Chapter One
In her first life she was a god.
Well, as close as she could get.
Mary ruled by Sirius’ side. It wasn’t love, what they had, but it was as good as. Formal, but not uncomfortable; allowing themselves to be the powerful image the kingdom craved. He kept good on his promise. To be her equal. They drank wine with the court, and met with their council as one mind.
Sirius was good company in the daylight, but when it got dark she slipped away; meeting a girl with fiery red hair and freckled skin. The noblewoman who held her heart, by the name of Lily Evans.
Sadly, times of peace never last.
War came. Months of it. She’d never been one to stay back home where it’s safe. Her, Sirius and James set off. Lily begged her to be safe, begged to go with her. But Mary refused. Lily has the hands of an artist, a craftswoman, it would break Mary’s heart to see them grow bloody.
The fights are ugly.
For the first time it does not matter how brave she is, or how smart. People around her die and somehow she does not.
James is a bright spot. His smile and heart keep the camp's soul intact. One morning she catches sight of her husband and him, foreheads pressed together in prayer, worry creasing their brows, and remembers how much she has to lose.
They’re on their eighth month in the battlefield when it happens. She kills the wrong man, invokes the rage of the wrong woman.
The woman’s name is Pandora. She finds her. Curses her. Bleeds her dry and stuffs something else in.
Sirius finds her hours later, alone in the woods and unable to move on her own. They shake with relief and something else Mary can only name as dread. But she’s alive, and right then that’s all that seems to matter.
They keep fighting, and Mary ignores the way blades no longer seem to wound her. How the sicknesses passed in the battlefields never touches her. She leaves every fight glowing as death curdles the bodies left behind. She tries to convince herself she was meant to survive it.
Peace comes.
They have three children.
She’s content.
It would have been a beautiful life to grow old in.
She returns to Lily, and never tells her what happened in the woods that day. But sometimes they hold each other at night and there’s a fragility in Lily’s grip that was never there before. It drives Mary mad but she tries every day to forgive her for it.
She watches her children grow, and watches her husband and his lover sunbathe. She watches everyone return to carefree days. She marries Lily in secret, ties ribbons around their wrists and smiles every time her fingers brush over it. Yes, Mary thinks now. Perhaps I was meant for this.
But she’s learning peace never lasts. She watches when, six years later, James Potter falls on the battlefield. Hears Sirius’ screams over his broken body. Holds him together in the aftermath. She’s never seen pain like that before. The kind that tears a soul apart.
Her oldest dies in battle too, her youngest taken by the plague. The same one that takes her Lily. Her skin is so rotted by the time death comes for her there’s almost nothing.
She learns immortality is watching people die and being unable to join them. Her body stays youthful, her mind sharp, but grief grips her as much as any sickness could. A fever that never breaks.
Margaret, their only surviving child, wears her father's crown beautifully. Sirius grows old without her. They move to the county; needing time, finally, to discuss what they never have. He’s the only one who knows the truth, of the consequences that await her without his protection.
“Where will you go?” He asks, resting in bed with the tea she’s made for them both.
“Far,” she sighs, “They’ll burn me as a witch if I stay.”
He dies with their hands intertwined and Mary leaves at dawn. It’s as close to death as she’s ever felt.
It’s years before they catch her.
The fire dances like fireflies on her dark skin. Even the bravest of men fear her now.
What she considers her next life begins when she meets Marlene Mikinnon. A knight with a wicked grin and an even sharper tongue.
Mary is working tirelessly as a barmaid. Times have only gotten harder, and though she cannot die, hunger is its own madness. The customers are all wandering eyes and browned teeth, but they’ve learned by now that twitching hands will be met with broken bottles and fingers.
Today, though, she's tired. Lets a sly comment pass only to hear the groan of a man kicked to the ground. A blonde girl stands above him, staring down at him like he’s prey. The first thing she learns about Marlene is that she’s a fighter.
Later, when she sneaks out for some fresh air, Marlene is waiting for her. Mary’s teeth chatter in the cold, but the sight of the grinning girl warms her. A bruise is already forming on her cheek but she still has that same look on her face from earlier, when she won the fight and sent the other man on his way. Like the world moves through her and she’ll walk away from it satisfied.
“I suppose I should thank you,” Mary grins.
“Oh please, it was a pleasure.” She bows, kissing Mary’s hand.
They start finding each other. In the town square, the market, the gardens. They have meals together and on more than one occasion go home together. It feels like a betrayal at first. To Lily, to her old life. How dare she think she has the capacity to survive this again. But soon enough the townspeople begin treating her strangely. The inn owner fires her, saying he doesn’t want any trouble. It’s a kinder fate than calling on the witch hunters, so Mary takes her wins and prepares to leave.
When she tells Marlene this, for once her smile wavers. By the time night falls Mary has packed her things, sold what she can’t take, and said goodbye to the stray cat she used to feed–taking care to ensure her neighbour Emmeline will take over this vital role. When she finally opens the door to leave, there’s her Marlene. Standing with a bag over her shoulder and two horses ready to ride. All she does is smile, asking, “Where to?”
They travel to Greece. Spend their summers sailing and their winters wherever they happen to land when the weather turns. They dance, drink the sweetest of wines, and for the first time in a long time Mary is alive.
Marlene never asks her why she doesn’t age, not until she’s old and gray herself. Even then she just quirks her brow as if asking, are you really going to let me leave with questions unanswered? Mary is tempted to let this remain perfect. Let them have lived a life without Mary's secret hanging over them for even a moment. Alas, she loves her too much to leave her wondering.
She explains it all. Killing the man, Pandora, her years with Sirius, and finally her children. Margaret. She has great grandchildren somewhere, she’s sure she could find them if she tried. She never has, and never plans to. Better not to know. She’s done grieving her family. Marlene holds her closer the more she talks, and when the tears come places a kiss on the side of her head and quiets her into silence. Finally, after a long moment, she responds.
“Truth be told, I’m selfishly glad of it. I got to live my life with you. It’s my only one, and I got to have you in it.”
Mary laughs, “somehow, I’m selfishly glad of it too.”
“What about this woman, Pandora. Are you angry at her?”
“Yes,” constantly, she doesn’t add. “But I–I’ve come to realize I misjudged her. I misjudged what it meant to take a life. I was young, and foolish, and I did that to her.I caused her that pain. And this is my punishment.” She tries to mediate between her rage and her intellect. Knowing both are as real as death is for everyone else.
Marlene considers her closely. “You don’t deserve this forever. If someone’s cast it then someone can undo it. I may not understand magic, but I know its laws.”
Mary gives her a tight smile, “Maybe, one day.”
Marlene Mikinnon leaves the world exactly the way she intended to. Having lived.
She’s felt grief before, but this time it builds, and builds, and builds. She leaves Greece and ends up somewhere in Thailand. She learns to dye scarves and works shucking corn for a man who feeds elephants. She scrubs floors and cares for peoples’ children; they remind her so much of her own sometimes it’s hard to breathe. She owns one bag and keeps her life in it. As if she could shrink herself small enough, death might consider her. Carry her off with some other lucky soul.
One day, she runs into a man fetching water by the river. She comes here to breathe, but upon meeting his eyes all of her’s is taken. His brown skin and wild hair. His apologetic smile and the way he scratches the back of his neck. James.
For the first time she considers the possibility of people returning. That there is not one life, but many. Her heartache grows, but so to does her curiosity.
“Sorry about that,” he smiles, picking up his water jug.
“No,” Mary assures. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.” If I had I would have seen you, I could have braced for it.
“Your notebook,” he notices the soaked pages. “Please, let me buy you a new one.”
Her heart aches. It aches, and aches. Sirius’ screams echoing in her head. The empty body lying before her.
“Thank you.”
He introduces himself and she finds out the dead get to keep their names. She lets him show her the best paper maker in town, a family friend of his named Peter.
His work is exquisite and Mary can’t help herself from remembering how when they were children, James used to bring her flowers. When Sirius would tease him for having a crush on her he’d looked so puzzled. It has always been in his nature to believe people simply deserve beautiful things.
He tells her of his family, and his father’s business making tinctures and healing salves for the sick and wounded. How his mother is a scholar at a local university, and intends to teach there one day. She takes every word and savours them. Keeps them close because she has learned by now how fleeting it all is.
When he asks about her own life, she references the Chalet family; the two daughters she cares for alongside their mother. How Rune, the oldest, draws her dragons and she puts them on her wall so they’re the first things she sees every morning. Thankfully, James doesn’t ask further.
She leaves him when the sun sets, and doesn’t seek him out again.
Half a century later she’s making a living as a thief in Venice when a man catches her arm right as she reaches for his gold. He quirks his brow and smiles, saying:
“You could have just asked.”
He introduces himself as Remus Lupin, and takes her to a nearby cafe for a break from the harsh summer sun. She bruises his ego by paying for their drinks, but if anything it only seems to amuse him more.
“I’m new in town,” he admits. “And for the life of me I can’t figure out what they do for fun around here.”
“Where exactly have you traveled from?”
“Greece, I’m an entertainment fighter there.”
Mary eyes his scarred face and arms, “Seems like your definition of fun and mine are very different.”
“Lions fight in a kinder manner than most humans in my experience.”
“Lions?”
Remus’ mouth quirks into a smile, “It’s good money, paid for me and my–” before he can keep talking, a voice from behind them interrupts.
“I see you’ve made a friend.”
Mary turns, and her heart stops.
Oh. Oh, my love.
My love, my love, my life.
Her eyes don’t hold their memories, but it’s her. It’s Lily.
Mary runs.
On weekdays Mary studies art as an apprentice, because she’s not allowed in the proper schools.
The next day she’s leaving her lessons and Lily is waiting for her, leaning against the wall with her long red hair blowing in the breeze. The sight brings centuries of pain to Mary’s chest.
“I didn’t get the chance to say hello.” She seems to sense Mary’s hesitancy but isn’t deterred by it.
“How did you find me?”
Lily smiles, “You had paint on your hands. Women can’t attend the universities, I asked around.”
“Why?”
“You looked afraid of me.”
“I’m not.”
“Good, then let me take buy you a drink.” Without a reason to say no, Mary nods. Lily takes her hand and leads her towards the town centre.
A week later Lily and Remus go back to Greece. Mary lets them leave. She goes back to her studies, and tries to forget. Otherwise it’s too easy to be bitter about it. No matter how hard she tries, it’s not her Lily. And this girl doesn’t deserve to be compared to her own ghost.
Sometimes she finds Sirius. Always in passing, always on his way to a great adventure. He’s only grown stronger with his lifetimes. His little brother, Regulus, is usually trailing alongside him. Keeping him safe as much as one can when Sirius Black has got his eyes set on some holy grail. Her Sirius had lost him when they were only children, and it’s beautiful, watching them together.
Every time, there’s James.
Thirteen years after Lily, she stumbles across their camp by accident. Regulus almost takes her head off with a crossbow, she slices his leg with her knife. She apologizes immediately upon seeing his face—which only increases his confusion.
“I can’t believe you got him, nobody ever gets him,” Sirius laughs while bandaging Regulus’ leg.
“Will he be alright?” Mary asks, leaning against a tree.
“I’ll be fine,” Regulus grunts, batting Sirius’ hand away to finish the job himself.
“Where are you going anyways?” Mary asks.
Sirius’ eyes glint with mischief. “To the mountains. There’s rumours of a magical river hidden within the caves. If you drink from it, and the goddess who rules it deems you worthy, she’ll grant you immortality.”
Mary’s smile stiffens, she knows that rumour well. It’s about her. “Immortality isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” James muses, lying back on the forest floor. “I could do a lot of things with that time.”
“Immortality would be wasted on you,” Regulus scoffs. “You’d spend all of it asking for directions.”
“Alright that’s enough, Reggie.” Sirius shoots Mary an apologetic smile. “I’d say they’re not always like this but, well…”
“They are?” Mary smiles.
She leaves them the next morning after a night of campfire songs and stargazing. She could have gone on with them, to the caves and wherever they went next, but it’s hard to always be bracing for a goodbye. It’s better this way.
Six months later she catches a glimpse of a familiar blonde in the market. Her smile carefree and a man’s arm hooked through her own.
She knows that face. Pandora.
Mary’s moving before she can stop herself. Knife in hand and centuries of nightmares in her heart.
Her husband, Marlene, Lily. Watching them all die. Watching her children die. Mary’s fate was meant for a battlefield, not this.
She does time in prison for her crimes.
It’s too much. She attacks the guards, the prisoners too when they get close. Her grief claws at the walls. Her nails grow brittle from it.
Twenty years later, she wonders why they haven’t tried to burn her as a witch. Another five and she realizes no one ever looks close enough at her to see it.
Better that way.
One night a guard who’s worked there for only three days sits too close to her cell. She slips her hand through the bars, and freedom is in her grasp.
Seventy more years, she gets desperate. Seeks out a witch by the name of Dorcas Meadowes. Mary’s met her before, but not in this life.
She lives in a cottage far outside the town Mary’s staying in. Dorcas is working in the front garden when Mary gets there. She takes one look at her soaked dress and mud stained shoes and laughs.
“Come in, you precious thing. I’ll make tea.” Her voice warms Mary’s heart, even as the rain soaks her skin.
“It’s powerful magic,” Dorcas murmurs when Mary gets done explaining her curse. “Ancient magic. I’m not sure anyone alive today could understand it, at least not enough to undo it.”
Mary wrings her hands, “does that mean I’m stuck like this forever?”
“Not necessarily,” Dorcas tilts her head, studying her intently. “You may be able to convince your body to die, your mind on the other hand…” She gets up, taking a book off a nearby shelf before sending Mary a sly grin when she sees her curious gaze on it. “It’s your curse after all, only fair if you learn to break it yourself too.”
“Have we ever met?” Dorcas asks her one night as they sit in front of a campfire. “In past lives I mean.”
“Yes,” Mary smiles. “In one you were an apple farmer, another life a great artist. I posed for you.”
“Really? Did it turn out alright?”
“It was beautiful. It got destroyed though,” Mary felt the memories pang in her chest. “There was a war, and well…”
“There’s always a bloody war.” Dorcas grumbles, throwing a log onto the fire.
“Humans are good at so few things,” Mary sighs. “making each other bleed is one of them.”
“Do you meet the same people often?” Dorcas has lots of questions, Mary has learned. It’s been so long since she’s been asked any, it’s hard not to revel in the feeling.
“Just a handful, actually. It’s funny, sometimes it feels like we get pulled together. More and more, I feel them close. Like…we’re all intertwined. Looking for each other.”
“It must be hard,” Dorcas murmurs, turning towards her. “Letting us go every time.”
“It feels like dying,” Mary finally admits. The words choking her. “Or as close as I can get.”
Over the next few years Dorcas teaches her everything. How to turn rocks into gems, to control the earth, bend fire to her will. The world becomes a matter of parts and Mary commands them all. Finds greater respect for it all. The life it brings, and what it can take.
One night Mary wakes to the smell of smoke, voices jeering and dogs howling. Dorcas is awake in an instant. It’s not soon enough. Someone from town must have seen them working, and come here to rid the world of what they think is rotting it. Women. Witches.
Dorcas doesn’t live long enough to see her break the curse.
Mary runs, tears streaming down her face and a hand clasped over her mouth to muffle her sobs. At some point she finds herself at a river. Uncaring if she lost those after her she collapses beside it. The river spirits find her there, recognize her for what she is and brush the smoke from her skin. Patch the clothes on her body and soothe her as she cries.
They too know of humanitys cruelty.
She wakes up alone. Shaking and unsure of where to go from here, so tired of fresh starts. But she can’t be sorry for herself forever, staring into the river like death has a chance of finding her here.
She sits up, and no sooner does she that there's a flicker of movement in the corner of her eye. She’s reaching for her knife before she knows it, and finds herself face to face with a young girl, no older than five. Her blonde hair in tangles and bright blue eyes wide and afraid.
Mary drops the knife.
She knows that face.
“Pandora!” a voice calls through the woods. “Pandora! It’s time to go home love.” The little girl doesn’t move.
“Better go to your mom, kid,” Mary finds herself saying. Her voice hoarse but loud enough to startle even herself. “Not safe to go wandering like that.”
The girl stands slowly, and runs off towards another young woman coming into view a little ways off. Mary meets her eye and waves. She waves back before picking up Pandora and disappearing back out of sight.
Mary curls up, her hands pressed to her mouth as she rocks back and forth. The faces of the three girls blurring together. The cruelty of the first, shock of the second, and innocence of the third. All becoming one girl, one Mary can’t hate. There’s no justice to be found, and at last she admits to herself, no vengeance to be sought.
She goes to the coast, a grief like nothing she could describe pulling her there. Maybe it’s Marlene, her memories there with her. She somewhat expects to find her. In the sun, lying on the beach with her brilliant smile; so it’s no surprise when she does.
She’s in her late twenties, working as a barmaid–the reversal of roles brings a smile to Mary’s face as she watches her wipe down a table. Marlene catches her eye, and oh, that smile. She’s missed it.
The place is empty, and Mary takes a seat at the bar. “Don’t mind me,” Mary calls over. “I’ll fetch myself a menu.” And she does, reaching over the bar to grab one. A good invention, the printing press.
“Alright then, give me a holler when you want to order.”
They end up sharing drinks together as the sun sets over the beach, opening the windows to let the evening air cool them from the long day.
She tells Marlene all about the places she’s traveled–neglecting to mention the timespan of her journeys. And Marlene tells her about her family. Her parents and their farm. Her brother, who owns the restaurant they sit in.
It’s nice. Almost like it’s been no time at all. But it has been, and there is more space between them than Mary knows how to cross. But she’s here, and she’s alive. Perhaps there’s hope in that.