10. Leela
LEELA
Iravan led Leela around the den for the next hour, occasionally stopping to sit and explain the different rooms. People everywhere were dressed in simple, loose clothes.
Women wore swishing skirts or pants with blouses, their stomachs exposed.
Men wore long shirts, scarves draped over their faces to keep the sun or heat out of their eyes. Some wore an assortment of both.
Iravan led her deeper into the depths of the den.
It made Leela feel like an ant, crawling through the cavernous red walls, peering through the haphazard windows, or evading the scorching light blasting through the bigger tunnels.
When they passed through, Leela gawked at the intricate carvings on the columns and walls—art of the Flames as they danced or fought one another.
Each swirl and floral design was carved to perfection.
Leela grew silent as she stood before an artwork on a long stretch of wall depicting the Flames from the Awakening in formation with weapons raised at the Flames from the Netherworld, a beautiful blue stone embedded between the two groups.
Foxes, Bats, Vipers, Elephants, Scorpions, Tigers, Ravens, Bulls, Hawks, Caracals and Peacocks all stood evenly opposite one another.
“Beautiful, right?” Iravan said, leaning over.
Leela jumped. “Yes. They had this particular artwork at the palace too.”
“Speaking of, were you in the palace this entire time?” Iravan arched a brow.
“Of sorts, yes,” Leela said, fidgeting with her shirt. She glanced at the mysterious rock in the middle of the conflicting groups. “What is that?”
“Ah, the elixir of immortality. The thing the Flames have fought over for generations.”
Leela frowned. “Don’t Flames live forever anyway?”
Iravan barked in laughter, holding his stomach. “Oh, you are still so very new to this, aren’t you?”
Heat rushed to Leela’s cheeks, and she glanced out the window. “I am aware.”
Iravan slapped her shoulder. “I’ll show you the library later, and we can talk about history.”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Eventually, Iravan found an unoccupied room and flopped on the bed. His messy curls hung over his warm brown eyes as he cradled his sore leg between his fingers.
Leela entered the lavish room with the finest oak furniture.
Wooden cupboards stood against the wall beside a mirror, which reflected how messy she looked.
How could they have possibly carried it all and decorated the place?
Especially given the tiny tunnels and passageways.
She was exhausted just from walking, let alone having to carry furniture.
“Enjoying the walk so far?” Iravan asked.
“It’s all so…” Leela glanced over the room, trying to soak it all in.
Curtains hung against the window, curbing the heat from rising in the room. Even the cupboards were decorated with beautiful designs.
“Pretty?”
“A lot,” Leela corrected. “Today has been a lot.”
Iravan sighed. “Yeah, I can only imagine seeing your ex-fiancé, who you thought was dead, alive and well.”
Leela’s chest tightened. She leaned against the wall and looked at Iravan as the candlelight cast shadows along his elongated jaw. There was nothing strange about his shadow, at least she knew he wasn’t a Vessel too.
“How did it happen?” Leela asked. “How did he become the Scorpion?”
Iravan bowed his head with a nervous chuckle. “I don’t know if I can tell you that, Lee. It’s not my story to tell. Well, it sort of is but isn’t. Anyway. You’ll have to ask him.”
“He won’t even look at me.” Leela crossed her arms and glanced at her feet, now dyed red from the cave walls she walked.
“You won’t even say his name,” Iravan pointed out.
She gave him a look, one of irritation.
He grinned, smug. “Am I wrong?”
“No.”
“I mean, I understand why.” Iravan rubbed the top of his cane, carved into the tip of the end of a scorpion tail. “He was distraught about you as, I am sure, you were about him.”
She wondered if Rajesh had told his brother about their last conversation. How she had snuck out with him to talk, and was then left heartbroken? She assumed Rajesh hadn’t. He wasn’t ever one to talk about those things with his family.
Leela was the one he spoke to. The one who listened without judgment. Yet when Leela looked at Rajesh now, he was so distant she wasn’t sure she actually ever knew him.
“I’m still processing it all,” Leela whispered. It was the only thing she could say. “Besides, he’s changed.”
“As have you. You got hotter.”
Leela didn’t bother with a comeback. Most of Iravan’s flirtatious remarks weren’t serious, and she’d never bothered to react. It was always Anika who giggled like a little girl and played along.
“You’ve got your thinking face on,” Iravan said, putting his arms behind his head and leaning back against the pillows. “What are you thinking?”
Leela’s heart throbbed. “Anika.”
Iravan stiffened. “Yes… Well…”
“What happened? After the attack? How did you all survive?” Leela asked. “The last thing I remember was Rajesh dead at the base of a dune, and you… well, you were trapped under the rubble.”
Iravan rubbed the back of his head. “From our point of view, everything was destroyed. The lustisha had ruined the wall, and the drakion were able to run free. I don’t remember a lot because I’ve suppressed a lot of it, but, well, I remember my mother running to me and pulling me from the wreckage before she dragged me over the dunes.
My leg was pretty fucked, and I’ve obviously never fully recovered. ”
Leela looked at the cane as Iravan twirled it between his fingers. The golden scorpion tail glinted under the light, and she felt a swell of pity churn her gut. “I’m sorry.”
“For what? You didn’t break my leg.”
“I know. It’s just something people say, right?”
Iravan chuckled. “Still as nervous and awkward as ever.”
Leela looked at him in exasperation. “You are still impossible to deal with.”
“I never said I changed on the inside, Lee.”
“I don’t know; six years is a long time.”
“You tell me.” Iravan leaned back on his arms and swung his cane. “Say, what happened to you these past few years?”
Leela didn’t really want to get into the logistics of how her life turned out after the attack. “Not a lot really.”
Iravan smirked. “Try me. Were you always in the palace?”
Leela opened her mouth to respond, but was thankful when her stomach grumbled.
Iravan raised a brow. “A bit hungry?”
“Maybe,” Leela said. She’d barely thought of food since this morning. How could she with the experiences she’d had?
“Come on,” Iravan said, standing. “Let’s feed the beast before she pounces.”
Leela twirled the orange spiky fruit in her hand. She had no idea what she was looking at, but it smelled like an instant toothache.
Iravan sat beside her in what she found to be a giant dining room, with candle chandeliers hanging from the ceiling.
Light from the flames licked the walls, almost igniting them enough into a steady stream of sunlight.
The hall stretched wide, tables dividing the room into sections.
Chatter blended with laughter and hollers as people played dice games or sat and ate.
Silver bowls of fruit and vegetables sat against the wall, and an unlit brick firepit circled by more chairs took up the center of the room.
“Eat it,” Iravan said with a mouthful of the orange fruit. A bloody red juice ran down his fingers and covered his mouth, which made him look like he was bleeding instead of eating. “It’s honestly amazing.”
“It looks…”
“Disgusting, I know,” Iravan said, waving her off. “But taste it. The bloodfruit is tasty once you eat it.”
Leela shrugged. She flattened the spikes and bit into the soft skin. A surprising stickiness stuck to the roof of her mouth, and a sweetness blossomed.
Her eyes widened.
“Oh, wow.” She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, which a smear of red now covered.
“See?” he said. “We grow our own fruit and vegetables here. Anything that can survive the heat, that is.”
“How did you make this?”
Iravan shrugged. “The farmers have their way, and we never question it. We have the best cooks here, though. We all share two meals a day, typically in the afternoon and evening.”
“Why only two?”
“Because the Gilded Thorns are mostly hunting.”
“Gilded Thorns?”
“Soldiers,” Iravan explained. “They go out and hunt the monsters. Some sail the dunes for weeks or months. Or others go out on expeditions and make sure the villagers are safe. Whatever the kingdom wants from us, really.”
“So this is all supplied by Nihikia?” Leela glanced at the uniforms the Gilded Thorns wore: a simple black shirt with golden embellishments and loose, black pants. Others wore an assortment of colors.
Iravan nodded. “The kingdom expects the soldiers to venture out and hunt the monsters. They supply all this in return.” He spread his arms to indicate the expansive den.
“Plus, the sandships that sail over the sand. Our weapons and artillery. Makes you realize why people would become a Vessel, right?”
Leela swallowed the fruit, questions burning at the edge of her tongue. “I don’t understand why anyone would want to become a Vessel.”
“There are some benefits to becoming a Vessel and fighting for the kingdom—money mostly. Power. Fame. Once you’ve done your training for three years. Then they go through this ritual and, well, as you might know, not everyone survives.”
Leela’s stomach churned. “I assume there’s a reason not everyone survives?”
“The Flames are as fickle and as picky as mortals, so sometimes, when they realize the mortal isn’t the right Vessel they can… well—” Iravan made a sliding motion across his neck.
“And the Flame?”
“They find a suitable match within their vicinity if they can leave the body before it dies and find another Vessel.”
She nodded, as if she understood. “What—?”
“Oh wow!” a woman squealed.