by Rena Barron
We stare at each other, emotions raging in our eyes, a lifetime of missed chances.
I want to sink back into his arms, but this is all I can have of him, and he of me.
It’s not enough.
Thirty-Eight
Rudjek is afraid to touch me. He thinks I’m a flower that’ll wither up and die if disturbed. He doesn’t know that I’ve died a thousand times already. I died when my mother cursed me. I died when she stole my father’s light. I died when I saw the children she’d taken for her ritual. I died when Koré told me about the edam. I die again every time I close my eyes and think about all the awful things my family’s done.
I’m not afraid of death, but I don’t want to die without ever feeling his lips pressed against mine. Even for the briefest moment. I’m haunted by the memories of kisses from the kas inside me. Soft, sweet ones; passionate ones. Sensual and slow ones that steal my breath. Rushed and messy ones that make my heart race.
I’ve avoided Rudjek since that night with Efiya. Now that we’re alone, sitting beside the river, listening to the lull of the water, I don’t want to stay away any longer. I want whatever my sister had of him—I want more.
“We should get back before they come looking for us,” Rudjek says, his voice somber. “Essnai and Sukar will think I’ve stolen you away.”
“They’d hunt you down.” I toss a stone into the water. “Essnai might break your legs.”
Rudjek gives me a lopsided smile. “I fear she’d do worse.”
Fadyi, the craven leader who almost looks human, steps into the clearing. He keeps his eyes downcast like he’s caught us in some lewd act. “I’m sorry to interrupt,” he apologizes. “We spotted Efiya’s army coming from the south, a half a day behind us.”
“Can we stay ahead of them and reach the Temple?” Rudjek asks, slipping into his commanding voice. A voice that is cold and precise and ready to issue orders like he’s been doing it his entire life. We climb to our feet, our backs rigid, and I suspect we both share the weariness in our bones. We’ve expected this for days, but that doesn’t make it any easier to hear.
“If we keep moving without rest,” Fadyi answers. “The demons are still limited by their hosts, but once they’ve consumed enough souls, we won’t know what they’ll be capable of.”
The chieftains erupt into a deafening chorus inside my head. Their words are urgent and feverish, and my muscles tense with the need to get to the Temple. We must go now. There’s no time. I start walking, not back to camp to gather our things first, but where they lead. Rudjek calls after me, his plea lost in the chorus too. When he and Fadyi catch up with me, their words sound like a half-forgotten dream that teeters on the edge of my memory.
The witchdoctors call me back to the Temple where they took their final breaths. Where their blood stained the grass. Where I must face my sister one last time.
I don’t stop until the moon chases the sun from the sky. We walk without rest for hours and arrive at the Temple in the dead of night. I expect to find a graveyard and the smell of death on the air, but there are no bodies here. Efiya burned them so the chieftains couldn’t return to their vessels. She left the grass beneath them pristine and untouched. I can’t help but wonder if it’s some sentimental gesture from our days in the garden in Kefu.
There’s not much left of Heka’s Temple besides toppled bricks and fallen columns. Through the chieftains’ memories, I see Efiya destroying it in frustration after they escaped her grasp. I climb up the uneven steps with Rudjek at my side carrying a torch—the others stay behind. We step over chalices and broken statues and cracked stone. The whispers only stop when I reach a raised dais that sits upon a smooth platform. It’s covered in dust and debris, but otherwise untouched by the destruction. I nudge the platform with my feet. “It’s here.”
Rudjek kneels and tries to shoulder the thick slab of granite aside to no avail. He pauses, sweat slick against his forehead. “It’s possible I need a little help.”
I kneel beside the granite. “Try now.” When we both push, the stone groans as it slides away, and dust and debris drop into a bottomless pit below.
Rudjek whistles and the sound echoes in the chamber. “Now we get to crawl into the belly of the beast.”
“Not quite the belly of the beast.” I reach for the ladder dug out in the wall. “But close.”
Rudjek lights several discarded torches and sets them about the Temple to give us more light. When he drops one into the pit, it falls so far that the flame goes out before it hits the bottom. We look at each other—his grim face echoing my own. “I’ll go first. We don’t know what’s down there.”
“Nothing living,” I say. Nothing we want to see.
Rudjek secures an unlit torch across his back, then descends into the darkness. I don’t tarry as I start down too. I don’t want to be far from him, for fear that Efiya might step out of the void and steal one of us away. The dank air chokes me and burns my throat.
Rudjek yelps and I freeze, clinging to the rungs. Cold air snakes around my neck as his voice settles into silence. Has Efiya snatched him from the ladder like a thief in the night? Has some other demon come to claim him as their prize? Or has some new, unknowable force come to spirit him away to spite me?
“What’s wrong?” I ask to break the stillness.
“I thought you said nothing was living down here.” Rudjek pouts. “Something crawled across my hand.”
I ease out a sigh at the incredulity in his tone, and we continue descending into the cold, dark chamber. “I amend my original statement. Nothing living of consequence.”
“Giant insects are quite consequential.”
I force down a laugh that settles in my belly. This is the side of Rudjek that I missed the most—the side of him that doesn’t take himself too seriously. I’ve missed you. I want you. I don’t say the words out loud, like speaking them might be tempting fate. Hasn’t the universe, whether by design or not, already conspired against us? Instead, I hold my words close, and they stoke the fire already burning inside me.
Rudjek lands in the chamber with a thud and a loud crunch. “Twenty-gods.”
When I reach the bottom, he strikes a flint and relights the torch. His eyes stretch wide as he takes in the room. “It’s a grave.”
Bones cover the floor of the chamber: jawbones, skulls, shins, shoulders, and ribs. Tiny bones and large bones of men and women who must’ve been giants. Suddenly time shifts around me, dragging my mind down a black hole so fast that the world turns upside down. The stack of bones shrinks until there’s nothing left but a white marble floor. Sunlight pours into the open windows overlooking a lush mountain range. I blink several times to clear away the fog in my mind. I haven’t moved—this is the same place. In the past it once sat upon the highest mountaintop, and in the present, it’s buried in a deep pit.
The kas in my mind are silent.
One by one other details come into focus. The gold trim along the base of the walls. Crystal vases so fine that the red roses and water inside them appear suspended in thin air. People frozen by magic like statues, their desperate, pleading eyes finding me. They’re twice as tall as me with white feathered wings that cast prisms of shadows across the room. Eyes that all glow a stunning shade of green. Their teeth are sharp points, their skin as diaphanous as the Northern people. There’s some reflection of the orishas’ ethereal nature in their postures.
They wear shimmering gold and silver tunics, and rings of rubies and diamonds and black opal. My breath hitches in my throat as I move closer to them. Close enough to see the rise and fall of their chests. Their panic is palpable even if it doesn’t touch the unnatural smiles upon their faces. This place is familiar, from the crisp mountain air to the sweet roses, and especially the macabre art. I glance over my shoulder to ask Rudjek if he’s seeing this too, but he isn’t here. This is a vision of the chamber from another time. He’s standing in the room as it is now, a tomb.
As I cross the chamber in the visio
n, the living statues make slight adjustments to keep me in their sights. A nighthawk lands on the windowsill, cocks its head, and stares at me with curious black eyes. I leave the antechamber through an archway large enough to accommodate people as large as the statues. It leads into another room of white marble—this one grand and expansive.
Steps arch over the room, where a throne floats like a cloud. It takes on a yellow hue from the sunlight pouring through the windows. I step closer, my footfalls ringing like bells in the chamber.
“You’ve finally come home, my love,” hums a voice as smooth as the finest silks, laced with the sweetest honey. His breath is a warm breeze against my neck. It raises a deep longing in me like the first strike of a firestorm. A shadow of his power wraps around my chest.
Just like it did before, when Arti cursed me with his magic. “I’ve missed you,” he says.
I spin around, but there’s no one here. My gaze lands on the steps again and against all logic I climb them to the throne high above the room. I don’t know how or when, but I’ve been here before, and without a second thought I sit on the throne. In an instant, I’m wearing a red dress that flows like lava at my feet. Gold bands embellish my arms, and my hands rest upon the crowns of two polished human skulls. Thigh bones shaved and strung together with gold twine form the seat. Animal skulls line the arch across the back. Ribs give the throne its distinctive curve. I have been in this chair many times. This place is a memory, and it feels as real as stepping into the chamber with Rudjek a moment ago.
“Your mother marked you with my magic to keep you safe from Efiya.” Another whisper on the wind. His name tingles on my tongue; it rings in my ears. His words are full of angst and longing. “I won’t lose you again, not when we’re so close.”
“Who are you?” I say, my voice trembling, but I know the answer. The Demon King has found a way to invade my mind when Efiya and Merka failed. Now he’s whispering lies to get me to trust him, lies that only a fool would believe.
The scene changes and I sit beside a frozen lake with my legs crossed beneath me. There’s a boy at my side—the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen. His long hair is a shock of white that matches the wings folded against his back. One wing sits a little higher than the other, as if it hasn’t healed right after an old injury. A memory flitting at the edge of my consciousness threatens to crack when I look at him, so I stare at the lake instead. Still I catch glimpses of his face in profile and my heart flutters.
“You remember nothing?” His voice is a purr, a lullaby, a hum of sweet music.
I can’t trust myself to answer, and he draws his knees to his chest. “I am Daho.”
He says his name like he expects a response from me, but I don’t care what he calls himself. I want him out of my mind. Yet I can’t stop staring across the frosted lake and the fog rising from it.
“I . . . I know this place,” I stutter, feeling like I’ve spent eons sitting still at this very lake.
“This is our place,” Daho tells me. “You found me here after my people abandoned me.”
“No,” I whisper, shaking my head. “This is a trick.”
“Fram stole your memories,” he sighs, “but they’ll come back in time.”
“I won’t let you play games with me like you’ve done with my mother.” I grit my teeth. “I don’t know how you broke into my mind, but I’m not like Arti or Efiya. I won’t do your bidding.”
“I’m not in your mind, Dimma,” he says. “You’re in mine.”
As I hear the name, a sharp pain slices through my head as suns and moons flash before my eyes. It’s worse than the vision of Rudjek in the Dark Forest. Moon and sun chase each other across the sky so fast that they’re a blur of never-ending fire and ice. My head feels like it will split in two. I squeeze my forehead between my palms, but the pain cuts deeper. I’m on the verge of recalling a memory when a calming, cleansing magic washes away the pain. I’m staring at the frozen lake again, and the name slips away.
“I’m sorry.” Daho winces. “I’d forgotten that Fram took your name too. Their magic hides your mind to keep you from remembering your true self. When you were marked with my magic, I tried desperately to remind you . . .” He pauses, drawing his knees even closer to his chest. “But you kept pushing me away. I’m stronger now, and you’re stronger too. Soon we’ll be together again.”
Fram took your name.
Fram, the orisha of life and death.
His words reel in my head and I can’t make sense of them. I’m left speechless as a calming magic suppresses memories on the edge of my mind—memories that feel very old. My thoughts fall on the Unnamed orisha with the serpents coiled around her arms. The orisha with no face. The one that Re’Mec, posing as Tam, refused to speak of. The orisha that betrayed her brethren for the Demon King—she’s his ama, his love. Did Fram take her name? And somehow he thinks that I’m her? But even as I reject this grim revelation, there’s a part of me that warms to the idea. I remember how familiar his magic felt uncoiling inside my body, how it protected me, how it tried to soothe me.
No, it can’t be true.
She is not me—I am not her.
I want to look at him, but now a force keeps my eyes on the frozen lake. “You expect me to believe that I’m the Unnamed orisha,” I spit. “Do you take me for a fool?”
“It will take time to remember,” he replies. “I’ll help you.”
“Stop lying,” I demand, my voice a piercing echo. “I know who I am.”
“I don’t need to convince you,” he says, too calm. “Time will reveal all.”
“Why are we having this conversation, then, if not to convince me?”
“Selfish reasons,” he admits. “I needed to see you.”
I hate how his voice sends a flush of longing through me. His magic wraps around me, settling in like an old friend—no, settling in like an old lover come home. It’s as familiar as my own self and comforting. I want to lose myself in it. Twenty-gods, no. I can’t let that happen.
I can’t let myself be fooled by his lies. I remember how the demons in Kefu tried to stop me from returning to my body when I was on the edge of death. How dream-Rudjek appealed to my heart to try to keep me there. I stare out over the lake, and the fog shifts into Tribe Litho, thousands of white-painted faces staring at me. Not tribal people, but demons taking their form again. They’re a projection from my memory.
Daho gestures at the demons. “They were farm folks, scholars, homemakers, people from all walks of life. They chose not to fight in the war, but the orishas killed them and trapped their souls in Kefu anyway.” There’s so much pain in his words that my heart aches too.
“They tried to take my ka,” I say, unsure now.
“They never feasted upon a single soul, but the orishas didn’t care.” He takes a deep breath. “They saw that you were special. They tried to save you from Efiya and keep you from ascending into death.”
My stomach twists in knots. I was so sure those demons wanted my soul, but they did little more than keep me on the edge of death. Had they wanted my soul in that state, they could’ve taken it without even trying. He’s right. They were different from the demons who taunted me in the desert after I broke my mother’s curse. Different from the ones that Efiya woke. I can’t believe most of what he says, but the orishas are a far cry from perfect and they’re vindictive. Koré said she would’ve killed me to strike at my mother if given the chance. For Re’Mec, the Rite of Passage is his way of punishing the Kingdom.
Doubt and uncertainty start to creep into my mind again. It frustrates me that I can’t trust the orishas either. Whatever else they may have lied about—the demons are dangerous. I saw that for myself in the alley when the demon ate that man’s soul. Still I can’t shake the feeling that there’s truth in what the Demon King says about the orishas too.
“It’s freezing in here.” Rudjek snaps my connection with Daho, and my mind slips back into the present, to the chamber of bones.
&nb
sp; I inhale, but the dank air cuts my breath short. My whole body shakes. Rudjek hovers next to me as he sweeps the torch around. The walls are black with tarnish, and somewhere water drips against stone. I cannot get Daho’s voice out of my head—it’s a gentle breeze against my lips, a warm embrace. If he’s to be believed, there are secrets buried inside me, ones that even I cannot fathom, ones that will unravel me.
I brace my arm against the wall and close my eyes. Bile burns a trail up my throat and I force it back down. Rudjek is at my side in a heartbeat, his hand on my shoulder. Warmth spreads down my arm. A more subdued feeling than when he touched my bare skin or when he pulled me against his chest. It comforts me when I need it the most, but he draws his hand back, not lingering for fear of his anti-magic’s effects.
“I’m okay,” I wheeze, half out of breath.
The Demon King is just trying to distract me from finding the dagger. I won’t let him.
“Say the word and we’ll go.” Rudjek’s deep voice reminds me of why we’re here.
Our eyes find each other in the half light; his stand out like black moons against his brown skin. Pieces of the past float in my mind like ashes from a fire, and another grim truth bubbles to the surface. I draw upon one of the witchdoctors’ memories. It’s the Zu chieftain. The greatest scrivener of his people, a historian.
“When the Demon King fell, Koré and Re’Mec collapsed an entire mountain to bury his legacy,” I say. “This place is all that remains. Years after the valley formed, the first tribes who settled the land could feel the remnants of his magic. That’s what drew Heka from the stars.”
“What is this place to you?”
He says you like he’s seen the memories too, or he hears how my heart beats two rhythms now. I fear the answer will destroy him; it will destroy me, so I leave it obscured behind the grim walls of my mind.