Page 9 of Above (Darkness Reigns #1)

I couldn’t blame them, even if I wanted to. I knew it was hard. Painful. Exhausting. So many things. Sometimes I wished I was strong enough to let them go. Most of the time I was too selfish to even consider it.

Without so much as another word, we all stirred into action. I busied myself with closing all the curtains and fastening the locks on each window, being sure to will a little magic into the glass so it wouldn’t break. What Dad and Mama didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.

Celeste hurried to restock and organize, her artist’s fingers precise and nimble. All the while, Mama prepared Dad and emptied the coin box.

Sometimes the protests were peaceful, as the demonstrators preferred. Other times the officials came eager to incite violence.

Officials were meant to be tasked with maintaining law and order. A position that could only be held by shaytan despite the fact they were meant to report directly to the king, not the core families.

Long ago, the original cores had made an agreement with the then king—no one in the royal blood line was allowed to ask for magic, and in turn the shaytan would never attempt to conquer.

The king had sole rule over all, but the shaytan would lead the military.

While shaytan fell under the rule of King Amori, the core families formed a council that seemed to be our true leaders.

And with shaytan being officials, we seemed to also run the districts.

Those who police the people, control the people.

Even worse, the officials didn’t require any education.

Such a job should, but it didn’t. All they had to do was complete the mandatory shaytan training we all went through after being gifted our magic.

It was a one month long exhausting experience, but it didn’t do much for educating.

That was why we had officials with less knowledge of our laws than many eadi.

So when eadi protested for their rights, begging for equal treatment and a chance at survival, many uneducated officials used it as a chance to attack. Any eadi near a protest was free game. Honestly, even I was fair game. I was of eadi after all.

The only thing the purists hated more than eadi were the shaytan born from them.

As if we weren’t all born magicless— equal.

That was the thing with equality though; it bred resentment amongst the entitled, which eventually fostered division.

Sometimes I wondered if the purists were right. If maybe dividing us completely was just better. Safer. Easier.

With that disgusting thought echoing in my mind and causing guilt to fill me like a well, I tightened the last lock, willed a ward onto the glass to make it hold overnight, and dashed to the door where Mama was wrapping a scarf around Dad’s neck.

“We took too long, we need to be prepared for whatever might come,” Mama hissed between clenched teeth. While they refused to let me help with my magic, I wouldn’t let them stop me from defending them. The stars blessed me with a way to save us if needed, and I would do just that.

“That won’t be necessary, Mama, we’ll be fine,” Celeste insisted as she pushed open the wooden door.

We all filed out, our heads down and eyes averted. Around us were eadi seemingly doing nothing. They were not speaking or moving. None of them shopped or browsed. They all simply stood. Waiting for the clock to chime upon the hour.

“Keep moving and do not make a single noise,” I ordered, taking on my role as the protector of our family even if none of them liked it.

Each of them let their heads tuck further, but I lifted my gaze, eyeing every protestor around us.

At any moment they could decide that they wanted to start early.

But of course, it was the mere sight of Dad that had them frothing at the mouth.

“You deserve to walk,” a woman said from where she stood against a brick building on our right.

Dad ignored her, but that one statement was enough to get her started.

She bent down, picked up a sign from the ground, shoved it into the air, and began screaming.

“We’re all born eadi! We all rot eadi! We’re all eadi! ”

Shit.

I shoved forward faster, cringing as the crowd started to converge. That one protestor was enough to spark everyone into action minutes early. Still, she was by far the loudest.

“Who will farm the ground when you’ve buried us within it?” she screamed. “Who will clean the floors when you’ve poured our blood upon them? Who will mine the coal when you’ve used it all to burn us?”

“If we die, so do you!” the others chanted in an ominous, low tone as she continued.

“Move!” I shouted to Celeste, who stared on in what looked like awe at the eadi as she began to climb on top of a cart, her sign facing us as she did.

Even the stars can’t save you if you kill us all .

Not willing to see the force that the officials would use to stifle this type of fiery resistance, I grabbed Celeste by her collar and pushed my hips into Dad’s chair, compelling them to move until we broke free of the mass of bodies.

“You can let me go now,” Celeste huffed as she shoved my arm away from her. A growl of fury rumbled in my chest, and I couldn’t stop myself from steering Dad around a corner and rounding on her.

“Apologies for saving our asses! Stars above, Celeste, why would you stand there like that? You could’ve died! The officials are probably already on their way!”

“Maybe dying would be better than this sad excuse for living. At least then I’d be able to say I did more than watch while you shaytan destroyed everything!” With that, Celeste shouldered past me and moved to Dad, guiding him further down the alley and towards our neighborhood.

For a moment, I was too shocked to so much as blink. You shaytan?

Celeste never grouped me in with the shaytan, especially not when she was furious at the core families and their endless desire to purify the magical community. Without fail, she always saw me for who I was. But just then, seemingly unprovoked, she turned on me. She blamed me.

“Don’t worry too much, Starlight. We know you’re different.

” Mama wrapped one of her arms around my waist, tugging me in for a quick hug.

Every ounce of my willpower was needed to hug her back, because, despite how much it hurt to have Celeste accuse me in such a way, there was an awful reality to it.

Mama let me go before pursing her lips and turning to head the same direction Celeste and Dad went.

I didn’t move, though Mama’s words seemed to repeat in my head and will me into action. I was too caught up in my newest discovery. This one about myself for once.

I didn’t think I wanted to be different.

That’s what I always was. Different than the eadi. Different than the shaytan. Something other and alone.

No, I didn’t want to be different. I quite truthfully just wanted to be the same.

Behind me, I heard someone shout, “Shaytan!”

Just as I turned to see if the officials had come, I was met with a fist to the chest. Air whooshed out of me. Breath evaded me. Bending in half, I silently begged my lungs to work.

“Filthy magical scum,” he hissed. I looked up just in time to feel his spit spray down upon me. “Your kind deserves to rot for how you treat us eadi!”

On my birthday? Really?

With little care for anything in the world at that moment, I stood up, summoned magic to my hand, and swung at him.

The moment my gloved fist met the eadi’s chest, a burst of light exploded into the air.

Screams ricocheted off the towering brick buildings as the man flew through the air.

I wasted no time on gloating as I turned and ran toward my family.

Fuck him. Fuck everyone.