Page 62 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
“I am glad you have asked.” The princess already knew whatshe was to become, but for the benefit of other monsters, I declared, “You will henceforth be known as the Grand Duchess Regnant, and you will remain Duchess Raise informally. The Raising Duchy is now yours to rule. The raising purpose is yours to bear. Your union will always come second to that. Do this, Duchess, and I will allow your husband to remain free, though under your strict control. Refuse this power, and watch him bound in shackles from afar for as many centuries as it might take him to convince me to mercy again.”
The duchess trembled, but not for the reason her husband might suppose. Her husband who was spluttering and gasping.
“What?” he choked out.
“My love,” whispered Duchess Raise. “Did you drift from purpose again? You said that you would not.”
He bowed his head. “I am greatly ashamed, my moonlight and breath. I have wished to be everything for you, and I have failed.”
“Youareeverything to me,” she said. “I will happily carry this burden of purpose so that you might go on free.”
“Yet carrying that burden means no freedom for you,” he said darkly. “I cannot allow it.”
She knelt before him. “You do not need to. I accept the burden willingly.”
“I forbid?—”
Duchess Raise smiled. “I am the Grand Duchess Regnant now, husband. You cannot tell me what to do. Save your breath for our kiss.”
She kissed him, then, which was an excellent strategy. His anger melted like butter in a pan.
Best to keep the momentum going. “Princess Raise, you are now the Grand Duchess Regnant, and now you must pay the price.”
That ended their kiss, and she whirled to face me, uncertainty clear in the tightness of her shoulders. “The price?”
“But the price.” I had an inkling of what the price would be.
Now I just had to switch them about, which could surely not be too hard, though not as simple as removing a crown and creating a tiara.
I reached into the Raises and gripped their souls in my power. They were my creatures now, and there was no possibility for them to resist. I had my fangs to their necks, so to speak.
But where was the essence of a king and a princess? Where was such a thing to be found? I could imagine it permeating through every aspect of a monster, but I could also appreciate its presence as a glowing ball linked to mind, body, and soul.
“And that is what it is,” I murmured, feeling my lips torsion.
The ball did not glow, and it was not a ball at all, but a bottle neck. A funnel through which mind, body and soul all flowed through before they could do anything. A thought might flow through this funnel before reaching the Raises’ lips. The notion to walk or sing or dance would all flow through this too. Their single reason for being could not escape this bottle neck either.Everythingthey were, whether princess, king, duke, or duchess had to flow through this narrowed and magic space of their role and purpose and monsterly design.
“Magnificent,” I gasped.
Even more magnificent that the Raises’ love could deny this force. This funnel was akin to wearing glasses without any knowledge. Those glasses colored the world in a way unique to each monster. Yet the Raises’ love countered or eliminated that lens in part.
Magnificent.
I switched their funnels. In the new duchess, I placed the kingly bottle neck, so that all of her thoughts, movements, and soulful musings must run through a more regal and ancient lens.
But parts of her switched off and went dark. “Ah, then here is theprice to be paid.”
I fathomed that if I left the duchess in this way, she would be quite insane.
“What if I…” I pushed the idea of hellebores into Duchess Raise’s mind. She was designed by ancients, so it was to them I spoke now.
The darkness in her being changed from black to a dark gray. Better.
I snatched at a wisp offered up by my minds.Slumber.The duchess would need to slumber.
I surely would still require her in the battle against ruin. “I cannot do without you for even a few weeks, let alone a millennia.”
Even if…
