How many times had I died? I lost count long ago.
Each time it was the same. His blade. My heart. The cold spreading through me.
Blood soaking my dress. And that damn bloody white rose lying on the ground, turning red as my blood touched it.
The rose was always there. I didn't know why. I didn't know who planted it. But every time I died, it was the same rose, drinking my blood until nothing white was left.
The first time it happened, I didn't understand. I thought it was just a bad dream.
I woke up in my bed, sunlight coming through the curtains, and kissed my cheeks. I told myself it was only a nightmare.
But when I went to the garden that day, I saw the white rose again, standing there like nothing had touched it.
That night, the blade came again. His blade. My heart. My blood fell again, and the rose drank my blood again.
After that, I tried everything.
I begged him once. I dropped to my knees, begged for my life, said anything that came to my mind.
He didn't listen. His eyes were cold, and his sword went through my heart, all the same.
I attacked him another time. I thought maybe if I struck first, I could stop it. But he cut through my magic like it was nothing and gave me the same ending.
I ran. I left the palace, dressed like a servant, hid in towns, even crossed the borders.
I thought if I cut my hair, covered my face in dirt, wore rags instead of silk, maybe he would not notice me.
For a while, I even believed it worked. I carried water jugs, swept the floors of strangers' houses, and lived like a ghost.
But living as someone else was not peaceful as it looked. Every time I heard footsteps behind me, I thought it was him.
Every sound of steel in the street made me shiver.
I ate bread like ash, slept with one eye open, and still he found me. His sword always found me.
I tried another path. I thought if I could not stop him alone, then maybe my father could.
My father was the grand magician, the king of Valtheris. His magic was said to burned the sky and split the earth. I stood behind him and told myself, this time it will end. This time I will live.
I watched it all. I watched the fire spread to the towns. I saw soldiers fall in the fields, their blood turning the ground black. I saw the smoke cover the sky.
I heard the screams at night. Children crying for mothers who never answered. Men begging for mercy. Women holding the hands of their husbands that would never move again.
I did not know how many children became orphans because of me. How many women became widows because of me. I only knew the war did not stop.
The kingdom I was born to protect was burning in front of me, and still his sword came closer.
Their fight lasted for days and nights.
My father's magic split the earth and burned the sky. But his sword cut through all of it. His sword was both his shield and his weapon.
Even my father's strongest magic could not break him. He cut through it. He raised his sword and brought it down on the man I once thought was unshakable. My father fell at his feet.
I still remember the sound of his body hitting the ground. I still remember the blood spreading under him, darker than the soil, darker than night. My father looked at me one last time, and then his eyes closed.
Then his eyes turned to me.
I was the next.
I had used my own father as a shield. I had dragged my kingdom into ruin, made war spread between our lands, all just to stop him. But none of it mattered. His sword still came for me in the end.
I tried to destroy the rose. I burned it. I dug it out. Every time I returned, it was there again, waiting for me.
The loop never cared about my plans.
So I learned. Dying again and again didn't make me brave. It only made me patient. It made me numb to pain, numb to any feeling at all.
There were nights when I wished it would end for real, that I could just fall into an eternal sleep and never wake up.
I hated the same ending again and again. It turned my eyes cold. And my heart - stone.
Even my father, the brave and grand magician, once looked into my eyes and flinched. He didn't say it, but I saw it. He saw the goddess of death staring back at him.
This time, I had only one path left. I thought of love. Not because I loved him.
I didn't. I hated him. I hated the way his eyes looked at me like I was nothing.
I hated the sound of his voice when he spoke my name, cold and empty.
I hated the weight of his sword pearcing through my heart, because I had felt it too many times inside my chest.
His name was poison on my tongue. Sometimes I dreamed of tearing his face apart, of watching him fall like I had fallen.
I wanted him to feel the fear that had lived inside me for so long. But the dream never reached. The curse never let me.
I wanted him to feel the same pain I felt.
The pain of losing your father. The pain of losing your kingdom.
From deep inside my heart, I cursed him. I cursed him to suffer the way I had suffered.
And when he would be lying on the same damn bloody rose, I would lean close and ask him.
Why? Why? Why did you do this to me?
What was your reason?
I wanted him to feel the fear that had lived inside me for so long. But the dream never reached. The curse never let me.
But maybe, if he loved me, the sword would not stab my heart.
So I decided. I would try to make the Prince of War fall in love with me.
Even if it broke me. Even if it felt wrong. Because if I failed, I already knew how it would end.
The rose was waiting.