Tie It With a Ribbon

Lucida’s marriage had been, apparently, riddled with problems. She wrote about many accounts of being at each other’s throats after discovering that they were going to have a child together. She also spoke of a certain paranoia, as if she was afraid her husband would rate her out to her people. Her husband had also had this issue, accusing her of feigning love to gather secrets for her side.

She later wrote about closing herself off from society, so sure that everyone knew her dirty secret. She often refused to leave her room, not even when Marius begged her to come out (as he often disguised himself to check up on her, something that only fueled her suspicions).

I knew how it ended: she committed suicide. The note had not been exactly correct, however, because there had been more reasoning behind her self-condemnation.

Lucida wrote about how she could no longer trust anyone, not even her family or husband; she wrote about the stress that was caused when every time someone spoke, she thought she was going to be discovered; she wrote about how she thought of her life as one spent in shackles, as if her wings had been clipped.

Her last entry had been titled “The cycle of life.” She wrote about how amazing it was to hold a living creature in her arms, and yet she also wrote about how excruciating the birth had been considering the fact that she had, desiring to have Marius at her side, done so in the forest without doctors.

Apparently, soldiers had heard her screams, and they had interrupted. Marius had escaped view with only seconds to spare, but the Royal Guard had been shocked to see their princess lying on the grass with blood all around her and a bloody infant in her arms.

Everything had gone downhill after that, and she had admitted in her diary that she began to doubt her life. The sentence had been exile for having an illegitimate child without having a husband, which she had not argued against for fear outing Marius as well as tainting her name further.

She wrote about her final visit to Marius, proclaiming her never ending love for him and giving him their child. He had not understood until he heard of his wife’s body being found lying in her bed. She had chained her feet and one hand to the bed before slitting her throat, refusing to be taken from her home.

The final sentence had read: “May the gods have mercy on the fools who attempt this ever again.”

I pushed the book away from me, not able to bring myself to take note on the final words to have formed before my eyes.

I cringed, my pencil and paper dropping to the floor as I clutched at my stomach. Lately my loving children had decided to give me a class in tough love, as if to remind me that they were there.

“I know, and I love you,” I murmured, groaning in pain.

“Are you okay?” Zanzibar asked, giving me a funny look as he raised one eyebrow. “Is the diary that bad?”

“It’s not that, you brat,” I scowled. “You did this to me, I’ll have you know.”

He smiled, looking up as if being pulled to his memories. “Yes, I certainly did. And you weren’t complaining at the time.” He grinned, striding up to me and kissing my cheek. “My sweet, bedridden Alena. I’m surprised you’re not getting all stir-crazy.”

“Yes, well, I have been told that I will receive a harsh scolding if I leave this bed. And if I did, I’m sure I would be ratted out by my snitch of a husband.”

He smiled, stretching his legs. “Ah, I feel like going for a jog!”

I growled at him, scoffing at his attempt of making me even more miserable. “That’s what I get for daring to love you!”

The pregnancy had progressed even further in but one week, and it had become so painful when I moved that the doctors had suggested I stay in bed for most of the days until these pains stopped. I was also more prone to sickness from the movement associated with walking, and the simplest movement caused a horrible headache.

I thanked Zanzibar under my breath when he very carefully placed himself beside me on the bed. After all, the first time he had simply thrown himself onto the mattress, causing me to rush to the bathroom, despite the pain, in a case of nausea.

He had my notes in his hand, and he seemed to be reviewing them soundlessly. I rested my head against his shoulder, groaning quietly about my disapproval of this entire week.

He only smiled, offering “I love you” and sweet nothings such as that to console my bad mood. I watched him as quietly as possible as he read over my writings, frowning at certain parts.

“So we are not the only ones to have doubted each other… I suppose that is good news; to say the least, it is normal.”

“That’s great,” I muttered, delusional at this point. “But there is no way I am giving birth on dirt, so don’t get any ideas…I want drugs!”

“Shout that louder, why don’t you?” he teased. “I cannot imagine stumbling upon a woman in the woods with a newborn child in her arms. That would be a story, I suppose. And imagine how loud her voicing of the pain was for the soldiers to be able to hear… Then again, mothers are heroes.” He paused, looking to me again with a smile. “I cannot tell you how lucky I am to have such an amazing wife to bear me three perfect children.”

“You’ll have to remind me of that afterwards,” I groaned, rubbing my stomach. “I’m already so very terrified at the thought of so much pain! I’m a baby, and you know it.”

He laughed softly, placing his hand on top of mine as it rested on my stomach. “Be brave. There’s no going back at this point, Alena, and once they are in your arms, you’ll have forgotten the pain entirely.”

“When did you become a mother?”

He kissed my nose, shaking his head. “Don’t be absurd. Cadence says that all the time.”

“Speaking of her, did you ever apologize?”

His smile vanished. “Was I supposed to have?” He took my hand into his lap, fiddling with my fingers absentmindedly.

“She’s your mother. You need to cherish her.”

He sighed, shaking his head. “I can’t find it in myself to forgive her just yet. I just can’t.”

“Will you do it eventually?”

“I think I’ll have to, because you’re only going to keep bugging me about it.”

I smiled apologetically. “That’s me: the nag.”

He smiled, opening his mouth to shoot some witty comment at me, but he was cut off when I suffocated his hand with a sudden death grip. His smile vanished.

Something was definitely wrong. I pushed him away, slamming my eyes shut and pulling my knees to my chest, trying to do anything to get the pain to stop.

“Alena, what’s wrong?”

Tears rolled out of my eyes, and I tried to form words, but I couldn’t speak past the pain!

“Zanzibar, it really hurts!” I sobbed, holding my stomach.

I didn’t even protest against the motion sickness when he pulled me into his arms, rushing down the hall without any care as to how much movement he made.