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More than their games

Author: Author Calypso
last update Last Updated: 2025-05-31 20:34:31
ALTHEA

The forest collapses behind me.

A soundless scream—wind tearing through leaves, light bursting from the roots up like veins filled with fire. I’m running, bleeding, choking on my breath, the seed clutched so tightly in my hand I think it might crack. And just when the world feels like it’s folding in on itself—

Everything stops.

I hit solid ground hard, knees scraping against cold stone. My vision spins. I blink up at a sky that’s no longer covered by ancient branches. The Mirror Woods are gone. I’m back at the trial grounds.

But I’m not alone.

Coughs echo to my left. A sob to my right. I turn my head slowly, limbs trembling.

Elise is doubled over, hands pressed to her face, shaking like a leaf. Her blond braid is half undone, dirt and blood streaking her once-pristine robes.

Marcy staggers to her feet, her jaw clenched. Her clothes are shredded down one arm, and blood darkens the fabric. But she’s alive. Breathing.

Caroline lies facedown a few feet away. Her f
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  • The Mate Games   The full dream

    ALTHEAI don’t realize I’ve started dreaming until it’s already too late.But this one isn’t like the usual ones. It’s vivid. Clear as glass. So sharp it feels like I’m living it all over again.I’m small. Maybe nine or ten. My hands are pudgy and grass-stained, my bare feet soft against the earth. I’m playing in the front of our old house,before we moved, before the war, before the fear. The sun is warm on my skin, the sky above me the kind of blue that only exists in childhood. I laugh as I run, chasing nothing in particular, spinning until I fall back into the grass.Then I see it. A butterfly.It flutters just beyond reach, soft, pale wings flashing with hints of gold and blue. I giggle and scramble up, forgetting whatever game I’d been playing. My fingers stretch toward it, always a second too slow. It dips and rises, then floats away from the house. Toward the trees.I follow.It’s only when the sunlight starts to vanish behind thick branches that I slow down. The forest isn’t

  • The Mate Games   Varya’s diary entry 13

    Many decades ago…I don’t know how much longer I can keep pretending.Every day, I wake up hoping something will feel different, better. That maybe whatever is clawing inside my chest will stop. That the air won’t feel so thick, so hard to breathe. But it never changes. If anything, it’s worse now. He doesn’t see it, or maybe he just doesn’t want to. He looks at me like I’m glowing, like I’m everything he’s ever wanted. I wish I felt the same.The physician came this morning. I’d been sick for weeks, nausea, headaches, weakness that made it hard to even stand some days. I thought it was just the aftershock of the bond, or the mark still refusing to heal. But then he looked at me, wide-eyed, and said it.Pregnant.I’m pregnant.I should be happy. I should be overjoyed. My husband certainly is. He picked me up and spun me around like we were living in some fairy tale, not whatever this is. He said it was a blessing. A miracle. That this child will be the true heir of the white wolf and

  • The Mate Games   D-day

    ANONYMOUS POVI didn’t mean to hurt the king. Not at first.I didn’t want to silence him forever, not really. But he found out. He figured it out, who I really am. That I’ve been working with the revolutionaries from the inside all along. That it was me. Me behind most of the attacks. Me feeding them secrets. Me hiding in plain sight, smiling, bowing, laughing when I needed to, all while plotting the collapse of this crown from within.When I realized he knew, panic took over. I didn’t think, just reacted. One second he was pointing a trembling finger at me, and the next… the dagger in my hand was red.I meant for him to bleed out. I prayed he wouldn’t survive. But he did.And by some miracle, or curse, it was all blamed on the attackers. No one suspected I was the one who had driven the blade into the king’s side.But luck has a short shelf life.He didn’t die. He lived. Barely.They said he was in a coma. Said he wouldn’t wake up. But I’ve never been one to take chances. So, I made

  • The Mate Games   Varya’s diary entry 12

    Many decades ago…I warned him.I told him over and over again that it wasn’t worth it. That pushing too far, too fast, would only bring disaster. But he didn’t listen. He never does when it comes to power. To his wolf. To proving that he was right, that he didn’t choose wrong.And now I’m the one paying the price for it.The day of the ritual came like a storm. Heavy. Loud. Unstoppable. I woke that morning with my chest tight and a weight in my stomach I couldn’t shake. I begged him one last time to reconsider, to wait. But his eyes were already far away, locked on a future I couldn’t see.“This is the only way,” he said.He told me that without full access to the white wolf, without proving complete control, there could be no coronation. No throne. No kingdom. No peace.And so, despite every part of me screaming to run, I stayed. I stood beside him in that cold stone circle, surrounded by old blood and older magic. I let them take my hand. I watched the blade slice my skin open, wat

  • The Mate Games   Varya’s diary entry 11

    Many decades ago…The last few weeks have been terrible, if I’m to put it mildly. I haven’t even had the time or strength to pen down what life has been like. Every day bled into the next, a blur of exhaustion and dread, each one worse than the last. Trial after trial. Test after test. Some were physical, brutal, punishing, cruel. Others were twisted in ways that made your mind curl in on itself, like they wanted to crack us open and see what spilled out.They succeeded.It didn’t stop until we were just three. Three out of how many? I’ve lost count. Maybe that’s the point. Names fade, faces blur. All that remains are ghosts and empty rooms. The ones who didn’t make it, some were taken, some disappeared, and some just broke and never got back up. I see them in my dreams. Sometimes I wake with their screams still echoing in my head.And then he had to choose.The prince.He stood there, quiet, unreadable, his eyes scanning the three of us like we were nothing more than lines in a book

  • The Mate Games   A question

    ASHERI don’t move. I just stare at her, at the way her red-rimmed eyes bore into mine like they’re trying to peel me apart. Her hands are still balled into fists in the fabric of my coat, but her grip loosens as her words hit the air again, sharper this time.“You were with her, weren’t you?”It’s not a question anymore. It’s a sentence. A conclusion. A blade dressed as a whisper.I exhale slowly, hands lifting in a silent attempt to calm the fire that’s clearly building in her chest. “Caroline, it’s not what you think.”She pulls away like my touch burns. Her eyes narrow into slits, full of so much hurt, so much bitterness, I nearly flinch.“It’s not what I think?” she echoes, her voice pitching up with something cruel curling behind it. “Really, Asher? That’s what you’re going with?”She turns her back on me and presses both hands to her temples like she’s fighting off a pounding migraine. Her chest heaves with the kind of breath people take before they scream or cry or break somet

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