THE POISONED HOST / WAFER (OSCAR WILDE)

None of the royal family of Spain (the Habsburgs or "Austrias") had entered the great cathedral of Saragossa since a mad priest, supposed by many to have been in the pay of Elizabeth of England, had tried to administer a poisoned wafer to the Prince of Asturias.

OSCAR WILDE

En realidad ningún miembro de la real familia de España (los Austrias o Habsburgo) había entrado a la catedral de Zaragoza desde que un cura loco, que muchos suponían pagado por Isabel de Inglaterra, había tratado de hacer tragar una hostia envenenada al príncipe de Asturias.

TRADUCCIÓN OFICIAL

This Oscar Wilde sentence sets my creative juices flowing. The Prince of Asturias (Crown Prince) at the time was Don Carlos, immortalised by Romanticism and by the opera by Giuseppe Verdi, known to be a sensitive boy with daddy issues, who died young, a violent death, and an odd duck among the Spanish Habsburgs: the perfect topic for Romantic literature and for Verdian opera. Surely Oscar Wilde knew of Don Carlos (and of Good Queen Bess), but did this happen in real life or is this only a legend?

This sounds like a great idea for a fanfic, or for a thriller (literary or cinematic, or both). Wilde implied that Don Carlos did not consume the poisoned host, but what if he did? Would it have affected the Crown Prince's mental health? And was the poisoner really a Catholic priest, or one of Queen Bess' many secret agents? Did they catch him, was he tortured and executed?... Or did he return home in the end? So many questions...

I have Googled "don Carlos hostia envenenada Zaragoza" - no replies. This is either something Oscar Wilde has fabricated or a real legend from the days of the Spanish Habsburgs. Most likely the latter. Still it would be lovely to write a novel or a fanfic, or to draw a manga, about this. There are already a few novels, an arc in The Serpent Queen, and fanfics (most of those I know, by Yours Truly), about Dauphin Francis and Sebastian di Montecuccoli... The poisoning of a young crown prince leaves no one indifferent!

MAGICAL ANGELS OF CULLA CASTLE

Juliet Capulet, cat lover and party girl and Guardian of Earth. Taurus. Phlegmatic. Raven hair and hazel eyes. In black and gold when she transforms. With ADHD. Left at boarding school by her scheming stepmother.

Ophelia Brahe, music and plant lover and Guardian of Water. Scorpio. Melancholic. Ginger hair and green eyes. In mint green and turquoise when she transforms. Bipolar. Left at boarding school by parents who only have time for her brother.

Desdemona de' Brabanzi, literature and fine art lover and Guardian of Air. Sanguine. Golden hair and honey eyes. Aquarius. In lilac and white when she transforms. Autistic. Left at boarding school by a father who seems to only care for politics.

And Viola de' Montecuccoli, lover of the performing arts and martial arts and Guardian of Fire. Choleric. Nutbrown hair and violet eyes. In orange and red when she transforms. Leo. Antisocial. Left at boarding school by guardians who are raising her twin Sebastian to be the next heir (the twins are obviously orphans).

The four schoolgirls, all of them intelligent yet regarded as outsiders, spend days full of routine in a Catholic finishing school in Culla Castle in Castellón Province, away from royal courts' intrigues and from the carnage of war.

But at night, when no Muggles are watching and only the hoot of owls can be heard, the quartet of friends are elemental magical girl warriors, mentored by Mephisto, a talking black cat who is actually a Matagot and the Guardian of Quintessence. Armed with wands topped with precious gemstones (that also serve as their transformation trinkets), they confront threats each time more complicated. However, if a Muggle should find out that they are magical girl warriors, they will turn into frogs!!!

Visits from parents and from fiancés, the banishment of Ophelia's parents to the Finmark, trips to Castellón and to Valencia, a prisoner King Francis I, a visit from Caterina de' Medici to leave Viola's cupbearer twin Sebastian in Culla (after fleeing from his execution, a decoy shikigami was quartered in his stead), San Juan with Elf King Oberon and Fairy Queen Titania, the heroics of Literature professor Alonso Quijano and the flirts of Andalusian heartthrob Don Juan Tenorio, ever accompanied by his trusty servant Leporello who is sweet on him; mysterious messages on the walls, written in blood, every now and then; Deep Ones on the streets of Benicassim and Oropesa... And the awakening of ancient Lovecraftian Gods, something far more dangerous than the rise of Gustavus Vasa, the Protestant Reformation, or the Habsburg-Valois Wars of that era (the doomsday prophets were more right than it seemed). Not to mention all four of our Guardians discovering that they are bisexual.

How can we get bored if we live in interesting times?

A SHATTERED REPUTATION (Aerwin drabble)

A SHATTERED REPUTATION

or, that aerwin montecucculli-inspired drabble...

This story takes place during a military campaign; both Aerys Targaryen and Tywin Lannister are in their late teens. They still hold the same rank and office from when Tywin first came to court. So oui, this is before Aerys' sanity slippage - he's just a young eccentric with far-fetched ideas and the need of a more realistic confidant (ie Tywin) to ground him - and of course Tywin needs someone less realistic and less serious as well - that's the reason why this is one of the most remarkable bromances/friendships in Westeros before their fallout, that still has ages to happen at this point... so this is something that might have occurred to them during their adolescence, and that actually happened to a crown prince and his cupbearer, who were most surely in a relationship, in real life in renaissance France (but those two were not that lucky and both of them died young shortly after the incident, as a consequence thereof... the former died of a combination of unintentional poisoning *there were scorched earth tactics, involving poisoned fountains/springs* and aspiration pneumonia; the latter was unjustly accused, and quartered alive...)

A SHATTERED REPUTATION

Already flustered and red in the face, in a stark departure from his usual Valyrian complexion, gasping like a fish out of water, a light-headed Aerys wiped his beaded forehead with a long platinum lock that had escaped his ponytail.
"Ty...win... Tywin, a drink or... or I die!" he wheezed, staggering, flinging an arm around the cupbearer's shoulders and locking bloodshot violet eyes with brighter green orbs. It was obvious, from his voice rattling and broken with coughs, that the crown prince had kicked up and breathed in enough dust to affect his voice, so deep inside his throat and maybe even into the lungs in his chest. In there, his heart was pounding against the ribs on his left side, as the shorter-haired, green-eyed cupbearer could feel, with Aerys' chest resting against his own back as the crown prince, knees buckling, leaned on his confidant for support.
"I guess for all your Targaryen descent, you are not that fireproof, Your Grace," Tywin smirked as he handed his liege lord a cup of costly glass and filled it from the pitcher he held in the other hand. "This is from a fountain spring I've found in our surroundings. Cooler or clearer it cannot be; hope there is enough to slake Your Grace's thirst..."
By now Aerys had already snatched the glass, lifted it, put it to his chapped lips to wet them, and cracked his mouth open as he tilted his head backwards. With one single deep draught --a lightning-quick throw down his throat-- and a loud gulp, the cup was eagerly drained to the last drop and reached out to Tywin for him to refill. The crown prince relished the moisture of the draught pouring over his lips, on his tongue, deeper in, the cool liquid funnelling into his throat and down his gullet into the inside of his chest, washing all that dust and dirt away, deeper down inside him. Yet something told him it was not enough; the sensation of thirst still persisted, chipping away at his throat even after he'd eagerly quaffed a second glass and the Lannister lad gave him another refill, watching how the outside of Aerys' throat worked with a steady rise and fall.
Had it been three or four cupfuls he'd drained until his inward heat was quenched? What mattered was that he was satisfied at last; and that he could finally stand upright without reeling and that his head had stopped to swim, his breathing and heartbeat having steadied as well.
A reasonably large entourage of knights and courtiers, followed by squires who carried their horses by the reins, had just stopped at the scene; they were the followers of the young prince, whom King Jaehaerys expected to arrive on that very evening... but a sudden illness that had struck Aerys down seemed to force to delay his departure, at least for a few hours.
All the colour had drained from his face... ashen and cold, not fair or typically Valyrian, but strangely pale, even clammy; and he staggered a few steps, reeling, open palms resting on his chest, before collapsing like a rag doll and curling up, clutching his own midsection as he doubled over. The pleasant coolness of his refreshment seemed to have changed into wildfire in there; to a liquid fire that burned his very heartstrings and tore at the very fabric of his deep insides. Excruciating. As he fell to the ground, so did the cup, which shattered, sending shards in all directions.
"TYWIN!!!" he yelled until his throat was sore and he felt like his vocal cords would snap.
"TYWIN... QUICK, A MAESTER... A SOOTHING DRAUGHT, MY INSIDES ARE ON FIRE...!!" Tears welled in violet eyes that quickly shut tight into darkness to stand the pain, as he writhed and tossed. He trusted the Lannister ever since the latter had come to court three or four or maybe more years ago - enough to make Tywin his own confidant. For how long had he gotten to know that green-eyed, golden-haired cupbearer? Aged thirteen, sweetly embarrassed by his breaking voice, aged fourteen, growing into the size of his hands and the breadth of his shoulders, aged fifteen, consciously naked at the hot springs, an image that replayed itself over and over in shameful repetition behind the crown prince's closed eyelids. Aged sixteen, laughing (a sound Aerys had never expected to hear and was pleasantly surprised by), aged seventeen, in the present year, pouring him three or four eagerly quaffed draughts. Their first swords, their first campaign... Would the green-eyed cupbearer ever dare to betray his trust in such an underhanded manner? Aerys had gotten to know Tywin pretty well over those adolescent years, living together side by side as their voices deepened, as the size of their limbs and breadth of their shoulders increased --the former self-assured, the latter sweetly embarrassed by these changes-- and he doubted that, no matter the courtiers' whispers, the Lannister scion would ever make such an underhanded move.
It felt to Aerys Targaryen as if he had swallowed a double-edged flaming sword, or a pitcherful of wildfire which had been ignited before he could consume it all; now it felt painful, scorching, as if the drink were about to boil inside him. Not only did he feel like violently torn and burned from within; his throat and chest felt iron-bound with red hot clamps. As he lay there writhing in pain, Tywin's remark about being fireproof crossed his hazy mind for an instant.
"I have to join King Jaehaerys and the lords as soon as... My faithful cupbearer will sure fetch me a soothing draught...!" Tywin stood on and looked in consternation, caring nought for the glass shard that had just grazed his wrist. This was not a customary lark of his liege's at all; Aerys was dangerously ill and things were about to get serious...
"STOP!" The knights seized the golden-haired lad, wresting the pitcher from him and packing him by the wrists. "Stop, Lannister, faithful cupbearer... and leave to trustworthier hands the concern of quenching His Grace's thirst... For, my lords, Aerys Targaryen, Prince of Dragonstone and heir to the throne, has just been poisoned!"
Tywin stood frozen in place, unable to react. Yet the more painful blow came afterwards.
"And here is the guilty party; Tywin Lannister, Shield of Lannisport and Warden of the West; that upstart whose kin was banned from court, yet always a rival to our crowned heads!"
Not even in his wildest dreams would he ever do that. He had even come to see Aerys as more than a friend, as more than a brother, as more than just his liege. "Look on, my lords; the crown prince has turned pale and he is writhing in pain..."
In fact, Aerys, now lying on a stretcher, was still racked with the most intense of suffering; while the knights and courtiers, all of them in shock, and naturally disposed to turn against the favourite stranger who stood in the path of their ambition, were now persecuting Tywin on irrational grounds.
"What about... Your Grace!!" Tywin's loud call pierced the haze on Aerys' febrile mind. "Would you suffer the loss of your most faithful servant, under such preposterous accusations?"
"No more vituperations, fair Lannister, and answer to this question: Where were you while the prince was tourneying; if not in your accursed poison-chamber, where you prepared the fatal draught?"
Tywin did not even breathe a single word; his very heartbeat seemed to have stopped. Though he had found his niche at court throughout his adolescence, now he was powerless, or so it seemed.
"He has not even said a word, my lords! He is guilty as charged..."
"Please... good Sers, please..." Aerys suddenly said in a weak voice, "do not accuse my good Tywin; I am not poisoned at all... this is nothing..." Fluttering eyelids like white butterflies revealed lifeless yet glass-like doll's eyes, like polished amethysts, for an instant, ere they shut once more.
Feeling slightly better after swallowing a potion brought by a freshly-summoned maester, though still ill-at-ease, Aerys Targaryen believed that he could take Tywin with him... but the obstinate silence of the green-eyed lad on such simple questions had made such an impression on the courtiers and knights that it had been decided that young Lannister would remain a prisoner in the nearest holdfast, until His Grace's complete recovery.
Tywin had to resign himself, and, as he kissed the crown prince's limp hand farewell, the latter whispered in his ear:
"Patience, my loyal cupbearer, within three days all this will come to an end, and you will come and join me..."
In fact, three days later the whole affair was over...
(Aerys is struggling between life and death on his four-post/canopy sickbed with all those maesters - Tywin is suffering chained to the wall of a holdfast dungeon and threatened with torture... three days later the prince has recovered and they both reunite)

LA FORÊT DU DAUPHIN

a mysterious haunted forest in southern France and the ruined castle supposedly within. A Prince was poisoned there, or so the story goes... 

Chapter 1: Tournon-sur-Rhône

Once upon a time, perhaps not so long ago, there grew a mysterious forest in the southeast of France. No one had ever really been able to measure it - though you could ride around it, you could never cross through it and come out safe on the other side. Indeed, you could not come out at all. More people than anyone remembered had been lost in that forest over the years. People called it la Forêt du Dauphin; rumor had it that it had once been the hunting grounds of the crown prince of France. But the kings and queens and princes were long gone now, their heads fallen from their shoulders, their blood spilled in the streets; and new men ruled in France. They sent surveyors and map makers throughout their republic. Only the forest remained unmapped, unsurveyed, and unremarked. Ages passed; satellites could not penetrate the tree cover to reveal what lay within, and GPS mysteriously failed within miles of the place. Roads diverted around it; they called it a "national preserve," and under that title it remained untouched and untouchable, the last blank space on the map where one might write "here there be monsters."

--- the charming scene outside their B&B window: cobblestone streets, window boxes filled with flowers, the occasional tiny car or bicycle passing by, the groups of people chattering away in (French) language --

And it's so fascinating! It's a book of local legends and superstitions, that kind of thing. Did you know there's a forest not five miles away that's supposedly haunted? They call it the Dauphin's forest because it was apparently the hunting grounds of the Prince way back in medieval times. And get this, dad: there's historical evidence that there used to be a château in the middle of it. Like, an actual medieval mansion that he used to house his whole retinue when he went hunting. Can you imagine? A ruined château in the middle of a haunted forest? Doesn't that just make you want to go look for it?
I'd be more interested in knowing why it's haunted.
It doesn't really say. There's just all kinds of stories of people going missing there. Apparently it's a kind of Bermuda Triangle of forests. Oh, and guess what? The Dauphin Francis, son of Francis the First, was supposedly poisoned and died in that château! They blamed his secretary, Count Sebastiano, and he was executed for it, but now people think the prince probably just died of pneumonia. He had been imprisoned as a child…

--- a glorious summer day in the French countryside? 

at the charming scene outside, encompassing the flower boxes, bicycles, hum of conversations at cafés with striped awnings…

https://archiveofourown.org/works/19416583/chapters/46207492