Chapter 15 #2
It’s the same bedroom I apparently used as a child, although I still have no recollection of it from before I returned to Maile four years ago.
When I escaped from Kenta, I was hopeful that being back in my childhood home would jog the forgotten memories free, but I was only left disappointed by the lack of familiarity I felt when I walked through the door.
The very same feeling I have right now. This doesn’t feel like home any more than anywhere else ever has.
But that shiel back in Alaha calls to me still.
I note the soaps and towels left beside the tub and surmise General Samasu must have given my mother ample warning of my imminent return. I strip off everything but my necklace of mangi stones, dropping my clothes on the floor, also in desperate need of being discarded.
Kneeling in the barren tub, I undo the knot from the base of my braid and begin to untangle the matted strands.
I did my best to care for it during my time at the border, tying it up and rinsing it as soon as I could after battle, but it was little use.
Its length stopping just below my breasts.
I turn on the spigot, waiting for the water to turn warm before I dip my head under.
Brown sluices from my hair as I work my fingers through it and it takes a long while before the water runs clear.
I then scrub my skin raw with a cloth and a liberal amount of soap and rinse myself clean before filling the basin fully.
I pour in a generous amount of oils and soap before settling back into a more comfortable position so that I can finally—finally—allow myself to relax.
It doesn’t last long.
A knock at the door rouses me. “Come in,” I call, voice cracking from underuse and exhaustion. I look over my shoulder to see Karla stick her head into the room.
She must deem me decent enough, because she scurries in with a tray. “I’ve brought some tea.” The older woman keeps her eyes averted as she deposits the cup and saucer on the bedside table before carefully placing the steaming teapot down as well. “It’s to help you sleep,” she explains.
There’s an awkward moment where her gaze locks with mine.
As my mother’s longest-serving maid, Karla’s the only person my mother would trust to deliver anything to my personal room.
For good reason. She doesn’t linger unnecessarily or gossip among the staff.
This is her duty, and she treats it with the appropriate gravity.
It’s why I’m taken aback by the worry in her eyes.
Fretting with the material of her skirts, she averts her gaze again before swiping my dirty clothes from the floor and making her way out.
“Thank you,” I tell her, but I’m only met with the sound of the door squeaking shut.
I drop my head against the basin’s side, sinking further into the water. Exhaling slowly, I turn my focus to my next breath, then the one after, and continue this way until breathing feels natural again. I wanted to avoid all of this. My mother’s concern sometimes feels heavier than my title does.
I poke at a few bubbles clinging to each other, and the black line of crust under each of my nails snags my attention.
Gross.
I call for my blade, the black dagger appearing in my hand in an instant.
I twirl it in my fingers. Over my knuckles, under, over again, and back into my palm.
The blade is dull and the hilt tweaks as I manipulate it.
I’ll need to repair it soon. For the moment, however, it still serves to pick the grime out from under my nails.
My mind clears as I perform the task, body going lax.
To think I once was horrified by the thought of eating with a knife used for killing.
Yet, here I am, picking at my nails with one.
Each scrape and snick of the blade feels cathartic.
Like carving out the last remnants of the weeks I spent at camp, the night scaling the rocky hillside, digging my hands and fingers into anything I could find purchase on, sometimes places slick with mud and clay and—
The earth is cold beneath my knees, but the blood coating my skin is warm. It doesn’t stay that way for long as the freezing air whips around me. The man underneath me is ghostly white, eyes vacant as he stares up at the night sky. He never saw us coming.
My hands shake.
They’re saturated with red, and I try to wipe them clean on my pants.
It’s futile. The more I wipe, the more it spreads.
It drips from my fingers like water from a faucet, flooding the ground around my knees.
Panic takes over as I try to stand, only for the ground to slide out from under me, melting into a rising tide and all of a sudden I’m drowning in a sea of blood.
I open my mouth to scream, but the liquid chokes me.
I go under.
I break through the surface, sucking in a lungful of air before breaking into a coughing fit.
Not a red tide, but soapy bath water as it sloshes over the sides, slapping onto the hard floor. I clutch onto the rim of the basin, heart slamming in my chest as I attempt to ground myself.
I’m home.
I’m safe.
My magic is surging underneath my breastbone.
A violent stirring that sets my skin alight.
It’s not the first time this has happened, although it is still rare, given the gyve of mangi stones I normally wear; the necklace I currently wear around my neck apparently isn’t strong enough to stop my magic from bursting out.
I place my palm against the place it emanates from, reassuring it that I’m fine. I must have fallen asleep. It was just a bad dream.
Then I feel it.
Him.
The tether that twines through my magic.
One doesn’t exist without the other and the longer it takes for my magic to calm, the more likely it is the other side of the Bond will respond.
A ghosting of what feels like breath on the back of my neck makes goosebumps spread across my skin.
I spin toward the door to see what’s behind me, only to find nothing.
An echo of a familiar chuckle sends fear flooding through my veins.
I leap from the bath, throwing even more water onto the floor as I hurry to my bedside table.
Jerking open the drawer, I grab a handful of mangi stones and necklaces from the hoard I have stashed there and hold them to the place my magic resides.
It’s nauseating, stifling it this way, but I swallow down the bile until it eases and the glow of my skin no longer leaches through my closed eyelids.
When I find the courage to open them again, I’m met with humiliatingly loud silence.
There’s no one here.
But I affix an extra layer of stones around my neck, and another. Just to be sure.
I look down at the porcelain cup Karla left and pour the tea from the teapot with shaking hands, splashing some of the liquid onto the saucer in my haste.
It’s black and opaque and I bring the cup closer to my nose before recoiling from the bitter scent.
It smells worse than the bootleg mead I had in Alaha.
Fredrich’s words float through my mind. Drink the tea.
I sit on my bed, heedless of my damp state, and down the terrible liquid in two gulps, holding the back of my hand to my mouth to stop it from coming back up.
Anything is better than feeling like I’m slowly losing my mind but still being aware of it, because there’s no other explanation for the sensation at the base of my neck. Like I’m being watched.
Then the world goes dark around me …
I don’t remember anything else after that.