A Fey for Valentines Day

Reflections

If the boys in the portrait are Alaric and Kael, then that must mean that the man and woman in the other are their parents.

Moving closer to the first portrait, I drink in the details. The man is unmistakably Fae — those sharp, elegant features, that otherworldly beauty — but there's a warmth in his expression that I haven't seen in either of his sons. He looks at the woman beside him like she's the only thing in the world that matters.

And she looks back at him the same way.

She's Light Fae. It's obvious now that I know what to look for. The same golden glow that surrounds Alaric seems to emanate from her very skin, soft and radiant. Her smile is gentle, her eyes kind. The way the artist has painted her makes her look like someone who laughed easily, who loved deeply, who lit up every room she entered.

If that's true, then it's no wonder her death broke them all.

I turn to the second portrait, and my heart aches at the difference. The same man, but decades later - the warmth stripped away, leaving something cold and hollow in its place. His eyes are the same winter-gray as Kael's, but where KAel's hold fire beneath the ice, this man's holds nothing at all.

And the boys.

They're so young. Eight, maybe nine, standing stiffly on either side of their father like sentinals awaiting orders. Alaric is already gleaming with golden light. Kael is darker, still taller than Alaric even as a boy, his little face set in an expression of fierce determination that would be heartbreaking if it weren't so familiar.

Even then, I realize. Even as children, they were already being shaped into opposites. Already taught that one of them was the sun and the other was the dark.

I reach out, my fingers hovering just above the canvas, wanting to touch those serious little faces. Wanting to tell them that it doesn't have to be this way. That they don't have to be enemies. That the love I saw in their mother's eyes — that light that Alaric carries and the shadows that surround Kael — is big enough for both of them.

But when I touch the canvas, it's just a painting. They aren't children anymore. Telling their portrait these things won't change anything.

I lower my hand and step back, trying to process everything I've learned. The Sorceress's secret. The brothers' history. The impossible choice that isn't really a choice at all.

Choose both, and I fall.

Can it really be that simple? After centuries of games and deaths and broken hearts, can the answer really just be... refusing to play?

I turn away from the family portraits, suddenly desperate for air, for space, for something that isn't ancient tragedy and impossible riddles. And that's when I saw the anomaly.

A mirror.

It hangs on the wall opposite the Sorceress's portrait, framed in the same black iron and golden thorns. But where her painting shows a beautiful monster in a red gown, the mirror shows... me.

I step closer, barely recognizing the woman in the reflection. My gown is wrinkled, my hair escaping its elaborate style in wild tendrils. My mask is askew, and beneath it, my face is pale, my eyes red-rimmed from crying. I look like a disaster. I look like someone who's been through hell and hasn't quite made it out the other side.

I look like someone who's been stripped bare and left with nothing but the truth.

Do you believe you deserve to be loved?

The Sorceress's question echoes in my mind, and I watch my reflection flinch at the memory. I answered honestly — brutally honestly — in front of everyone. In front of them. I told them I didn't know. I told them I was broken. I told them they deserved better than me.

Did I mean it?

I stare at my reflection, really stare, forcing myself to look past the ruined hair and smudged makeup to the woman underneath. The woman who's spent thirty years waiting for someone to choose her. The woman who paints ordinary magic because she's afraid to reach for anything more. The woman who touched enchanted water because she was so desperate for connection she was willing to risk everything.

Am I broken? Or am I just lonely?

"You know," a voice says from the shadows, "most people who find this room run screaming back to the ballroom."

I spin around, my heart leaping into my throat.

Kael emerges from the darkness like he was born from it, shadows clinging to his shoulders before reluctantly releasing him. He's leaning against the door frame, arms crossed, watching me with an unreadable expression.

"How long have you been standing there?" I demand.

"Long enough." He pushes off the frame and takes a step closer. "Long enough to watch you commune with my family portrait like you were trying to solve some grand mystery. Long enough to see you stare at yourself in that mirror like you were meeting a complete stranger for the first time."

"It's rude to spy on people, you know."

"It's rude to run away without explanation." He takes another step, and another, until he's close enough that I can see the shadows shifting in his winter-gray eyes. "You scared us, Sophia. Both of us."

The admission catches me off guard. "I scared you?"

He laughs lightly at that, "Alaric wanted to chase after you immediately. I had to physically restrain him." A ghost of a smile crosses his lips. "I thought you might need space. And I thought, if anyone was going to find you in the dark, it should probably be the one who lives there."

My breath catches. He's close now — close enough to touch, close enough that I can smell pine and smoke. Close enough that I can see the question burning in his eyes, the one he's too proud to ask out loud. Why did you run?

"I couldn't face you," I whisper. "Either of you. After what she made me say-"

"The truth?" Kael's voice is soft. "She made you tell the truth, Sophia. That's nothing to be ashamed of."

"I told a room full of strangers that I don't think I deserve to be loved."

"You told a room full of strangers that you're human." He reaches out, his cool fingers brushing a strand of hair from my face. "You think Alaric and I don't understand that feeling? You think we haven't spent centuries wondering if something is fundamentally broken in us?"

I think of the little boys in the portrait. The ones with the too-serious faces and the weight of their parents' tragedy already pressing down on them.

"I found something," I say. "The Sorceress's secret. There's a way to beat the game, Kael. A way too-"

"I know."

I blink. "You know?"

"I've known for a very long time." His smile is sad, self-deprecating. "Choose both, and she falls. It's not exactly a mystery to those of us who've lived in her shadow. The problem is, no one ever does. No one ever chooses both. They always pick the golden one, the safe one, the hero." His jaw tightens. "Never the monster."

"I'm not going to do that."

The words come out before I can stop them, fierce and certain. Kael goes still, his hand frozen against my cheek, his eyes searching my face for an untruth. For any sign of deception.

He doesn't find it.

"Sophia..." My name is a warning, a plea, a prayer on his lips. "You don't know what you're saying."

"Yes, Kael." I step closer. "I do."

"That's not how the game works."

"Then I'll break it."

Something cracks in his expression then — hope — raw and terrified, like a flower pushing through the frost of winter. He stares at me breathless for a long moment, a war playing out behind his eyes. The part of him that's been rejected and put down so many times, he's forgotten how to be accepted. The part that wants so badly to believe me but is afraid of what happens if he does.

The part that's already falling.

"You're either the bravest woman I've ever met," he says quietly, "or the most foolish."

"Maybe both."

"Maybe." His hand slides from my cheek to the back of my neck, cool fingers tangling in my already ruined hair. "Sophia, you don't know how badly I want to kiss you right now."

"Then kiss me."

He doesn't hesitate a moment longer. His lips cool against mine, like the first breath of winter, but there's nothing freezing about the way he kisses me. It's desperate, tender, and fierce all at once, hundreds of years of loneliness pouring out in a single moment. I rise up on my toes, pulling him closer, and he groans against my mouth.

When we finally break apart, we're both breathing hard.

"Well," Kael says, his voice rough. "I wasn't expecting that. That might complicate things a bit. Now I'm not going to want to let you go."

I laugh, a genuine laugh, despite everything that's happened. "I think things were already complicated."