, but hopefully this would be the last time. Liam didn't foresee any possible reason they would need to. Either this would go very wrong and they wouldn't have to wear this garb again, or things would go very well and they also would never have to wear it again...
"I wish I could dress like Anwyn," Romeo grumbled. "Midshore sure decked you out. You look so comfortable..." he whined teasingly. Anwyn wore a sensible pair of trousers and a belted blouse with a vest. She still had her hair covered and her face covered in a veil in hopes to hide her identity, but Liam still felt anxious knowing that she was going to be in the palace at all. She could be recognized, and if something went wrong they would have to worry about saving both her and Gloria, something that could become very difficult very quickly.
She hadn't fit any armor available, or else they would have had her look like a guard with them. A helmet would have concealed her face much better, but a woman just wasn't built like a man, especially not a pregnant woman, and she couldn’t fit men’s armor.
Midshore came up beside them. "It's getting dark, and I can see the boats coming closer to the shore. We should get into position. Let's go."
Liam and Romeo didn't hide themselves as they walked with what they hoped looked like purpose. Making their way over to the side wall of the Palace, they opened the little gate, ushering in Midshore and Anwyn who had followed in the shadows. Liam knew the palace grounds like the back of his hand, and he and Romeo led the way to the side door near the guards’ wing. It would be heavily guarded, but hopefully with the approaching conflict they would be able to get around without being noticed.
“Midshore, is there any way that you can hide us? Make them not think we’re here or something?” Anwyn asked as Liam peeked around the door.
“I don’t specialize in deception magic, so, no,” she said bluntly with a smile. She was stressed, so Liam wasn’t going to hold her negativity against her.
Romeo took a large breath. “Ok, I guess I’ll just go along and if it’s clear I’ll knock three times on the wall. Wish me luck.”
He walked down the hallway, and as soon as he got to the corner he looked, then knocked on the wall. Liam knew sneaking was only going to get harder, and with every minute he was in the palace and nothing went wrong, he was worried the danger was getting closer and closer to them. They just needed to get up to the old queen’s quarters and get Gloria free, then they could leave this whole mess of a monarchy behind them.
They inched through the palace like this, with Romeo and Liam playing leapfrog over and over, signalling when it was clear. The rebellion would be here any moment, and they had to move quickly.
The foyer was the most intimidating room to get through. It was a double story room with large windows and the possibility to be seen from the floor above.
“All right, I’ll go,” Romeo whispered only loud enough for the team to hardly hear him. He took a step forward, then another, casually looking to the balcony as he made his way across the room, nodding to a passing guard on the top floor. He was nodded at in turn, and once the other guard was gone Romeo waved the team over, not wanting to make a knock to attract the guard to look back.
Midshore and Anwyn, dressed in soft soled boots, darted over nearly silently, but Liam couldn’t be that quiet in his armor so he walked over as casually as he could.
Anwyn started to walk up the main stairs, but Romeo grabbed her arm, stopping her. “We can’t go that way!” he hissed.
“Why not?” she asked, pulling her arm free but setting foot back on the floor.
“Montoya told us that if we go that way we’ll be stopped by the guard outside her door. We have to go up the back way. There are stairs just like the ones on the King’s side of the palace; we’ll take the back way and go right up to her wing.”
“But that takes us through the Duchess’s wing, and we’ll be caught for sure,” Anwyn said.
“I’ll shield the door,” Midshore assured, “we won’t be caught by surprise. Our only foe would be ahead of us, and I only sense one person on this side. Most people are in the back of the Palace.”
Liam and Romeo looked at her as if she had grown horns. “You could sense if there were people, and we’ve been peeking around corners this whole time?”
She blinked at them, pulling in her lips. “It’s not the most accurate. But now that we’re more in the middle of the building I can tell which direction they’re coming from better. Ok? Let’s move. I don’t want to catch Illia.”
Nodding, Liam grabbed the knob of the Duchess’s wing and pushed it open. Immediately in the hall, pacing, was Blake. He was dressed in fine, clean clothes that were fit for a prince. He had always been clean when they were on the Islands, a bit more than the normal person, but seeing him in clothes like these it made perfect sense why he had never been comfortable being dirty. He was raised in a pristine environment.
Blake looked up at the two men dressed as guards, then he noticed Midshore and Anwyn behind them, but not recognizing them. “What is the meaning of this?!” he asked, facing them, a scowl on his face.
Midshore turned and placed a shield over the door, sealing them in. Romeo pulled off his helmet and showed his face, eyes narrowing in on his target. “I was hoping I’d find you,” he said. He remembered toddler Lucian, bumbling his way around the palace 19 years prior. If he had known then… He may have stolen him away with them and raised him right. He couldn’t have hurt a child, but he didn’t mind giving what this fully grown young man had coming to him. “I’ve got a fist with your name on it.”
A dawning look of recognition came across Blake’s face. “That’s touching, Fredrico Romeo,” he said, “But no matter how many times you put my name on your body it won’t make a difference,” he sneered, grabbing for his blade, only to find that he wasn’t equipped with one. With shocked eyes, he picked up a pot and threw it at Romeo, but Romeo was faster. Shattering the pot against his blade, he tackled Blake to the ground.
“We don’t have time for this. We have to go and find Gloria before we’re discovered,” Anwyn rushed. “Love, Midshore and I will go ahead and grab Gloria, can you stay here and make sure that Romeo doesn’t kill the poor boy? I’d rather he rot in prison to an old age than get out of this so easily as to die now.”
“Of course, we’ll watch this end, you hurry,” he said as Anwyn and Midshore hurried around them and up the hidden staircase.
Coming out the top of the stairwell, Anwyn was surprised by how tacky it was. It was nearly bichromatic, everything being white and red. All of the flowers were red, the curtains were red, and the wallpaper was busy and dated. Or maybe it was in style- how was Anwyn to know? She hadn’t cared about Mainland style for over 18 years now.
She remembered when this wing had been lush and teal, the colors that the previous queen had loved and cherished from her home. Now she wondered if she had loved those things at all or if she had been locked up like an animal in a synthetic enclosure on display.
She went to the door knob to the bedroom and tried to push it open. Though it wiggled a bit, it was very much locked.
“Oh, think I remember a spell to unlock doors, give me a moment to remember what it is…” Midshore placed her hand on her chin, wracking her memory.
Anwyn didn’t have the patience for this, her little girl was on the other side of this door and she was going to get her out. “Out of the way!” she hollered, picking up a chair and throwing it at the door. It burst open as if the lock had been paper, but the chair hitting the door and floor made a loud noise. Midshore jumped, cursing loudly, and Anwyn rushed into the room to find her daughter.
Midshore went to the window, pushing aside the curtain. She could see a skirmish already taking place on the front lawn of the palace, with guards pouring out of the front door to stop the rebels, but from what she could see, there were more rebels than guards. They had a real chance of winning this fight.
“Gloria! Gloria, are you alright?” Crouching next to her daughter, she went to wrap her arms around her, but Gloria recoiled. Her hands were bruised, her wrists too. Anwyn bristled. “If they hurt you, we’ll burn this whole place to the ground. The whole building. Make all of this marble crack and crumble.”
“I’m so happy you’re here,” Gloria said, trying to hold back tears. “I really needed this today. I can’t stand another day here, I just want to leave and never look back,”
“And you don’t have to, but we need to keep moving,” Midshore urged as she went to the other door, listening for footsteps. “That chair may have gotten us in the door, but someone’s going to have heard it and worried about the princess. We need to hurry before things get hairy.”
“Midshore? When did you get here?” Gloria asked, blinking away tears, getting to her feet.
“That’s another very long story that we don’t have the time for. Now, get moving,” Her eyes moved to the door again.
“Mom, can you take these things off of me? I can’t use my power with them on, and I can’t get them off,” Gloria held out her hand. It was shaking.
“Yes, I can definitely do that,” Anwyn looked at it a bit puzzled for a moment, then adeptly twisted a knob and the whole thing fell off of her hand. Gloria turned around for her to untie the necklace while Gloria fished the rings off of her hand, shuddering as they fell off, and Anwyn thought she saw the bruises already starting to rapidly fade. Gloria looked at her and gave a weak smile.
“Someone’s coming-” Midshore said abruptly, grabbing Gloria’s shoulder and pushing her out the rear door in the direction they had come.
Anwyn followed closely behind them, but her head scarf fell back and her face veil with it. She hadn’t had enough hair pins to secure it when they’d left the cabin, and she’d feared this would happen. As she scrambled to pick it back up, she heard the lock of the exterior bedroom door turn and click. Anwyn’s stomach dropped as she froze in place. It was too late, they were going to be caught.
“My rose?” came a deep voice. “My rose, are you all right? I heard a noise from my office in this direction, I wanted to check and see if you were-”
The king broke off as he saw Anwyn standing in the doorway. “My love, Annie, you’ve come back.” A smile spread across his face.
“My- my king,” she said, straightening her shoulders as her blood went cold and her stomach dropped. Signaling behind her back for the other two to continue on without her. With the same hand she drew a knife from her belt, out of view from the king.
“Annie, you’ve hardly aged. You’re still as beautiful as you were when last I saw you.” He wandered closer to her, closing the few feet between them. “My love, you’ve returned. Now we can be happy…”
He placed one hand on her shoulder and the other on her waist to pull her in gently, craning his neck to kiss her.
Knife in hand, she placed the weapon between the two of them, stabbing him in the chest as he closed the distance. She hadn’t expected it to work. He wasn’t wearing armor, just a fine shirt. She couldn’t simply kill him like this, could she? He had been such a horrible, unstoppable force, she hadn’t expected to be able to pierce him as easily as you pierce a fish. Was he really just a man, formed from flesh?
She stared him in the eyes as he stumbled backwards. “You can’t hurt me any more,” she said, “And my daughter will never be a part of your games again. My family will not be a part of your hatred.” The king sank to his knees, then fell back onto the floor.
Anwyn looked down at him, “There were times when you made me wish I was dead, but now, at the end of things, it is me who lives, and you who dies. I am finally free of you.”
“Annie…” the king wheezed, “I never wanted to… to…”
She blinked and took a breath, looking at his choking face as he breathed his last breath. Her aggressor- her demon- could never hurt her again. He could never hurt Liam again, and he could never hurt her family again. Could it really be this easy? To just walk out of here and never have to fear him again? It didn’t feel real. He couldn’t be dead.
She picked up her scarf from the floor, looking at the rough weave of it. Looking at the still body of the king on the floor, she threw it at his lifeless form. “I will never hide who I am again.”
OOOooo! It took so long to figure out How I wanted this scene to go. I didn't know what emotion I wanted Anwyn to convey, and my editor friend gave me some insight on how someone who's experienced recent trauma (Gloria) would react to contact.
I must have edited this part four times over, and I'm finally happy enough with it to post it. Now the next part has more editing that's needed, so that'll eat some more time. And Midshore wasn't doing her normal magic stuff so I hope her sim isn't borked...
Thanks for reading, and I hope you all are having a better week than me! Oh, And I got my second Vaccine!
And yaaaaassssssss. That was so satisfying. After almost two decades, Anwyn got closure
I'm afraid that Gloria got pregnant though. Rule of drama states that it did form a baby. I'm guessing this will be a new arc, and she won't be free of Blake just yet. I think Ilia will become the next main antagonist, and the fact that the baby has Blake's genes will give her some control over it
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Chapter 68, Part 2
Midshore paused at the bookshelf, pensive, scanning it. Gloria didn’t understand, she had been in a hurry five seconds earlier, why was she staring at a bookshelf? This wasn’t the time to read!
“Aha!” Midshore exclaimed softly and pulled on the spine of a thick leather-bound tome. Gloria gasped as the door swung inward, revealing a secret stairway behind it leading down. “Come on,” Midshore urged, pulling her along.
“These were here the whole time?” Gloria asked, baffled. “I could have left my wing at any time?”
“The duchess’s wing is directly beneath yours. You wouldn’t have gotten very far,” she responded. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she pushed open another door, revealing Liam and Romeo standing over a restrained Blake.
“Dad! Pops!” she ran to them and held them close. “I’ve missed you so much. This is all my fault, I should never have left. I was so scared that I wouldn’t see you again,” she let the words come out of her, not bothering to wonder if they were coherent or not.
“Hey, sweetheart, I missed you too,” Liam said softly. “But we’re not out of here yet. We need to get to a safe place so Midshore can teleport us away. She can take one of us at a time, and it’ll be hard, but we need to get out of the palace. Stay with me-”
“We have to get Seneca,” she said, pulling away from him. She noticed that Blake was unconscious on the floor. Oddly, she wasn’t used to seeing him asleep. He was always on high alert, watching. Now he was limp. She could feel his energy, so she knew he was still alive. She also realized she never wanted to see him again. “He’s in the dungeon, we have to save him.”
“Seneca, the son of the king?” Romeo asked. “You told me he had died in the fire.”
“He didn’t, though! Blake lied to me, told me that I was the only survivor. He captured Seneca and has him in the dungeon.” Gloria said. Liam shivered at the thought of the dungeon.
“His people are coming, they’ll save him for us. We don’t have to worry about him,” Midshore weighed.
“No! I need to make sure he’s ok. I owe him that much. He’s saved my life twice now, and it’s time I return the favor.” Gloria stared at the group.
Liam, Romeo, and Midshore looked at each other. “What’s one more stop?” Romeo asked.
“One more stop could get us all killed!” Midshore said. “We all have kids! None of us should go through any unnecessary risk. Especially not for a boy who has a whole rebelion here to put him on the throne. This isn’t our job!” Midshore pointed out.
“But the lad’s only a boy, and the dungeon can be hard to find if you don’t know where to look. What if he’s killed before he can be rescued?” Liam said.
“Romeo’s wife is taking care of five children by herself,” Midshore emphasized. “Anwyn is expecting another. We can’t risk our lives for the heir to a doomed line. We need to leave!”
Liam looked around, “Where did Gloria go?”
She was standing at the door, still shielded by Midshore, just short of pounding her fist on the barrier.
“Gloria! I asked you to stay by me!” Liam shouted as the group jogged over to her. “You can’t just leave us like that. You’ll give me a heart attack.”
“I will save Seneca if I have to break through one of Midshore’s impenetrable shields. I’m not leaving until I know he’s all right. Besides, I can summon fire so don’t try to stop me,” she said.
“Good luck,” Midshore said under her breath.
Liam tilted his head down at her, remembering her when she was a little girl. “I can see there’s no fighting you on this one, so we’ll go,” he said. Anwyn came up behind them, wiping the King’s blood from her hand.
“I highly disagree-” Midshore turned to look at him.
“If we don’t, she’ll go alone, and that’s even worse. We go as a group,.” Liam said. “Now, Midshore, please lower the shield.”
She glared at him, then dissolved the shield with a wave of her hand. Gloria pushed open the door, opening to the entrance. It seemed the rebellion had already come through here. The walls were marked, there was rubbish on the floor, and smoke hung in the air from a distant fire.
“Where are you going with my heir?” A woman’s voice came from beside them, and Illia stepped out of the shadows. “I need her, now more than ever. Once she has a child, I have no need for her, but I need a male heir!” Sparks flew from her hands, and Midshore blocked them.
“We’re taking Gloria home, and you’ll not stop us,” she said, measuredly. Her anger that she had been speaking with not two minutes before was replaced with eerie calm. “Illia, your crimes against humanity and the pain you’ve caused other spellcasters with your selfish use of magic is too much to be answered for.” she said with a face devoid of emotion.
“Mirri, your skin would crawl if you knew everything I was responsible for. But are you up for this? I can tell you’re powerful, but you're younger than I am, and you have less experience, less willing to take what you want, and to take lives.”
She lashed out with her power, reflected back by Midshore but blocked harmlessly. “Get going, I’ll hold her off,” Midshore urged over her shoulder. The trio darted towards the direction of the dungeon, but Gloria held back. She may not know the full extent of Illia’s power, but she knew that if Midshore, the strongest spellcaster the Islands had, was intimidated, it was going to be a hard fight.
“That’s quite a bit of illusion magic you’re using, Illia. How old do you really look?” Midshore volleyed an attack, hard enough to partially get through Illia’s defenses.
“In 200 years, you won’t look this good, darling. Nor will you have had as much fun!” She shot a strong spell at Midshore, a perpetuated blast that Midshore tried to fight off, but it just wasn’t enough. Illia’s spell was getting closer and closer to her.
“The amount of strings I’ve pulled over the years, the power I've tasted. I’ve influenced the most dedicated men to turn from their partners and lives to follow me to ruin, and I’ve savored every moment of it! I will have an heir to this line, if I have to use all of Blake’s hair to have it be done, then so be it! He’s so weak willed, it took me only three days for him to come to my bed by his own free will. Imagine what I could make him do over the next twenty years!” Illia crooned as the blast finally struck Midshore, knocking her to the ground.
“NO!” Gloria jumped in front of Midshore, shooting her own attack at Illia. It hit her in the shoulder, making her recoil. “I’ll not let you harm someone I love,” she vowed.
“Honey, you’re due for a rude awakening,” she said, rolling her shoulder. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to have your son by my side. No one I wouldn’t hurt. No one I wouldn’t maime. No one I wouldn’t pull every bit of life out of. Because in the end, the only person out there who’s going to get me what I want is me.”
Illia sent out a hail of fire, but Gloria deflected it easily but a pit was forming in her stomach. “Why do you need my heir, when you’ve known this whole time that Seneca is the true heir?” she asked, realization dawning across her face. “Why did you say that a new heir must be made?! There’s already an heir to the throne!”
“Even with your power restored, you can’t tell that lover boy is dead?” Illia sneered.
“You’re lying to me!” Gloria said, throwing an attack at her. “You lie about everything!”
“Just because a truth is hard to hear doesn’t mean that it’s a lie, dearie. But don’t worry, you can join him as soon as you give me a son!”
She volleyed a strong attack at Gloria, but she brushed it off as if it hadn’t happened.
“No, your time of power and villainy ends here.” Gloria said, steel in her eyes. With all the power she could muster, she shot a blast at Illia. At first, Gloria wasn’t sure she was seeing it correctly. Lines started to form on her face, then her posture started to sag. Her hair, already white, came out of its knot and wrapped about her. Her clothes, always so flashy and stylized, transformed into rags.
“What have you done to me?!” she shrieked in a warbling voice, that of an old woman.
“I’m protecting those I love, something that you’ve never done.” Gloria said, finally pushing through and breaking Illia’s last defense. She shrieked again before crumbling into a pile of dust.
With effort, Midshore pushed herself up off of the floor. She looked at the pile of dust on the ground. “I guess that’s what we’ll look like in 200 years,” she joked. “Come on, let’s get this done. Let’s go home.”
But instead of going out the entrance door, Gloria pushed towards the direction they’d been going, towards the dungeon.
Anwyn grabbed her hand. “Gloria, we all heard her. She said that Seneca is dead,” she looked at her with regret in her eyes. “Let’s go home, love.”
“No, not until I see it with my own eyes.” she said, pulling away. “I have to know for sure.”
“To what end?” Midshore asked.
“If you heard that Dad had died, would you leave without him?” Gloria asked Anwyn. “Or you?” she turned to Romeo. “Or if Everstar was down there, in the dungeon? I love him, mom. He wanted me to run, to get as far away from here as I could, but I couldn't do that. Not without him. And I’m the one who made this mess.”
“It’s this way,” Liam said, leading the way. The other three adults looked at him, spellbound, but he didn’t care. He knew what it was like to be parted from someone he loved, and the desire to do whatever it took to make sure they were safe. This whole mission had been one of love, who were they to decide where that love ended?
The two of them hurried down the corridor to the dungeon entrance. The door had been ignored by the rebellion, and it was unlocked. With no other prisoners down there, there was no need to keep the door secure.
They rushed down the stairs, and Gloria kept searching for him, for his feelings. She hoped that the distance and the thick walls between them had been inhibiting the sense, but the closer she got the more worried she was that Illia was right and that he was dead.
She blew open the door to his cell area, praying to whatever powers there were that he would be sitting there, and look up and smile at her when he could see her.
He didn't stir.
Surrounded in a circle of blood, his skin had started to change color and his chest drew no breath.
“No no no no no,” Gloria ran to the bars of the cell and disappeared a set of them, as if they were a toy from when she was younger. “No,”
She crouched beside him. The blood on the ground was dry, but the powder of it stained her dress. “I- I’m too late.” She pulled him up onto her lap, the way she had wished to hold Henry when he’d died. Blake had taken more from her than anyone had ever taken from her. He took her youth, her faith, years of her life, her trust, Henry, and now Seneca. Her Seneca.
“No, I was born for a reason. We are tied together for a reason,” she said to him, gently. Tears were starting to cloud her vision. “You are my other half, the one I've been inexplicably tied to since I was old enough to read,” she smiled a small smile, remembering first meeting Seneca in the greenhouse. “You were so full of yourself, demanding that I remember who you were. I was so horrible with names, so in my own world that I never thought you were important enough to remember. But you never forgot me.”
She closed her eyes, feeling calm come over her. “And I refuse to let you go.”
She had been afraid to love this deeply, to let it consume her, to fill her up like the way fire spreads through a firework, exploding and firing into beautiful shapes and colors. Or the depths of the ocean, where you couldn’t see the bottom, only imagine that it existed but unable to fathom how deep it was. She had been restored before. She had gone from dead to living, but the reason and source for her powers had never been explained. And what are gifts if you don’t share?
Illia was right to be afraid of her power, because for once in her life she was going to put it to good use.
With her hands burning from the intensity, Gloria pumped energy into Seneca’s limp body. I love you. Come back to me. I love you, Seneca, come back. Come back to me.
“What’s she doing?” Romeo asked Midshore quietly.
Midshore stared on in a mixture of awe and horror. “She’s trying to restore him. But there are no runes, there are no crystals. The Spirits aren’t here, how could she restore him? It’s hard enough for Everstar and I to do it together- Gloria is a rookie at best and has never trained in restorative magic.”
Queen Rosa and Barnabus stepped into the room, not sure what they were witnessing. She recognized Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo, but had no clue as to why they were here.
“Come back to me, my love. I have enough for the both of us.”
The lights in the room were all suddenly extinguished, replaced by an ember glow that seemed to have no source.
“I’ve seen this before, only once.” Midshore said. “When I restored Anwyn, the room shone gold. It has never happened that way before.”
“I thought that was part of the process,” Romeo answered.
“No, it was unique,”
The light intensified from the dim glow to a growing blinding light.
“Come back, my love.”
The audience stood, not making a sound, watching as the light began to fade, waiting to see if she had been successful, not wanting to breathe less they missed a sign.
With a sharp breath, Seneca arched his back, coughing. His skin started to blotch back to the correct color, and while his breaths were labored, they were there. He was breathing.
“Seneca, Seneca, is that you?” Gloria asked. She wanted to make sure she hadn’t restored a monster or demon instead of the correct soul.
“Who else would come back here?” he asked, turning to look at her with admiration.
Gloria grabbed him and held him tight, smiling like a child who had been given a puppy.
Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo all cheered, startling Rosa and Barnabus.
“What is going on here?” Rosa asked. “Why was my son dead? Who is responsible for this?”
“I’m- I have more details than anyone else here and I still have no idea, ma’am,” Romeo said, still applauding but turning his head to talk to the queen. “You’ve aged nicely. Good for you,”
Anwyn looked at Liam, love in her eyes. Her daughter was in love, she had pulled off a huge feat bringing someone back from the dead, and who knew what sort of consequences there would be, but right now, everything felt perfect. She pulled Liam into a kiss, smiling.
Midshore and Barnabus stood around, acting like they didn’t know what to do with their hands. Midshore wanted to go in and talk to Gloria and Seneca about what had happened, if they were feeling any different, any side effects from the experience, but it didn’t feel like the right moment to do so. They looked so happy as they were. It almost felt dirty watching them...
No one saw him come in, or knew how he had gotten out of his bonds, but with surprising agility Blake pulled Gloria away from Seneca and held her against him with a knife held out in defense.
“No!” shouted Anwyn and Liam in unison. Everyone else took a sharp inhale, not moving.
“Son, what do you think you’re doing?” Romeo asked.
“I’m leaving here with Gloria. You’ll let us both leave, without confrontation, or I’ll kill both of us, her then me.” Blake said with wild eyes.
“Son, you’ve lost. Let her go, we’ll talk this through.”
“No,” he said. “The throne must continue. The king must have an heir. I love Gloria, she loves me, we’ll run away together-” he was speaking as if he was stringing one thought to another, hardly making sense. Gloria tensed up in his hold.
“I don’t think so,” Seneca said, launching himself at Blake, hitting the table and falling to the floor. Seneca grabbed a blade from the table in the skirmish, and stepped on Blake’s hand to make him drop his own. He felt weak, not fully at the strength he had been before he died, and it was a fascinating feeling to feel your muscles rebuilding themselves, but he knew that with all of his strength he had to do this.
“Seneca-!” Gloria shouted.
“I’ve never met anyone who I’ve hated more,” Seneca said, standing over Blake. “You’ve been a thorn in the side of the rebellion, you’re the son of Lady Malice, you’ve killed dozens of people, but the worst thing you’ve done is harm such a pure thing. You told her you loved her, convinced her to leave her home for you, and all so that she could live in a cage. She had so many chances to kill you, and she should have, but she’s too kind to do that. Even with all of the pain you’ve put her through, she’d still probably want you to live out your days in prison. Gloria can’t bear the weight of killing you on her shoulders, but I can.”
With a plunge, Blake moved no more.
We did it! There were a bunch of bloopers in this chapter, so let me get to those!
^I don't magic duel a lot, and I didn't know that this was going to be the animation for a 'Heated Duel', and I thought it was hilarious because I can totally imagine Midshore mocking Illia like this.
^I thought this was a really pretty picture.
^Watching the trio as the audience was funny and I had to take pictures of it even if their reactions didn't fit the tone of the scene. More than half the time they were cheering for Illia!
^I had to have the spellcasters fight more than a few times so that I could get the proper endings to the fights I wanted, and Midshore won more fights than I needed her to, and Illia won more fights than I wanted her too as well, so when Gloria finally won the round she celebrated.
Also, I had to make a new entrance to the palace as a detached room because the original one is too small! If you look at the pictures, see if you can tell the difference.
^These are great pictures, but Seneca is wearing the wrong clothes! Thankfully I noticed before getting too deep into that scene.
^My little cinnamon roll.
This is the pose I wanted Gloria to use with Henry. When I said in the chapter that Gloria held Seneca the way she wanted to hold Henry, that was a wink at the fact I could finally use the pose pack that would have been perfect for it!
^I love the sims. They cheer when people kiss
^Didn't use this picture because I don't know if I wanted Gloria to be sad that Blake was dead or not.
There are two more chapters I have planned for this story, then we're on to what ever comes next! I have plans, much more mundane plans than a medieval story. I've said before, but I want to do something more vanilla, take out all of the cc from my game, all of the poses. I want to do a bachellortette challenge and let my sims live normal-er lives! It'll be fun!
As always, I want to thank all of my readers for encouraging me to get this far. I would have never done it without you.
Here you go! Link!
Also, try as I may, I'm not very good at writing magic battles. I should have read Harry Potter or something before hand to warm up
And thankyou for the compliment!
Midshore can be sassy
Ooh, I was wrong about Ilia being the next main antagonist. I wonder what'll happen to Gloria's baby though.
Yaaassssss. All the loose ends are coming together. But what of the Queen and Barnabus? They're quite cruel as well. Maybe the fact that their only heir will get taken away to the islands to be with Gloria (presumably) should be punishment enough. But then again, the King didn't stop trying to get Anwyn and Gloria back, so maybe there's only one way to be safe...
Ooh, only two more chapters. After two years, it's finally ending. :0 Thanks for sticking it out. Some stories or challenges on this section of the forum tend to just die out, so I'm happy that this thing is concluding properly
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Chapter 69
Gloria knocked on the Romeos' door, anxious. She had a lot to answer for.
"You're going straight home!" Anwyn had told her after all of the introductions had been made and the pleasantries exchanged between Queen Rosa and Anwyn's own band. "You're in danger here, the rebels will be looking to get rid of anyone associated with the king, and with you here they'll be looking to kill you too. So you're going home. Midshore-"
"On it. Hold tight Gloria, this is going to be rough." She wrapped her arms around Gloria, holding her close.
"But- Sen-" Gloria was cut off as the world fell away and she felt as if she were being spun at frightening speeds. After countless moments had gone by, the two of them dropped onto the pale sands of the Islands. Midshore stumbled, but Gloria tripped over her own feet and fell to the ground.
Looking around, she saw that she was on the Midshore's home island, volcano fuming in the background, the greenhouse standing just as they'd left it. Had Gloria really only been gone three months?
Midshore looked up at the house, yearning to go up there and let Everstar and her children know she was alright- that everyone was alright, but she also knew that she should return to Anwyn and the group to talk about their plans.
"Go to her. Mom, Dad, and Pops can wait," Gloria urged.
That extra push was all Midshore needed to get her bolting up the hill. Gloria chuckled as she dusted sand off of herself. She had been appreciating the lack of sand on the mainland, and at night the sand was very cold. She shivered. At least the air was warm, unlike the winter they had just come from.
Midshore bounded through the portal and down into her home. It had been night on the Mainland, barely touching dawn, so it was late at night on the Islands. If she thought about it, Midshore knew she should be exhausted, but she was so wired she couldn’t possibly sleep.
She opened the bedroom door and found her wife sleeping in bed. “Everstar, honey, wake up.”
Everstar rolled over in bed, hardly opening her eyes before recognising Midshore. She then leaped out of bed and the two held each other close, both nearly squeezing the air out of the other.
“I thought for sure I’d be a widow,” Everstar said. “You don’t ever get to leave me again. Next time, I go on the dangerous journey.”
“Deal,” Midshore smiled.
Gloria wandered into the little underground dwelling. It was almost a second home to her, and she knew every crumbling wall like the back of her hand, but she felt like she was a stranger here. She had changed in the three months she’d been gone and nothing felt the same even if her senses were telling her they were.
Everstar and Midshore came out of their bedroom, and a shocked look mixed with anger sprouted on Everstar’s face. “If I wasn’t so happy that you were safe, I’d slap you,” she said to Gloria, pulling her abruptly into a suffocating hug. “I’m so angry and happy,”
“I missed you too,” Gloria said.
After that, Midshore squeezed Everstar’s hand, and took Gloria’s. “We need to rescue Lily from those children. I’ll see you in a few days, if not sooner, darling.”
The trip to the Romeos’ was much smoother, teleporting just a few miles rather than a couple hundred.
“Time to face some consequences,” Midshore said as they approached the door. “And no, I will not knock with you. That woman scares me when she’s angry.”
Gloria took a steadying breath. She still felt light headed from everything that had happened. She had brought Seneca back to life less than two hours ago, and her legs were starting to feel like they were made of jelly. That was either the side effects of the magic or her fear of Lily Romeo.
“See you later, and good luck,” Midshore floated up off the ground then disappeared.
“This can’t be harder than bringing people back to life,” Gloria said as she knocked on the door. The lights were all out in the house. It was the middle of the night, no one would expect company now, especially from a girl who’d been missing for three months…
Gloria saw the soft glow and harsh shadows of a candle being carried around the house, and then the curtain part to see who was outside. The face was pale, but then most of the people in the family were, so she wasn’t sure that it was Lily or one of the twins. Or her brother Robin…
The door opened slowly, and the full form of Lily stood in the doorway. She wore a simple night dress, and Gloria was reminded that she was also wearing night clothes and how strong Lily was. She had been a nomad for a long time, and she had kept up her fitness even when in domestic life.
“Gloria, is that you? You’ve come back?” she asked.
“Yes, it’s me,” Gloria shivered.
“Where’s my husband?!” Lily let her voice raise, standing defiantly in the doorway, looking like she was ready to pull out all of Gloria’s hair if she gave the wrong answer.
“Pops is fine!” Gloria replied quickly. “They’re all fine. Mom’s fine, Dad’s fine, Midshore’s fine, everyone’s fine. I promise. They just stayed back to talk to Queen Rosa and everyone. They thought I should come back so that I wasn’t hurt.”
“Oh, well then,” She softened visibly. “You can tell me everything over a nice cup of hot juice, you look like you haven’t eaten in days! I want to know everything!”
Gloria ended up talking until her voice was hoarse and the sun dawned, but it felt so good to be able to talk about what she’d done, to share it all with someone and not have to carry it alone.
“The kids will be happy you’re here, and you can all go home. The house will feel empty with them all gone, I had just gotten a rhythm going, too, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t be happy your siblings are gone! That was a lot of food… You look exhausted, and you need a change of clothes. You can sleep in my bed, and you can borrow some of my clothes.” Gloria looked up from her mug and felt like she would crumble to pieces from the tenderness. “Oh, don’t you start that now, I’ll start crying too, and I’ll be 🐸🐸🐸🐸 if my boys see me crying. Come on, lass, let’s get you taken care of.”
~*~
Anwyn took Liam’s hand and turned to Rosa who was holding her son at arm’s length. He looked remarkably fine for someone who had been dead fifteen minutes ago. The king hadn’t kept many guards on the island, just enough to be comfortable, not fortified, and the sounds of the skirmish were coming to an end.
“Rosa, there are some things that I feel should be discussed. Perhaps we could meet in the dining room in fifteen minutes? I’ll try to find something for us to eat, and you can talk to your people, or whatever else you need to do?”
“Yes, that sounds fine to me,” she said, not looking away from her son.
“Very good,” Anwyn said as she stepped out of the dungeon and started up the stairs in search of food. The kitchen was always well stocked; hopefully the soldiers hadn’t been dumb enough to ransack it.
Liam let out a sigh. “Our daughter is safe.”
“Gloria is safe,” Romeo echoed, looking into the distance. “What do we do now?”
“Now we talk to Rosa and her team and we iron out an agreement. Didn’t Gloria say that Seneca doesn’t want to be king? We know who would be in line for the throne if he turns away from it, and something tells me that she isn’t up for the job on her own. So we need to talk to Rosa.”
The next few minutes were spent looking for food, which was a fruitful mission. They found plenty of ready-to-eat foods like bread and preserves. It wasn’t hearty, but it would fill the stomach.
“Queen Anwyn,” Rosa said as she sat down at the table, her people on one side, Anwyn’s on the other. “What is it that you wish to discuss?”
“You can drop the title, Rosa, we’re equals here,” Anwyn smiled. “And I am no queen. What I wish to discuss is that I know who can reign if Seneca wishes not to take that path. The girl doesn’t know that she is in line, so she’s no threat to you. She lives on the Islands, and has no knowledge of any of this, besides perhaps that Gloria ran away from home. Everyone on the Islands knows that by now,”
“Why would Seneca not wish to be king? It was what he was born for. He’s got the blood of kings in his veins,” Rosa said, looking at her son with skepticism.
“By the way, the king’s blood is on the floor in the princess’s wing… You may want to get that cleaned up…” Anwyn said quietly.
“Good for you,” Rosa said, looking at her out of the corner of her eye. “Seneca, you want to be king, don’t you?”
He looked at his mother, his mouth dry. All eyes were on him. “I- mother I think you want to be queen again more than I want to be king,” he stammered out quickly. “This has always been your dream, not mine. I- No. I don’t want to be king.”
“You don’t!? But all the work we’ve done over the years- all of your education- You’re primed to be the king! Anwyn said herself that the girl who would rule instead has no knowledge of government!”
“Which is why I think that it would be a good idea for you to rule with her. As co-ruler.” Anwyn said.
“Co-ruler?”
~*~
Seneca looked at his bandaged hand. There was nothing wrong with it, but it had started changing colors and while he was alarmed, he didn’t want to scare anyone else. Gloria had colored hands, maybe now he carried a small part of her.
Krista rushed into the room, throwing herself into Seneca's arms. He had no option but to hug her back, her arms were too tight around his neck to allow him to have any other response.
"I heard what happened!" she said. "I can't believe you were dead. Things were so close to going wrong! All I can think is that we're so lucky."
"Luck didn't have much to do with it," he said into her hair. "Just lots of bravery." He held her at arm's length. "Krista, there's something I have to say,"
"Me, first. Please." She sat down on the bed next to him. She seemed to radiate, and she was still so clean. The idea of things being clean was still a mystery to him. The palace was in ruin, they had only cleared out a few rooms to work from in the past few days.
"Seneca," she smiled, taking his hand in hers, "I know you're going to want an heir as soon as possible, or at least your mother will, but I want to wait. I don't want to have children right away. There was a little while after I visited you that I was sick, and I wondered if I was expecting, but that wasn’t the case." She smiled a small smile. "I was terrified. I know that there's much less to be worried about now, with our cause in power, and we have a whole island to have as our own, but I don't want to bring children into the world where their home is a building site and we're sorting out government policies."
"Krista," Seneca felt like he was about to jump off a cliff into an ocean. "Krista, I don't want to marry you."
"Oh," she took her hands from his, confused. "But our parents signed a deal. This was the deal. My father’s support in exchange for our marriage. You can't just back out of that,"
"Krista, I want to marry someone I love. I can't marry you,” he said gently. “I've found someone else who I love. You and I hardly know each other, Krista. We've seen each other a handful of times, and that may be enough for some people, but that's not enough for me. I don't want to spend my days regretting who I married. You're a wonderful girl though-" he covered. "You'd make any man very happy as a wife- any man but me."
Krista took a shaking breath. "Oh thank the Creator!" she said. "I don't want to marry you either."
"You don't?" he asked.
"No. I mean, if we're being blunt, you're never clean, you always have dirt under your nails, you're grumpy all the time, your hands are rough, and you're broody. I found a really nice man in the capital; he's a merchant selling jewelry. I haven't pursued it because I was tied to you, but now that neither of us want to get married, it doesn't matter!"
Seneca blinked in surprise, chuckling. "That's the best news I've heard all week!" he hugged her. "Congratulations on finding a nice man!"
"And I hope you're happy too, you deserve that much."
~*~
“I’m what?” Ember asked. It had been nearly 20 years since she’d had to think about her father or being locked in the basement of that manor, and she’d hoped to never think about it again.
“You’re the next person in line to be the ruler of the Mainland,” Anwyn said. Ember hadn't seen much of her in the past 20 years. She’d been taught by her, yes, but Ember had been well-read by the time she’d been in Mrs. Reed’s class, so she hadn’t had much to learn and had graduated early. Ember was 25 now, and she was happy where she was.
“Do they know I’m a mermaid?” she asked.
“No, but I don’t see why that matters. And between you and me, they could use some new perspectives in that stunted government.”
“But I’m- I’m happy here! There are other mermaids like me here. Peace! And I’m going to be married soon… I can’t leave just like that.”
“I’m not saying you should, but I am saying that you’d be a good fit for it, and it is your heritage. You’ve always been bright, Ember. Always. And you won’t be alone; the previous Queen will be there with you, ruling beside you. She’s a tough cookie, but I think you could teach her something about acceptance and kindness. And tolerance. If you ruled the Mainland, you could revoke discriminatory laws that were placed against all those who are different. Mermaids, Spellcasters, all sorts of people could live without fear,” Anwyn smiled and patted her knee. “It’s a lot to think about. Talk it over with your fiancé.”
“I’ll do that,”
AH! the next chapter is the finale! I have the feeling that you all know what's going to happen, but as always I would love to hear what you thought and felt. This story has been such a journey, and I'm so happy that you've all been here for it./b]
I have a few bloopers!
^ Get yourself a partner who looks at you like Seneca looks at Gloria.
^Or how Liam looks at Anwyn.
^A few unused angles
^My handsome boy
^A few pics that just didn't fit quite as well as the others did
Uh, Midshore, I don't think that's how you're supposed to back float... You look like you're sinking...
Do you guys want me to keep posting to this thread for discussion and new chapter links or should I start a new one? We're still following the same family and many if the same characters are going to carry over.
Good thing Seneca got out of the wedding arrangement too. I guess he can finally be happy with Gloria.
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
Hmm...I've used Blogspot for one of my shows. The good thing about it is that the pictures will always be there, and it'll be easy to look things up, as opposed to going through the pages of a forum thread.
Personally, I would prefer something that had the format of the Sims 2 website's story uploads, where you click on left and right arrows to navigate through pictures and text. I'm not sure if there's something like that out there, but it would be nice.
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
I've been trying out Blogger, and I'm still figuring it out. I have been in a school for 3 years or so, so it's been a while since I've had to learn new things!
Chapter 70
*Finale*
Anwyn, Liam, and Romeo’s homecoming was well met by the community, and everyone was happy for their coming child. The council was more forgiving than anyone had expected after they heard everything that had happened.
“While we stand by what we said before,” the head of the council said, “that we didn’t want you to leave, we can say with honesty that we are happy that none of you were killed, and that you were able to save your daughter from what sounds to be a horrible life. We’ve talked at great length about whether or not to discipline the lot of you, but we’ve decided that we would have all done the same for our own family and no one can fault you for what you set out to do, and what you have accomplished. We welcome you home.”
The trio breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, we are happy to be home. Beyond happy. We’re so relieved-” Romeo sputtered.
“We understand,” one of the other council members said. “No need to thank us that much, Mr. Romeo. You may all go now.”
~*~
Gloria waited days on end for something that no one else besides Aunt Lily knew could be possible. She hadn’t thought to censor her story the first time she told it, and she had included the part where Blake had been influenced to create an heir, a part that she had struck from her other retellings. She didn’t need her parents looking at her with pity, or more mutterings about how they were all happy that it was finally over and how it couldn’t have turned out better.
It could have been better. She could have never gone on that horrible trip with a boy who told her he loved her. She had believed him and now she could be carrying his child? Was she pregnant? Would she have to live with the violence taken against her for the rest of her life?
She sat in her room for days, trying to read or draw, but all of the quiet time she spent alone was time that she spent in her own head, and she couldn’t get rid of the thought. She just had to wait, and waiting was the worst thing.
Gloria supposed that Midshore suspected something, but didn’t know what it was, and she didn’t pry. She was so busy blending back into her important place in the society of the Islands that she didn’t have time to pay attention to Gloria. She had cures to brew, bones to set, plants that needed harvesting before they were past their prime; the list was lengthy. Gloria didn’t blame her. She only blamed herself.
It would be another week before she could know for sure, and every day was agony, reliving the time she had with Blake. She saw his face when she let her mind wander, his cold, pale eyes unseeing as he held her there. It hadn’t been Blake, but it may as well have been. He’d done so many other things to control her.
She had barely been let off of the little island they’d returned home to in the past two weeks, not that she wanted to leave. She felt embarrassed, and everyone would ask her what happened even if they’d already heard. Rumors flew quickly in a small community like this.
Ember was doing well as monarch on the Mainland, or so Midshore told. Talks were open between the Islands and the Mainland now, though they were both being held at arm’s length. The Islands didn’t trust the Mainland for their power hungry and explosive ways, and with the amount of refugees that had come from there the Island government was wary to be open. But with the thought of returning to or visiting family and close friends lost on the Mainland, the council didn’t see why they should prevent the talks between governments that could one day bloom into a friendship.
“I think I’ll go to Mara’s house tomorrow,” Gloria said while they sat and ate lunch. It was a Saturday so there was no school to worry about, and wouldn’t have to tomorrow either.
A quiet mood came over the table, and no one spoke for a moment. Anwyn swallowed. “Are you sure? If you like, you can come with me on Monday and see her and Mabel in class. We’re talking about your favorite book this week. You might like it.”
Gloria had expected this. No one wanted her to go anywhere by herself anymore if she was leaving the island, and she understood why. But she wasn’t broken, and the Islands were incredibly safe now that Blake wasn’t walking around them.
“I don’t really want to go back to school, mom,” Gloria fought to smile. “And besides, distracting them at school would be impolite. I’m sure Aunt Lara would want to see me too, she’s my favorite aunt…”
“I don’t see why you’d want to save the trip and go with me, you wouldn’t be alone-” Anwyn started.
“Mom, I’m not going to wander off! I’m fine!” Gloria shouted. She was being irrational and she knew it, but it had been this way since they got back. Her room felt too small, her little patch of sand felt confined, and where she had once looked out to the horizon for inspiration she now felt like it was too wide. She both felt cooped up and exposed at the same time.
“Gloria, apologize to your mother,” Liam said calmly.
Gloria fumed for a moment, then relented. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have yelled.”
“Apology accepted,” Anwyn said, and took a bite of food.
“Why is Gloria angry?” Robin asked.
Gloria set her jaw, but it was Anwyn who spoke. “I think Gloria is frustrated, and we aren't communicating the way we’re supposed to. We all get angry sometimes, especially when we feel like we’re not being heard. It’ll be ok.”
Gloria stood up from the table, taking her plate with her. “I’m sorry, I can’t be here right now,” she said as she walked out to the porch and the sand.
~*~
Rosa looked at the body of her ex-husband who lay on his slab of hard stone, very much dead.
“You missed out on a great son, you know.” She sighed. “We could have been magnificent, if you had taken me as a partner instead of a trophy. Been kinder. I should have shown more kindness to Seneca, our son. Maybe he would have wanted to be the ruler more then. Now we have a half-blood mermaid who is the queen now. I can just imagine how you would have been enraged at the idea of a mermaid on the throne. You’d want to sleep with the girl before seeing her rule, but I guess times are changing.”
She sat down on a nearby chair. “Times are changing faster than we ever imagined they would. Talks are open with the Islands, laws are being repealed on spellcasters. You heard me right, Galant. We’re letting spellcasters live here out in the open. Who would have imagined? Apparently they’re not all bad.
“You missed so much by being on the wrong side. Who knew that little girl with the scar on her face would ever be able to stand up to you? I never imagined it; she seemed so timid, and to fall for that guard who spoke so little… life is strange. But it’s better with you not in it. Rest in hell, Galant.”
~*~
Anwyn met Gloria outside at the water’s edge. The ocean was calm tonight, and the waves were nearly nonexistent, but it was nice to have the soft rhythm of them back again.
Gloria was staring out at the horizon, a tear occasionally forming a trail down her cheek, her breathing slow but steady. Her hair was down, moving gently in the wind. She tended to wear more conservative clothes than she had once worn, Anwyn had noticed, but after everything that had happened she wouldn’t be surprised if Gloria had changed.
She sat down next to Gloria without speaking. She knew that if Gloria wanted to say something, she would eventually. Anwyn just had to be there to listen.
Out of habit, Anwyn counted the waves like time in a song. It was five waves before Gloria said anything.
“I’m not pregnant,” she stated blankly.
“Oh,” Anwyn said, not sure how to answer that. “Did you want to be pregnant?”
“No, I didn’t. It would have been Blake’s and I just- I didn’t want to- He made me-” Gloria pulled at the beginning of sentences, and Anwyn stared at her daughter. “I didn’t want to be pregnant, but I was worried that I was.”
“Baby, I understand, and I am so, very sorry that you had to go through that. It’ll never happen again, I’ll make sure.”
“I love you, mom,” Gloria smiled through her tears, “And I know it’ll never happen again, because I will never fall for the wrong man again. But that’s the thing,” she trailed off.
“What’s on your mind? Tell me.” Anwyn said softly.
“Mom, I love him. Seneca. I know you don’t want me to leave you, and I know that I could never leave you, not fully, but I... I love him. And I know that he would never hurt me.” She smiled like a love stricken girl.
“Gloria, you thought that about Blake. How could you be sure? He’s the king’s son, for the Creator’s sake.” Anwyn clucked.
“I can tell what he’s feeling, mom, and he’s only ever felt kindness towards me, unless I was annoying, but he’s never felt ill will towards me. He saved my life time and time again. Mom, we’ve been seeing each other in our dreams for years, and he makes me feel like there’s a future that I never considered. One away from the Islands, one with a partner by my side, not Blake pulling me through life. I swear, I love him,”
Anwyn sat on the bench, torn. She had just gotten her little girl back, now she had grand ideas. “What do you have in mind?”
“I want Midshore to take me to the Mainland and let me find him. I think I know where he’ll be, and I want to see if he’ll have me- if we can build a life together from the fractured pasts that we both have. If we can make it work. If he loves me the way I love him. It may not work. He could have gone back to Krista, or he could have decided to be a hermit, or he could have set to sea as a sailor, but I have to find out.”
Anwyn felt her heart rate pick up and her breathing become heavier. She bit her lip. “But, Glo, we just got home. I can’t lose you already. I love you too much,”
“Mom, I love you too.” She pulled her into a large hug. “But Pops always says that he learned from Dad that if you’re afraid to do something, you should probably do it. And this makes me terrified, but it feels right. And I’ll have Midshore with me- She can teach me to teleport that far. I’ll come back in the winters because I don’t know who would want to live in the cold like that,” Gloria said with a chuckle.
Anwyn sighed. “I’ll have to talk to your father about it,”
“I say go for it,” he said, startling them both.
“Dad, you weren’t a part of this conversation, you shouldn’t have been listening!” Gloria scolded.
“Sorry, I was looking for my wife and overheard declarations of love. And I think you should do it. I’m not going to stop you from pursuing your future. You have my blessing.”
“Liam, I thought maybe we would talk about this more…” Anwyn edged.
“Gloria’s been in a funk for weeks, Annie. We’ve both seen it. If this is a way for her to go forward and stop looking back, then I support her for taking that step.”
Anwyn took her daughter’s hand. “Apparently I’ve been outvoted,” she said as she kissed her forehead. “We love you and want you to be happy.”
~*~
It had been three weeks and some change since the insurrection at the palace, and Seneca had tried to build a life away from his mother and reputation. He was going to make a living on his own now, without the help of his mother, without the title of prince, without the safety of a body guard or anyone to have his back.
It was… quiet. The base had always been rather quiet to not attract attention, but for the past forever his mother had always had someone over to talk business with, and Barnabus and his wife were always bustling him from one thing to another. It was time to eat, or it was time to train, or it was time to learn. Being his own man was intimidating, and it had made his legs weak more than once.
He’d needed a home, and he’d been lucky. He’d found a place for sale near his home community, where he could see the ocean, and think of the loss and potential the waves had held for him, but he was done with the ocean. He was going to keep his feet planted firmly in the soil.
Seneca was exhausted by the time he fell into bed. The property had been cheap since the house was run down and the prior owner was a supporter of their cause. Getting the place suitable to be lived in was tougher than Seneca had thought it would be and he had spent the past three days just trying to clear out the broken furniture.
It took only a few breaths for him to fall into sleep, waking up to the swirling sky of the dreamscape. I expect I’ll be alone. I should never have told Gloria I loved her, I’ve scared her off…
The white violin was easily found in the greenhouse. Gloria’s box with strings, he thought with a smile. She was always being musical, maybe he could adopt some of that now that he was his own person.
“I’d love to see you play it.”
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as the sound tickled his ears. “I wouldn’t know the first thing about playing it,” he said, not wanting to turn around and ruin the immersion he had created. If he turned around, she wouldn’t be there, and he would be alone. Better to imagine her ghost than to have it disappear completely.
“I could teach you,” she said, walking around him and picking up the violin. Her hands were a vivid orange, and her white tattoos stood out on her skin.
“You’re…” he trailed, spellbound. You’re here.
She looked at him, curious. “If you tell me I’m no good, I’m going to hit you,”
“I’d never say that,” he said, still staring at her. She was beautiful, shining like an angel. When she had restored him, he thought that he had been in a dream, to see her all in white like that. She was always so vibrant, but she was only so pristinely dressed here, in the between.
“You’re talking a lot less than you normally do, Seneca. Cat’s got your tongue?”
“I’m- I’m surprised to see you,” he stuttered, his mouth dry.
“I had no doubt I’d see you,” she smiled, stepping closer to him, closer than was casual. “I’m hoping I’ll see you again very soon. Where are you? How can I find you?”
“I’m where I’ve always been. On the coast,” he breathed.
“Then I will be there.” She placed her hands on either side of his face, and just as she was looking at his lips to not miss, he woke up with a start.
“🐸🐸🐸🐸!” he shouted, hitting the covers. “I’m such an idiot!”
See him soon? What did that mean? It certainly felt like she meant to come here, but his place was a disaster! It wasn’t ready for company! Even though he had been exhausted not an hour earlier, Seneca now felt he had enough frantic energy to clean the whole house.
~*~
Gloria woke up on the floor of the greenhouse, with Midshore sitting nearby.
“That was... interesting. I’ve never had an experience like that before. The spirits are not as… decorated as your environment. You’ve seen the spirit’s home, it’s quiet, dark, gleaming. Yours is quite the opposite.”
“Yes, it is,” Gloria rushed, shoving her blanket she’d been sleeping on into her bag. “He’s living on the coast, and you got a feel for him, can you pick him out? Find where he lives?”
“I’m not a tracking charm, I’m not exact, but yes. I got a feel for him. It could take a while, but I think we could find him.”
“Let’s do it then.”
~*~
Seneca’s frenzied cleaning had worn off within two hours and his lack of sleep was starting to affect him more and more as the hours went by. It was hard to see without any fairy lights and just going by candles and moonlight. His eyes were starting to play tricks on him from the flickering of the candle light, but he breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the sky start to change with the dawn.
“Why am I worrying, it takes days to get here from the Islands. I have time… “ he said to himself as he trudged up the stairs to his room. Maybe now he would be able to get some solid sleep.
“It’s odd, I feel fine. Normally I feel sick after I have a dream,” he said as he kicked off his shoes and pulled back the covers.
Right as he was closing his eyes to sleep, a knock on the door downstairs roused him. “It’s not Gloria, it can’t be Gloria, '' he assured himself. “It’s probably Mrs. Grigham wondering if I’ve eaten this morning. Breakfast would be good…”
He shoved his feet into his shoes, leaving the warm fire in his room and stumbling down the stairs half asleep, something that was rather dangerous as the stairs weren’t the sturdiest.
A knock came again. “I’m coming, coming!” he replied lazily, shuffling a bit faster towards the door.
Reaching the door, he opened it, wiping away sleep from his eyes with a questionably clean hand. “How can I help you?”
“I love you.”
It wasn’t Mrs. Grigham's voice, it was Gloria’s. Seneca whipped his head up and blinked. Something was in his right eye, bugging him, and he was trying really hard to not let that bother him from Gloria standing in front of him. She was here! How was she here?
“What- how?- How did you get here?” he stammered.
“I had Midshore take me. She’s getting better at teleporting long ways, and hopefully she’ll teach me, but that’s not what I need to tell you. Sen, you’re-” she broke off, taking a breath, “I feel like you’re my future. I know that you don’t want to be king, and you may have gone back to Krista, and I’ll leave if you want me to, but I feel like you are my one person in life who is my equal, and I want to build my life with you in it. I love you.” she repeated.
“You rehearsed that, didn’t you?” he asked with a smirk.
“More than you would guess,” she nervously laughed.
Seneca grabbed her and pulled her into a strong embrace, squeezing her shoulders. They felt thinner than he remembered, like she hadn’t been eating enough.
“I don’t want to live alone. Live with me, Gloria. Never leave me.”
“I promise,” she said, smiling into his shoulder. Her soul felt like it was glowing, she was so happy, almost as if her heart were full of stars.
That's it! I finished the series! I did it! We did it!
Gloria and Seneca will return in The Last Forever, coming... i don't know when, but it'll come. My mood totally tanked today and I fought myself to post this all day and then Imgur kept not uploading pictures and I don't know why, but what matters is that it's done now. We got here together.
I'm really looking forward to what I have planned in the future, it's going to be a lot of un for me, and hopefully for you guys too! I couldn't have gotten here without you, and I'm incredibly grateful.