Dutchess of the End

The Royal Archives were- all things considered- a fucking mess. It’s understandable to want to hold the most priceless historical artifacts in all of Telbud in one place, but the underground dungeon that this was was a damp, dark, miserable place to be in half the time. Nevertheless, there was no leaking water from in between the cracks in the ancient stone, no threat of rats eating priceless texts, and no threat of invasion foreign or domestic to steal the nation’s secrets.

 

The room I stood in now wasn’t my private office within the Archives, but rather the closest room to the entryway that could be cleared out easily. After putting Stephanie to sleep in my bed with a trio of orgasms, I quickly dressed in my red and gold robes and made my way here to begin preparations. The food I requested of Sister Marie had been placed on a table in my office; it, along with a large wooden table, had been moved into the empty room. This place had formerly held a small bookshelf of early-form bound books as well as a stone fireplace constructed by a Nostrian civilization centuries ago.

 

Neither were as important as those stone tablets. Those could hold the key to understanding everything. I wasn’t lying when I wrote to the king about needing to rewrite history based on this knowledge. So in anticipation of the potential for our entire understanding of our world’s history being thrown upside down, I stood alone in a torchlit stone box, listening for the sounds of approaching women.

 

The first foreign sounds came in the form of a squeaking pair of cart wheels. A two-wheel barrow was hauled into the room by a Sister of the Stars I didn’t recognize. The Sisters often volunteered to help me and my work in the Archive, though by the oaths they took upon entering the religious order, obeyed no woman, their only loyalty was to Soall- the Goddess of Time- who was said to watch over all things. A noble enough cause if you believed in it. I kept my mouth shut on such matters. Heresy was a crime heavily punished, especially by one as important in the Royal Court as I.

 

“I’ll take it from here, Sister.” I said, though after carting the wheelbarrow in, I realized she wasn’t alone. I saw a myriad of individuals enter and leave, each of them placing a single stone tablet gently on the table. I watched them carefully, no longer interested in the contents of the cart. 

 

“Your Grace,” She said, bowing deeply before walking backwards out of the dark room. I paid her no heed, instead watching the table fill up with the ancient stone tablets. Six were there now, half of the total amount recovered from the Hinterwastes. The second half were slowly filing in, one at a time. I couldn’t just sit there and wait for all twelve to be placed down, I had to take a look.

 

Stepping closer to the table, I noticed that each of them had runes on them, scarcely the letter-based writing system we use in Telbud today. This was old. I had been right in what I told Sister Maria earlier- this predates Notrian. Hell, it probably influenced Notrian signs. I wish I could have said I recognized the influence in any writing system we knew about. It was but a cryptic stream of markings. Circles, mostly, resembling the Marks on my hands in some ways, yet in others looking nothing like it. Each character seemed to be based on that circle, with additions or subtractions from it. I saw the familiar two rectangles of the Gift Mark with an extra square in the middle of them. I saw the beginnings of a Birth Mark save for the second swooping line, leaving only the one slashed through the middle. I saw semicircles with designs atop them, whole circles with nothing in or around them, and circles that appeared to have- if such a thing was possible when carving into stone- a small section erased in favor of a smooth gap in between the two edges of the line. All circles, and when it wasn’t, it was derivative of one.

 

“Interesting.” I muttered. After staring at the first tablet I came across on the table, I looked to the rest. By now, all twelve had been deposited and the room lay quiet. I found myself alone- as I liked to be when performing such difficult translations. My expedition crew had returned, though the bulk of them were likely passed out in their beds, fucking their wives, whatever else it was they did in their free time. Leaving me alone, most importantly. I was here with two days worth of food, a fresh burst of energy from the nap I inadvertently took earlier, and a hunger to uncover whatever secrets this old rock could give me.

 

I pulled out a quill and a book bound with blank pages- half of them filled with notes from my previous efforts in translating Notrian script- and left it open to the first fresh sheet, my quill stuck in the middle of it for when I needed to begin writing.

 

The first step for a normal translation would be to find all the runes that were either identical to something that we already knew the meaning of. Were that even remotely possible, we would have a starting point. But alas, I was left with nothing save for the eons between the creators of these tablets and myself. I began several steps removed from where I would have liked to- by attempting to search for patterns. Similar circles in sequence, identical runes, symmetry in runes either close or distant from one another on the stone. This had been a simple task. I found quite a few that repeated several times more than the rest- the plain circle, the semicircle facing in each of four directions so that either the left half was missing, or the right, top or bottom respectively. There was one that was especially intriguing, however. It only appeared on the corners of the tablets- all twelve of them, on all four extremities of each- it was the Star, the light of Wilen, the Slain Goddess. It almost glowed blue in the dim red light of the torches set on the walls.

 

I ran my hand over one, and for just a moment, out of the corner of my eye, it lit up a bit brighter. So I tried again, putting my fingertips on it for a solid few seconds, watching the blue light slip past the cracks in between my fingers. 

 

Interesting.

 

“What happens if…” I muttered to myself, leaning over one now, turning my Birth hand around so as to press my Mark directly on the stone. I had to steady myself on the table with my Gift hand so as not to fall over from the blast of energy I felt. It was like a magnet was pushing against the back of my right hand from the stone star I aimed for. The blue light overtook the red in the room, almost blinding me as it shot out in all sides from around my hand, illuminating every stone around me.

 

After pushing forward for a few more seconds, I took a deep breath and made one last effort to connect my hand with the rock, pushing against the force of the light being expelled from the thing. When I did, it felt cool, though not cold, as the runes on the tablet lifted themselves upwards.

 

In the same blue light that I fought against moments ago that left me nearly breathless, I watched each of the runes begin to glow. Then, the glow hovered above the etchings in the stone, as though the light was being cast upwards. Before my eyes, I watched the runes shift, as though the circles were unwinding themselves and reforming into letters.

 

These, I could read, unlike the runes they once were. In plain modern Telbian script, I saw the pair of messages plain as daylight.

 

I, Ylona the Liberator, have defeated the evil of the Race of Myn. Though not destroyed, they lay in darkness where they shall sleep for eternity. These foul beings of darkness, these giants of pain, corruption, these Markless forces of violence have cast us down for long enough! My magic will let us live without them, to flourish, to thrive. Woe be to any who seek them and their awful power.

 

There was a small gap in between the words, a second passage started just below where this one ended.

 

I, Prova, daughter of Ylona, have foreseen a terrible fate for the women to come. Daughter of riches, daughter of power, ye who seeks wealth above all, forsaking love, friendship, and family for riches. There will come a daughter of glory, a mother of many who shall unleash the Race of Myn upon us all, woe to those who fight against it, for death shall soon follow. Woe to those who aid Her, woe to those who hear our message but do not heed it. Woe to She who reads this and knows.

 

The words disappeared just as I finished reading the second message. Daughter of power? Forsaking love, friendship, and family? She who reads this and knows?

 

“Fuck.” I whisper, my chest tightening. I feel my hands tremble as I look around the room, darting for my notebook, frantically copying down the words I’d already committed to memory. The handwriting was dodgy at best, near-illegible at its worst, but I had to copy it down now, lest anyone else discover the secret. 

 

The last words were scribbled down with a drying quill as I gently blew on the ink to let it dry, closing the spine shut with an audible snap as I set it back down on the table. Hands on my hips, I take a moment to stare down at the relics before me, the harbingers of doom I’ve accidentally unleashed onto my future.

 

That couldn’t have been me, right? It said ‘She who reads this and knows.’ Am I to believe that an ancient prophecy about some pompous royal who brings about the apocalypse is referring to me? Did these ancestors think so little of me?

 

My thoughts were interrupted by a pair of footsteps echoing closer. I gulp as the sound rounds the corner into the room, the red and gold robes of a royal official flowing in front of me now as well as around me.

 

It was Penelope Knass, a subordinate of mine. Short, cute but not fuckably so, with a wit that’s insulted my dazzling intelligence on many occasions. She looked down at the tablets, her short blonde hair hiding her young face from my worrying gaze.

 

I can’t let her touch them. I thought.

 

“Wow, check these out!” She said loudly, filling the room with what was probably the last sound I wanted to hear right now. “No wonder you blew off a Princess to study these.”

 

“I had that letter delivered to the King herself, how did you hear of such things?” I asked her, stepping forward, intent on being closer to the table than she was at all times. I had landed on the opposite end of the room in search of my notebook, leaving her to clamp her little claws down on the table before I had a chance to intercept her.

 

“You should know how much of a gossip Mona is when she’s drunk.” Penelope said. I groaned.

 

“If you had any shred of respect for what you’re looking at you’d be wise to not stand so close.”

 

“And what have you been doing the past half hour?”

 

“Studying. Respectfully. From a distance.” I said. 

 

“And have you discovered anything in your respect, madame Princessfucker?” Penelope winked at me, earning another groan. “If not for the royal pussy you’ve been getting you would have been at the Hinterwastes, too. I get it, I get it. Stephanie is hot as hell and I’d totally hit that if I had a chance.”

 

“I’ve cross-referenced every ancient script currently known in Telbian history and have found no matches to what you’re so casually looking at.” I said, holding up my notebook to her before depositing it into an inside pocket of my robes. She didn’t need to see the true message I’d uncovered.

 

“Well that’s not any good, is it?” She said. One of her hands raised up. Were I not so focused on preventing her from finding what I had found, I would have fired back with a comment about her virgin fingernails. Nobody else was around, I needn’t worry about punching down when we were discussing privately. And when a High Archivist waltzed about the Castle with Marks revealed, criticism and wit ought to follow.

 

Her hand reached forwards, moving straight for one of the Stars of Soall that I’d used to uncover the prophecy. My arm bolted out as I noticed the motion, but I was too late. By the time I grabbed her wrist, her fingers were firmly atop the carving of the star. However, unlike when I did it, Penelope’s fingers prompted no blue light to emit from the stone. I pulled her hand away from it anyways- part of me still cared for the preservation of ancient artifacts. Subject of a prophecy or not, I am still a historian.

 

“With respect. And cut your fingernails, or you’ll never get any royal pussy.” I said in a sharp tone. I held back a smirk as Penelope’s hand immediately went back down to the rock, running her hand over one of the tablets, end to end. No light, no translation. No prophecy.

 

My work here was done.

 

“Stooping to my level now? And don’t worry, rumor has it neither Stephanie nor the twins Rose and Dawn are into blondes. I’ll keep my fingernails as long as I like, thank you.” Penelope said with confidence. I looked at her briefly, my mind whirling as I tried to ascertain whether or not she realized just what she’d implied about herself. I decided it wasn’t worth pursuing.

 

“The hour is late, and the honor of being the first one to inspect Telbud’s oldest treasure will be mine forever.” I said, yawning. It was mostly exaggerated, but I had a hint of weariness about me after four rounds with Stephanie and the excitement of my discovery. I could retire with peace of mind.

 

“With all due respect, Grand Archivist, fuck off.”

 

My official title was spat at me, though I was scarcely in the room to hear the full volume of it. My retreat upwards had already begun, my footsteps filling my ears with a sound much more preferable than Penelope’s insults. She may have been a High Archivist- an impressive feat for one who’d only turned eighteen months ago- but she was the worst of womankind at times.

 

Amidst the torchlight, I forgot about Penelope Knass and walked with purpose back to my chambers. The castle was mostly deserted at this time. The lobbies and upper levels of the Archive were a buzz of activity unloading the minor artifacts recovered from the Hinterwastes. A woman or two asked me a question while I walked. They were met with swift answers concerning my desires for the proceedings of study. Once I reached the ground floor and above, I saw nary a soul save for the princess in my room. Stephanie was still naked and asleep under my bed sheets. I stripped down and joined her, falling asleep quickly on the far end of the bed, thoughts of that prophecy swimming in my mind.