choice

CW: Violence, blood, and references to murder

Why did the morning come so soon?

I’d like to lie back down in my moonlit garden and forget this mess, but it was morning, and morning was never a good thing in this world.

Especially not today.

Because today…

“Lalie.”

Though I’d been waiting for this, Ronen’s voice still surprised me.

“Don’t tell me,” I sighed, but kept on my practiced smile, practiced softness, practiced tone.

“We have to go.” His voice was sharp, cold, and unforgiving.

I knew I was the reason for that.

And I was sorry. 

But those things didn’t matter right now. 

So instead I frowned, asking “Can’t we wait? And where’s Piper?”

Ronen gave me a look, upset as always that I mentioned his lover. “She is already there.” 

I could hear what he meant by that.

She is accepting her fate, which you somehow can’t even do.

“I don’t want to do this,” I whispered. “I want to go back to before.”

“Well, it’s your own fault.” Ronen snapped. 

I didn’t mean for it to be like this, I thought, trying not to let that sting.

But, of course, I could never say that to him.

“I can’t do this,” I said. “Even if it is my fault, I can’t.”

“Well, you deserve it. And I don’t believe you. I think you wanted this to happen.” Ronen’s voice was low and angry.

I flinched, my voice wavering as I said, “I’ll walk there alone.”

The first tears of the day flew into the wind, as I tried to run. 

“Wait.” Ronen quickly caught up to me, and his hand wrapped around my wrist. 

I slipped out of his grasp, quickly walking away. “I don’t think I will.”

“Eulalie,” I heard him call behind me.

I hesitated, but still walked forward.

It was no good to hope for forgiveness, after all, when soon he’d remember why he hated me so much.

“Eulalie.”

Just as I thought. The way he said my name was an accusation, and I knew better than to pretend otherwise.

“Eulalie, please.” 

This time, it was half a plea.

“You really shouldn’t chase after other girls when you’re engaged.” I finally replied, knowing this would shut him up.

“Lalie, you know I’m not–”

Ronen’s irritated denial was cut off by somebody else’s words.

Or, somebody else’s laugh.

“You two are so funny,” Piper said when she stopped giggling. “And you’re also super slow.”

Ronen sighed, loving and sad. “Why are you so happy, Pip? One of us will die  today.”

Piper smiled at him, arguing, “Then why not enjoy our last day living? It’s better to be optimistic. Right, Lalie?”

I turned to her. No, it wasn’t, and I wasn’t just thinking that because part of me didn’t want to agree with the fiance of the guy I still somehow loved. Still, I said, “I suppose we should.”

Ronen probably knew I didn’t mean it. He probably knew a lot about me that I wish he didn’t.

Piper flicked Ronen’s hair out of his eyes, triumphantly exclaiming, “I told you so!”

I looked away, wishing I hadn’t noticed their sweet love; wishing they weren’t perfect for each other. 

I knew that I had no right to be jealous after what I was about to do, but…

“Oh, Lalie, please don’t feel guilty; it’s not your fault,” Piper grabbed my hand, and Ronen did the same, for some reason.

But I barely paid attention to that, wondering how when Piper said my name, it was anything but an accusation.

She should hate me.

She should hate me, more than even Ronen did.

But she didn’t.

And that might be worse.

Ronen sighed. “Piper, she should feel guilty. It’s her fault we’ll never be together.”

“But I’ll always be with you in spirit, and you with me,” Piper told him, and I let go of their hands, going silent.

I remembered The Royal’s words.

One from the past, one for the future. One with the present’s regret.

I didn’t want to choose. I still loved Ronen, though I hated it, but Piper was an angel, and I could never let her die.

We walked on, silent, for what was there to say?

Their fates were in my hands, and all I wanted was to give it away. I’d only wanted to help, not to destroy them like this.

Piper sighed delicately. “Can’t we all enjoy the sunshine one last time?”

Ronen turned to glare at me. “Stop it, Pip. You’re not going to die.”

“I am. You will live.”

“I’m dying. Right, Lalie?” 

Both of them spoke at the same time, and it broke me to hear the two opposites released in me such different emotions, and I was torn between needing to to choose and needing not to.

One you know, one you don’t. One choice of great despair.

“I…I don’t know,” I softly admitted.

“Oh, but it would be so much easier to choose now, and get it over with,” Piper pleaded.

“It would be better for everyone that way,” Ronen agreed. 

“I can’t.” I gasped for air.

I wish there was no such thing as the Third Term Trials. 

If you’d been arrested three separate times, you’d be forced to be the Third.

And though I hadn’t done anything wrong, I’d done the worst in the eyes of The Royal.

The Royal was superior, The Royal knew all, and The Royal was the only one.

And no one knew anything about The Royal.

And we were all getting punished for my crimes.

And…

And Piper and Ronen wouldn’t stop begging.

“You loved Ronen before, can’t you love him again? Spare him, not me.”

“If you ever loved me, you’d give Piper the chance to live. To love again. I found my only love because of my second chance, and she could do the same.”

I shook my head at them. I wanted silence. I wanted to be free of the choice. I wanted to trade with one of them, so I’d only have to be sentenced to life or death, and not decide.

“Lalie.” They said my name together, and that’s when I shattered. 

I fell to the ground for the first time that day, anguished tears dripping onto the path as I gasped, “I can’t choose.”

“It will be okay,” Piper reassured me as Ronen said, “Everyone before you did.”

Both of them offered me a hand again, one out of kindness and the other out of spite.

I took their hands reluctantly, and we walked ahead, silently at last. 

But somehow the quiet didn’t comfort me like I thought it would. 

Their two opposite pleas swirled around in my mind, trapping me deep inside.

In stories, there is a black and white wrong and right and the choice would have been easy.

But Piper wasn’t an angel, and Ronen wasn’t evil.

I was the villain here, they were two different shades of good.

But I guess that meant there were many shades of evil, too.

What am I? I wondered. Good enough, not to want this, but evil enough to have caused it?

“What did you do, anyway?” Piper asked quietly.

I shrugged. “In whose eyes?” Mine, Ronen’s, The Royal’s?

“Well, I already know about the stolen bread, the seditious statement, and how you ran,” Piper lowered her voice.

“And she was careless enough to forget,” Ronen was quiet, but it was worse than a yell when I knew what forgetfulness meant to him.

“I don’t know what I did,” I told Piper, my voice fragile. “But it had to be something for fate to hate me so.”

“Don’t.” Ronen looked into my eyes, his near black ones colder than ice. “Don’t you dare make yourself the victim. Like you always do.” 

I looked away. He wasn’t entirely wrong.

“She has it harder than either of us,” Piper insisted. “I bet she’d give everything to trade with one of us.” 

“But it’s her fault. And she deserves it. So she can’t complain.” Ronen argued.

“She needs someone to understand. And she shouldn’t have to do this.”

“But she will. We both know she won’t try to stop it.”

“Ronen, if she did, it would be worse for all of us.”

He walked around me, and I let go of their hands, as Ronen took Piper’s. “Pip, I don’t want to argue. This could be the last chance to say goodbye. One of us won’t make it.”

Piper brought the warmth back into Ronen’s eyes, and he leaned in to kiss her. I looked away. 

“We should go,” they both said, but Piper wouldn’t let go of Ronen’s arm, and he wouldn’t let her out of his sight. 

Before long, the grand castle came into view, and I felt too sick to go any closer. I couldn’t do this, but whatever choice did I have?

If I didn’t, this could be so much worse. 

Maybe we should run.

No, running had caused this all.

And only the death of one could set the other free.

No, it wouldn’t. It would enclose them in a cage of grief.

We would never be free, no matter what…

Couldn’t The Royal choose for me? Clearly that person had no problem killing people. 

“Lalie.”

That was the third time they’d said my name together, and I was reminded that the third time wasn’t a charm, it was a curse. 

And I wished it was last night, where I could sleep among the white lilies and the stars. 

One to live, one to die. One to be trapped forever in between by the guilt.

“Eualalie, we have to go.” Piper’s amber eyes were naturally warm, but they were beginning to freeze over as the truth dawned down on her. 

“If we wait here…well, we all know it will get worse.” Ronen was emotionless and numb. 

I guess the frozen reality of what was to come was finally wrapping its cold hands around us.

I blinked, out of tears by now. I wanted to scream.

Slowly, I walked closer to the gates, where two guards were standing. 

Waiting.

For us, probably.

One of them looked at us, suspicious. “Who are you?”

“She’s the girl who’s having a Trial today,” the other guard told him, seeming frustrated. “Can’t you tell by the other two?”

They both moved over, and the gates opened, almost as if by magic.

No, magic is entirely the wrong word.

Nothing created by someone so cruel could ever be magical.

Piper squeezed my left hand, and Ronen quietly brushed against my arm, each their ways of trying to comfort me, though I wished they wouldn’t.

Slowly, we walked forward on a pathway to the castle, everything here so bright and happy that all I could think of was that something here was very wrong.

That many things here were very wrong. 

I jumped as something sharp pressed against my back, and as Piper squeaked and Ronen grunted, I knew they were also being punished for walking too slowly.

Oh, weren’t we being punished enough already?

I slowed myself again, stumbling as the point of the sword shoved me forward again.

I made a sound, a gasp and a cry being torn apart from the inside out.

In front of us was a door carved into a hill, unnaturally inviting, a sweet choking kind of invitation hiding the poison behind it. 

I opened the door, heartbeat fast enough to drown out the twisted laughter echoing inside my memories. The room inside was dark, dirty, and barely lit. A black, metal staircase stood in the center, spiraling up to our doom.

The guards pushed me forward for a third time, and I scrambled up the staircase, not daring to figure out what happened if it happened a fourth time. 

We’d only been in the dark for a minute, but the too-bright light still blinded me.

It was wrong to have so much sunshine on a day like this.

We stepped into an empty area, fencing us in, trapping us like wild birds enclosed in a cage.

I stepped onto a raised platform, and Ronen and Piper stepped onto two more, on either side of and slightly behind me.

We waited, and I flinched as a voice from a hidden speaker began my torture. It was scratchy, cut out, and nothing was recognizable or familiar about it. 

“Eulalie Estrella Lumina.”

I was wrong earlier. When Ronen said my name, it wasn’t an accusation. This was.

“You have been accused of theft as a repeated offense, a mutinous statement against The Royal, and attempted escape from prison. Do you admit to these crimes?”

The speaker person’s voice sounded mildly curious in a way that seemed wrong.

“Yes.” Knowing this would be broadcasted across the nation, I held my head high as I softly spoke. The wind blew my hair into my face ungracefully, erasing what I felt should have been silence.

“Not many people are so bold after being condemned to a Trial. Is there a reason why you are?”

The Voice sounded amused.

“You’ll punish me either way, so I’d prefer to take my punishment unapologetically.” The guard behind me slashed his sword across my back as I finished, and I stumbled forward, gasping for air. I felt the sting of the wind around me as blood dripped down my back. Yet still I remained on my feet.

Slowly, I began to get more nervous as the seconds passed by.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

The countdown in my brain refused to slow or stop.

But finally, the Voice spoke again, and I wished I had waited longer for it.

“I’ll allow you all a moment to converse. Perhaps that will give you an idea of your choice. It wouldn’t be good to drag this out, now, would it?”

The guards sent Piper and Ronen to where I stood, and I turned in time to see them run into each other’s arms. They softly whispered their final confessions and farewells.

“You’ll never forget me, right?” 

“I thought I told you, you aren’t dying.”

“We’ll both die, either from this or from heartbreak.”

“No, Piper. You must learn to live without me.”

Her lips met his before he could say another word, and desperate tears mixed together. But nothing beautiful, even something as tragic as their goodbye, could last, and the guards soon ripped them apart, dragging them back to their platforms even as Ronen yelled, and Piper frantically cried.

“I thought I had told you you could use that time to decide. Not to say your silly goodbyes. That isn’t how this works.”

There was somehow a twisted smile laced like poison into the distorted voice of the speaker, and I shattered. 

“How can you be so cruel?” I cried. “How could you do this to innocent people?”

The Voice laughed, not really a laugh at all. “You humans are never innocent. Guards, would you have the pleasure of making sure our…guest knows this?”

I fell to my knees, my hands hitting the ground as blood spilled onto the white stone, screaming as a dagger plunged into my side, enough to hurt…but, of course, not enough to kill me.

“LALIE!” Piper and Ronen screamed, soon meeting the same fate, based on their anguished cries.

“Have you made your choice?” The Voice echoed all around me, and it was too much.

I shook my head, crying hard, and sitting up as two guards grabbed hold of my wrists as a third slashed the sword across my back again.

“Lalie,” two voices cried, one a plea and the other an order, both saying the same thing.

Just choose me.

“This isn’t going to end well if you don’t stop being…difficult,” the Voice said disgustedly. “It isn’t that hard to choose.”

“Yes it is,” I cried. “Don’t you realize I am ending one life and trapping the other.

The Voice sighed, apparently irritated. “This is the problem. You humans simply do not understand the value of sacrificing one to save another. And you will soon learn that without the sacrifice, it becomes worse for everyone.”

“Value? I thought this was a punishment, not a lesson,” I whispered. “Isn’t the point of this to make me feel guilty?”

“I suppose you could view it that way. But I would much rather hold these Trials with willing volunteers.” The Voice sounded bored, and the guards took that as their cue to spill more blood between me and my companions. 

“Are you ready to choose?” 

The Voice echoed from too many speakers, and I freed my wrists from the guards for a moment to myself, screaming “No. I can’t.”

“Then this will only get worse.”

The guards grabbed hold of my wrists again, and the blade that was becoming too familiar sliced across me again. 

“I am generous, so I gift you the rest of the morning to decide who to save. But just know that the longer you wait…”

My head became fuzzier still as the Voice answered with a cut on my arm this time. I guess my back had run out of space.

“Do you have a decision?” the Voice sounded far away as a sound rang in my ear.

“No…” the word slipped from my mouth with effort as another slice ruined my other arm. I felt too strange to notice if the same happened to Piper and Ronen.

My heart pounded too loud and slow for me to hear anything else, and with each labored beat, I heard the beginning of an end.

Three.

Two. 

Then, on one, the terrible answer escaped from my lips.

And all went dark–

Zero.