For the Love of the Goddess

For the Love of the Goddess
the private journal of the Queen's Ravens
author unkown

She was mine.  The ring had chosen me at her birth.  At first I believed that once she was old enough we would be promised to each other and be one in body and soul.  But Andais had other plans.  She concealed the pairing from the Prince, my beloved's father so that he would promise her to another.  The ring's power had faded and died by the time she'd come of age, so Andais had her excuse for not using it to find the child's true mate.
Why didn't I speak up?  Why didn't I go to the Prince and reveal myself?  The Queen had made it clear that it was her wish to keep me from the girl, and if I did anything to go against her wishes I was sure to be signing my own fate; centuries of torture.  I would've been willing to do almost anything, endure almost anything if it meant one day I could be with her.  But then it became obvious that my beloved was mortal.  I could have endured a millenia of torture for her, but she was unlikely to live past the first century of it.
So, I kept my tongue, and died inside as I watched my love be taken by another, and then betrayed by him.  I secretly watched her at court, being careful not to show any hint of my true feelings for her to the Queen or anyone else of the court.  I suppose it worked.  She seemed to believe that with the ring's magic dead to her touch, so too was the magic it'd worked on others.
That was how I lost her, my beautiful Princess.  As the years after her engagement passed I grew to hate her for her freedom.  She had been too young to remember the ring choosing me for her, and when she became of age, she never once saw me as I did her.  I hated her and loved her all at once.  I admit to having known women before her. I'd given a time or two to the ladies of the court.  Before becoming a Raven I'd spread my seed hotly into the bellies of many Sihde women, though none produced a child.  But to see her and know that I was not the first and likely never to be the last, made something fester in my heart, like a putrid infection of jealousy and disgust.
She left the bright mound of the Sithen, and I mourned and rejoiced at the same time.  Seeing her was so painful, and yet not seeing her anymore was worse than any torture Andais could contrive.  In a way, I was free of my love for a time, but there was no end to the slow death inside me.  Without her, I was nothing but a walking corpse.  Oh the years I spent praying to the goddess for it to end!  Maybe if my life were snuffed out before she awakened to the love I felt, she could then be given to another mate and be happy as I never could be.  As long as I lived she'd never be able to find another to truly love, of that I was sure.
But then she resurfaced, and even as I rejoiced that I'd be allowed to see her again, I wept inside at the futility of it.  The Queen gave her the ring.  The ring came to life again.  Not as it was, but enough to fill me with dread.  When the Queen offered my princess her Ravens in the hope that she become pregnant, the hate, the soul-eating anger returned.  I should have been the only one in her bed.  I was her match.  No other had that right to her.  It may not be in the Sihde's nature to be jealous, and in truth it wasn't the number of her lovers I was jealous of, but their access to her was something I'd dreamt of for decades after so many centuries of celibacy.  The denial of that one chance at my beloved's warm body is maddening.
I think she may have sensed it, my anger, but as she doesn't really know me, therefore she has no idea of what the reason could be.  It flavors my lust for her.  Perhaps if I were to become more aquainted with her body, am able to become her lover fully...but that cannot be yet.  It's too soon, I must hold back still until the time is right.
The ring has come fully to life, more fully than it had for the queen.  It shows the phantoms of babies to be born, but it hasn't revealed me to her, not yet.  Should I do so for it?  Should I confess the love I've held tucked away for three decades?  It is not certain that she feels the same for me as I do her, although she holds no ill for me, at least I don't think so.  My pretending not to notice her may work against me in trying to gain her affection.  If I were to reveal my true self to her, Andais my not take it well.  I may very well find myself at the Queens mercy for such deceit.  And my sweet Princess, what if I were to tell her and she did not reciprocate my feelings?  It would kill me, but more so, I doubt my sanity would survive it.  So, I must bid my time, till my love realizes we were meant to be together.  By Danu I pray that that time will come about soon.