The Hanging Garden: Prologue

I do not remember when I first discovered the meaning of the Hanging Garden, though I had known of its existence for years. Nor do I remember when I first discovered the fate of those called to be its keeper. I had known that I would one day take the place of my mother as the queen of those grounds, though I had no idea the meaning behind its name nor the horrors that were to await me upon succession. I knew, only as a child knows of places they are forbidden to go.

In my mind I had greatly romanticized the Hanging Garden. Many an hour was spent daydreaming of the day that I would take my mother's throne and be the solo heiress of those haunted landscapes. I imagined tea in lavish gardens filled with fragrant roses and graceful willows. I pictured court suitors and lords desirous of my hand in marriage pleading with me beside small pools of crystal clear water. I imagined them proposing with white honeysuckle and purple hyacinths plucked from those very gardens, for where else would there be flowers as sweet?

I did not then know that my only suitors would be the ageless scarecrow, hung upon his decaying cross, and the merman prince, forever drowning in his pools of blood. I knew not that the only flowers in my care would be those that sprang from the viscera of wicked and innocent men, spilled in those gardens for generations before my own existence was realized. I did not know that upon taking my mother's crown, my mother's throne, that she would join the hanging bodies in that cursed garden. A forever feast for the carrion birds that flourished in that sweltering bubble of decay.

And now, in my age of dying, I begin to write these words to my daughter. She may read of her fate in them after I have gone to take my place aside my mother. A fate suffered by myself, my mother and countless generations of first born daughters to the cursed queens of the Hanging Garden. A fate that each generation has tried so desperately to record in the annals of a history censored by destiny. She may never read these words before she has met the ageless scarecrow or the drowning merman prince.

She may never read them, as I never read those of my mother. It is only now, in my age of dying, that I have found the words my mother recorded to warn me. How little I understood has now been made plain. Mayhaps my daughter will be wiser than I. Mayhaps she will do what I did not and read the words written as warning. I can only hope and pray to the pagan gods of this land that she does.

Though I do not know the use of these words of mine. Had I read my mother's words would I have been able to escape her fate? Would the line drawn by destiny have wavered? Would I have been able to change the course of time? I suppose it no longer matters as I am too old now to prove useful to anyone but the starving grounds to which I am promised.

So it is that in this, my dying age, I, Aubra of Jarron, do take up my quill and ink to write to my only child, Selene, of the Hanging Garden.

~~~

It has been said that once, many years hence, there lived a beautiful queen. She is said to have been a witch, marked so by her unnatural white hair and piercing lilac eyes. Though she was queen she was not safe from man's lusts nor his suspicious nature.

A day arrived when the queen was called to name her king, for she would need an heir once she had gone. She refused all that sought her hand. And though, they pressed, she refused to name a man as her king. This infuriated her advisers and those that sought to make themselves higher in status than was their station. So much so that they conspired against the queen, seeking to overthrow her and name one of their own as king of the land.

One night, not long after refusing yet another suitor's advances, the queen was walking through her garden. The garden was famed throughout the land for the lushness of its grasses, the grace of its trees and the fragrance of its flowers. Though those against the queen whispered quietly that it was only so beautiful because of sorcery and innocent blood spilled. Flowers that beautiful could only be grown by the spilling of innocent blood upon the earth. Trees that strong must only grow from the bones of honest men buried. Grasses that soft could only thrive from the tears of the mighty felled by wickedness.

While she walked through her garden, the queen was ambushed by her advisers and rejected suitors. She was bound and hung, naked, from the tallest tree in her garden. As she struggled for air she placed a curse upon the men that bound her there.

"This day," she gasped. "I curse thee and all that may come after thee. Thy wife shall rise above thee and all thy daughters will be sworn to follow me. This garden, thou shalt not enjoy, for when I die all shall die with me. A beautiful garden no longer to be, a Hanging garden shall be the last thy eyes shall see."

Her last breath came out as a sigh and as it floated away the men marked a strangeness growing within them. Each man found himself rooted to the ground, vines pushing out from within them. Their screams were terrible to hear and the earth quaked with fear. Thunder crashed and lightning struck as each one of them became a part of the garden. Once beautiful, as the queen had said, now the garden had become a place of death.

From each man's eyes grew venomous flowers, stained with the lust and envy of the heart. From their mouths grew spiked grasses, sharp as razors. From their bones grew haunted trees, bound to the earth by wickedness. From their hearts burst flowers and vines, until they had been choked to death by them.

In the garden it is not hard to find them, they stand as a monument to the curse. Forever rooted before their betrayed queen, her body clothed only in vines and rotting flowers.

~~~

My daughter, Selene, today you are seventeen. The day that you will take my throne and bear my crown. Today is my dying day. The day that all mankind must one day meet. I do not yet know if all my writing will be for naught or if you shall heed the warnings herein. I suppose that only time will tell and my time is quickly running out. As my successor, and only child, I hope you do.

When you take your first steps as queen, they will be to follow me to the garden. A garden you have heard of many times. A garden you have known for years would one day be yours. A garden in which you shall watch me die as I watched my mother die. And as she watched her own mother die before me. It is only once I have joined my mother, her mother and all the generations of women before me, that you shall be completely bound to the garden. I wish it was not so, but wishes mean nothing in the light of reality.

After you have watched me die, you will be compelled to wander the landscape. In your coronation gown, stained with my blood, you will find yourself standing before the first queen to die in the garden. You will be surrounded by her betrayers, her monuments. You will feel sick and overwhelmed, but you are not done yet.

There are more horrors in this garden. It is a testament to the madness flowing rampant through our veins, your veins. I will not speak of all that there is within this cursed ground. Though I know them better than the skin that covers my bones. You will learn in time, what I have learned.

You will have no suitors, no men to call upon your hand. You will have no lovers, besides those that may be found in the garden. You will be alone until the day that you, too, bear a daughter. Have no doubt that you will bear nothing but daughters no matter how hard you wish for a son. No matter how you may try, you cannot escape that part of the curse.

The first man with whom you speak will be the scarecrow. He stands, crucified to a dying tree, in the center of the garden. He is never to be removed from his post. I know not how he came to be there. He only speaks in rhymes and is timeless within time, ageless within age. He is the only beautiful thing within the walls of the garden, though he has tattered with time and age. He will ask from whence you come and whence you came. You must never answer him. I know not why.

The second man you will encounter in the garden is the merman prince. He is secluded in the furthest corner of the garden, drowning in a pool of blood. He will never leave his pool and he will never drown. He will give you a gift, which you must not open until your dying day. His words will sound like honey in your ears, but their meaning will turn your hair white as snow. You will fall in love with him, as many generations before you have, but beware his love.

I do not know how he came to be imprisoned within those pools of blood or how the scarecrow came to be crucified on his dying tree. Perhaps you will read the volumes left behind by previous generations and within them find the answers. I do not know why I was so foolish as to believe I could find them without help. I pray you do not fall prey to the same arrogance as I.

These are the last words I write, darling. I leave my words behind hoping that you will be the undoing of this curse and that you will be a better queen than I. You may find all the writings of your ancestors within the libraries buried beneath the garden. You will know how to find them, though you may not know their use until it is too late. You will be brave, because you are stronger than those that have gone before.

These are the last words I, Aubra of Jarron, last queen of the Hanging Garden, leave my only daughter, Selene of Jarron, newest queen of the Hanging Garden.