Love Spell

Three days had passed since I last retrieved the spices from Friar Gregor in secret.

With my father slowly recovering from his illness, I was forced to make preparations for the visit of the Duke and Duchess of Canterbury throughout the week. Along with the help of Herman, my father’s head advisor, I spent time as a proper host to the duke and duchess during their pilgrimage to our kingdom for two days. My last visit to Serena’s cell was four nights past.

My heart ached when her image filled my dreams. I had not but a moment to myself; not a moment to spare to see her in the flurry of exhibitions, performances, and tours I was in charge of providing for the visitors.

What should Serena think of me if this madness of entertaining visitors every hour continues? She, an angel trapped in a dark corner of the dungeon with but a mat to lay her pretty head upon, and I, a foolish prince with a number of obligations, was given on which to rest my head a soft cushion made of the finest goose feathers in all of England. Oh, how I suffered.

Today I awoke with a mighty weight on my heart, for it would be another day to serve as host to the impertinent nobles who wanted my full attention. Never had I so wanted to abandon my obligations as crowned prince.

It was then that Herman caught my arm in the hall, and delivered word from the physician. A beaming smile spread across my face, and I shook his hand wildly. Oh, how the good Lord provides!

My father was recovering. In fact, he had awoken from his afternoon slumber with high spirits, and with a touch of strength in his bones, he slowly rose from his bed, snatched his scepter, and used it as a cane to shuffle over to the physician’s side. He went so far as to call for a banquet to wish the duke and duchess a safe journey returning to their home.

Later that night, among the hustle and bustle of the ballroom, I managed to avoid the guards stationed by the entrance to the main hall after squeezing past a group of conversing nobles. With luck, I found the prison guard asleep; an empty pitcher in his right hand. I shook my head with a slight grin upon my face and wondered if my father knew that the dungeon’s keeper was a drunk. I slipped the iron keys from his belt and took the lantern hanging above his post in hand.

As I made my way down the narrow stone stairwell, a series of thoughts began to cloud my mind and suppress the jolts of excitement within my heart upon visiting Serena. It had been four nights since my last visit. Would she be angry with me?

The light of the lantern encroached upon the dark shadows within her cell as I approached nearer. I stood before the iron bars and gazed upon her figure. There she was; crouched in a corner hugging her knees close to her chest. The blue cloak she had worn the day of her sentence was draped across her bare shoulders. Her gown was filthy, without sleeves, and torn at the hem.

The moment that the light from the lantern filled the whole of the cell and reached its dark corners, she jerked back to look over her shoulder, as if in fear. Her eyes widened as she leaned forward and stared at my silhouette.

She rose to her feet and murmured, “Edwin?” almost as if in a state of disbelief.
I nodded as I unlocked the gate, and stepped into her cell. Before I could apologize for my absence over the past few nights, she ran over to where I stood and snatched me up in a quick embrace.

“I thought I’d never see you again,” she whispered.

I placed my hands on her shoulders and turned her to face me. My eyes were caught in her gaze as I replied, “Serena. I would never abandon you so.” She smiled as I pulled a bundle from my doublet, and placed it in the palms of her hands.

“You must be famished,” I said, gesturing towards the bundle in her arms. “Please, don’t hesitate to begin your meal on my account. I can certainly-“

“Edwin,” she interrupted with an apprehensive tone in her voice, “there is something I wish to share with you.”

My cluttered thoughts dissolved within the fathoms of my mind, and brought my full attention to the magical, seemingly hypnotizing essence of her presence.
She stood there for a moment, almost as if waiting for my approval. I rocked back and forth on the heels of my leather soles.

“Oh, well- of course,” I managed to stutter. There was something about her touch that had left me slightly dazed. In my heart, I was certain that it was far more than the overpowering sense of attraction I felt for this woman. The air was heavy with foreboding tension that made it seem as though the cell’s walls were becoming narrower by the minute.

With a prim smile, she then led me by the hand to where her straw mat lay upon the dusty floor.

“Were you able to fetch the spices?” she inquired; her eyes bright with excitement.
I immediately withdrew the two spice pouches hidden behind the tightened leather belt cinched at my tunic and handed them to her. Kneeling across from Serena, I watched as she tore pieces of straw from the mat’s fraying edges. Arranging them in a small cluster, she then placed them into her empty wooden prisoner’s bowl. Bringing a single piece of straw to the burning candlewick within the lantern that I had left by her side, she set the small pile of straw ablaze.

Her eyes glinted with the reflection of the flickering flame as she undid the knot to the first pouch.

I watched in silence as she poured the first three vials into the flame, which began to take on a purple hue. Vervain made a crackling noise upon meeting the smoldering heap. The crushed lavender and comfrey gave off a scent that brought back thoughts of springtime, and the new life that could be found all throughout nature.

She squeezed the juice out of the single cornelian cherry with her palms, and let it roll off of her fingertips and into the mass of herbs burning within the bowl.
“It seems as though the time has come to reveal the nature of your rightful retribution,” she murmured as she sprinkled crushed hollyhock into the smoldering flames.

“Serena,” I murmured, nervously rubbing the back of my neck with one hand, “I could not possibly accept any form of repayment. I have done nothing out of the ordinary. I acted as any righteous man would.”

She took the second pouch in hand and held up a single vial; the most dangerous of them all: the Ragged Robin. I had been forewarned by Friar Gregor of the capacity of its power.

“I know quite little of the nature of herbs and such,” I began hesitantly, shifting my eyes towards the prisoner’s bowl before me and anxiously wringing my hands, “Though I’ve heard some bits about the use of ragged robin by the ancient apothecaries. Is it not a key aspect of sorcery in terms of black-”

Pressing a slender finger to her lips, Serena motioned for me to stop talking. She saw my eyes drifting towards the vial, and immediately murmured my name. I tore my gaze away from the herb and focused on admiring the mixture of hazel specks hidden in her overpowering green eyes.

“Edwin, do you trust me?” she repeated.

This time, I did not hesitate, nor did I give her words a second thought.

“Yes.”

“You spared my life, and for that, I am eternally grateful,” She began as she held the vial above the flame. “The gift I am to bestow upon you is one that shall remain all the days of your life. Are you willing to accept?”

I paused, and for a moment we simply stared at one another, drowning in the silence.

“That I am,” I murmured.

She dropped the vial into the flame before I could catch my breath, and the flame within the bowl immediately darkened to a deep shade of black. With the blink of an eye, the flame had gone out, leaving nothing but a trail of smoke and a pile of grey smoldering ashes behind.

She clenched a handful of the ashes in her palm and rose to her feet, letting the blue cloak slide off of her shoulders. I stood up as well, with my eyes resting upon the sleeveless and tattered beige tunic with a torn hem that hugged the soft curves of her figure, beautiful even in the dim glow that remained from the flickering lantern by our feet. She placed her free hand on my shoulder and approached nearer to me, sliding her fingertips down to unbutton the clasp of my shirt sleeve and gently roll it up to expose my forearm. The silence hung heavily in the air as she inhaled deeply and slowly angled her face nearer to mine. Her mouth lingered but a hair’s breadth away from my own, nearly setting my heart ablaze.

Serena bit her lip, leaned her head against my chest, and whispered, “This may hurt a little.”

I nodded and stood perfectly still as she held the hand clenching ashes by my forearm and murmured something unintelligible, almost as if it were in another language, and without another word, she clasped her hand on top of my forearm, pressing the ashes onto my bare skin. The warmth of the ashes soothed my skin upon contact, as though I lay basking in rays of sunlight.

Suddenly, an abrupt wave of force erupted from my very bones. My knees shook, and my back crashed down upon the stone wall of the cell, with Serena still forcefully grasping my arm. The tears glossing my eyes stung, as if a rush of pain was emanating from her touch and slowly making its way throughout my entire body. My muscles were shot, and jolts of stabbing pain traveled throughout my nerves and made their way down my spine. I clenched my teeth and prepared for the worst. It was as if every ounce of energy I possessed was being drained out of my entire body.

“Edwin!” Serena shrieked; a flash of fear shone in her eyes as she stared at the black imprint from where her palm rested upon my skin and watched as it began to crawl across my skin, nearly consuming my entire forearm. “No! Edwin, please, do not give up!” she pleaded as her grasp tightened around my arm, around the very spot from which the pain had spread. “Just a moment longer,” she assured me. I lifted my free hand to her warm cheek and stroked her skin, soft as rose petals.

Even upon that moment of suffering and excruciating pain at her hands, I wanted nothing more than to blatantly stare at the true essence of her beauty. This proved to be incredibly difficult as my sight began to leave me. Darkness crowded around my peripheral vision, and her image before me started to blur. I began to feel my eyelids drooping over my pupils, pained by their exposure to the little light that existed in the cell.

I was barely able to roll my head over to its left side to catch a glimpse of my shoulder, now consumed in a black hue. It looked and felt as if it were being quickly eaten away at by a devastating case of plague. In the weakest state I had ever found myself in throughout all of my years, I glanced back towards Serena’s face, slightly withdrawn from the shadows of the cell by the nearly melted candlewick within the small lantern. With great difficulty, I was able to murmur the only question on my mind, “Why?”

She shook her head, and removed her hand from my shoulder. The upper half of my body went completely numb.

Before I could even attempt to slur a single word, Serena had thrown her arms around my shoulders and urgently pressed her lips against mine. I placed my hands around her hips and pulled her nearer to me. Her prim little mouth desperately pressed against mine in a flurry of amorous movements. Rather than leaving me a dazed oaf, Serena’s kiss, the very feeling of her warm breath on my face, ignited a fire within me that even I did not truly understand. T’was more than a lustful attraction for this beautiful young woman, for I was, without question, left completely infatuated with her.

I responded with all of the passion within my soul, pouring all of the heartfelt concern I’d ever felt for her into that one kiss. The strength of the muscles in my legs returned, and like the blossom of a springtime flower late in bloom, it was as if a wave of magic had rejuvenated my body and healed me of all of my pain.

With the intensity of the harsh jabbing pains I had experienced only moments ago, my normal reaction would have been to tear away from the other person’s grasp and hurry off sprinting in the opposite direction, yelling for help. However, this situation was unique in its entirety. I was in the arms of an alluring woman, whose majestic presence left me dumbfounded and completely vulnerable. Everything about her was enticing: her waves of long ebony hair framing her heart-shaped face and accentuating those effervescent jade eyes, her soft skin; she smelled like the fresh summer air after a storm. It was as if the soles of my shoes had sunk into the ground and remained locked in place. I couldn’t bring myself to part with her, and in all truth, there was not a fragment of my being that wanted to.

I shivered at the feel of her warm breath on my ear as she whispered, “I’m so sorry.” Her fingers gently stroked the side of my arm, still burning from the pain earlier, marked by a black scar. A few tears rolled off of the corners of her eyelids and became trapped in her long eyelashes, like drops of morning dew glinting off of the tall grass of a meadow.

I paused and simply stared at her unfathomable beauty, befitting her like a goddess. “Do not ever say that,” I whispered harshly and shook my head, “Because I’m not sorry about anything. There is nothing to regret.”

I took her face in my hands and kissed away her tears in an array of passion. First, her eyelids, then her flustered cheeks, and lastly, her lips, which tasted of the salt of her teardrops. I wound my hands around her waist and she pressed her palms against my chest, outlining the muscles beneath my shirt. Our lips collided together once more with a sense of urgency that sent a sensual feeling throughout every inch of my body, and at that moment, as her soft mouth pressed against mine, I felt as though somehow we were meant to meet this way: through a bond formed between us with each visit I paid to the dungeon cell of the condemned witch of my kingdom.

My thoughts flashed back to the first day I laid eyes upon her in the throne room. The very thought of professing my love to her was surreal back then, not so long ago. And yet here we were: a prince caressing a young maiden deemed a sorceress in his arms. I couldn’t help myself, and succumbed to her spell, kissing every inch of her neck and hugging her waist nearer to me.

She responded with more passion than I had ever known, giving off a thrilling, and almost magical feeling with every time her lips met my own. Blood sang in my veins with the heated exaltation I felt for her. I slipped my hand behind her knee and lifted her up so that her arms wrapped around my neck and her legs locked by her ankles around my waist. In the process, Serena kicked the dim lantern with the barely burning candlewick to its side, and darkness consumed the chamber.

This was a dream. It just had to be.

~♥~