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Kristen Anne Glover

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{24} A Visitor

31 Days: From Enemy to Heir

A Visitor: Day 24 of 31 Days. 

For Day 1, click on the image above.

The Enchanter slipped in almost without notice.  Jewel, the bride of the prince, the upholder of the standards of the kingdom, had made a fatal mistake: she had forgotten to close the gate.

In her righteous busyness, in the rush of skewed priorities, she had neglected to do the simple and inglorious things that needed doing in the kingdom.  More important to her in the moment were the jobs that would be noticed when they were completed and rewarded with praise.

No one noticed a door slightly ajar.  No one, that is, except the one who had been waiting for just such an opportunity.

“My, how beautiful you have become,” he said to Jewel when he found her standing vulnerable in her chamber.

She spun around.  “What are you doing here?  Get out!” she demanded.

In the corner, her Advocate’s face seized with pain.  Only one man belonged in the bride’s chamber, and the Enchanter was not that man.  She should never have even spoken to the intruder.  Jewel should have screamed!  She should have run to her Advocate and hidden, appalled by the intrusion of this uninvited guest, and her Advocate would have doled out an appropriate punishment, sure and swift.

But Jewel did not.  So taken was she with her own beauty that she mistook it for strength and power, and she decided, in that moment, to protect and defend herself.

A visitor

A visitor

“I underestimated you, Obscurity—but that is not your name anymore, is it?” the Enchanter asked with silken words that slipped around Jewel so seamlessly, she hardly knew what was happening.

“I am Jewel,” she said, raising her chin and looking down at him as best she could, though he was taller than she.

“How fitting,” he smiled, easy and relaxed.  Jewel could not help notice how perfect he looked, and not at all terrifying like she remembered.

“I do not know another woman who could have adapted so easily to being the queen of her own kingdom.”

She was not the queen, and it was not her kingdom, but she did not correct him.  Even though she stood ridged and wary, she was pleased by the words.

“You don’t need to worry,” he continued, sprawling himself across her couch and looking at her with a grin.  “I’m not here to bring you back.  I can see that you belong here, and I came to congratulate you.  You’ve done well, Jewel.  Very, very well.”

She was suspicious, but it was kind of him to notice.  No one understood her prior life quite as well as the Enchanter, so no one would appreciate the transformation as much as he.

“In fact, I am astonished by how well you resemble the prince.”

Jewel’s ears pricked up. “Do you think so?  Do you really?”

“It’s uncanny.”  He let the words roll off his lips slowly, like honey.

“It’s nice of you to say.  I’ve worked hard at it.”  She didn’t mind taking the credit for the effort because it had been slow and agonizing and she deserved to be noticed for it.

“I can tell.  It’s a good thing your people have you as such a fine example to look to.  Your prince has been away for quite some time now, hasn’t he?”

“Yes, he has.”  In some ways, it felt like the prince had just left.  In other ways, it felt like an eternity.

“Are you planning anything special for him when he returns?”

“Well, you see, I don’t really know when he’ll be coming back.”

“Oh?”  The Enchanter looked surprised.  “I wonder how he could leave such a beautiful bride with no plans to return?”

“He’ll be back,” she said, but Jewel suddenly felt very foolish, like a child who doesn’t yet realize she’s been abandoned.

“I’m sure he will.  I certainly would not leave you alone for long.”  His smile was easy and charming.

Jewel stood awkwardly in the middle of the floor, listening to the Enchanter’s words and feeling very, very alone. “You should go,” she said hoarsely.

“Yes.  But thank you, Jewel.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen the prince as clearly as when I look at you.  Why, if I had seen what the prince saw in you, I would have taken you for a queen myself.  Keep this up, and the prince won’t recognize you when he gets home!”

“You are very kind,” Jewel mumbled, but her mind was confused.  The words seemed disingenuous, but she could not work out why.

“In fact, perhaps we can have of truce,” he continued.  “It’s a bother to be at war all the time.”  The Enchanter yawned a slow yawn.  “Of course, I will give you all the credit.  The prince will be so pleased to find that because of you, we are now friends.”    

Just like that, her unexpected visitor left, quietly as he came.  Jewel was left standing in her room, back to the mirror, alone.

In the mirror

In the mirror

31 Days, Faith, From Enemy to Heir 1 Comment

{8} The Long Road Back

31 Days: From Enemy to Heir

Day 8 of 31 Days.  For Day 1, please click on the graphic above.

The prince lifted Obscurity out of the mud and placed her on his horse.  He walked ahead, leading the horse safely over the treacherous road.

Later, when Obscurity recalled the story of how she came to live in the prince’s kingdom, she found it hard to explain this part of her journey.  It was all at once the longest and the shortest road she had ever traveled.

All the way, the prince led her, singing softly over her when she was tired, and speaking truth to her when she was awake.

With each word he spoke, he became more and more lovely until she could hardly believe she had once been revolted by his appearance.  It was as if his face was changing right before her eyes.

How unlike the Enchanter he was!  The Enchanter’s beauty faded with truth; the prince’s deepened.  The more she knew of the prince, the more she wanted to know.

The sky lightened, the shadows slunk away, and her eyes began to see with agonizing clarity.

But the more she saw of the prince’s beauty, the more she recognized her own ugliness.  Obscurity felt she was seeing herself for the very first time, and she was stunned by the reflection.  As much as a failure as she was, she had still believed herself to be beautiful, at least in some small ways.

The light revealed a much different picture.  She was filthy all over.  The clothes she wore with haughty pride were nothing but rags.  She was broken, vile, and disgusting.  She was a stranger and enemy of the prince, and when she looked at him, she was so ashamed of the contrast she wanted to retreat back down the road and into the shadows again.

The Long Road Back

And yet he had reached down in the mud for her, knowing how repulsive she was, and carried her in his own arms when she could not even stand long enough to help herself.

Fresh sobs gripped her.

“Why are you crying?” he asked.

“Because I am so ugly,” she cried.

The prince stopped the horse.  “Who has made you feel ugly?”

“Well, you, I guess.”  It seemed the wrong thing to say, but she hadn’t felt this shame until she met him, so who else could it be?

“No, Obscurity.  Not me.  A woman who was dead and now lives is not ugly to me.”

“But I am ugly!  You can’t pretend that you don’t find me repulsive.”

“I find you in need of rescuing.”

“But I am so unworthy.  I want to hide!”

“Then you have fallen for the lie, and he has won.”

Obscurity wiped her eyes and looked at the prince.  She was so tired of lies.  Her entire life was one big lie, and here she was, tangled up in another one just as soon as she had gotten half-way free.

“He is pursuing you, Obscurity, even now.  He always will, because he hates me.”

Obscurity looked behind her quickly.  But the road was empty.

“He will do anything he can to turn you away from me.  If he can keep you hiding in a corner of my kingdom, he will.  And if he can’t get you to serve him, he’ll have you serve yourself.”

Obscurity felt sick with confusion.  She didn’t understand any of it, except for that last bit.  The prince was certainly wrong about that.

“I am not serving him, and I most certainly am not serving myself!” she cried out.  “I hate myself!”

“That is exactly the problem.  You are turning inward, looking for some sort of worth in yourself.  But there isn’t any, is there?  And because you come up lacking you feel ashamed.  You pity yourself.  ‘Poor Obscurity.  She is such a dirty mess.’  You feel worse about it than ever because now, you know what clean is, and you are far from clean.

“But I am telling you, Obscurity, I did not save you because you were clean.  I saved you in spite of your filth.  And if you begin now to look for some reason for your salvation other than my goodness then you are giving something to the Enchanter that only belongs to me.  I rescued you because I am good, not because you are.  You deserve none of that glory.  So do not take it, either by pride or by shame.”

The prince’s words were sharp, as if he was speaking to the Enchanter himself, and Obscurity held her breath because she dared not breathe.

“You can run and hide in your shame but if you do, know that he has won.”

“No,” Obscurity begged, hiding her face in her hands because she could not look at him anymore.  “I don’t want him to win.  I am sorry, please, I am.”  She paused, trying desperately to figure out the words in her head before she spoke.  “Only, I don’t know what to do with all this.” She spread out her hands over her filthy dress and mud-caked feet.  “I don’t know what to do with it.”

“Let your dirt and your filth be the reason you run to me.  Don’t you see?  Being sorry is a very different thing from being ashamed.  Being sorry turns your eyes toward me, and away from him.  Because he can’t do anything with ‘sorry.’  But I can.  Let me.”

Obscurity nodded through her tears and felt the prince’s arms enfold her to himself.

“Remember what I said when I found you?” the prince asked when she had quieted.

“You said, ‘Come.’”

“Yes, and now we have come through the hardest part of the journey.  It has been a long road back.  But we are here.”

Obscurity looked up.  Above her loomed the massive gates to the kingdom, and the prince’s hand was already on the door.

*The story continues tomorrow with Day 9.  Please join us!

From Enemy to Heir 4 Comments

I believe you can find grace for the mother you are and help to become the mother you long to be—a mom who has the freedom to choose the better things and enjoy her kids right now.

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