The Godlings' Visitor
⚠️ content warning

Queen Mab sits across from her sister at dinner. Their meal is a recipe from the Near East, a stew of auroch meat and root vegetable, boiled overnight and served alongside a fried bread with a spiced fruit reduction. It's delicious, and three servings have barely stilled the terrible churning in Mab's stomach.

Next to her sister sits the Visitor. They share stories, tell jokes, and laugh like old friends, though the Visitor laments the absence of "potatoes" from their meal.

Occasionally, the Visitor looks to Mab, and her lips curl into a knowing smile.


Queen Mab roused from uneasy dreams to a chamber still blanketed in moonlight.

Beside her slept a nude Captain Mykyta, fast asleep and clinging to her arm. He was adorable like this: his long auburn hair, fit for running her fingers through, spilled over her sheets; the gentle rise and fall of his stubbled chest; that warm, slight smile, the one she only ever caught at his most vulnerable. 'Stay in bed, my Queen', she could almost hear him say. 'Don't trouble yourself with getting up.'

Of course, he hadn't actually said anything. Perhaps if he did, things might be different.

Slowly, gently, Mab wriggled out of Mykyta's grasp, unfolding her wings just enough to hum over her rustling. Her gown and sash lay strewn across the floor — tonight's memories came a little clearer — but did not smell so much of Mykyta that it could not be redonned. A glass of wine, half-empty, stood on a nearby dresser; Mab took it, and left her room.

With the moonlight, the Palace of Dream's corridors had wound themselves in knots. Mab found it calming; though the Queen could not lose herself in her own domain, the illusion of disorientation freed her feet of purpose, and she could just walk. Eventually, the calm would dust her eyes with sand, and she would grow weary enough to return to bed.

The corridors were lovely, of course. They were always lovely, would stay lovely for as long as Mab wished. Her reign would last a thousand years, she once vowed; how many thousands had it been, now? The Winter Queen would be here, as still as frozen night, and perhaps, so too would her Empire. She wondered if it might ever bore, and took a sip of her wine.

And seeing her sister in the dim crystal lights, it was all she could do to keep it down.

"Sister!" The Summer Queen was dressed in a tattered cloak, thick enough to hide her wings, with a heavy hood to mask her face — but not from Mab. Never from Mab.

"Sister." Mab stepped forward. "What is the meaning of this?"

"I…" Her sister shuddered. "…Sister, please do not, ah… please, do not think I'm off to besmirch our name." She stumbled back. "I only wish to gauge the health of our queendom."

"Our queendom," Mab furrowed her brow, and took a small sip of wine, "Is doing well, Sister. You need not…" She gestured to her robes.

"But… but how would you know, Sister? How would you know?" The Summer Queen sounded… troubled. "You have done wonderfully upon the throne, Sister, but how, and how could it be improved? We'll never know if we keep to our palace."

The hall behind the Summer Queen bent slightly to the right.

"You're… you're being foolish, Sister." Mab chuckled. "Take off that robe, and go back to bed. I'll send a missive to our governors in the morn."

The Summer Queen fidgeted in place, and remained silent.

"…what in blazes do you think you're doing, Sister?" Mab gripped the bulb of her wineglass just a bit tighter. "Mingling with the peasantry? Tromping around their dirt hovels, just to say you 'know' what it's like for them?" Her lips curdled into a smile. "You of all people should know better."

"Sister, I—"

"What's to stop some insect from tearing your cloak off? What will happen when it's revealed the Summer Queen was caught slumming with her inferiors? What then?"

"Sister."

"You do not need to trouble yourself with them. You are royalty, and if you're truly loyal to our queendom you'll act like it!"

The wine glass shattered in Mab's hand, and the Winter Queen was suddenly and violently brought back to clarity. Before her stood the Summer Queen, and only barely, for she shook so much she seemed in danger of falling.

Apologize, spoke a voice at the back of Mab's brain. She's your sister, and she's worked just as hard as you upon your realm.

No., spoke another. You were right. This is a bad plan.

So they fought within Mab's head, and by the time she could think of something to say, her sister had already fled in tears.


"My Queen."

Queen Mab looks up from her work. "Yes, Zofiya?"

The Royal Librarian carries with her a sheaf of papers and an air of anxiety. It's… troubling, actually. Zofiya and Mykyta know better than to fear the Queen Mab's wrath — they're beloved to her, after all — but ever since the Visitor arrived at the Palace of Dreams, they've been more and more worried. It's like they're becoming strangers.

Zofiya nods. "I… I reviewed the documents you submitted. The ones concerning…" She shudders. "The ones concerning the… envoy to the Tsardom."

Mab eyes Zofiya's movements again. She is not one to be so fidgety; more worryingly, she is not one to fumble her words.

Her stomach is turning, again.

"Zofiya." Queen Mab stands up from her desk, circling around the Royal Librarian to rub her shoulders. She relaxes, slightly, but the feeling in Mab's stomach only seems to grow. "If there's a problem with the documentation, you know I'll correct it. Now," she kisses Zofiya's neck, and whispers: "What's wrong?"

Zofiya gasps, but seems otherwise calmer. "Thank you, my Queen. I…" She rights her papers. "While working, I noticed that some of the papers appear to be… stained."

"Stained?"

"Y-yes, my lady."

Zofiya adjusts the angles of the papers, enough for Mab to see over her shoulder. She's right: while the penmanship is as neat as Mab is capable, there are several spots of… curry sauce, from Mab's late dinner.

"While I don't mean to… demean the work you do, this does carry your seal, and I believe it's…" Zofiya tenses. "Prudent, this letter be clean."

What a hassle. "Of course."

Queen Mab takes the papers from Zofiya — she gasps in surprise — before pulling away, circling back to the desk. Another letter is easy enough. Retrieving a fresh paper, Queen Mab copies the text of the original onto the new letter, reviews it, and eats the original. "Could you fetch me some wax, Zofiya?"

Zofiya remains silent.

"Zofiya?"

Queen Mab looks up from her letter, to her Royal Librarian. Her expression is one of terrible bewilderment — and though they are nothing alike, it reminds Mab of the way the Visitor smirks at her. Like a sick animal.

The storm in Mab's guts has not abated, not at all.

"… darling?"

Zofiya blinks.

"Do you think you could get on the desk for me?"

There's a pause. Then Zofiya takes a deep breath, circles around to Mab's side of the desk, sets her ink and letter to the side, and takes a seat upon it.

Mab has never been hungrier than she is now.


The Summer Queen was… unaccounted for, for the next few weeks.

Mab knew she was fine, had to be fine. There was no one in the realm who could take her sister down, and that her whereabouts were unknown suggested she hadn't yet been sighted. She knew this, knew that all would be right with her sister, and so the unease with which she sat upon her throne must have emerged the seat itself.

But Mab was strong, and she would endure. There was no other option.

Below her stood the myriads of the Capitol, its millers and carpenters and every pilgrim that weaved its way through the mountains to arrive at the seat of her Empire.


To her left, she can see the Scarlet Fool taking the Xanthous Tsar's entrails and jumping upon the Horned King's shoulders. The King, too enraptured by his Ambassador, is caught unawares as the Scarlet Fool wraps the entrails around his neck and pulls with all his wretched might.

To her right,





Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License