Quest 268

[primrosella]

[Private || Hackable by Friends]

It's a little strange, really. There are good curses and there are bad curses, but there really aren't many that I find myself wishing fervently would never repeat again. Or that I'm afraid of enduring again, really. There are a few, of course--the clockwork gears, and the swamps of despair, and of course the one on the Ides of March--and now there's this one to add to the list. The curse that compels one to obey another's commands.

It's not even a particularly strange curse, really. I've certainly seen it before--Lolotte had it over her winged monkeys, didn't she? They weren't really evil at all, but they were bound to her command and couldn't help but follow her orders. They didn't hate me at all, even when they were hauling me around and locking me up and keeping guard over me in the meantime. They just couldn't help what they'd done, and couldn't tell me so until after she was dead.

I wonder if that could be why so many of them were asleep as I went through the castle that night. I never thought of it that way before. But could it be that letting down their guard by sleeping on duty was the only bit of resistance they could offer to help me? I never once thought they might've been for me, not in all these years...but now that I've been through it myself, I wonder if that wasn't what they meant to do, after all. I'd thought it was only good fortune at the time. Now I wonder if there might've been something more to it, instead...

In any case, there's no doubt that it's a common curse because it's a horrible one. It's not the sort of command a lord gives his subject, or a king gives his guard. There's a difference between loyalty and compulsion. There's always the choice, the assurance that one is following orders willingly; that doesn't come with a curse to obey. Half the things I was made to do yesterday morning in the Library were things I would've done anyway, and gladly, except that I had no choice about doing them in the first place. That was what made it so awful, really, that feeling of being a puppet dancing on strings. It wasn't the tasks that I minded; it was that I couldn't help but do them whenever I was ordered so.

Honestly, it's hard to say which ones were worse, the people who knew exactly what they were doing and commanded me anyway, or the ones who thought they were trying to help and only made a greater mess of things in the process. "Don't tell anyone you're cursed." "Have a nice day." "Cheer up, dear, a pretty girl like you ought to smile." And then the next thing I know I can't finish half the sentences I try to start, I can't feel anything but delighted at whatever else comes to pass, and all the frustration of being made a slave for the day ends up crushed under a smile and good cheer.

I suppose it's no surprise I had nightmares last night. Lolotte's torture chamber and the dragon's stake in the Land of the Clouds. It's been quite some time since those ones came back to haunt me, and there's no Sam to sit outside my door and make sure I'm all right when I wake up anymore.

Once upon a time, twelve princesses were cursed to dance all night, until they wore holes straight through their shoes from it. It's not a bad thing in itself, dancing all night in the company of a charming partner. The difference is in the choice--was that dancing a pleasure they sought out themselves, or a punishment that they were forced into after each and every sunset?

I wonder if their princes were ever so considerate as to try and help them. Though I think in that story, the princes were cursed themselves, weren't they? All day they were made to wait for their princesses, and all night they ended up dancing, too. So perhaps they didn't have much choice in it, either...and perhaps those princesses found the strength to bear it because even if they were both cursed, at least they were cursed together. I wonder if that helped them to forget the misery of it for a while.

It's not the first time I've been cursed that way. Once it was even when Rue stole my heart and left me a shell for a while. And of course I've done things I haven't wanted to, that I was made to, that I had to...

It's being made helpless, that's all it is. I was helpless for the dragon. I was helpless in the chamber. It was Alexander who rescued me the first time, and Edgar who won my freedom the second. Nothing I did, nothing I could've done, would've freed me from that. There was nothing I could do, and if they hadn't stepped in to help me the way they did, if they hadn't made it in time...

I wish thoughts like that didn't frighten me so much.

But it's all right. It's all right. I wasn't hurt and they were only silly little things I was made to do, and I'm fine now. There's no sense in thinking about what might've been, what could've happened. I shouldn't dwell on what someone might've done. They might've done anything and I would've had to--no, stop it, I won't. I'm fine. It's over now. It's not a curse I'd ever want to repeat, but it's over now and there's nothing to do but move on from it.

The sooner I get that through my head, the sooner I'll sleep soundly again. I hope.

[/Private]

...Yesterday was quite a curse, wasn't it?

I do hope everyone's all right today, and that no one found themselves seriously harmed by any compulsions yesterday. I suppose that's the sort of curse that could be as harmless or as dangerous as one cares to make it, really--or rather, as the one in power cares to make it, I should say. I know there were some people who tried very hard to make things easier on the people who had the misfortune to be cursed, certainly, and from what I saw on the Network, there were others who did everything they could to take advantage of the situation instead. I suppose I should count myself lucky I wasn't made to do anything worse than a few silly errands and some running around, really. It certainly could've been much worse.

Curses like that always put me in mind of marionettes, somehow. I had one as a girl, a gift from a gnome who was a friend of the family, and he showed me how to make it dance by pulling on the strings. I think that's a rather apt analogy for a curse like yesterday's, as well--one person dancing, and the other tugging at the strings to make it so. It's the same sort of thing, I think; the marionette can't help how it moves, and it's so all on the puppetmaster to determine how gently or cruelly it dances.

But of course, there's a difference between a person and a toy, just the same. Some people on this Network would do well to remember that.

Still, it's over now, and I think I'm going to spend today doing whatever I want, however I please, in whichever order I care to do it. It's often said that we never properly appreciate what we have until it's gone, and if there's one thing yesterday's curse has taught me, it's that free will goes underappreciated far, far too often.


[OOC: Yup, she was cursed yesterday. Fortunately, Cain found a loophole and got her out of obeying everyone (at the expense of obeying him alone), so she didn't have nearly as bad a day as she could've. Which is why she's just kind of thoughtful and introspective instead of a nervous wreck, because control issues are big with her. Also, yes, she really does get locked in a torture chamber at one point in canon. Sierra, what are you even.]