Sugar Hearts

Many thanks to everyone who has read this story, and especially to the people who have taken the time to review.

Love,
Falcon

Sugar Hearts

Chapter Thirteen

Sylvia stared down at Marzi. He hadn’t regained consciousness since Kale carried him up here, and she hadn’t gone out of her way to revive him. There was no point. Whether Marzi was awake or not, the battle would continue, and whether he was awake or not, his body would eventually lose it. Far kinder to let him sleep. Far kinder to let dreams offer him the comfort she couldn’t.

So he lay there, in her bed. In the bed where his sister had been murdered. In the bed where, in all probability, he would also die. Bending over Marzi, Sylvia touched her gloved fingers to the heart necklace. Occasionally, a burst of icy blue or sickly purple flashed in its depths, illuminating an instant of fear or pain. But mostly, the crystal just glowed with a dull, almost grayish light, which wavered ever so slightly in response to Marzi’s shallow breathing. Then, as Sylvia caressed the heart, her fingers slipped. And when they brushed against Marzi’s bare skin, even the barrier of black leather gloves couldn’t keep her from remembering.

Call me Marzi? Just once?

Damn him! Why did he have to be like that? Sylvia didn’t want to be noticed, and most of Kale’s associates seemed perfectly content to ignore her existence. But Marzi had looked past all her carefully placed shields. He had offered her friendship. And now, when she should be able to watch his final hours with the same detachment that she bestowed on all the results of Kale’s evil – now, her heart was breaking.

“So this is how it ends,” Sylvia sighed. “This is the punishment for foolish love.” But even as she spoke, she wasn’t sure if she meant Marzi’s punishment, or her own.

The sound of the door opening interrupted Sylvia’s thoughts, and she looked up in time to see Kale enter her room. At the sight of him, bitter words rose up in her throat. But Sylvia held them back. Kale owned her. She was a valuable servant, a particularly talented servant, but a servant all the same. No good would come from forgetting that.

Barely glancing at her, Kale walked over to the bed where Marzi lay. “How is he?”

“He’s dying.”

Kale’s face should have betrayed guilt, should have betrayed sorrow. But his expression only revealed mild disappointment. As if Marzi was an expensive purchase which had not quite lived up to expectations. Observing her employer, Sylvia felt a surge of disgust. But was she any better? When had she ever cried for any of Kale’s victims? She had always kept her emotional distance. She had always told herself the greatest of all lies – that she wasn’t aiding evil, she simply wasn’t opposing it.

“I don’t understand,” Kale muttered. “He should be able to control the magic. It’s his birthright.”

“Actually, it isn’t. It never was.”

“What?” Kale turned away from the bed, really seeing Sylvia for the first time since he’d entered her room. “What do you mean?”

Sylvia swallowed. She hadn’t intended to bring it up. But Kale’s lack of remorse infuriated her, and now that fury gave her enough courage to cross over to her desk and retrieve a document from among her sketches. Angrily, she thrust it at Kale.

“I always wondered why he was so easily enchanted by his sister’s magic,” Sylvia elaborated. “Her own spells never affected her – if he was so similar to her, why didn’t he have a similar immunity? So I did some research. Just got the results a few hours ago.”

All during her explanation, Kale had kept his attention fixed on the document. Now, he looked up at her, his green eyes flashing like freshly sharpened daggers. “Adopted?”

“Apparently.” Glancing over at Marzi, Sylvia couldn’t keep the sadness from her voice. “It was just a charade. All the times his parents tried to teach him magic, they must have understood there was almost no chance he’d ever be able to do any of it. But they didn’t want him to know that he wasn’t born of their blood.”

“The ritual was doomed from the start.”

Sylvia nodded. “Congratulations, Boss. You just killed two people for absolutely no reason.”

For a moment, Sylvia thought Kale was going to strike her. But she should have known better. Kale never lost his temper. He would wait, and he would plan, and she would pay for her insolence at some later date. Instead of lashing out, Kale tore the adoption document in half. Then, dropping the pieces on the ground, he started for the door. But before he reached it, Marzi stirred.

“Kale?” he whispered.

Kale froze mid-step. Then, abandoning the door, he returned to Marzi’s side. And his expression was almost compassionate as he reached down to stroke Marzi’s cheek.

“I can’t do it,” Marzi confessed, nuzzling Kale’s hand.

“I know.”

“I’m sorry.” And even now, there was so much trust and love in Marzi’s eyes, like a dog dragging itself back to die at the feet of the master that had always beaten it. “I failed you. Please forgive me.”

“You did your best, Marzipan Penicandey. But, in the end, you were only human.” Placing his hands on either side of Marzi’s face, Kale bent down, and pressed a final kiss to his lover’s forehead. Then, he turned and walked out of the room.

Watching him go, Marzi bit his lip. Sylvia could almost feel the tension in the air as he strained to hold back his grief. And, for a moment, he managed. Then a crack appeared in the crystal heart, and it shattered, falling away from the silver necklace chain in a flurry of sharp pieces – broken by a despair so strong that not even magic could hold it.

“Marzi?” Sylvia murmured, momentarily forgetting her vow to speak no names.

But Marzi didn’t appear to hear her. Instead, he picked up one of the shards of crystal, and pressed it between his fingers until it pierced his skin. His eyes seemed hypnotized by the resulting trickle of red. And Sylvia wondered if he was remembering what she remembered – what she would never forget. Walking into his room to find him asleep in Kale’s arms, dreaming sweet dreams on a bed baptized with his own blood.

“Marzi?”

This time, he looked at her, revealing the tears that had begun to slide down his sharp cheeks. But when he spoke, his voice sounded empty. Like a house that even ghosts refused to haunt. “I’m dying, aren’t I?”

Denials and easy lies danced on Sylvia’s tongue. But she could tell that deceit would be useless. Marzi already knew the answer. “Yes. The ritual is irreversible. Your body and the magic are going to continue to fight until one of them wins. And your body won’t win. When you blacked out in the car, that was because you suffered a stroke -- you’d be dead already if I hadn’t healed you.”

“How long do I have?”

“A few hours. Maybe the rest of the night.”

Nodding, Marzi made a clumsy effort to wipe away his tears. “Tell him that I died well. Tell him that I wasn’t afraid.”

“I’ll tell him,” Sylvia promised. Although, when she looked into Marzi’s eyes, she could see that he was very much afraid. “Is there--? Is there anything I can get for you? Anything I can do?”

Marzi stared off at nothing, seeing things Sylvia couldn’t imagine. For a long time, he was quiet, apparently lost in thought. Then, the corner of his mouth curled into a slight smile. And he hummed a snippet of some tune Sylvia didn’t recognize. “I’d like to feel snow. One last time.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Sylvia protested. “You really should stay in bed.”

“Will it make a difference?”

Sylvia sighed. “No,” she admitted.

“Then I’d like to feel snow.”

So Sylvia helped Marzi sit up, and draped a blanket over his shoulders to keep him warm. Then, supporting him the best she could, she let him lean against her as he took a few shuffling steps. Even that seemed to drain Marzi’s strength, and Sylvia expected him to give up and return to bed. But if Marzi and Kale had ever shared any trait, it was their unrelenting stubbornness. After a moment’s rest, Marzi started forward again, and together, they began the journey out of Kale’s house.

Most of the time, they moved through darkness. Sylvia feared that turning on any lights might attract Kale’s attention, and in any case, she had learned these hallways so well that she could navigate their twists and turns using only shadows. Several times, Marzi needed to pause. As Sylvia waited, listening to his breath, feeling the pressure of his body against hers, she wanted things that scared her. And she thought of Tennyson’s Lady of Shallot, who had been perfectly content inside her tower prison, until she caught a glimpse of the knight whose heart could never be hers.

“My doom has come upon me,” Sylvia murmured, too softly for even Marzi to hear. Then, they continued on their way.

Finally, they reached the back door, and Sylvia helped Marzi outside. All around them, the world seem to have fallen silent. The branches of barren trees stretched across the starless sky like bony hands, straining to catch the snowflakes which drifted between their rigid fingers. Watching the scene, Marzi smiled. Then, he stuck out his tongue, allowing a bit of snow to land on it.

Despite her sadness, Sylvia couldn’t keep from matching his smile. “Do they taste as good as you remember?”

“Better,” Marzi admitted. “Pepper and I used to think of god as a confectioner. And snowflakes were pieces of candy that he’d occasionally toss down from heaven. I wonder if maybe we’re all just sweets that he created. Us, with our skin made of frosting, and our blood made of syrup and our strange sugar hearts.”

“Maybe.”

Marzi looked at Sylvia, and slowly, like a woman in a dream, she removed her dark glasses and placed them in the pocket of her jacket. For the first time, she stared at him with unguarded eyes. And somewhere within her, a door opened, which could never again be bolted shut.

“Give a message to my sister,” Marzi requested. “Let her know that I love her. Let her know that she was right, as always. Let her know that, as hard as it may be to believe, her big brother never tried to be such colossal fuckup.”

Sylvia opened her mouth, and then shut it again. No. Pepper’s death was not something Marzi needed to know about. Not on top of everything else. And, in any case, he would find out soon enough. “I’ll tell her.”

“Thank you, Sylvia. For everything.”

Marzi turned his gaze upward, and Sylvia’s fingers ached to brush away the snowflakes which became impaled on his long lashes. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t even move. Then, as Sylvia watched, Marzi’s face twitched. “Oh god...” he gasped. For a moment, Sylvia thought he’d had some sort of religious revelation. But then his body tore from her grip, caught in the violent spasms of another seizure.

“Marzi!”

Reeling out of control, Marzi slammed back against the side of the house. Sylvia rushed toward him. However, before she could offer any assistance, he seemed to recover, and took a few shaky steps. “I think,” he began. But Sylvia would never know what he thought. Because, at that moment, Marzi pitched forward and collapsed face-first in the snow.

“Marzi?” Sylvia repeated, dropping to her knees beside him. As she rolled him over onto his back, she could feel the tremors ripping him apart. Sylvia yanked off her gloves and placed her hands on the sides of Marzi’s face, allowing her magic to flow down through his body, illuminating each charka point. Except that, instead of the normal seven points, there were fourteen. Two sets, lined up side by side, ebbing and flowing into each other, like two life forces trying to join. Unable to trust her eyes, Sylvia squeezed them shut. And when she looked again, there were only the seven charka points, just as there should have been. The second set must have been a trick. An illusion caused by tears blurring her vision.

“Now I lay me down...” Marzi panted. “Now I lay...now I...” His entire body jerked, torn by a final convulsion, and his eyes rolled back until Sylvia could only see their white undersides, like pale ghosts. Then his lids closed, and he lapsed into unconsciousness.

“It’s alright,” Sylvia soothed, taking Marzi’s hand in hers. She could heal him. But that would only prolong his suffering. It would be far kinder to just let him go. “The pain won’t last much longer. Soon, you’ll be with your sister.”

And even as she spoke the words, Sylvia had no way of knowing how literally true they were about to become.