▸ Column · An old enchanted kingdom — the royal court and its feast-halls, where a married noblewoman writes to a court advice column.
MALEFICENT replies.
Replied to by Maleficent, with a rebuttal from Alexstrasza.
The letter
I have been three winters wed to my lord, and together — gladly, with no division between us — we have chosen to bring no heir into the world. We are wholly at peace with it. My torment is his aunt, the Dowager Renata, who corners me at every gathering of the house — the harvest feast, the spring rites, his cousin's knighting last month — to demand, loudly, before whoever happens to stand near, whether I have "consulted the court physicians about my trouble," and whether my lord understands that my "season is waning." I have tried gentle turns of subject and a courteous smile; she rides straight over them. And my husband, the moment he sees her bearing down, finds urgent business at the wine table. I do not wish to shatter a feast or force his parents to take sides. But I will not spend another holy day deflecting the notion that my womb is the property of the whole hall. Is there a firm, civil line that will actually silence her?
Maleficent replies
How tediously predictable, this Dowager Renata — a small soul who has mistaken another woman's body for a public ledger. Let us be precise, my dear, for precision is where your power begins: she has not betrayed you. She is merely rude, and rudeness of so common a vintage merits a raised eyebrow, never a curse. You waste fire when you reach for a script. A script is a little performance staged for her approval, and you shall not audition for a creature you ought to look through rather than at. When next she demands to know whether you have "seen the physicians," hold her gaze. Let the silence lengthen until the whole table feels its chill, and say only: "How curious, that you find my household so absorbing." Then return to your wine and say nothing further. The smallness will become hers, visibly, and you will not have raised your voice.
But hear me, for the true wound here is not the aunt. Your lord — who vowed you his faith, who watches her bear down upon you and slinks away to the wine — that is the broken faith. He abandons the field and leaves you to hold it alone. I have known what it is to be deserted by one who owed me loyalty. Do not spend yourself on the aunt. Turn your eyes, calm and terrible, to him.
— Maleficent
Alexstrasza weighs in
Maleficent names your husband a betrayer, and I will not, little one. He is not a traitor — he is a man who never learned to stand in a storm, and that is a thing the two of you can mend together, shoulder to shoulder, not across a frozen table. As for the Dowager — have you wondered what old grief fixes a woman so hungrily upon another's empty cradle? Pity her. Not to excuse her; to keep her smallness from taking root in you. Meet her, yes, but let your "we are content" be warm rather than a blade. Warmth, dear one, can be every bit as unanswerable as frost — and it leaves nothing cold behind in your own heart.
— Alexstrasza
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