Lost
DALI
She was back in her room before the blood had finished drying.
She pulled the glass vial from beneath the mattress and held it to the lantern. Blue-green, thick, filling the glass almost to the top. She examined it carefully. It was now almost full.
Normally she would have consumed every bit of strength she pulled from him. Instead, for weeks, she had been saving it.
She smiled.
Maridale stirred somewhere beneath the surface.
The usual. The admonishment forming before it could get anywhere.
Dali did not let it get anywhere. She was stronger tonight than she had been in months and Maridale knew it and that was why she was stirring, not because she had anything useful to say but because strength made her nervous.
It should.
Dali set the vial down and went to the washroom.
She was covered in blood. More blood than skin showing on her legs, already dried in the short time it had taken to walk from Teorin's chambers to hers. A Siren could heal easily. The blood was not a problem. She began scrubbing.
She had gone to him tonight intending something simpler.
Give him release. Feed. Walk away. The same as any other night.
But then she had felt it, the darkness in him, the desire to hurt the things he could not have.
The anger and attraction he carried for Asharin had made him careless and the more he gave the more Dali had taken and she had not stopped until she knew with certainty that today would be the day that the vial was finally full.
If I cannot love, none of you can either.
She scrubbed her legs and thought about Teorin's face and found it easy not to feel sorry for him.
The vial was enough now. Anything more she took from him would be purely for amusement and she was not certain she had the patience for it. She had what she needed.
The amulet was in the Vault. The Vaultline was difficult for a Saren.
Easier for a feeder. Better for a king. Best for a Rathmor king.
She was none of those things. But what she had collected in that vial was almost as good.
Better. It did not involve sweat or feelings or blood that was not already on her legs.
She rinsed the cloth and wrung it out and stared at the water.
She thought about how long ago it had been since any of this started.
Since she and Maridale had had something that resembled a life.
She had a man she loved. Not a prince, not a king.
Veynar-born, calm and easygoing. He was the sort of person who walked into a room and made it quieter and more pleasant without trying.
He had made everything pleasant. More than pleasant, in fact.
She had told him she was going to Yorali and did not know when she would return.
He had followed her. Found a position at the Yorali palace as a guard. He had stood outside doors and escorted royals through corridors and spent his evenings with her.
Sarens did not love. It was rare enough to be almost mythological. And yet.
She had not wanted to be in Yorali at all. But Maridale was pregnant and Maridale needed Tamal and Tamal was in Yorali and so there they were.
Tamal wanted to marry Maridale. Orsin said no.
Vaelor blood, yes. Legitimacy unverified.
Weak. He said it more than once. Each time Maridale absorbed it and went back to Tamal's bed and Dali absorbed it alongside her and said nothing because there were larger problems and Tamal was not worth the headache.
The final time he said no Maridale could not accept it.
She left Tamal in bed one morning and walked to the throne room and waited for hours until it was her turn.
The room was full when she entered. Guards. Wives. Seers. Advisors. A woman with dark hair stepped forward before Orsin could acknowledge Maridale. A circlet on her forehead, pale gold eyes, the posture of a princess.
Ivanoxa. Orsin's favorite. She had seen her before, though she and Tamal did not seem very close, despite being twins.
He asked for an update. Ivanoxa said she did not have one.
He stood. "You displease me."
His voice was cold. Dali felt Maridale's fear rise.
"Go fuck yourself, King Orsin," Ivanoxa said.
He stood and moved toward her. "You will not humiliate me. And you will call me father."
Before he reached her a soldier stepped between them. Her Soldier. Standing in front of a king in a room full of guards and power.
"Ah." Orsin looked at him. "You are supposed to risk your life for me. Not my ungrateful guests."
Dali took over.
This was not the time for Maridale.
"Leave him alone," she said.
She moved toward him. Orsin raised his hand and she stopped, frozen, his power pressing her in place. The pregnancy had weakened her more than she had accounted for. She turned to Ivanoxa.
"Please. Stop him. You are his favorite."
Ivanoxa stared straight ahead.
"You will go to the pits," Orsin said to her Soldier. "You will meet your certain death in—"
"Do not send him," Dali screamed.
A surge of green and then brown hair and blue eyes and desperation. "Do not send him," Maridale begged.
She turned to Nox again. "Please. Ask him. He was not doing anything wrong. He was protecting me. Tell him—"
Nox said nothing.
Dali turned to the room. Every face Yorali except one.
Teorin Rathmor stood in the corner with a goblet in his hand, watching with mild interest. He walked lazily toward Nox as her Soldier was lifted from the floor.
Her Soldier looked at her.
"Live well," he said. Quietly. Just for her.
Then he was gone.
She lunged for him. She did not decide to lunge — her body did it before anything else could happen — and she fell and as she stood she felt it. The cramping. The warmth. The certainty of something leaving that could not be called back.
Orsin looked at her and smiled. "Well. That solves that problem."
She would not let it happen in that room. She would not give him that.
She limped toward the doors, the cramping getting worse. She looked at where her Soldier had been standing and then stopped looking at it because there was nothing there.
At the door she heard them.
Teorin, leaning toward Nox, his voice low. His hand covering hers briefly.
"Good work."
"Is she alright? Tamal will kill me if she even breathes wrong."
Teorin snorted. "Just a limp."
Dali stopped.
She looked at both of them. At the ease of it. At Nox's hand under Teorin's. At two people who had just watched the only thing she had ever loved thrown into a pit and were already talking about something else.
"Any bit of happiness you have," she said. "Any chance at a future you have."
She looked at them both until they looked back.
"You lost it the moment you threw mine away."
Then she walked out.
She had not stopped walking since.