The Diary of Aisling

  Marci was a wizard. Despite everything else that the world told her she was, Princess, Warlock, Shardkeeper, Monster, she still thought of herself, first and foremost, as a wizard. It was what she had wanted to be ever since she had read a children's book where a brilliant wizard had saved a town from a dragon with their quick wit and clever spells, and she had fled her mother's cold and cruel court in order to chase that dream. Even at her lowest point, seven pints in, she had at least been able to look into the dark, cloudy liquid she was chugging and see a wizard staring back at her—washed up, sure, but still a wizard.

  Which was why she was handling a terrifying situation like any good wizard would. She was hitting the books. All of the books. As many books as possible.

  She wasn't even really sure what she was looking for. Ideally, a book entitled What To Do When Everyone Is Trying To Kill You Or Recruit You For Evil. Thus far, her search for such a tome had been unsuccessful, although she had found a few very interesting spellbooks, several collections of awful poetry that the previous Shardkeeper, Aisling, had written, and, weirdly, loads of cookbooks.

  Marci's body had been reformed three days to the minute of her previous body's death, and had emerged in a surge of energy, bare and utterly blemish and scar free. It had been strange, after three days as a disembodied consciousness, to suddenly find herself back in her body, the same body she remembered dying inside twice now, but she had done her best to shrug the feeling off and focus on a way out of the ever increasing mess she seemed to be making in the course of trying to get out of the gyre of previous messes she'd made.

  "More poetry," muttered Marci grumpily, slotting the journal back into its slot in the wall before moving to the next row up, her eyes scanning over the titles, which seemed to be demonic literary theory. She was just about to give up and try another bookcase when her eyes fell on a red-spined journal, different from all the blue-spined ones that had thus far contained nothing but the presumably deceased succubus' tortuous prose.

  She fished it out and cracked it open, slowly wafting to the floor as she began to read through the succubus' spindly handwriting.

  Only, instead of terrible love sonnets with very creepy and predatory overtones, this journal was written in a more familiar style to Marci: research notes. Research notes on the Shard. It was full of measurements, short-hand, and dates which Marci could sort of glean a few insights from, and gave her a few ideas for things to try herself in trying to figure out how the Shard worked.

  The most interesting part, however, was a page near the back, which unlike the other rough notes seemed to be more like a diary entry.

  Possible Breakthrough? 24/6/4136

  I have becoming increasingly convinced that the Shardforts were not made by creatures of this world. If the things that made them were 'creatures' at all as we understand them. The magic involved is utterly unreted to anything I have been able to find, not only in the Underworld or on the surface, but even in the tombs of the Ancients which I have managed to acquire some relics of to compare. In all of those, I can find through-lines, cross-pollination of ideas, and a few basic principles: none of them exist in the Shard. The only even remotely simir magic I found was when I observed one of my minions, a Spiritbinder with a pact with an archfey, casting a divination spell.

  The lesser fey I have summoned and interrogated profess no knowledge of the Shard's or their origins, even when put to the question. It seems I may have to venture into the Wildes myself, and seek a being powerful, wise, and ancient enough to give me some answers.

  Fey? Surely not. Nothing about the Dreadfort looked fey at all. Marci reread the passage; no, it wasn't that Aisling had thought that the fortress was fey in origin, but rather, that the fey might have some kind of insight into its origins.

  That seemed a pretty long-bow to draw, and venturing into the Feywilde wasn't exactly something anyone, even an archwizard took lightly. It was a strange, chaotic, alien realm that operated on strange ws and codes of conduct that even as a fairy, a person in whose veins ran blood that had originated in that realm, it was far more dangerous than even the Underworld.

  But Aisling had thought that it might contain answers to what exactly the Shardforts were, where they had come from, and how they worked—questions that Marci also desperately wanted answers to as well. She had no idea if the succubus had actually ventured there, but it was the first solid lead that she had.

  Marci hummed as she brought the book back to her desk and began to pour over it, making her own notes as she tried to reconstruct the experiments and the shorthand that the succubus might have been doing. It seemed that Saoirse had been right in that psionics appeared to be involved in the Shard, although Aisling didn't appear to have gotten much further than that, at least in this journal. Some of her experiments pointed in the direction of some kind of folding resonance and mirroring, but it was so incredibly esoteric that Marci couldn't really follow it.

  A knock at the door pulled Marci from her work, and she blinked owlishly as she looked up to see Of entering the room, two cups of steaming coffee he must have gotten in his hand. Behind him, the wrath demon she'd assigned to him saluted, and then at a mental word closed the door.

  "Hey," said Marci, accepting the coffee—a triple strength bck brew, as he knew she liked. "What's up?"

  Of raised an eyebrow. "You mean, apart from the fact you apparently…" He gestured over her newly reformed body. "And didn't tell me? I was kind of worried, Marci."

  "Oh, right, sorry," said Marci, taking a slurp of the delicious, caffeinated beverage. "I've been distracted…"

  He gnced at the journal for a few moments, before giving up.

  "With?" he asked.

  "Trying to figure out how the Shard works," said Marci, setting aside the cup and holding it the diary. "Apparently, the st Shardkeeper was working on the same thing. Found one of her journals."

  Of took a long sip of his coffee. "And?"

  "And she thought that maybe she might find out more if she could talk to an Archfey," said Marci. "Go into the Feywilde. Don't know if she ever did, the journal is dated two years before she went missing."

  Of took another sip and then sighed. "Oh, right, so, naturally, you're thinking of 'going into the Feywilde?'"

  "I mean… yes?" said Marci. "If that's where answers lie, then yes."

  "Do I need to point out how incredibly insane that is?" said Of. "That nine out of ten groups that go in, chasing 'fey riches,' are never heard from again? That most of those who do make it back come back wrong?"

  "I don't have a lot of good options, Of," she said. "I'm doing the best I can."

  "Sicking demon guards on your friends is 'doing the best you can?'" he said, jerking his head back.

  Marci gred at him.

  He gred back.

  "Gillian-"

  "-betrayed you," finished Of. "Betrayed all of us—we'd have died too if this fortress had fallen from the sky. That doesn't mean we'll do the same."

  Marci looked away. Was that true? Could she trust him? She'd trusted Gillian…

  "Please Marci, you're isoting yourself," he said. "Shutting us out-"

  Marci felt a spike of both anger and self-hatred.

  "-like I always do?" she snapped. "Is that it? Oh, it's just Marci being Marci, you know—the perennial fuck-up. She couldn't have a reason for doing something I disagree with, could she?"

  "So, what, you don't trust us?"

  "I trusted Gillian!" shouted Marci, fring her wings and buzzing into the air. "I trusted him with my life! I gave him total access to the Shardfort. So how- how can I trust you now!?"

  "Because I love you, and so does Tissa," said Of softly.

  His words were calm and measured, and meant to be soothing, but as soon as they registered Marci felt a huge spike of anger consume her, and a poorly healed, partly healed wound she hadn't even really known she'd had—or perhaps she had and had just pretended she didn't—ripped itself open.

  "Yeah?" said Marci, trembling with sudden, overpowering rage. "Yeah!? You kicked me off the team! When- when I most needed help! You abandoned me!"

  "Is that what this is really about?" he said, clearly surprised by her sudden anger. "Marci, you were endangering not only yourself, but everyone else. We gave you so many chances, and you refused to take them. Don't bme us for your mistakes."

  "You didn't have to break up with me!" screamed Marci, her entire body shaking. "You didn't have to toss me aside as if I'd never mattered!"

  "What are you talking about?" he said. "You were barely speaking to me: monosylbic, most days! The way I see it, you broke up with me. And I went above and beyond; I lined up that job for you when I didn't have to, made sure-"

  "I sted two and a half weeks! Not that you fucking knew that!" shouted Marci. "I needed help, and you just left! Not even a letter, for a year and a half!" She said. "And then, when- when I happened to see you in Krefeld, and- and I tried to get back together, you brushed me off. Told me I wasn't 'being serious.'"

  "You were drunk-"

  "Of course I was drunk! I'm a fucking addict, Of!" shouted Marci. "I'm addicted to alcohol!" Marci grabbed the fabric above her heart and gripped it so tightly it almost ripped. "I have so much hurt and pain inside me, and- and sometimes it just gets too much, and I can't… I just- I just can't…"

  Her wingbeats eased and she nded back in her chair, and Marci put her head in her hands as tears streamed down her cheeks.

  "I thought you had my back," said Marci weakly. "No matter what; you wrote me poems, you made me feel like I was special to at least one person. I… I understood why I couldn't be in the party anymore. But then you cut me out of your life—as if we meant nothing. I'm- I'm not a strong person, Of, and I fell down, and I needed you, and- and you weren't there for me. And then you came back, offered me my spot, and I tried- I tried to forget all that, to turn over a new leaf, and then- and then all of this happened."

  She looked up at Of, who was looking at her in shock. Hadn't she told him this before? She felt like she had, although perhaps that had just been in her head, and she'd never bothered, because she knew he wouldn't care to hear more of her stupid excuses…

  "And then Gillian tried to kill me," said Marci, wiping her cheeks. "So, look me in the eye, and you tell me that you don't understand why I don't trust you."

  Of held her gaze. Seconds past, then his eyes began to water, and tears began to roll down his face.

  "Marci, I had no idea," he said weakly. "I thought- I thought…" He took a deep, shuddering breath and looked away. "You have so much potential; you're a genius, the smartest woman I've ever met; when you turn your mind to something, there's nothing you can't do. Crence? He's a great guy, but he isn't a tenth of the wizard you are. But you squander your gifts, and yes, I didn't- I couldn't watch you destroy yourself anymore. And you made it clear that you didn't want anything to do with me."

  "Except I didn't!" said Marci. "I was angry for- for a week and a half! But instead of a break, you broke me off! You didn't even leave a way for me to contact you! Admit it, you were gd to get rid of me!"

  Of's eyes darted to one side, and his tail flicked violently behind him, ears fttened against his skull.

  "See, you can't deny it, can you?" said Marci.

  "No. That… that's not true," he said.

  "Isn't it?"

  Silence stretched out between them.

  "If I look back, maybe… maybe it was easier to tell myself that you didn't need me, didn't want me—not seriously," he said slowly. "I'm sorry for that. I should have checked in on you, should have found a way to support you."

  Marci looked away.

  "I wish you'd told me all this earlier," said Of. "How you really felt; that you didn't just shut me out. If I'd known…"

  "Just one more thing I fucked up," said Marci bitterly.

  "I think… I think we both could have done things better," said Of. "But you're wrong if you think I was gd when things ended between us. I adored you, Marci; and that love didn't vanish. It's still there, even if- even if I don't think it can ever work between us."

  Marci hung her head and began to cry.

  "But I would die before I deliberately hurt you," he said. "I promise, no matter how this goes, no matter how it ends, I'll stand by you. Even when you get prickly and pretend you don't need anyone, I'll do my best to be here for you; Tissa will too; you just have to let us in."

  Marci looked down at her small hands through her veil of quiet tears. She did need help. She did need someone she could confide in who wasn't Saoirse, a literal demon who, even if she was actually surprisingly nice, didn't have any allegiance to the South that Marci was trying to figure out a way to save.

  Of hadn't betrayed her; he'd fought to defend her even, against southerners. Was she being paranoid? She wouldn't have thought so; but she also wouldn't have thought Gillian was capable of betraying her.

  But… but in the end, unless she demanded that they swear themselves to her—something even she wasn't so far gone that she would conscience, then she would never be able to trust anyone else, ever again, unless she made a leap of faith.

  And if she couldn't do that for Of, who could she do it for? Yes, he had let her down, but that was probably more her fault than his. It must have been so hard for him, seeing the woman he loved destroying herself; of course, he'd pulled away—it wasn't like she hadn't given him every indication that she didn't want anything to do with him. Had she been blurring those feelings of hurt she'd been too much of a coward to really interrogate into the wound that Gillian's betrayal had left?

  Yes. She had.

  And that wasn't fair. She could be better than that; as a Shardkeeper, a person with immense power, she had to be.

  She sent two mental commands. "Alright."

  "'Alright,' what?" he said.

  "I've dropped yours and Tissa's escorts," she said. "I'm sorry Of I… I just got scared. Gillian, what he did—it got to me. But it wasn't fair; I haven't been fair to you. I'm sorry; for everything."

  Of seemed stunned by the admission, which made her wince a little. She wasn't that bad at apologising, was she?

  "Thank-you, Marci," he said in an earnest voice. "That means a lot to hear that." Then he paused. "Wait, Tissa and me? What about Anke?"

  "What do you think?" said Marci, irritating resurfacing. "You're lucky I didn't put two guards on her—ten guards on her. She'd stab you in your sleep if someone offered her a handful of silver to do it. Copper, even."

  "That isn't true. Maybe if you stopped insulting her every chance you got, you might be able to see that she's not actually a broadsheet vilin; she'd just… a little bit too interested in money. But that isn't her entire personality."

  "That's like saying 'the sun is slightly hot,'" said Marci. "She's a narcissistic, greedy little psychopath."

  Of elected to ignore her. "I know Gillian's betrayal, I know it was bad for you. And I can't- I can't even really imagine what it felt like to… die. If you want to talk…"

  Marci nodded sharply, pushing the memory of the burning, searing, bone-deep pain away. It couldn't hurt her if she didn't focus on it. That was how that worked, wasn't it? At least she didn't really sleep anymore, otherwise she was sure she'd have terrible dreams.

  "And I do appreciate that you came back for us, really. You were pretty amazing, you know? Even if you, you know…" He gestured towards her eyes, then around them. "Used demons, and undead…"

  "I don't like any of this anymore than you do," said Marci, gd that the conversation was finally moving away from all the hurt and pain of her past mistakes, even if it was onto her present ones. "But right now I'm just trying to figure out how to get out of this mess; how to get anyone out of this mess. They're pnning an invasion, and, sure, the Southnds seem to be mobilising just for me, but the North couldn't defeat the Shardforts, and they've had decades to prepare."

  "So have we," said Of.

  "And 'we' couldn't beat me after, what, two weeks of being a Shardkeeper?" said Marci. She shook her head. "I don't know. I'm just… I'm just over my head."

  "I've got your back," he said. "Tissa too."

  "I'm sorry for pushing you away. I was scared."

  Of smiled softly at her, and for the first time since she had become a Shardkeeper, for the first time in a long time, really, Marci felt a deep, ember-hot warmth spread through her heart as she returned his lovely, warm, easy smile. The kind of smile he had used to give her when they'd first started dating, before everything had gotten complicated, before Marci had fucked it all up.

  Gods, but he was gorgeous; no man had a right to be so handsome…

  They held each other's gaze for several long moments, before, with a start, they both seemed to realise at the same time what they were doing, blushed, and looked away. The intimate moment shattering as it was observed.

  As it should. He'd said it himself; it couldn't work between them; Marci wasn't going to py with his emotions any more by telling him about the longing in her heart. He deserved better than that.

  And besides, he was with Anke. Bizarrely, perhaps, but he was.

  Yes.

  This was the sensible, grown-up thing to do. Which was the new Marci: mature, responsible.

  "So, uh, the Feywilde?" he said, stammering slightly and looking everywhere but her.

  "Yes, right, the Feywilde," said Marci, picking up the journal and staring at it. "We, uh, should go. To the Feywilde, that is."

  "We?" he said.

  "Well, um, yeah," said Marci. "Beyond Saoirse, I don't trust any of the demons to learn I'm looking into how Shards work. They have contracts, but they're not… absolute."

  "Why do you trust Saoirse?" he said.

  Marci shrugged. "She's nice."

  "She's a demon," he said.

  "Yeah, but she's a nice demon," said Marci. "And, well, I guess I see parallels between us. I know she won't betray me; I can feel it. I can see into people's heads Of. She's nice; we can trust her."

  "Well, I guess that brings us back up to four…" said Of. He exhaled. "This is a terrible idea, you know that?"

  "From where I'm standing, everything seems like a terrible idea," said Marci.