Page 34

Malia

After I reported back to my parents, I went straight to my room, my mind still reeling from today’s mission.

My parents, furious as they were about their failed plans, didn’t take it out on me which only worries me more.

It feels like the quiet before the storm. If they knew that I helped our enemies- I don’t want to think about that.

Why did I help the enemy? It seems unbelievably stupid now, but when I saw one of our soldiers standing over Keahi, his sword raised in what should have been a killing blow, and Keahi just kneeling there as if accepting his fate, something in me snapped.

I am not done with him yet.

He doesn’t get the easy way out. Not if I have any say in it.

It was somewhat of an instinctual reaction.

One that hopefully won’t come back to bite me.

How would they ever know? No one saw me interfere. At least I think so. The fight was so messy, no one quite managing to get the upper hand while the truck kept moving.

And I was shot.

I still can’t believe I let that happen.

With only two guards to fight at the same time, I should have been able to take them out. My father often makes me duel several opponents at once to prepare me for a fight like that, and yet I found myself with another hole in the stomach. Stupid slip-up. Good thing I’ve learned how to treat simple wounds as such since the last time I was shot. I just can’t quite get Keahi’s expression when he saw me out of my head.

I got a bad case of déjà-vu and I didn’t like the swarm of feelings it awoke.

I snap out of my thoughts when loud voices reach me through the muddied walls.

Dread fills every pore of me as I recognize two of them, my parents.

There’s a second of silence, then my door slams open and my parents, along with another man, enter. It’s the man that I knocked out to save Keahi. No. He couldn’t possibly know it was me.

"Malia,” my father starts, his voice unreadable.

“Edan here was just telling us his report of the mission.

There was one detail that’s rather enlightening. He says he was about to put down a young guard but mysteriously passed out before his strike could land true. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

I rise to my feet, trying to appear confident and cold.

The perfect stoic weapon.

“No, sir. I was busy fending off several opponents, then later on tending to a wound. I didn’t note anything out of the ordinary. Otherwise, it would have been in my report.”

“Funny.

It’s just that I went asking around and Avel, you remember him from your last mission, don’t you? He told me that you were very insistent on taking care of the guard Arcane sent by yourself while they went ahead, but there was no body left behind at the end of the night.

Avel’s description of the man matched Edan’s, and it’s got me wondering. Young guard, roughly your age, and he’s appeared in two out of your three missions, both of which he survived unscathed when he wasn’t supposed to.”

I open my mouth to protest, but my father’s hand strikes out and wraps around my throat before I can utter a word.

I snap my jaw shut, focused on not letting an ounce of fear enter my eyes.

Even as he cuts off my blood flow and the pressure in my head grows, I stay still.

“I know he was with you at the academy.

Don’t play me for a fool, child.

This is the second time your ties to that wretched school have impaired your judgement and jeopardized a mission.” He releases me from his hold as quickly as he grabbed me and his words are calm again as he goes on, “You’re overdue a training session if you can’t beat two measly Arcanians. After that, we’ll finish this conversation.”

He turns around and walks ahead, trusting me to follow like a good little druid.

I ignore my mother and the seething man at her side as I leave my room behind.

We walk through half the camp, cross the training area, and stop near a small group of soldiers clearly waiting for my father. He must have already had all of this prepared before he came to see me. I get the feeling this isn’t like my usual trainings.

I halt at my old man’s side, facing the collection of his fighters as his heavy hand settles on my shoulder.

No matter how hard I try to squash it, there’s always the urge to flinch away from his touch.

I can never shake it, the chills that arise, but I sure fight my reaction so it’s nothing palpable to the man himself.

“Since it has been a while since you’ve overpowered my daughter, I’ve decided to give you an advantage,” he addresses his soldiers, and I hate the sound of him calling me his daughter.

“That is, another one on top of your outnumbering her.

You all recognize this." He lifts a syringe in the air, filled with a yellowish liquid. Cobratoxin, a neurotoxin that is often used to paralyze hostages for fun and giggles. Earth or air handlers could easily paralyze them with one aspect of their powers or another, but the toxin is proven to be hard to heal even by the most specialized healers, so the long-lasting effects work to the Fraction’s advantage.

My stomach twists.

I’m far from being an experienced healer, especially when it comes to poisons.

Having to fend off several Shadow Handlers while simultaneously fighting the effects of the Cobratoxin? I was right, this isn’t like our usual practices. This is my father giving his soldiers the okay to rough me up before he takes over the punishment for my disobedience.

His hand leaves my shoulder as he uncaps the syringe.

The vial isn’t filled with the same amount of poison as it would be if I were an enemy to restrain, just enough to slow me down as my body fights an internal battle as well as an external one against eight fully grown men.

My father pulls back the black opaque fabric of my uniform to reveal a sliver of skin on my wrist to insert the needle. I don’t react as the first effects show and my eyelids try to droop. I fight it, and the small muscles start twitching.

The looks my opponents regard me with tell me just how deranged I must appear to them right now.

They look at me with varied degrees of apprehension and unease, though they try to hide it behind puffed up chests and balled fists.

Meanwhile I make sure my eyes are the picture of lunacy beneath the ever twitching eyelids.

Maybe I can do this.

Maybe I can fend them off.

Is that even the best possible outcome? Perhaps being taken out here quickly would be a small mercy in the face of the “talk” my father mentioned is to follow this exercise.

I’ll need my strength for that.

Damn Keahi.

Damn Dustin.

I have been fine for two years. Sure, I was living with people I despise, had to do my parents’ bidding, and slept on the floor, but I was no longer being intentionally hurt outside of training. It was fine. Now, it feels like I’ve moved five steps back.

I don’t want to be back here with my parents distrusting me, torturing me.

The muscles in my neck start cramping next, and I finally step up front and get into position.

I need to stop this downward spiral.

One step at a time. I need to focus on getting through this exercise. Nothing else. I take a steadying breath.

The neurotoxin spreads to my respiratory muscles, still not diminished by my attempts to heal myself, and it becomes hard to breathe.

It’s enough to make me sluggish as one of the men swings at me with surprising agility considering his size.

His beefy knuckles graze my chin as I dodge, rolling off to the side, but he’s strong enough to make even that failed attempt sting.

I grit my teeth and get back to my feet just in time see the earth handler molding compact dirt bullets.

They hover in the air for a beat before they come flying at me, their speed impossibly accelerated with the help of the air handler of the group.

Oh fuck no.

Not again.

A frothing wave of inky black water rises between me and the attacker, creating a thick wall that I quickly freeze.

Usually, the water in its liquid state is enough to fend off attacks, but considering the speed at which the bullets are coming at me, it’s better to be safe.

The impact of the dirt hitting my ice is accentuated by three dull pops, and once I know the attack is over, I manipulate my wall to flick off razor sharp plates of ice in the direction of the earth bender. I miscalculate my strength, though, and the ice drops onto the trampled ground inches in front of its target. The earth handler quirks an eyebrow at me, clearly mocking.

He comes swinging at me while the air handler tries to manipulate the oxygen that I breath, singing in my head to just stand there and take it.

My head becomes fuzzy, partly thanks to the manipulation and partly due to the toxin numbing my senses.

I try to fight it, try to blink my sight into focus and refuse the air handler, but I’m not fast enough.

Heavy knuckles collide with my cheek, making my head swim as I fall to the ground.

Someone’s boot collides with my ribs next, and while my mind fires off the command to get back to my feet, roll it off or find some way to fight back, I can feel my body obeying someone else’s orders as I kneel in the dirt.

Fuck. No.

I don’t kneel for anyone.

Not now, not ever.

I just need this damned air handler out of my head. Two burning hands grip each of my shoulder, demanding all my focus. Fire handler. Just what I needed. I focus on the pain, on the smell of my burning flesh in the air rather than the sweet, sweet pheromones. My vision clears, and I find myself face-to-face with the handler currently marking my arms with his handprints.

I bring my head forward and break his nose with a satisfying crunch.

He curses in pain, and it makes the throbbing of my forehead so worth it.

When he releases me to cup his bleeding nose, I reach forward and punch him in the same spot again. This time, he howls and starts crawling away. I smile underneath my mask, even as the agony in my burned arms registers and the effects of the neurotoxin spreads through my body. My limbs are impossibly heavy, and I don’t have the will to try and fight it.

I put on a poker face, staring the man coming forward down as if I were preparing to manipulate him.

His roundhouse kick collides with the side of my head and the sweet, sweet relief of endless darkness pulls me under before my body hits the ground.

I wake up strapped to a familiar chair made of rusty nails and bloody restraints.

I come to slowly, but when my father says, "You seem so fond of fire, maybe we should change that, " his words break through to me.

My vision zeroes in on him, then the woman standing to his right.

She steps closer, and I feel my eyes widen. My parents normally don’t need help torturing me, so this can’t be good.

“Hey sweetie,” the woman says as she presses a hand on each of my arms, a sweet lilt to her voice that doesn’t match the occasion.

She’s sick.

They’re all sick.

She smiles as her hands slowly get warmer, so terribly slowly.

They want me to dread it before I feel it and I hate that it works.

For years, I’ve my father mutilated my legs, then my stomach when he ran out of place. He was careful to keep his attacks limited to the places where no one would see when I attended one of their stuffy balls. Everywhere a long gown would hide it.

Now, they’ve moved up to my arms.

What does that mean? Are they done with me? Or do they plan on healing it like nothing has ever happened?

My thoughts trail down the rabbit hole and I’m too weak to stop it.

Only the insistent pain in my arms keeps me tethered to this place.

I bite the insides of my cheek as she gradually burns me harder. I want to scream, but I can’t. I learned a while ago not to show my pain. If I do, I am weak and get punished more. If I don’t, they continue until my body gives out. It’s inevitable.

This is because of Keahi.

All because of him.

I had to save him again and look where it got me again. Back in this dark room, on this chair of nightmares. He will pay. I have to hang on for just a little longer, a little more, and then he will pay. If only they don’t kill me just yet.

The smell of burnt skin reaches my nose and I want to retch.

I can feel the handler burning through each layer of skin and muscle tissue individually until I can barely keep myself from writhing underneath her touch.

Not that the restraints grant me much room for that anyway, but I need to do something. Anything to get away.

"That’s what happens when you choose the fire," my father hisses, and I want to scream.

Scream at the top of my lungs until my throat is raw and my ears bleeding.

Scream at the injustice of this and scream away the pain. Until I can’t feel these burns and smell this scent anymore. Until I’m gone because I’d take anything over this.

"Traitor," my mother adds, and the stranger’s hands suddenly turn impossibly hotter.

"I didn’t!" I finally give in and cry out.

"Please!" I shriek.

The pain doesn’t stop. Not until I black out.

I gladly give into the darkness, hoping I would never have to wake up again but knowing that I will.

And knowing that my punishment is not done yet either.

All because of him

I wake up to my parents’ voices.

The stranger is gone but the pain she caused me is just as present.

"Won’t you look at that," my mother huffs once she sees me while my father steps to my side.

"Make sure it’s high enough to be covered inconspicuously.

The chances of her getting picked by someone are slim enough as it is," she tells him. I feel a cold blade grazing my shoulder a moment later.

My father pushes the knife a few inches into my flesh, and I bite down on the already-bleeding inside of my cheeks.

He moves the blade a few inches down before pulling it out with a nauseating slick noise.

I stay silent and still even as I feel my warm blood run along my arm and covering the chair beneath me.

He walks to my other side and cuts me again.

This time, he keeps the knife still in my wound while he hisses something in my ear.

"You are lucky we’re attending that ball in two days.

We won’t be the next time you step out of line." He rips the knife out of my flesh and leaves the room with my mother right behind him.

Only once the door slams shut behind them, does a small whimper escape me. More blood drips everywhere and I can’t get away or treat it. Not that they would allow me to heal it before they say so specifically, but maybe at least clean it.

The cuts are placed just where the sleeves of my dress will cover them up.

As my father said, there will be a ball in two days that I have to attend, and appearances are everything.

I’ve been released out of the cell this morning and am now in my room.

I washed the dried blood off my skin and cleaned my wounds as well as I still could.

My mother then healed the burns on my arms entirely and the cuts on my shoulders just enough so they won’t bleed all over my dress when I have to dance this evening.

Because that would just be a bummer.

Never mind that the entire camp must know what my parents have been doing to me.

I screamed so loudly when I first arrived here. But stars-forbid there’s a visible indication of the harm they’ve caused, especially at their beloved ball.

The Dark Fraction likes to organize fancy parties to show off.

They organize it like ordinary people, using weddings or other events as a cover to get the venue.

This is the first ball I am allowed – or forced to go to and my parents have made it clear that it’s a very big deal. Apparently, everyone dances and mingles so the eligible men can choose a bride by the end of the month.

I hate how this Fraction is stuck in some past century in more aspects than their torture methods.

When my mother initially told me about the reason for this ball and my attendance, I wanted to yell, I’m sorry but the men pick themselves a wife? Of course, I said nothing.

She thinks the chances of me getting picked are small, and I sure hope she is right.

I won’t marry anyone, no matter what, but not getting picked at all might be the one way out for me that doesn’t include another stay in the cell.

I shudder at the thought, then push it far down the back of my mind like every memory of ever being in there.

Once I’m ready wearing the gown my mother picked, I meet my parents at the agreed place and follow them to a beautiful mansion, trailing behind them to draw as little attention to me as possible.

While the neckline of my dress is relatively modest, I feel exposed with my arms and face revealed like they have never been around people from the fraction.

I know they are noticing it too. Try as I might to ignore the stares, I can feel their unwanted gazes on me like a hot rash.

I wish I didn’t have to be here, but sadly, acting like my parents’ little lap dog consists of more than just fighting for them.

The venue is on a nearby hill, far away from the city, and it looks like something a royal family would live in.

It’s about as extraordinary as would be expected from the Dark Fraction, all paid for with stolen money.

Before we reach the stairs leading to the entry, my mother whirls on me.

"Here,” she says and gruffly hands me a black masquerade mask.

It’s intricate and feels precious in my hands, the metal shaped into what looks like vines dancing around the holes meant for my eyes. I take it even though it comes as a surprise. I haven’t been told that it is a masquerade ball. I feel like it objects to the whole point of getting to know each other.

Not that I’m complaining.

I’ll take anything, whittle as it may be, to feel more covered.

I put my mask on, and the three of us start walking up the stairs.

People in beautiful gowns and tuxedos are conversing around the entrance or walking in the hallways around us.

They look happy, if still uptight. Almost normal. Those that notice us, turn to stare, and it’s almost comical how my parents walk by with their noses up in the air, too snooty to greet anyone.

We turn a corner and are greeted by an enormous hall.

The space is all cleared, except for the mass of people, to make space for dancing.

There are beige marble floors, polished to perfection, and tall walls topped off with a domed ceiling. Along the western wall, large windows rise from floor to ceiling to show off a beautiful lawn with a few statues and trimmed bushes outside.

The sun has already set, and the crystal chandeliers above spread a warm glow over the room.

If you look past who these people in the flashy gowns conversing in this flashy manor are, it might look like a scene from a fairytale.

At the far end of the hall, there’s a band with some kids playing near them.

I wasn’t expecting kids to be here, and I realize it’s the first time I see anyone from the Dark Fraction play.

In the rare occasion that I saw someone younger than me at the camp, they were always practicing, their faces set in indifferent masks mimicking their parents.

"We are going to talk to some of the other parents, be pleasant, and don’t mess this up," my mother threatens from the corner of her mouth, even as her face is pulled in what might be a smile.

It looks unnatural on her face, more like a grimace than anything else.

I nod and watch them disappear. Only then do I release the first deep breath since I met up with them. I start scanning my surroundings, looking for a corner to hide in for the rest of the evening, preferably. Nope, too many people. Maybe if I pretend to walk outside and just hide behind one of those lavish curtains-

"May I have this dance?" a man interrupts my train of thought.

At least ten snappy retorts and five ways to reject him cross my mind at once, but I bite my tongue.

Think of the cell. You don’t want to go back to the cell. I silently hold out my hand for him to take. Anything is better than being locked back into that damned cell, even dancing with the devil.

My appointed dance partner smiles, showing off dimples while his thin lips stretch over straight white teeth.

Stars, he’s polished.

His blonde hair looks golden thanks to the light above, and with that trained pleasant expression on his face, he could almost come across as charming.

The stranger pulls me onto the dance floor and places one hand on my waist while the other holds on to mine.

I have no idea how to dance but he takes the lead and I try my best to mimic the twirling women around us.

"My name is Seraphin," he tells me a few steps in, the smile steadfast on his face.

"Malia." I try to return the gesture but barely manage a grimace.

"You have the most breathtaking eyes, Malia." Right.

I cringe and avert said eyes to the ground since no friendly reply comes to my mind only to feel his grip on my waist tighten in warning.

I take a deep breath to calm the indignation inside me and obey to his silent command, smiling up at him.

"Thank you," I say in an awfully high-pitched voice.

Not that he’d know that something about it was off, seeing as he’s never heard me speak before.

No one here has. Just the way I like it.

I don’t try to make conversation and after a few more unrequited tries, Seraphin gives up too.

In silence, twirling and stumbling awkwardly, the song seems to go on for forever.

As soon as the last tune ends, I walk away from Seraphin with an awkward nod goodbye.

I intend to distance myself from the crowd like I’d planned from the beginning, but it is hard to see where I’m going with the gowns flowing over every inch of the marble floor to the beats of a new song.

My gaze is focused on the way ahead of me when my wrist is grabbed from behind and I am whirled around.

My hands end up on a man’s chiseled chest while his encircle my waist, and before I get a glance at his face, he lowers it so that his mouth is next to my ear.

“You wouldn’t be sneaking off without granting me one dance, would you?”

I whip back to look up at a pair of dark brown eyes, and my heart skips a beat trying to pump the blood that’s now frozen in my veins.

How on earth is that even possible? I ask myself swiftly followed by, So, I saved him only so he could go on a suicide mission in the same week.