Page 56 of The Merciless Ones
Thank you, Ixa, I say, squeezing him tight. I’m feeling a little better.
Deka, he chirps happily as a shadow falls over us.
I look up to see Britta staring at me with a worried expression, Li beside her. “Deka, yer awake,” she says quietly.
When she nods at Li, who swiftly melts away, my eyes immediately begin stinging. “I am, I was just—” I whirl away, trying to prevent the tears, but before I can hide, Britta plops down and wraps me in her arms. I bury my face against her neck, exhaling fast when my chest tightens again. “I can’t— I can’t—”
Britta rubs my back in soothing circles. “It’s all right to cry, Deka,” she says. “We’re safe.”
“No, we’re never safe,” I whisper. “Never, not when Idugu’s around.” And I haven’t even started on the mothers – all the ways they’ve lied to and betrayed us. They aren’t here, and they won’t answer when I call, even though they promised they would.
Even though the world is falling apart around us and jatu are resurrecting the way we do.
Britta pulls away and gestures at our surroundings. “Look, Deka,” she says, pointing at the vastness of the water around us. We’re so far from Hemaira’s lights now, they almost seem like a mirage.
“We’re on Lake Iyema,” she says. “That’s the largest lake in Hemaira. We might as well be in the middle of the ocean as far as the jatu are concerned. The Forsworn can’t reach us here – not unless they have an entire fleet of ships. And even if they did, I’m here; I won’t let anything happen to ye, I vow it.”
She looks down at me, her blue eyes piercing mine. “Yer safe, Deka,” she repeats firmly. “Safe. Ye can cry if ye want.”
I shake my head, trying to swallow past the painful lump in my throat. What she’s saying is so tempting, but I know better. “I can’t,” I whisper, pained. “I can’t give in to it. Not now, not here.”
I can’t break again the way I did with Keita. There’s no time.
But Britta doesn’t seem to remember this as she pulls me closer, strokes my hair. “Oh, my heart,” she whispers, “I can feel how much pain yer in, an’ ye have to let yerself feel it too. I know ye don’t like to feel weak, but grief is like the ocean. It ebbs an’ flows, an’ it takes ye by surprise. Ye can’t control the ocean, my love, no matter how much ye try. Ye just have to follow it where it leads.”
“We’re in the middle of a task,” I protest. “So much is at stake. And Elder Kadiri is dead, but jatu come back now…” I sit up as I realize. “Jatu come back, so perhaps—”
Britta puts a finger to my lips. “Ye can let it rest for a day,” she says. “Just once, ye can think of Deka an’ Deka only. An’ besides, I kept my eye on Elder Kadiri’s corpse when the others started moving. It remained still. He truly is dead.”
I shake my head. “How can you be certain? You saw all those other jatu. There might be a chance, there might—”
“His blood ran blue,” Britta says implacably. “When it was severed – a killing blow – the red turned to blue, not gold. Even if the other jatu resurrect, he will not. He’s well an’ truly gone, and so is yer old friend Elfriede. Ye can weep for her too.” Britta pulls up my chin so I can look her in the eye. “It doesn’t make ye any less of a warrior to weep. I won’t respect ye any less if ye cry for the death of yer loved ones.”
Loved ones. Father, Elfriede – despite everything they did, they were still my loved ones.
The dams burst again, the tears coming fast and heavy now, wracking my entire body with their force. This time, they flow mainly for Elfriede.
I remember the girl she once was, so happy and full of hope. But then I became what I was. And there she already was, my closest companion, that red mark like a brand upon her face. How she must have suffered, merely for having known me. The guilt of it eats at me. That bitterness Elfriede spewed, all the things she did – they didn’t just materialize from the ether. She must have paid dearly for my actions – so dearly, she began hurting others and twisting herself in the process.
I should have found a way to rescue her. Should have saved her the way I did so many others. But I didn’t. I didn’t even spare a thought for her. And now she’s dead. As are many, many alaki.
The tears continue to flow, an entire ocean of salt, until finally, the ocean finds its end. I remain quiet and still while Britta wets a cloth in the lake, then gently wipes my face and hands.
“See,” she says cheerfully once she’s done. “Now, don’t ye feel better?”
I blink, then nod, surprised. I actually do.
I’m feeling so much better, I can actually look up when a robust form strides past us – Lady Kamanda. “All right, everyone,” she says, gesturing to the dark, empty water. “Here we are.”
As I frown, looking at the nothingness of the lake, a loud creaking sounds, and then the air in front of us shimmers. A massive gate slides open out of nowhere, its panels the same reflective material as the wall supporting it – the wall I didn’t even notice before, it’s so well camouflaged. Lanterns blaze suddenly, illuminating the gatemen on top of the wall pulling open the gate, as well as throwing light across the island rising in the distance and the sprawling estate at its centre, set amid rolling hills.
My jaw drops at the sheer size of it.
The estate could encompass the entire Warthu Bera, it’s so massive. And beautiful as well. Among its whimsically carved bushes, sleek little nuk-nuks – bright green miniature deer that camouflage themselves as moss during the day – are playing hide-and-seek, while brilliantly coloured birds and even zerizards, those lizardlike winged creatures with crowns of bright red and blue plumage, roost in the colossal mabureh trees that sprout with cheerful abundance. Looking at it all, I finally understand why Lady Kamanda’s name plucked at my memory. The Kamanda estate is one of the Ibujan, the famous seven sisters, a group of islands in the middle of Lake Iyema, each closed off by nearly invisible walls that protect the estates of the city’s wealthiest families.
“Would you look at that.” Asha gives a long whistle of appreciation as the river cows pull the boat into the island’s harbour, where a line of splendidly robed servants lie prostrate on the ground, awaiting our arrival. Even from here, I can see that they’re all wearing the same intricately threaded hairstyle, golden combs and jewels supporting their coils, and yet more gold in the bangles encircling their wrists and feet.
A small, neat man sits in front of them, his elaborately embroidered green robes the very picture of elegance as they drape over his golden chair, which, strangely, has wheels on each side. Jewelled rings twinkle on his hands while a tuft of pink horsehair sprouts from his golden fly whisk. When he lazily flicks it at a buzzing insect, I turn wide eyes to Lady Kamanda. Only the Orbai, the highest class of Hemaira’s lords, can hold a golden fly whisk.