Rhian & Andrei

You all know how it started: Everleigh Gloom was a Strachan-born lass looking a lot like a Partisan. But when she failed to actually be one, she was branded and exiled from Palisade, not long afore she nearly died in a house fire. But what you lot don't know, is that when she was seventeen, she smuggled her way on a cargo embark from Stracha to Delphia, hoping to get help from the renowned doctors on the Isle of Tuition. See, ever since the fire, Everleigh Gloom could barely breathe on the best of days. And on the worst of days, life was agony.

Growing up in Stracha where barter takes precedence over currency, Everleigh Gloom arrived in Delphia poor and without even a second set of clothing to her name. She tried posing as a Partisan, but what manner of Partisan slept in alleys and still dressed like an adolescent girl? She didn't have the charm or the good looks to compensate, for Everleigh Gloom was a shy young woman with an unsettling disfigurement—too true and too sad to appeal to the rose-coloured Delphi.

One day, while looking for a snack in a dumpster, she found what she didn't know she was looking for. Expecting it to be empty, she pulled the violin case out of the trash, surprised by the weight. And when she popped it open, the instrument seemed to be in good condition. The lass had no idea how to play the violin, but she'd seen the performers on the street corners around town. She liked watching them, from far enough away not to offend anyone with her face. Anyhow, looked easy enough, she thought.

After indulging in an assortment of discarded pastries, she returned to her home—a dead-ended alley not far from the printing press. When all the businesses had closed and she was alone, she raised the violin to her chin and drew the bow across the strings. She pressed one finger down, and drew again. She placed another finger elsewhere, and drew again. The noise was awful, but she made note of how each string sounded and how each was affected by the placement of her fingers. For months, every day was the same. Her condition was only getting worse, and she was still poor, but she knew: one day she'd be famous. She practiced until her fingers bled.

Late one night, he came 'round the corner in a suit the colour of the midnight sky. "Your dedication is disarming, my dear. I'm ever so pleased with your progress," he said, and she said back, "Thanks. Who are you?" He thought about it for a tick. "Can you keep a secret?" he asked, and she replied, "Who would I tell." And it wasn't a question but it was good bloody point, wasn't it? Sebastian Vonsinfonie sat down beside her, dirty alley in a midnight suit be damned. "My name is Sebastian," he said, and, "I'm Ever," she said back. And then it went a lot like, "You're Ever what?" and, "Not what ever. My name is Ever."

Sebastian promised to teach her everything he knew, and over the next year they practiced, and over the next two years they made a name for her as a threnodist—a performer of songs of lamentation. The Isles of Delphia knew her as Evergloom, and with her black and white dress, prematurely grey hair, her sickly pallor and deep, dark circles, she added atmosphere and flair to hundreds of funeral proceedings. She'd become famous, indeed, and she'd finally earned enough to see the very best doctors Delphia had to offer. She would never let him pay, after all.

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The good doctors pocketed her money and said, "We're sorry, miss Gloom, there's nothing we can do." The damage was done. She asked if they'd have seen her sooner, would it have made a difference, and they shook their heads. The lass went home to Sebastian later that night, the same way she did every night. But that night, she told him something he already knew: she was dying, and not in the way everybody's dying. A few months, maybe a year. There was nothing they could do.

But there was something he could do. She'd kept his name a secret for so long, and he knew her heart was pure. "Can you keep another secret?" he asked, and of course she said she could. He told her what he was, and she was curious, but she didn't judge. With her consent, he put his hand to her chest and tried to heal her, but nothing changed. The damage had been done—there was nothing he could do. Except—there still was. She was his protege, and she soon would be his daughter.

Tale as old as time: he said he could make it new again. He promised it wouldn't hurt much, or at least not for long. He should know, he'd done it once already. She agreed, but not yet. It wasn't time. Evergloom performed her songs for the living and the dead while she teetered the line between. One, two, three months later and she was coughing up blood. She hadn't eaten in a week.

The night her breaths slowed to two per minute was the night her transformation took place. She laid on her canopy bed dressed in silk, surrounded by love—even if only from one source—and dozens and dozens of deep, red roses. And when she took her final strained and shallow breath, he watched sleep her until she took her first unburdened one. "It doesn't hurt anymore," she said. And he kissed her forehead and caressed her cheek. The scars didn't scare him.

For the next twenty-one years, Evergloom traveled around the territory of Delphia playing sad songs for sad folk, spreading the tradition of night-time funerals across the Isles. If anybody questioned why she never seemed to age, nobody seemed to care.

Yes, Everleigh Gloom was famous, and she was alive, and she was dead. She was immortal, she was rich, and the fame didn't matter anymore. Not when there were so many people to help. Following one of her biggest performances, she pulled Sebastian aside with resolve in her eyes and said, "Dad—I hear things, and I want to see it for myself. I want to go to Amalia." Sebastian looked to her and smiled. "It was only a matter of time, my dear."

'Course, she knew he'd never go with her. She also knew her father'd be waiting for when she was ready to come home. But what she didn't know was the promise Sebastian made to himself on the day she left. If Everleigh Gloom didn't make it back to Delphia in ten years, he'd travel to Amalia himself. She was his protege. She was his goddess-be-damned daughter. And in ten years, he'd pack his bags and break a centuries-long pact with his brother to go find her.

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