"No." Her tone was flat. "I don't know what it was like for you to feel my memories, but yours nearly tore my heart out of my chest. I have to know Nyx. What happened to Atalo?" Her brows pressed together, and she let go of my arm. "...And why did you get the Mark? From what I saw, the punishment doesn't fit the crime."
I hugged my head and rocked back and forth where I sat. My chest felt tight and my skin felt cold. "I can't..."
I felt her hands on my back. She leaned down and nuzzled my hair. "Please tell me," she whispered.
I raised my head, my cheeks damp and my nose running. Elmiryn was close enough that I could feel her breath on my skin. There was that light smell of rum about her. Her eyes were fixed on to mine, and something about them compelled me to speak.
With a swallow I started. "Atalo and I fled, but the Cerrite, a criminal hunter, found us. We defeated him, but I'd been stabbed with his blade and passed out. Atalo dragged me to an abandoned shack a mile up the trail we followed. It was used as an outpost, and he managed to find some supplies." I turned my face away, toward the fire. The heat felt glorious on my skin. In a dry whisper I continued. "As it turned out, the Cerrite's blade was poisoned, so my wound wasn't healing. I was caught in a fever. Atalo tried to treat me, but the medicines he had were too mundane to handle the special poison that ran through me. Time was running out, and soon the rest of the hunters would find us. But not before...not before..."
My mouth, as if in rebellion, ceased to move. Nearly a minute went by before Elmiryn grabbed me by the shoulders and gave me a harsh shake. "Nyx, what happened?"
I looked at her, my face slack. I imagined her angry, disgusted, horrified. I realized this would be the first time I would say any of this aloud, to anyone, and I feared the truth would cause the one friend I had in the world to turn away from me. My tears returned with a vengeance and my body trembled. "I'm weak." I sobbed with a slow shake of the head. "Elmiryn. I'm just too weak!"
"But what happened, Nyx!?"
I flinched at the steely tone of her voice. In a mousy voice, I continued to speak. "E-Ever since I was young, I had t-t-trouble dealing with my Other Self. They said it was–was because I read too much outside literature. Because I questioned our ways too much. They always t-talked of our primal sides being one-half of a whole. But I never saw it that way, n-not even when I was young. I grew up at odds with Her and she stopped listening to me. Because I never learned to control Her...She...She..." I hugged my head. "She killed him! She killed Atalo!"
Elmiryn grabbed me by the chin and forced me to look up at her. Her eyes were wide. "What do you mean?"
I shut my eyes and two fat tears rolled down my cheeks. "In my feverish state...I...I lost control. I shifted to Ekilluos, the form taken during war. It was the first time I ever did. Atalo...he was just a boy...he didn't...couldn't defend himself. As therians, we can only take so much before our healing powers mean nothing. She killed him, and it's my fault because I was too weak to stop Her."
Elmiryn let me go, and I crumpled. A long silence sat between us, interrupted only by my occasional sobs.
When my tears had subsided, I found myself continuing to speak. I started to feel detached, like the pain I felt was too much, so my heart began to shut down. "When the hunters came, they found me sitting with what was left of Atalo. I was half-dead and mad with grief. I kept scratching at myself...drawing blood. I wanted to crawl out of my skin. I didn't just want to die, I wanted to cease to exist." I heard Elmiryn shift but didn't look up to see what she did. I assumed she moved away from me. I was certain of her disgust.
"Instead of killing me," I rasped, "They took me prisoner and brought me back to my village. They publicly charged me with treason, fratricide, and perverting Aelurus' gifts. Shortly after that, they gave me the Mark, and cast me out of the village. I only snuck back to take some things with me. That was when I found out my mother had died." I laid on my side and covered my face with my arm. I started to feel sick.
Then Elmiryn finally spoke. "I want to see it."
I removed my arm and looked at her. She hadn't moved away from me. Her face was turned to me, and her eyes were sharp. "I want to see your Mark."
I stiffened. Automatically, I thought to argue, but exhaustion had set into me. After what I had just revealed, what was the point?
"Shut the door and lock it." I muttered.
NYX____________________________
She shut the door and I heard the snap of the lock. I picked myself off the floor and wiped at my swollen eyes. Elmiryn turned to stare at me from across the room, and we both fell quiet as our gazes met. The firewood cracked and popped in the fireplace as a glowing piece fell away to the ash covered floor. My hands raised to touch the collar of my tunic before I once again became aware of the layout of the room. Not wanting the bed between us as I undressed, I gestured for the woman to come closer.
"You'll see better with the firelight." I said quietly.
Elmiryn came closer, a soft frown on her face as she moved around the bed to stand near me. She stopped a foot away and placed her hands on her hips.
I bowed my head and turned so that my back was to her. "It took them a little over a day to finish the design. The man who did it...I grew up with him. We were...friends. He was an apprentice learning the ways of the shamanites. He wasn't allowed to stop or rest until the Mark was finished." I pulled the tunic over my head. My arms felt weak and shook as I struggled to be freed from the fabric. The air felt unwelcoming to my shoulders, and goosebumps spread across my skin. When my tunic fell before my feet, I stopped and took a deep breath.
I couldn't deny it, I still felt hesitant. All that was left to remove was the bandage that wrapped my breasts. It wasn't too late to try and stop this. Unless the bandage was removed, the most important aspect of my brand would not be seen.
But my hands were already moving without my consent. They undid the bandage with fumbling fingers, and before I registered it, the wraps had fallen away. My arms crossed over my front and I squeezed my eyes shut.
I jumped when Elmiryn brushed her fingers across my back, from my left shoulder blade down to my right hip. The magic trappings that encased me in my curse seemed to pulse at her touch. It was something I hadn't felt before. The best description I can offer for it, was as if my body wished to change. To say it was a chill, or a spread of warmth isn't quite it. I felt as if something of my blood, my hair, my skin had trembled in the most microscopic sense.
But the moment was fast, and before I could make a remark on it, Elmiryn spoke.
"They designed this just for you, didn't they?"
I nodded and swallowed. My throat felt tired from being so tense. "A reflection of my crimes."
"Do you remember what they did to you?"
I smiled sardonically. "Of course. Aside from feeling many of the lines more than once, they had it on display before me so that I may know just what my punishment would entail." With a deep breath, I began to explain. "There's a woman, only partially shifted in a form that looks similar to Ekilluos. She looks like she's running away from the viewer, but her body twists so that she turns to look over her shoulder. Her feline head is mangy and her claws are dripping with her own blood from the wounds she has inflicted on herself." I paused to ease down the lump that tightened in my throat. My eyes began to burn again. "From her naked chest and back, you can see worms are squirming out of the wounds she has made. A sign of pestilence. Inherent evil. That was for inflicting harm on myself after Atalo's death. Self-harm is considered a perversion of Aelurus' gift of regenerative healing."
"But–" Elmiryn began.
I cut her off. "Next, there should be a bearded serpent slithering from the woman's open mouth. It's wrapped around her throat and right arm. It faces downward, toward the ground. It's for my defiance and, as they put it, my lies and treasonous words."
"You don't sound like you believe much in that charge, Nyx..." There was the scrape of wood as Elmiryn pulled a chair up to sit behind me. Her
hands placed themselves at my hips and she pulled me a little closer. I bit my objection back and instead answered her remark.
"I don't doubt that it was my misguided persuasions that led Atalo to his death."
Elmiryn made a low sound with her throat. "Go on. Tell me what else is here."
I sighed. "Elmiryn, you must know that I can recite each and every detail of my own Mark. Why do you need to test me?"
There was a squeak from the chair as the warrior leaned forward to peer at me from my side. Her eyebrow was raised high. "Believe it or not, I'm not trying to turn this into a game. I happen to have a problem with keeping pictures in my head. Remember?"
I blushed and nodded, feeling a little ashamed. Still, my shoulders bunched as I resumed my explanation. "The woman is wearing two earrings, both feathers. The one on the left is dark, the one on the right is light."
"Lemme guess...the separation of your two selves, right?"
"Yes."
"I'm seeing something else, but I'm not sure if I have it right..."
"It should just be a gate." I frowned. Elmiryn's condition really had become worse if she had trouble identifying something as common as that. It only made me more frustrated that she had been reckless enough to go hunting while in such a state. "At the top are some words written in my native language. Hejka et Juek. Hejka et Ool. Hejka et Lunés. 'Traitor to Blood. Traitor to Water. Traitor to Spirit.' I betrayed my family, my people, and my goddess. ...They made it a point to go over those lines several times."
"There's more. Beneath it, right?"
"Below that are words written in an archaic tongue. I...don't know what it says exactly. Something required for the spell, I imagine."
Elmiryn's hands left my hips and I heard her sit back in her chair.
I turned to peer at her over my shoulder. "Are you satisfied?"
She looked up at me and shook her head. "No." Half her face was lit, the other half in warm shadow. With her hair down, she looked feminine, just as that night in the mountains. "But I'm not sure if there's anything I can do about it."
I stooped to pick up my bandages, conscious not to stick my rear in Elmiryn's face. "You mean about what you remember?" I felt guilt nettle me. I didn't turn around or raise my eyes as I started to wrap the long bandage around my chest. I hated the idea that my pain had somehow become someone else's. It almost made me want to apologize, but I refrained when I remembered that it was never my intention to share such things to begin with.
"No. I mean about what I can't remember."
This made me pause. She wanted to keep those memories? Did she really mean that, I wondered. And how could she?
"Was that...presumptuous?" she asked. Her voice was low and had a warm quality to it. It was subdued, but not in a way that suggested to me exhaustion or a sense of defeat. Instead, it only reminded me of the rapacious looks that came across Elmiryn's eyes in the morning, when she thought I didn't see her looking my way.
"You...you really don't make any sense." My fingers seemed to forget themselves. They fussed uselessly with the bandage's ends, failing even to make a simple box knot.
"So set me straight."
I turned on the spot and fixed Elmiryn with a half-hearted glare. "You are not so far-gone as to ask for what I've got, Elle. It was perhaps the–the luckiest thing that I ended up being chased by those farmers. If I hadn't...I wouldn't have met you...and..." I faltered mid-sentence. I finally managed to tie the knot correctly and moved to pick up my tunic from the floor.
As I came up, Elmiryn's hand touched my shoulder gently. I peered at her with my tunic clutched to my chest. She frowned at me.
"I do consider myself lucky to have found you when I did, but regardless of whether or not I was there, had you not found those farmers, I think you would've been fine." When my gaze fell away from hers, her light touch turned to an iron-like grip. "You would've been fine." She repeated firmly.
"You know why I was nearly starved to death? Every village I went to chased me out. Near my home, outsiders have recognized who outcasts are. I had been kicked out of every known area of the Northwest before meeting you." I pulled away from Elmiryn and put on my tunic. "I wasn't going to survive long. I was starving. Just in the week that I've been with you, I think I've gotten healthier. But...but even if I had managed something to eat, I think–"
Elmiryn cut me off with a loud snort. She sat back in her chair and crossed her arms high on her chest. "Shit, you're starting to get aggravating."
I sputtered. "P-Pardon?"
The woman stood to her feet with a bang. She made a big show of stomping her feet and pushing her chair back with all her strength. She was taller than I was, and advanced on my quickly. The display startled me so much that it caused my legs to fail and I began to fall backward, but Elmiryn didn't let me go down. She grabbed me by the front and lifted me up so that my toes barely scraped the ground.
"Enough of it, Nyx!" She hissed through her teeth. Her sharp eyes were like knives turned on me, and I trembled as I dangled in the air. I thought back to Leander, and fought the urge to struggle.
What she said next surprised me.
"You aren't weak," She said. Her words carried such strength and force, I could practically feel them bury into my gut. She gave me a shake. Elmiryn's face started to turn pink at the cheeks, "You aren't useless, you aren't a coward! A WEAK person wouldn't have survived in that cave. A USELESS person wouldn't have tried to take care of me. A COWARDLY person wouldn't have tried to save their brother from death at such a great risk to themselves. You wanna know what you fucking are? Undisciplined! But if you can keep pace with me, you're certainly capable of more. So guess what?" She paused and had an expectant look on her face.
"...Wh-What?" I stuttered out. I had the most bewildered look on my face.
"We're going to train together. I've been getting a little soft, and as my ward you've got to be able to defend yourself. So enough of this, 'I can't fight' nonsense. Yer gonna learn to walk with a straight back, Nyx." She dropped me to the ground and gave me a bit of a shove. "I swear to the heavens, if I hear you bitch one more time about how you aren't good enough, I'll hit you square in the mouth. And..." She faltered, and the flare and fire in her eyes died down. Then without warning, she smiled and started to chuckle. "And by the four winds, you'll thank me for it!"
She turned and walked away, swept up in a fit of humor that managed to annoy and frighten me at the same time. Her laughter seemed to intensify as she left the room with her hand to her head.
Elmiryn had either suffered from some delusion created by her curse.
...Or she really meant every word she said.
I collapsed to the ground and blinked as a piece of ember managed to slip through the guard at the fireplace and land near my feet. I thought to snuff out the glowing bit with my boot, but I couldn't bring myself to move. The piece cooled and turned black.
I wondered nervously what tomorrow would bring.
Tributaries
NYX____________________________
I curled in the sheets of a massive bed that wasn't mine. I heard patters on the window. Fat drops of water abused the panes with such gusto that my eye creaked open. I heard people laugh outside. At first it was hard for my sleepy head to grasp why, but then it became clear.
I sat up and tried to blink the sleep from my eyes.
It was raining at Gamath.
I kicked the sheets away and placed my bare feet on the wooden floor, my face turned long with wonder at the sight of the speckled glass. The view revealed to me indefinite forms that danced and shifted. I stood, my legs affected by my fleeting dreams. I swayed a little as I crossed the room, and the partial light lanced my sensitive eyes. Forced to squint, I tried to shield my face with a hand, and it was through parted fingers that I saw a phantom drift toward the window.
They wore only a soaked white nightgown and their auburn hair was left to hang in wet locks about their angular face. Even through the changing mosaic of r
ain, I could make out wide cerulean eyes that didn't blink or falter in their stare.
"Elmiryn," I called, hoping she heard me through the glass.
She reached a hand up and placed it on the window. Her lips moved and I could hear her voice through the rain, but couldn't make out what she said. I shook my head and stepped closer, where I leaned on the window sill for support. My breath fogged the glass. "What did you say?"
The woman laughed and shook her head. She gestured for me to come outside and began to walk away.
I tapped on the glass and tried to call her back, but then decided I was being silly about it. Rain wouldn't kill me. I ran to get my shoes and was about to rush out the door when something occurred to me.
Elmiryn was standing outside in nothing but her nightgown. Wet from head to toe.
Red-faced and thoroughly bothered, I went to the innkeeper's wardrobe where I was lucky to find cloaks both for myself and Elmiryn. The inn itself was quiet when I left the bedroom, but outside children and adults alike were celebrating in the rain. I didn't pause long to watch them, instead I put on one cloak and made my way around the building to the back, where I found Elmiryn sitting on a barrel with her arms crossed over her chest and her head tilted back. Her eyes were wide open, despite the rain, and she had a long smile on her face.
"Elle, where's your sense!?" I cried as I tossed the heavy cloak onto her lap. She didn't jump or look even remotely startled. Her eyes lingered on the sky before she looked at me, the turn of her head a smooth line of motion that outlined her lack of concern.
"Hm?" Was her only response. She sounded like she wanted to laugh.
"The cloak, Elle," I said, my jaw tense as my eyes rapidly shifted focus from the left to the right side of her face. I tried very hard to keep my head up, but I could see the pink of her chest through the white fabric. Despite the cold, heat burned up my neck. "Put it on. You're indecent and there's children around!"
Eikasia: Tributaries Page 21