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Kiira pulled my focus away from our injured friend. “The Fates also chose you. We will use that.”
“So what comes first?” Maariya asked.
“I think the removal of veils is a solid start. It will be a shock after so long with them, but seeing us again will aid in the rest…whenever we can agree with the Kral on what that is.” Kiira let out a long sigh, the weight of her task bringing her shoulders inward.
“Why wait for him?” I questioned. With his recent attitude, I didn’t think he’d ever come around to such a change.
Kiira’s answering grin pulled a mirror one to my lips. “You’re right, Assyria. Sometimes it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission.”
An echo to the time she’d snuck me out of Rokath’s room at Gyor Palace surfaced. That was when I’d decided I really liked Kiira.
“Are you going to leave us when the Kral returns to Uzhhorod, Kiira?” Vokkia asked, tentative sorrow in her tone.
“No,” she said with enough conviction my eyebrow twitched up. “I can still work from here, though it will take longer having to send ravens so far south.”
“We will help however we can. We may be learning to wield weapons and honing our magic, but that does not mean we have fully abandoned our other duties,” Maariya said, adjusting her wet hair over her other shoulder.
“I will send a raven to my flock tomorrow, informing them that they no longer have to hide themselves beneath sheer veils,” Izze
“As will I,” Vokkia stated, lifting her chin.
Kiira softened and squeezed her priestess’ arms in turn. “Thank you both. We don’t want to rush everything too quickly. Each small change will take time to adjust. I appreciate all of your support thus far and everything I know you’ll give in the future.”
Solidarity. That was what this was. Females coming together to create change that would benefit us all.
“And I appreciate you all volunteering your lives for the army.” My throat thickened because the reality was that these three, the others tucked away in their bunks further back and down below…not all of them would survive.
Kiira knocked her shoulder into mine, and I offered her a sad smile.
“We are the first, but we certainly won’t be the last,” Maariya swore. Then, her maroon eyes danced with an idea. “We should mark ourselves. Show the world who we are. Assyria is already our symbol for hope. What better way to honor her courage than to ink it into our skin?”
Before I could protest that I needed no such veneration, Vokkia clapped her hands, excitement curving her lips upward. Izze
Delight danced in Kiira’s expression. “This is what we need,” she said under her breath.
I knew that on an intellectual level, Rokath and I were supposed to become a myth unto ourselves. But this?
I wasn’t worthy.
Izze
My breath caught.
An eye, open to the world, greeted us. Instead of a colored iris at the center, a blooming rose waited. Sharp points speared from the top and bottom, almost like twin daggers.
“For the eyes of devious burgundy that Kiira saw,” Izze
Tears pricked the back of my nose, and I had to press my lips together to hold back a joyful sob. “It’s perfect.”
Izze
I nodded, and the others murmured their assent.
“How will we mark ourselves with it though?” I asked, the H’s carved into my wrists aching at the thought.
Vokkia giggled and yanked up her sleeve, revealing swirls of ink so much like Rokath’s. “I gave these to myself during one of my rebellious periods before I became a priestess. All I need is a needle, ink, and silver. All of which I happen to have in my bag.”
She went to fetch it while Maariya gathered clean cloths and a basin of water.
“Assyria should go first. It is in her honor after all,” Vokkia a
“Where should I put it?” I asked her. Rokath had tattoos everywhere. Other than the perfect circle between my shoulder blades and his initial on my wrists, my skin was unmarred.
“Your forearm, I think,” Vokkia said.
I shrugged off my jacket and then settled beside her, arm outstretched. She wiped my skin clean, lingering on the H on my wrist. Rather than shame rising, pride bloomed. Rokath had claimed me as his long before either of us consciously wanted it. And now, I wouldn’t change that moment for anything.
Vokkia dipped the needle into the ink and silver mixture, then poked it into my skin. I hissed at the first intrusion, but she worked quickly, and soon, the pain dulled. We fell into further conversation about the war, combat skills, magic wielding, and of course, the males. I forgot she was working at all until she pronounced my tattoo finished.
With a final wipe of cloth on my arm, she revealed the design Izze
Vokkia beamed at me. “Anything for you, Assyria.”
Kiira went after me, and once we had our matching symbols on our forearms, we admired them together. Those tattered pieces of my heart stitched together at the sight. Especially as Izze
“This is only the begi
“I couldn’t do any of this without you,” I whispered back, vision blurring. We embraced, and she smelled of moon lotus and lavender—the floral scents drawing my days of tending to a garden to the surface.
How far I’d come, how much I’d changed since then.
When we broke apart, each of us had to dry our tears.
“Assyria and I had better return to our rooms before we’re missed. And before these are noticed.” She gestured to our now-empty glasses and bottles. “We’ll sneak back tomorrow to see everyone’s tattoos.”
Maariya packed up everything for us, and with aching limbs, I rose from my place on the couch. Stretching my arms overhead, I bent from side to side, trying to work out the soreness creeping in.
With warm embraces, we said our goodbyes, and then Kiira and I slunk out of the barracks under the cover of darkness. We dropped our basket off with the final kitchen worker before navigating the maze of halls to the two rear towers where our rooms awaited us.
At the door, I let out a long sigh, preparing to brace for the climb.
“Will you join me in my room for a moment?” Kiira asked, shifting her weight.
“Of course,” I told her, my curiosity piqued.
What could she possibly want this late?
Without another word, she disappeared through the arched entry to Xa
What did she know that I did not?
Suspicion twisted my gut, and I remained still and silent, waiting for her next move. A few moments passed with no sound, and finally she stepped away from the door.
“I need to talk to you,” she said, aiming for one of the plush seats in a ring by the windows.
Yet when she settled herself in it, she fidgeted, not quite able to get comfortable. On hesitant feet, I approached, easing into one beside her. I crossed my legs over one another and twisted my ring around my finger, wondering what had the High Priestess so agitated.
“Is everything okay?” I ventured, hoping to prompt her into speaking.
“Well…no.” She looked at her hands, shoulders slumping inward. “Do you remember our first solo conversation?”
“When we were in the garden?” I clarified. She nodded. “I do.” We’d talked about why I didn’t want to be a priestess, the pain I’d endured at the hands of my dead husband, and my future in the Demon Realm. She’d promised to find out information about Olrus…
My throat thickened at the thought of my friend, burned for protecting my secret. That also reminded me of Izgath, and another wave of guilt swept up from the deep.
“Did you not tell me everything in your letter?” I choked out.
She whipped her head up, concern etching her face. “Fates, no, this isn’t about you. I’m sorry, I should have clarified. It’s about…me.”
Relief washed through me before my mind caught up to Kiira’s words and worry replaced it. “Has something happened?”
She swallowed hard, burgundy eyes growing glassy. She looked up to the ceiling and dragged in a serrated breath. “It was so much easier to ignore it, you know?”
“Kiira…” I breathed, my voice softening with sorrow.
“I haven’t told Rokath and Xa
“Do you want to tell me what happened?” I asked, closing the distance between us.
“I think I need to talk about it with someone who understands,” she murmured, her voice barely more than a whisper.
“I’m here,” I promised her, rubbing soothing strokes over her forearm with my thumb.
“You won’t know him, but he’s one of the more prominent nobles in the realm. He holds a lot of sway with the others, and he produces much of what we need in the realm.” She paused, fingers digging into the tops of her thighs. “Why did I drink what he offered me?” Her voice cracked on that question, and she folded in on herself, burying her face in her hands. Sobs wracked her frame, and I moved my ministrations to her back. Letting her know I was there. That I saw her pain.
“I thought Xa
“Why would he not?” I asked.
“The male who raped me helped us build all of this,” she replied. “We couldn’t have done it without him, Assyria. We knew it was a risk…”
She straightened, but I didn’t release her. She needed to know that there was nothing wrong with her. That I didn’t view her differently for what had happened to her. To me. “And you’re worried that Xa
“Yes,” Kiira breathed, her voice haunted.