Chapter 37
“Iris…what have you done? Drink…drink…drink,” I hear, the words propagate through my muffled senses.
It’s my mother’s voice.
The sour tasting fluid diffuses within me, reviving my agonizing body.
“If I had not been there disguised as a soldier’s you would have died. Why, Iris?” my mother asks me, without expecting an answer.
I cannot see or speak, but I can hear her words.
“Drink,” she repeats, pouring a second fluid in my mouth, bitter with just a tinge of sweetness, and I open my eyes.
“Is Ludwig alive?” I ask when I manage to speak.
“He is. If you die the royal family will have no future, regardless of Ludwig’s fate. Are you aware of this?” my mother says, her tone reproachful and worried at once.
I shake my head no, lying.
“Yes you are,” she says.
“Is Ludwig alive?” I insist, ignoring her admonitions.
“Yes he is,” my mother confirms.
I want to hit my womb to destroy all it holds, even if that means my own death. I raise my hand, ready to strike, but my mother grabs my wrist, looking at me sternly.
“You are to listen to me very carefully, Iris,” she tells me.
Immobile, I look at her.
“Tell me the truth,” I reply.
“Ludwig always resented being second born,” she starts, and I nod.
“He decided that he deserved a better destiny, and devised a way to create a copy of himself who – he hoped – would achieve the status of leader. That copy is the man you saw today,” she tells me.
“How did Ludwig duplicate himself?” I want to know.
“You once met a man in Boulder CO. He told you not to jump through a crack in a room that felt familiar and yet unknown. Do you remember?” she asks me.
All I remember are flecks of a dream, or perhaps even not flecks, just the feeling they left behind.
“Vaguely,” I tell her.
“That man didn’t want you to come back to change the course of things. If you hadn’t, Ludwig would be the king now. We all counted on you, Iris, and you didn’t disappoint us,” she tells me.
I feel a huge burden on me.
“What does that man have to do with Ludwig?” I want to know.
“He’s the one who created Ludwig’s copy,” she explains.
“So why did he not prevent me from doing what would change the course of things?” I ask.
“He couldn’t. Once your decision was made he could not stop you. Even if he had prevented that specific action in Boulder you would have pursued the plan in other ways,” my mother tells me.
“But I had no plan,” I object.
“You did, although you were not consciously aware of it,” my mother corrects me.
I struggle to decipher my mother’s meaning. Surrendering, I decide to divert the subject.
“And the mother of this new Ludwig is the queen,” I say.
“Your father the king was married to the queen, but she was never loyal to your family. Ludwig had chosen her to be his mother, to foster the enemy within the very womb of the royal family. If Ludwig’s plan had worked your brother would have been an identical copy of your uncle, shifted in time,” she tells me.
“And how come uncle’s plan failed?” I want to know.
“Why do you ask? You must know the answer already. Ludwig was extracted from the queen’s womb, and his embryo was stored in a place where I thought it would not be found,” she tells me.
“Not within me?” I ask, sitting up, lit by the sudden hope that I am not carrying the vermin within me.
“Only a small fragment of him is inside you. That fragment allows you to control his life and death, and ensures that he cannot kill you without killing himself,” my mother says.
I let myself drop back on the bed, defeated.
“Wait, let me finish the story,” says my mother, gripping my wrists.
“The woman who married your father was a clone, you know?” she continues.
“What?!” I exclaim.
My mother nods.
“Yes, the original seed of the queen was raised in a faraway place, in a country of ferocious invaders, the same barbarians who have been menacing the future of the royal family. The future descendants of this nation created the clone and ensured that it got married to your father, to destabilize the royal family,” my mother explains.
“How do you know this, mother?” I ask her.
“I’ve lived longer than you have, my child,” she replies, smiling sadly.
“And so the man I’ve seen today is the son of the barbarian queen?” I ask.
My mother nods.
I pause for a moment, and then say, “I no longer want to have any part of Ludwig within me, whatever the consequences.”
“I’ve realized this today,” my mother tells me.
I wait for her to continue.
“I will give you a potion that will expel the last fragment of Ludwig from you. But beware! Once you’ll drink it your life will be in jeopardy, and so will the fate of the royal family,” she warns me.
I nod my understanding.
“Once you’ll exhale Ludwig’s last fragment I will store it in a bottle, in a numbing solution. I pray the gods that Ludwig will not find it”, my mother tells me.
I nod again.
“But prayers are not good enough. The seed must be destroyed,” she says.
I want Ludwig dead, and yet I gasp.
“The facts have proved that there is no other alternative,” my mother states coolly.
“Then why store the seed in a bottle? Why not destroy it now?” I want to know.
“Because only you can destroy it,” she tells me, enunciating the words slowly as their weight sinks within me.
“Me?” I fumble.
“Yes, you, and you alone,” she confirms.
I drop silent.
“But you cannot do so now. You must first find the door and open it, and learn all the answers it conceals,” she says, before bringing a flask to my mouth, and pouring the potion down my throat before I can speak another word.
The potion creeps inside me in fingers of pain, excruciating, twisting my womb, and I scream as I’ve never screamed before.
And yet, before I black out, an infinite and liberating happiness elates within me.
I am finally free.