Page 64 of Down from the Tower

Rupture in the lands, Barrens Created - Red Era

Flowerborne crossing borders - Red Era

Palace of Thorns borne - Red Era

Queen’s Court slaughtering the citizens of Wonderland - Blood Era

Mad Queen’s spies in crossing Mystica - Blood Era

Ander Son’s Way close borders to Mystica - Blood Era

Neverland close passage - Blood Era

Walls built around Tressa - Blood Era

Rise of the Reapers - Blood Era

Mad Troops storming Sherwood - Blood Era

Penned in at the bottom, in ink that looks fresh, my eyes widen at the scripture.

Visit from the Golden Princess - Blood Era

My eyes lift to his, confusion and betrayal rocking through me. “I don’t understand. I’m a part of this?”

His lips purse, and for a moment I think he’s going to dodge the question. “Every choice we make has an adverse reaction. I went to Tressa. Midas struck me with gold and the princess left her tower. My father hunted with his wolves, and one bit his son as a young boy.”

I blink, leaning closer. “Did you say father?”

He nods, leaning back in his chair. “Omari is my father. Elaine, my mother. They had three more children. When the Mad Queen started sending her troops through Mystica, crossing the borders of each land, they attacked anyone in their way. My family died in one of the first waves. They lived up closer to the Red Woods, in a little village that no longer exists.”

I feel like I’m not processing everything he says, but I ask anyway. “What was it called?”

“Wolfsbane.” Zarev looks away, and more and more questions bubble up inside me. “The village was full of hunters. That’s how I met Raymundo’s family. His dad used to travel through and go on hunts with mine. They used the wolves, and always brought back a lot of kills.”

Playing over everything he’s said, the pieces slide into place. “The boy who was bit… that was you?”

Zarev nods, curling his lips. “When the Mad Queen first started laying siege to the land, she used a lot of dark magic, blood magic. That contaminates the earth. When beasts eat and drink from the land, they are subject to the poisons left behind. The wolves ate the small creatures and drank from the streams the magic polluted, and after so long it began to drive them mad. I wasn’t careful around them, and one day one of them snapped.”

He tugs back the sleeve of his tunic, showing me skin I’ve seen before. But this time his fingers trace over a scar that’s barely visible, circular like a deep bite. “We thought I would die from infection. Instead, the wolves had magic in their blood, and in a human boy it mutated.”

My eyes widen, and I can’t look away from him. “And it turned you into…”

He chuckles humorlessly. “I think the last name I had was the Big Bad Wolf. I didn’t do a whole lot of killing in my hybrid form mind you, and I only shifted with the moon. I didn’t fit in with the shifters, because I was made from poisoned magic, and I didn’t fit with my family, who feared I would contaminate the rest of them.”

Licking my lips, I close the book and lean in closer. “So, before they died-”

“My family died during the Blood Era,” he explains. “The Red Era lasted for close to a century, though time is meaningless when the victors of war keep rewriting history. That’s why books like this exist. Mystica is a land fractured by kingdoms, at war within itself. The greedy believe time doesn’t exist outside of their reign of rule, and they do their best to erase that history. That’s why most entries aren’t included with dates. It’s all a guestimate at best. We track the time in Mystica through eras, set in motion by whatever manic ruler decides to go to war next.”

“So the Mad Queen?”

He raises a brow. “And King Midas. He built a wall, locking his people away from the rest of the world, and stopped allowing the trading of goods. Gold is scarce in Mystica except for in your home, and all the trading that happens with Tressa goes directly through the Kings, like Arthur. The rest of us aren’t included in those trades. We’re expected to figure things out for ourselves.”

Pressing my hands to the table, I try to steady myself. Time has no meaning, so to know how old a dead man is supposed to be could be impossible. I wet my lips, looking down at the closed book again. “What era were you born in?”

“The Blood Era, when the Red Queen turned mad and started slaughtering everyone. Before Tressa’s walls rose and the Mad Queen lost what was left of her mind. If memory serves, rumors of the Princess of Tressa started just after the wall went up. You can’t be much more than a decade younger than I am, if I were still aging. Your lifeline is longer too, extended by the gift you were blessed with.”

I let that thought settle in my mind. I wish there were dates, timelines, but if people keep rewriting history there’s got to be a source someplace. Some magical libraries out there where people who care deeply about books preserved the things that really matter. Midas wouldn’t have anything like that, but it would have to be someplace like a palace where it would be difficult for knowledge to be destroyed.

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