4. Elara
Chapter 4
“That woman is a monster, and someone should flay her alive!” I yelled the words the second the door to my room snapped shut. I didn’t care if it were technically treason, and I really didn’t care that it wasn’t ladylike or princess-like, or whatever-the-hell-I-was-supposed-to-be-like. I didn’t care. Nothing about my life was ladylike or princess-like anyway.
Even my rooms were sparse, the bedroom barely large enough to fit the small mahogany bed frame that was pushed against my barred windows. I tried to keep the window open, to coax in the breeze that always seemed to be scented with lavender, even though the delicate flowers grew several stories below, but the panes barely let in more than a draft, the casement barely accessible through the bars. The tall bureau that held my underpinnings barely fit between bed and wall, tucked into the corner beside the window as it was. The sitting room I now rampaged in was cramped, the tiny space filled with a simple table, a threadbare chaise, and the Boy’s sleeping quarters, which were also cramped behind a large ornate dressing panel that may have been the nicest thing in the place.
The panels were carved with a scene that showed the history of the Goddesses and the war of the Fae and the Sister in stark relief.
It was beautiful. At one point it had matched my room and all the ornate finishes that would be befitting a princess. But I had lost my large quarters after my Catalyst died, and lost more and more of the luxuries befitting a princess in the years following as Mother tried to make me hide away and behave like the invalid she wanted me to be.
At some point, I stopped caring that she would take things when I disobeyed her, and she stopped trying to punish me that way. It’s not like there was much left to take anyway. Besides, punishing me with pure hatred suited her better. That and, I guess, refusing to accept she had a daughter.
“I hate her!” I yelled again, marching across the sitting room and the one throwable object I could find, the book I had stolen from the palace libraries last week.
I was ready to toss them across the room one by one while yelling more obscenities but only got halfway to them when gloved hands wrapped around my arms and pulled me back into a hard chest. The Boy stood right behind me, his hands firm as he held me against him.
“Boy, not now…” I started. He held firmer, his heat radiating through me as he held me against him. As he breathed. Slow, steady.
He didn’t need to say it for me to hear him.
Calm, Elara.
It was what I always imagined he would say when everything became too much and he was there, right behind me. Holding me just like this.
He clicked twice and exhaled, the sound slow and steady in my ears before he inhaled in a slow calm, his chest rising and falling against my back.
“Please, just let me be mad,” I said, but my voice cracked with a sob, some of the fury already waning.
He clicked again and inhaled, then exhaled. Again and again, he breathed as he held me there, his gloved thumbs moved over my arms. He clicked again, the sound soft as he inhaled, slow, steady, and this time, I followed, my chest shaking with the threat of tears as I tried to follow along with his breaths.
My breaths stuttered as I forced all of that rage and fury out. Well, almost.
It didn’t matter how much I breathed. It would always be there, along with all the loss and sadness and everything else I smothered with bad behavior and rule-breaking. I shoved this down like all the rest.
“She’s never going to stop, is she?” I asked even though I knew he could not answer. He held me closer, his hands sliding down my arms to grip my hands as he pressed his head beside my own. I could see little more than the shadow of the shape of his head through the hood, feel his jaw move as though he was saying something I couldn’t hear.
“I’ve got to stop letting her get under my skin,” I breathed, and he clicked lightly in agreement, the sound faint in my ear. “She won’t be there forever. Batian will be Ramal soon, and then things will change.”
Oh, by the Goddess. They had to change, or I would find a way out of there if they didn’t. My shield of stubbornness and sass could only get me so far, after all.
For now, I inhaled, focusing on the Boy as I exhaled and slowly became myself again.
His hands squeezed my arms before he stepped away, moving to the other side of the room, where his bed lay hidden. I stood there, still breathing, still shaking.
He emerged from his cramped space with two wooden swords in seconds, the old things dinged and dented, the paint I had covered them with years ago all but gone. He held them out in question, not that he really needed an answer.
He knew me. He knew me even better than Batian.
He knew me better than anyone.
There was no better way to work off my anger toward my mother than by becoming even more of what she hated.
Strong.
“You know I’m going to beat you tonight, right?” I warned him through my shaking inhales, and he shrugged. I was worked up enough that I could probably beat Batian, not that I could fight Batian. If my brother knew I did any of this, it would not end well.
Sometimes I thought he bought in a little too much to Mother’s tirade about my sickly little body.
The Boy swung both swords around in what I was sure he thought was an ominous way before handing me mine, his body language all sass and taunt. I couldn’t see an inch of him, but I sure could read him.
“You really think you have a chance?” I quipped. He swung the wooden sword impressively in answer, swooping it around him like it was a ribbon in the small space. The wooden tip would have hit the door and chaise if he swung too wide. “Naw, all your fancy training will get you nowhere.”
He swung again, spinning the thing like he was about to break into a dance, and then, without warning, he swung forward, the sleek edge of his wooden blade aimed right for my shoulder.
He never would have let it make contact, but it didn’t matter, I blocked him long before that anyway. I stepped back, skirts hitting the side table as the edge of my sword hit against his with a resounding thwack of wood against wood. The gruffest sound of what could have been a laugh escaped his shroud, and I grinned.
“Impressed?” I gave him a wink and stepped closer to him, making sure to keep enough space between me and the side wall that I could move.
He should be impressed; I don’t think I had ever blocked him so well. So, of course he only grunted and shook his head no. “Bastard.”
This time, I was the one to swing my sword. I stepped forward, letting the motion build up momentum before I swung. He blocked it easily, already moving toward the next possible hit.
Swipe and thwack. Thwack! Thwack!
The sounds of our swords hitting again and again mixed with our heavy breathing, the motions we had practiced for years working all of that rage and fury right out of me.
Around. Over top. I pushed against the side table, sending books flying and launching myself forward. Thwack!
Side swipe and lunge, keeping away from the chaise even as he jumped on it. Dodge, parry. Thwack!
Again and again, we fought, until sweat pooled down my back and between my breasts. Until it dripped down the side of my face and over my nose. But I kept moving, kept hitting and breathing until everything boiling through me hissed out in steam and rage. I hit and grunted and swiped at all of it. The failures I couldn’t avoid. The life I wish I had. The magic I was supposed to have.
Even this fight would have been so much different if I was what my mother wanted me to be.
“You know, if I had fíra, I’d light this on fire and send it right at you,” I said as he dodged a low swing, pointing at himself before pantomiming the motion we saw so often in the training pits as he sent an imaginary ball of fire right at me.
I dodged it, laughing maniacally as he huffed and clicked.
“Nice try. Maybe I’ll use vio instead,” I moved my hands around, lifting my free hand up as though I was calling rocks and stones from the floor.
The Boy made a sound like a soft scream that was more of a groan and pretended to dodge my invisible weapons, slashing at them all as I laughed with a sound that was far too close to Mother's.
Fake magic or not, I’ll never make that sound again.
The sound was silenced as the Boy spun, sending yet another fireball my way. I wasn’t fast enough for that one and I let the invisible fire hit me right in my gut. I swear I felt the heat prickle over me, that same feeling from before burning over my skin.
Okay, I might be getting too into this.
With all of the overdramatic skill I possessed, I fell to my knees, my sword falling by my side with a clatter.
“No! How could you! I had so much life! So much vision!” I clutched at the imaginary wound, holding my free hand out to the Boy, who held his hands over his head in mock panic before rushing to my side and dropping to his knees, catching me as I fell back.
My supposedly broken body was draped over his lap, his hand cupping my neck as I made what I assumed were dying sounds and he wildly pantomimed in what was clearly distress.
“You have ended me!” I exaggerated everything, gasping and breathing and reaching toward the sky. “This life is not meant for me, nor I for this life. Oh! Goddess! Take me to your gardens of the afterlife!”
I reached for the sky in what I was sure was the last moment of a very emotional death. The Boy’s pantomiming shifted as I choked out a very dramatic last breath and sagged in his arms. He clutched me against him, rocking and making noises that could have been sobs, until he pulled me back, one hand still cradling my neck as the other lifted to my face.
I stared into the nothing of supposed death, waiting for the right moment to double-cross him. Instead I froze.
His hand was soft as it pressed against my cheek, the cold leather of his glove somehow warm as he pressed his palm against my jaw, his thumb against my cheek. His touch was featherlight as his thumb moved over my skin, both of us frozen as my once dead eyes shifted, looking toward the shroud where his face was hidden.
Looking toward the Boy.
The Boy that was somewhere behind there.
It wasn’t the first time I had tried to see his face. I should really stop trying. It didn’t matter how close I got. I couldn’t see through the fabric. This time was no different. There was nothing there, just a stretch of black as his thumb moved over my cheek, his warm breath moving over my lips.
Soft, faint, stuttering.
My heart caught, my stomach clenching as he leaned closer to me, my eyes still searching the black in the hopes that I could see. But all that was there was a hot breath over my lips, the strangled sound making something deep inside of me clench.
By the Goddess. He was so close.
He had never been so close.
“Boy?” My voice caught, and not for the first time, I wished I had a name, a real name I could call him.
Anything.
To see him smile and feel that hungry warmth that was everywhere move everywhere.
Oh, Goddess.
His thumb moved over my cheek again as yet another warm breath fluttered over my lips, and all of that hungry warmth might have escaped me in a sound I had never made before. Half moan, half growl.
What in the world?
Then, he lifted his wooden sword and stabbed me right through the heart. Well, he pantomimed doing so at least.
“What the—? How?” I looked at where the sword was stabbed beside my rib cage, my death and his victory now crystal clear. “You bastard!”
I nearly screamed the word as he chuckled, standing and rolling me off his lap and onto the floor in an unceremonious heap.
“You tricked me!” He was still chuckling as I unwound myself from my skirts that had twisted around my legs, my hem torn even more now. “That was dirty!”
It was, but only because he had stolen my trick. Which he admitted he did, gesturing wildly to me and pantomiming the exact double-crossing I had planned. Pretend death, stab him. I had done it before, and he had been expecting it.
“You learned from the best.” I filled in what he couldn’t say, screwing my face up into a wicked smile before curtsying to him.
He applauded me, the muffled sound of his gloves slapping together in a slow mockery as he walked back over to me, bowing before he took my hand and lifted it to about where his lips should be.
It wasn’t a real kiss—no skin touched—and for all I knew, he pressed my palm to his nose, not his lips. It didn’t matter. My stomach swooped all the same, that feeling from before coming back in a hot rush.
“You do realize I’m never going to let that happen again.” I wouldn’t. Even though my stomach was still trying to tie itself in knots.
The Boy, however, waved me off, putting his hand to his forehead in a fake swoon that earned him a swat on the arm. Oh, if he thought he could mock me, he had another thing coming.
“Don’t get too smug, Boy.” I stepped right up to him, staring into the void that was his face. “I have even more of a game I can play.”
I grinned at him, feeling his breath roll over me as I could have sworn I saw more than heard the smile on the low groan that hissed over to me.
Then, I punched him in the gut. Same as I had Batian. Now, that he should have seen coming. He grunted as he doubled over, hands around his gut. Or not his gut.
By the Goddess.
It took me a second to register that I may have aimed a little too low. Well, I guess lesson really learned now.
“You’ve been warned,” I said as sweetly as I could, trying to hide my laugh as he did his very best to stand up all the way.
He grunted and waved me off as I strode over to the door that separated the living space and his room from mine, opening it on silent hinges before I turned.
“Oh, and Boy,” I whispered, well aware all signs of the game had left my voice. He was standing now, his form back to his usual shadow. “Thank you.”
He nodded before I shut the door. A second later, the snick of the lock sounded through my room as he locked me in. He locked me away from him and where he slept, and the precious moments when he revealed that face that I was suddenly dying to see.