Page 69 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
Worth a try…
That about summed up my queendom tonight.
Chapter Twenty-One
Fullness of reckoning
At last.
Fullness of connection
Never.
“Wait! I want to come with you!” squelched a princess from the second floor.
I peered up from the courtyard where I had gathered with the other champions in the deepening shadows of the evening before leaving for the night’s work.
My heart pumped harder, but only King See—in his gothic palace—might be aware of my eagerness for Princess Bring to return to her fullness.
She slapped to the cobblestones from above, and promptly drew herself back into a stack of blobs. “Queen Perantiqua, I want to come with you.”
“And are you an adult again?” I asked.Flinging herself off the second level seemed to contradict her readiness… though I did like to do the same from the rooftop.
“I am an adult.” She glowered.
“You seem determined to be sure.”
She stretched taller. “I have felt a pressing need to return to all duties. Since five minutes ago.”
How timely. “Tell me, Princess Bring, how does your power fare?”
“My power fares fully, Your Majesty.” She beamed a smile that shined like a beacon.
There she was again, our kind monster and friend—and princess to a king. Did she recall him? We could only hope not. Here was a chance that not many beings got—a chance to present themselves to someone they loved for the first time after a great mistake.
A reset.
I nodded. “I would never seek to inform a monster of their power or fullness. You are by far the best judge of that. Welcome back, my champion.”
She shot a look at Duke Raise. “What is he doing here? This is a woman thing.”
Princess Take snorted at her use of “woman.”
Duke Raise colored. “The term is champion, notchampioness.Child.”
“I am not a child!”A slap of blob accompanied this.
I had a lot in common with this nearly adult, and that could only confront my self-respect. If only petulance did not feel so good. “The term is champion, and you will not seek to exclude any worthy monster when you see what we face, Princess Bring.”
She colored next, and Duke Raise decided not to lower himself to smugness.
I closed my eyes and let some madness take root in me. “Reckoning.”
My voice lifted in a roaring wind in the courtyard, but mychampions—filling with their own madness—only cackled in response.
My eyes snapped open, and even mad, I had to steel myself to touch the stitch on my shoulder. In the distance, almost on the opposite side of the world, a weak artery flopped in reply. The artery was frayed indeed, a piece of fabric mostly torn in two. The union it represented had not always been the strongest. Ironically, that accolade had once belonged to the Changes. Or so we had thought from what little we could see of them.
Now this seam—so destroyed and limp—belonged to the monsters with the healthiest union.The Raises.
