I blink once. Twice. I curl my fingers around her throat—loosely. My grip limp and weak. “You could have saved me—,”
And light explodes onto my back as the door behind me is shoved open.
“Kokoros—Oboro?! Oh gods—,” Rushed footsteps—
And I bring my hands from her throat—grinding my teeth, my jaw aching from the slap as pain erupts behind my eyes. As the headache worsens and worsens—and red becomes my vision. Bright scarlet—I curl my fist.
“Get off—,”
Hue's voice as my first rises—soars towards her and she's just staring at it. Daring me to ram it into her eyeball and in moments, I'm seeing the flash of her hand. A small black purse—her worried face. Her sad, dejected, face as she ushers me off. Never wanting to do it. Never wanting to see me go.
My fist stops. Halfway. Almost there.
I could do it.
But will this free you? Will hurting her help you?
Or will it only hurt you further, Naia?
Is she truly to blame?
I—I blink, my breathing unsteady.
Who truly killed them?
Who took them—Akane, Chima, Nyx and Shanti?
Who stole your sisters from you?
And I breathe—slow and controlled.
The Dawnlord.
He has stolen my sisters from me.
A man I have not even seen—only heard of. The man who invaded Felicity—forced thousands to join his ranks. He stole my sisters—my livelihood—my home.
Not this girl.
“Y-you helped me.” I murmur as hands curl around my shoulders. “You helped me—and I ought to be gracious for it.” Hue yanks at me and I shrug his fingers away. I heft myself up and offer Hana my hand. She takes it, grunting as she pushes herself to standing.
Hana glares behind me, staring squarely at Hue.
“Sir,” Hue comes to stand near me, a whole head taller than I am. “I'd like to apologize for my friend's poor manners tonight. But, please understand—he's a new conscript from Felicity, and—,”
“I deserved it.” Hana snaps, poking at the short collar of her tunic as she brushes dust from herself. “Be more mindful of your charges, scullion. The latrines are closed to the night shifts in the early morning hours. Did you forget that?”
Hue swallows as I am taken aback by her sudden change of tone—her voice reeks of regalia. Crawls with it.
“I apologize, sir, I—,”
“No matter.” she breathes, shoving past us as she finds the door. Throws a harrowing gaze over her shoulder. Leaves.
Hue rounds on me. “Do you know who that was?”
I open my mouth—but Hue's gone red in the face. Furious as he towers over me, peering down at me with a glare that's gone murderous. “That man alone has the power to make you a cook—a server—a minstrel or a watchman. And just as easily as he can push you up the chain of command—he can force you down. He can make you lower than a scullion—a drudge—even! He could force you up the road—put you in infantry, write you up as a criminal and put you in the stocks! Do you understand this, Kokoros? You've not only put yourself on the line here—but you've left me out to dry too! You've put us all in horrible danger!”
Hue shakes his head—sighs. “But, of course, it doesn't matter. Does it? Seems like nothing matters to you Felicity-types.” he brings a hand to his head and pulls it down his face. Mismatched eyes meet mine and I take a step back as he snarls. “You can clean this mess—alone.” When he leaves, it's like a draft has come in. A chill that makes me shiver when his footsteps disappear down the hall.
And I'm shrouded in darkness when the silence comes—alone with my thoughts. With what I've done.
…
I clean till the sun rises. Till Badger barges in and gives me a half-hearted thumbs up.
19. Speech Sounds
I'm not used to sleeping the day away, to waking up to waxing skies faded black. But when I spend the entire night scrubbing away a mess that always replaces itself come the following evening—I'm exhausted come the morning. When the sun rises and the kitchen's finally spotless, I hit my mat with thoughts of home—thoughts of sleep—and I black out; only for the routine to repeat itself again and again, night after night.
My palms are raw when an entire week has passed like this, my sleeping pattern destroyed. The moon becomes my new sun, as sweeping rays of golden light brings grogginess—while white light does the exact opposite. Wakes me up. Tells me it's time to work—to clean. And it's always the same mess—pink slime, overturned pestles, black rocks spilling from soot filled ovens again and again. Night after night. Nothing changes, and when three weeks pass by—fading into my memory, forgotten, like so many things I've tried to force away—I begin to wonder if I died all those weeks ago. When Akane tried to take me. I begin to wonder if the Fates have played a cruel joke on me—damning me to the four circles of the underworld—sticking me into a realm of monotony. Of the same thing done night after night.
But then, I remember the march here—the biting winds. The deaths. I remember the peach faced boy we threw into the river. I remember the screams.
And I see Hana's face—shrouded in darkness, her eyes glinting in dim shadow as she attempts to hug me.
I choked her—I almost knocked her out.
And Hue hadn't forgiven me for it. Ignored me since the incident.
And Hana—she hasn't contacted me. Or punished me for what I almost did.
I swallow at the memory, my saliva sour. Tainted with guilt. It tastes awful.
I'm cleaning the dark walls of a cauldron when I pause. My hand stuck to it's inky insides, my eyes staring at utter blackness.
“Ay, Kokoros?”
I blink. Place my left hand around the lip of the cauldron and hoist myself up.
Dusty hair looks back at me—Ken. He blinks eyes that could have been drawn with the careful curve of a brush. “You alright in there?” when I push myself from the side of the cauldron, I fall to the floor. Catch myself with a hand and force myself to stand.
As Hue lets out that high-pitched screech of a whistle and we freeze. We turn ourselves towards the door and stand at attention. I drop the rag in my right hand to the floor.
Boots clack and the door is whipped open. Hue reports—it's Badger, it's always Badger—and the yellow-eyed man leaves with a huff and a sigh. Not badgering anyone tonight—Hue's joke. It's always the same—and no one laughs. Ken and I exchange a glance and we both roll our eyes. I imagine everyone's doing it—even Hue. Who always seems determined to light the room up with jokes. With words and listless stories from home. But tonight, even Hue's staying quiet—getting the hint. Falling into this hole of depressing monotony we've all fallen into.
Things change when I can't fall asleep. One day, when the room's snoring under the noontime sun, I sit up. Hug my knees to my chest and listen. I let the sun pour over me. I feel the chill from the windows behind me—and I rock. Forward and back. Forward and back.
What have I done to deserve this?
I bite my lip. I think of Akane. Her welcome—her letting me stay at her home. That shelter. I think of Shanti—holding my broken zither, telling me my voice did things for her.
It always did things for people—for others.
But what could my songs do for me?
I look around the room. The scullions sleep—some tossing, some prostrate on their mats like corpses while others curl up like children.
What could my songs do for me?
I think of Yarne's song—Stay,Fate—she titled it. I think of the verses Lore and I pulled from it for our ceremony. I think of Hana's voice murmuring it's first line—carrying it on a breath of her wind.
Truly, it was our song. The Orthella's song. It brought us together and made us who we are.
It was the song I chose for my ceremony—for my coming out as a songstress all those months ago.
Or was that years? Years now? So many days have passed. So many things have changed.
>
I am a different person now.
But still the same in this instance—
I look around the room once more, listening for telltale snores, before opening my mouth. Before murmuring the words:
In this bitter world, who can declare the difference between love and hate?
In these mortal realms, who can declare the difference between right and wrong?
Someday, I would like to ask—'In this world, who writes the scrolls of our Fates?'
Someday, I would like to ask—'When mortals dream, who plucks the strings of the ancient zither?'
Silence. A gentle breeze whistles outside, the cold air crawls upon the windowpane and brushes at my back. My toes curl under me and I bring my knees in closer to my chest as my voice dwindles down to a hum:
White, blankets the peak of a distant mountaintop.
As the snow falls, my sorrow for you crumbles into ashes,
Can snow grasp how—
And I hiss as the mark upon my arm aches. As I clap my hand to it—but my fingers are kissed too. Burned by this brand and I snatch them away. I look at the black mark upon my arm as it licks at my blood—burning, the sizzling a thing created by my mind, but it's still real. Still hissing and hurting me as if I were only branded yesterday.
Outside the closed wooden screens, the kitchen has quieted.
As a neck cracks at my right.
“Bring that over, Kokoros. Let me see.” Hue sounds like a doting parent and I freeze when I hear him clamber up. He moves to sit near my right side and snatches my arm. “You keep acting like it's infected when it's fine.” his hands are rough when they rub my mark. When he peers at it, his hair slides down my arm. “You don't have anything to worry about, alright? So stop messing with it.”
Slowly, I slide my arm away from his grip. I feel heat rise into my face. “Aren't you mad at me?”
I hear him snort. “At a face like yours? Never!” and I throw him a look—a worried one. “Keep giving the guys eyes like that and we'll really begin to wonder.”
He winks when my lips become a grim line. When I narrow my eyes. “Are you trying to…tell me something?”
Mismatched eyes blink. Once. Twice. Hue throws a look over his shoulder, brings his gaze back to me and then looks down my mat towards the sleeping man across from it. “You know what time it is, Kokoros?”
I shake my head at that, but he pulls me up anyway. Lets go of my arm and rushes towards the wooden screens that separate our quarters from the kitchens. He slides the screen back a bit and peers through the crack before he throws it open completely. Steps into the kitchens and motions for me to come along.
“Are we supposed to be out?” I ask him, hands clasped before my chest.
He throws me an all-knowing look. Smirks. “Does it matter? Just keep your head down—we're servants. We're supposed to be everywhere!”
And he leads me through the corridor from before, but it's like a maze and I struggle to keep up while keeping my head down. Hue relents to walking beside me, tugging at my forearm when we've got to squeeze past someone or bow to some official who barely looks us over. Simply nods and leaves us to our work. When Hue leads me towards a corridor with an obvious dead end—I stop when I realize the trick. The wool this man is trying to pull over my eyes.
It's obvious—he knows you're a girl. He knows!
And Shanti's words come rushing back to me—I think, I think horrible things as Hue shoves past me and pulls at an invisible string in the ceiling.
“Rush up there and be quick.” he tells me as the wood paneled ceiling comes tumbling down. A pair of white-washed ladders ease out and touch the floor. I move to the ladders. I look up.
“What are you trying to do?”
He throws his gaze back. “Just go—we're almost there! I'll explain—but you have to move!”
And I throw my gaze over my shoulder to see a guardsman padded in black moving down the corridor.
Hue shoves at my back and pushes me towards the ladder. I've got my hands on the rungs when I hear the guy yell—screaming at us to get down—but it's already too late. I'm climbing up and I come to a dust spattered wooden floor in a room that's open. Stone walls reach high and there's wide open archways standing on opposite sides. A gust of wind whispers by and my hair blows past my face.
“Go, Kokoros! Before I have to push you!”
And I hear boots slam upon the floor beneath me as I pull myself from the ladder and stand. As Hue moves to do the same, but rips the ladder up behind him—concealing the door and hiding us away.
I look out to a sky hounded by clouds. Before me, stands the open mouth of a wide stone archway with a gray lip protruding about an arm's distance out. My eyes scan the clouds—I breathe in fresh air I haven't smelt in weeks and it's refreshing. It's as if I haven't been living—just existing. Just going through nightly tasks with the overwhelming fear that this will be my life now. Forever and always, this will be my life.
Hue takes a couple of steps before the archway, turns around and opens his arms wide. “Nice, isn't it? Don't go telling the others about this place, now. Subaki and I used to share it before he…went over to the side of the cooks.” and Hue's face darkens when he recites the last bit—he hesitates as if he didn't want to say it. “Anyway, just…” he trails off when he turns around. When he goes under the wide archway to the protruding lip of gray and sits down. Dangles his legs off the edge.
Tentatively, I come to stand near him. I marvel at a flock of geese as they fly by. Heading towards the east as they fly high over my head.
“…I heard you singing in there, so…” he turns his gaze towards me, a smug grin brightening his eyes. “…if I were you I'd keep those pretty words here. Not just 'cause of the guys, but 'cause—” he stops himself. Shakes his head. “—well it's not like you'll ever meet him, but just in case—try to keep your singing out of earshot, okay?”
And I nod. Humoring him. “Sure, Hue.”
Silence comes when I sit. The wind's blowing lightly and when I dangle my legs off the edge I catch a good breeze. I look past my legs and see sharp black roofs that curve up.
“Are we at the top of the castle?”
“Most of the lower servants live on the top floor, this—,” and he points backwards towards the room behind us, “used to be a watchtower—or a bell tower—I can't remember which. Subaki told me…some time ago, but he never comes up here anymore. It's like I lost my best friend.” and he claps his hand over his mouth. “For-forget I said that.”
I cock my head. I sigh. “I understand.” I tell him, truthfully. “How you feel, I understand. I've lost many.”
And their names flash through my mind—too many.
“Was it the march here? Corin tells me it was brutal.”
Corin—the milky eyed one among us. The one who almost never speaks—who keeps his head down.
I think to Akane's headless body as steel flashed through her neck. “Y-yeah.” I sputter out—blinking.
“Ya'll had to throw a kid in the river for the castellan.”
I nod.
“On the way here,” he tells me matter-of-factly, “I had to kill my brother.”
My mouth drops open. “What?”
“To prove to Lord Hinata that I deserved his mark.” and he slaps his right forearm, covering the dragon before sliding his hand away. “Others had to do worse.”
“Lord Hinata?” The Dawnlord?
Hue freezes—his eyes wide. His mouth stuck in a crooked smirk. “You—you'll,” he lowers his head. Shakes it. Clears his throat and plants his hands upon his thighs. “You'll never meet him—if I have anything to do with it—none of ya'll ever will.”
I swallow. Curtly, I nod and his eyes follow the movement of my head. Unblinking.
“The cold air's getting to me.” Hue murmurs, scooting back as he pushes himself up. “We should get back before the cooks do—where-ever they went off to. Let's hope that guard isn't look for us either, need a hand?”
/> I accept it, clasping his palm. It's sweaty.
20. Threads Unraveled
Together, Hue and I break the monotony. Though scullion life rarely changes—night after night, the mess stays the same though the work gets easier—we make it a bit better when we invite the other boys to talk about their old lives back home. Specifically, food from home. Though we work in a kitchen, we are only fed a meager diet of rice and grains, which leaves many of us wanting. Pining for home, and it helps to talk about it. To describe the dumplings and fruit filled pastries our mothers used to make.
I avoid speaking during the discussions—satisfied with listening and dreaming about the food that's described. But it hits home when I realize that—out of the five scullions I work with—only two are able to aptly talk about their mothers or grandmothers back home. Two. The others do as I do, listen and laugh. Salivate and dream. Wishing for a home. Longing for one.
One night, Corin pipes up. Clearing his throat loudly from his spot on the floor. “I had a sister,” he tells us and we all crane our necks to hear him—freezing. This kid rarely talked, and when he did, his voice was always so soft. So delicate. Corin was frugal with his words—picky about them—and this somehow made every word uttered that much more precious. That much more important. Corin lowers his head. “who made rice pudding with dyed sugar. She called it—called it,” Corin shakes his head now, moving it from side to side. “festival pudding. I wish I had paid more attention to how she made it. I wish—back then, I wish I'd cared.”
“I always believed cooking was a woman's job.” Ken says from his place near the cauldrons. “And I regret that—I wish I had learned too. I could have kept a piece of my mom that way—through her cooking.” and when he sighs, the noise is shared. It journeys around the room, stopping at the ovens. At Hue and I who lack parents or siblings, along with Sunan who sits cross legged near the door. His sunken eyes closed.
But that feeling of regret is still shared. That feeling of sorrow and loss.
And it blows away when Hue shoves himself from the ovens. Forces blackened fingers between his lips and whistles with a screech.
Heartfelt Sounds Page 9