Interlude V
AYA RUNA
The samay transfers to Cashan aren’t working.
“I can’t,” the princess bites out. Her lips are bleeding from the force of her own teeth. I want to say she’s lying, that she’s not trying hard enough.
But the sweat drips down her face. The blood, a mix of hers and the sacrifices, drips down her palms from where her nails are still shredding the flesh.
The Samay Stone process may refill her life energy, but the effort it takes to do so is taking a physical toll on her body that samay can’t replenish.
She stopped her soundless crying hours ago, yet the tear tracks still shine.
Qajay is about to call for Tutay to send another person up, but I raise my hand to stop them.
We’re at the top of the central platform in the plaza.
The raised platform towers over the empire’s citizens.
They’re used to watching ceremonies from below, but now they all try to look away.
They’re cattle taking their last breath.
There are ten corpses at our side, and there’s been no change to Cashan’s condition. He doesn’t look better. His skin doesn’t look any less sallow and thin. His chest doesn’t beat with more force. It’s like the samay she pours into him goes straight to an ever-hungry and empty abyss.
It’s not working, and it’s not because the cursed princess isn’t keeping up her side of the deal, no matter how much I wish it were.
We know how to handle noncompliance. We know how to force people to do things. We don’t know how to deal with this.
“She can’t,” I croak. I’m worn out, and my voice reflects that. I haven’t used mimicry since going into Suyai’s subconscious, but my body isn’t recovering during this rest. I’m in physical limbo, my body deteriorated to near death but is now in stasis, not healing but not dying either.
The relief I felt hours ago is a stranger to me now. I was naive. I thought cooperation, this deal, was all we needed.
Life taught me better than that.
“She can’t do it,” I say, just as my arm gives out from where I leaned on a chair. I fall to my knees with a thud.
Izhi runs to me, but it’s no use. There’s nothing they can help me with. Cashan is dying. Suyai is dying. The princess tried to heal both, but healing is her weakest ability.
Pushing samay into Cashan, though, that’s not healing. She said it herself. She was adept at it and used it on her own mother at times. So why isn’t it working?
Two people dying, three if Paria’s condition gets any worse, four if my own body gives up. Ten people already dead. But there’s no longer a point to it. There’s no point to anything.
How many times have we been surrounded by blood? Every time we’ve been surrounded by treasure as well. There’s no treasure here, just a worthless princess and two siblings who have expended their value. And the blood. The screaming. The people being led to their deaths.
“What are you playing at?” I hear Pucaru shout.
My head snaps up. Pucaru is running at Suyai, grabbing her by the hair and yanking her upward.
“Did you make her fall? Are you hurting her?” Pucaru continues, shouting even though she’s right next to Suyai’s ear.
I look around. The only one on the floor is me, but Pucaru couldn’t be talking about me. Suyai isn’t near me at all, and I fell from my own weakness, not external forces.
Except, as Pucaru swings Suyai’s head around, I see what she saw. Suyai’s hair is overrun by white streaks. She’s been using mimicry.
“Stop,” I rasp out, but Pucaru doesn’t hear me. I tug on Izhu’s sleeve and mouth the word again. Izhu has to repeat it multiple times for Pucaru to stop her tirade, and once she does, Suyai hangs her head low and groans in pain.
“Did she hurt you, Qui?” Pucaru asks, and I shake my head no. She narrows her eyes between Suyai and me, refusing to step away from the injured girl.
I agree with Pucaru’s stance. Suyai may not have hurt me, but she was doing something, something subtle enough none of us felt it stand out against the princess’s mimicry. She can talk more than I can. She has no excuse to sneak around.
Pucaru doesn’t have a chance to talk before Suyai speaks up for herself.
“You’re doing it wrong, Yanami,” she says, her voice quiet from lack of use. “You’re not maximizing the samay.”
I look at the princess and see genuine shock on her face. Good. That might have just saved Suyai’s life. If any of us thought for a second she was playing games with us, she would be dead.
The clock is ticking for Cashan. The clock is ticking for us all, waiting for the Guardians’ Hero to show up with the Sun Staff.
“How could you possibly know that?” The princess asks. She doesn’t deny the statement, though, in her state, I don’t think she could fight against anything.
It’s the right question to ask. Suyai is an Ave mimic, mimicry based on the Hanan Pacha, the domain of the heavens.
Ave mimics can specialize in things like unspoken communication, reading minds, projecting images and sounds.
Yet, I can’t think of a specialty that would help Suyai come to this conclusion.
“I can read your mimicry, intercept it in the air, and gain information from it. I would have told you sooner, but I didn’t realize it until now.
There’s so much energy everywhere, so much cursed power, but it doesn’t reach the necessary amount to pull him back.
It never gets to the critical point, so it’s gone, and you have to do it all over again.
It’s messing with my head,” Suyai tapers off into a coughing fit.
She brings her hands to her head, careful not to disturb the boy still unconscious on her lap, and pounds them into her forehead.
She hasn’t done a single thing today, but she looks the most affected out of all of us.
“I can’t stand it. Again and again. But not anymore. I figured it out. The draining process–”
The princess flinches, opening her mouth as if to defend herself, but is unable to when Suyai continues to talk.
“The person’s struggle, it uses up their samay. Even if it doesn’t lead to full mimicry, their body expends it in a desperate last attempt to get away. You’ve probably never felt the difference… They’re all weak compared to you… We all are.”
Suyai collapses onto her hands. She doesn’t sound like the quick-witted girl we got to know. She sounds lost in pain, both physical and mental. She sounds like a child begging for the torture to stop.
But we can’t afford to lose him now.
“What does this mean for us?” Pucaru asks, quieter than ever.
“I can’t drain more than one person until my samay is depleted again.
We… we tested it. I had to test it. Years ago.
The second person I try to drain might die from their wounds but never from the samay transfer,” Princess Yanami stutters through her sentence.
Her abrupt stops and starts raise the hairs on my skin.
It sounds unnatural for such a powerful being.
A young being.
Years ago. Her mother had her doing this since she was a child. The dead Inka I despised forced her daughter to kill not just for necessities but for experimentation. It’s sickening.
Here we are doing the same.
Bile rises up my throat, and I spit it out without hesitation. It coats my mouth with acid, but I don’t gag. I’m outside of my body and mind. I am simply here to finish a task.
“Willing participant,” is all Suyai says, but we all understand the meaning.
Princess Yanami has to drain someone who won’t fight back.
Their samay will be more potent that way.
If the rumors are true that the Samay Stone was created and gifted by the Guardians themselves, I can’t help but marvel at their technique.
Give the rulers infinite power, but only if their people are willing to die for it. If not, it will always be a bloodbath.
I guess not even our powerful Guardians could predict how many people saw blood as just another liquid that spills.
Including us.
We don’t have the advantage of numbers on our side anymore. One willing participant can save Cashan’s life where a hundred unwilling ones can’t. We can kill every person in the empire, but unless we get lucky and find the one who’s ready to face death with no struggle, it won’t do a thing.
And Cashan doesn’t have that kind of time.
I struggle to flex my fingers, feeling every bone grind against the other. My cartilage has worn out. My body is functioning at a level years beyond my actual age. Rest will help me regain some strength, but the years I lost to using so much of my samay, that will never be recovered.
The princess agreed to help us with one thing, healing Cashan. She won’t kill more people to restore my samay, or Paria’s, or Izhu’s.
I was willing to die to save him the second we set foot in the palace. So, why is it so hard to lay down my life now?
Because I know he won’t be happy about it.
I have to do it without any doubts in my head.
I have to do it humbly, submissively, no fighting, no pride.
Cashan would kill me if he thought I was considering it.
People like us, we don’t lay down our lives.
We die in battle, whether it’s a fight, a mission, or the battles we faced every day as children ourselves.
If I were the type to give up, I wouldn’t have survived past five years old.
Cashan will never forgive me, but I have made up my mind. At least he can be alive to hate me for the rest of his life. At least my sacrifice will be worth something, unlike his.
I stand from my chair when commotion breaks out below us. Qajay puts a firm hand on my shoulder as the others move to the edge to see what’s going on.
I hear Pucaru scream. I hear Izhu’s gasp. They break into a run, positioning themselves in front of Cashan and Paria. I wait for Tutay to run up the steps and onto the platform. She’s our last line of defense, which means she retreated, causing Pucaru and Izhu to get into defensive positions.
Except I know Tutay would never retreat.
I slap Qajay’s hand away with more force than I thought I had. I get up, stumbling, falling to my knees in slow motion. Qajay is at my side. Pucaru is telling them to hold me back. Quillari can’t see her like this.
I can’t see her like what? Tutay may look like a brute at times, but I always liked that about her. I like watching her fight. I like watching her defend us.
I love–
I try to crawl forward, but Qajay uses their full strength to force me back into the chair, and I’m helpless to fight against it.
Qajay steps in front of me, but it doesn’t make sense. Tutay wouldn’t let any threat make its way up to us. She should be here reporting what happened already.
When Qajay shifts, I see the silhouette of a newcomer. It’s not Tutay.
It’s the Guardian’s Hero. Sinchinrei. Head held high, not a single blemish on her. The only sign of battle is the blood coating the gold staff in her hand.
The Sun Staff.
I am outside my body and mind. Tutay’s dead, and I am here. I am nothing but the smoke that kills before the fire. I am here for a singular task, to save Cashan.