Beyond the Red (12 page)

“If you’d rather deal with a displeased
Sirae
Court when you tell them I exist and find someone else willing to keep you on the throne and protect you …” I shrug and try to look apathetic, but to be honest, if she
did
choose to report me and use someone else, I’d be dead.

She arches an eyebrow. “I wasn’t aware you had a preference as to who held the throne.”

“I didn’t. Until I met your brother.”

She smirks. “He’s a bit difficult to get along with.”

I snort. “That’s putting it mildly.”

“Fine. I accept your terms.”

“You do?”

Kora nods, steps over to her dresser, and rifles through the drawers. After a moment she pulls out a shimmering gold scarf and steps in front of me. “Do you know how to pledge?” My hesitation is all the answer she needs, and she nods again. “Kneel.”

I obey, and she takes my right hand in her left and wraps the scarf around her arm, over our clasped hands, and tightly onto my forearm. She does it swiftly, like it’s been ingrained in her muscle memory. How many others have pledged their allegiance to her? Finally, when the scarf runs out, she tucks the end beneath a loop and meets my eyes.

“This golden fabric is representative of the holy oath you are making. Just as the cloth binds us, your oath to me binds us together until death. Do you swear this to be true?”

A part of me rebels at those words—
until death.
But what did I expect? I’m a slave now, and will be for the rest of my life—the tattoo on my arm makes that clear enough. Sweat beads the back of my neck and, for a terrifying moment, my hand goes slick against hers. But considering where I am, where I will be for the rest of my life, this is the best I could hope for. I squeeze a little tighter and say,
“Sha.”

If she notices my clammy palm, she doesn’t comment. Instead she reaches into her skirt and pulls out a knife from stars know where, spreads the loops of the scarf over the top of my hand, and slices my skin. My breath catches in my throat, and I resist the urge to pull away—not that I could if I wanted to—and she releases the fabric and watches as it soaks up my dark, purple-red blood. She waits until my blood has leaked down the sides of my hand and has dripped onto the edges of hers before speaking.

“Repeat after me: I, Eros of the Eljan Vastlands, swear on my lifeblood and the fate of my afterdeath to serve and protect Kora Mikale Nel d’Elja to the end of my life, or until she freely releases me.”

In my mind, Day jerks to the side and crumples in the sand. My parents’ clasped hands and the burning tents and tiny bodies littering the sands flash across my eyes and stars alive, I hope I’m doing the right thing. I hope they wouldn’t hate me for this and see me as a traitor. Nausea rolls through me and a chill rushes over me, but I repeat her words.

“If I break or fail my oath, I ask that
Kala
dishonor me and my descendants for eight generations, and I submit my afterdeath to the Void.”

Maybe I’m a failure for agreeing to this. Maybe I deserve endless nothingness after I die. But I say it word for word, then Kora unwraps her arm and hand and winds the rest of the cloth over mine. “It is done. Wear the fabric until your hand heals, then you may remove it and do with it what you wish. You may rise.”

I stand and stare at my stinging hand. She wrapped it pretty tight, so I’m not too worried about the bleeding, but will it leave a scar? A permanent sign of my allegiance to her, etched into my hand?

I suppose it doesn’t matter. Scar or not, I’ve just sworn my life away.

“You’ll be given new clothes immediately, and you’ll sleep in my chambers.” My eyes shoot up at that last bit. She doesn’t notice at first—she’s examining my blood on her hand—but then she sees my stare and smirks. “You’ll have a bedroll. On the floor.”

My face goes hot. “I knew that.”

“I’m sure you did,” she says, sounding vaguely amused. “Now, you need a bath. No guard of mine will wear
kara
.”

After scrubbing my skin clean of the waxy white layer stubbornly bleaching my body, I change into the new clothes Kora’s servants left folded beside the tub—a weird white pair of pants that looks like a knee-length skirt with pant legs sewn into the bottom and a red stripe along the legs, and a silver metal band to clasp just above my elbow. All of this is better than the white skirt I was wearing before, so I have no complaints.

I step out of the bathroom, feeling more like myself in my bronzed skin—albeit, a pathetically hairless version of myself—and enter Kora’s chambers. Iro jumps off the bed and strolls right up to me, pressing against my side as he moves around me, swishing his tail. I stand still and try not to panic, but even on all fours, the blazing cat comes up to my chest, and beneath the soft, thick fur is all muscle. It could kill me in a mo.

“Iro,” Kora calls with a slight laugh. “Come here. Don’t scare the poor man.”

The cat trots over to her side, then flops down beside her. She’s waiting at her desk with a woman sitting across from an empty chair holding an inscribed metal band. I recognize the band—it’s the same one that burned the tattoo into my skin not twelve hours ago.

Kora’s gaze slowly rolls over me, from head to foot, and something about the way she’s looking at me almost makes me feel dirty. A hint of a smile curves her lips. “Much better. Now sit.”

I take the empty chair, and the woman clasps the band around my marked arm and slides it just under my current tattoo.

“Is this really necessary?” I ask, and Kora raises an eyebrow.

“Your body reads Servant of Elja. You are no longer a lowly servant; you are sworn to me. Now your skin will say as much.” She nods at the woman who runs her fingers over the surface of the band and taps a sequence into the surface. The edges glow red and my skin burns.

I grit my teeth and stare at my toes. Iro licks my knee and I grimace—his tongue is like slimy sandrock.

“How do you like your clothes?” Kora asks.

“They’re comfortable,” I mutter. My fingers squeeze into my knee until my skin stops sizzling and the band cools. The woman then unclasps my arm and Kora nods.

“Thank you, Mijna. Have the servants I specified been gathered?”

“Sha,
el Avra
,” the woman says with an airy voice.

“Wonderful. Flush the nanites from their bloodstream immediately and see to it that they are released. I’ve already informed Jarek and the others of this order.”

Mijna bows and steps out of the room. I examine my arm. I still can’t read any of it, but the weird black crescent letters follow the contours of light markings swooping over my skin. Which is great, because I really wanted to bring attention to my almost-Sepharon skin.

I force myself to look away and turn to Kora. “Thank you. For keeping your word.”

“I expect you to hold me to my words, as I will hold you to yours.” Her gaze rolls over me. “I take it you’ve noticed you are not wearing the uniform of a warrior.”

“I hadn’t really expected army clothes, all things considered.”

She nods. “You must understand it is imperative that all others believe you to be my personal servant, and nothing more. It is essential for your safety, as well as mine.”

“That’s fine.”

“Good. I feared you may be insulted.”

I snort. “I’m not that fragile.”

She smiles. “I had hoped as much. Thank you, Eros.”

My new job requires shadowing Kora incessantly, and Iro, it seems, feels the need to join us just about everywhere. No one pays him much mind though, so I guess it’s a regular thing. When we first left her room, I got more than a couple lingering stares from guards and a few raised eyebrows at the new line inscribed on my arm. But it seems the black text was more necessary than I thought, because no one questions me after looking at my arm.

The first day is mostly uneventful—Kora goes to her personal training room where she works out until I’m exhausted just watching, then returns to her room and eats a quiet lunch of colorful imported fruits and orange meats dripping with a blue glaze. She shares her food with her personal servant Anja, who doesn’t wear the uniform servant clothes, either. Instead, she has a long sheer green skirt that’s see-through below the knees and a blue top made out of the same kinduv thin material, but wrapped around her body several times and knotted at her waist. It looks nice against her dark skin, I guess, but to be honest, I’m more interested in their food. My mouth waters and my stomach grumbles as I watch them eat. When’s the last time I’ve had a decent meal? It feels like a lifetime ago….

They chat idly over their food about her brother and some kinduv celebration over fifty sets—or, a term, as they call it—away. After they’ve finished, Kora hands me a bowl full of chopped fruit and meat, then walks to the bathroom to bathe and change.

I eat quickly out of habit, but I try to slow down because the food is incredible. I’ve never had fruit before, and the pink juice is sweet and sour and the pulp is slightly chewy and entirely amazing.

When I pick up the meat with my fingers, Anja wrinkles her nose and hands me two stick-like silver utensils with short twin tines at the end. I have no idea how to use them, so I stab the meat with it and eat it off the end. Anja looks disgusted, but I don’t care because the meat is tender, and salty, and sweet, and easily the best thing I’ve ever eaten.

Maybe I should be insulted that I get the scraps, but these scraps are way too delicious to be blazed about. I suck the blue glaze off my fingers and Anja snatches the bowl out of my hand and shoves a square of fabric at me. I wipe my hands and she takes that, too, shaking her head.

After eating, Anja gives me two metal spheres covered in some sortuv thin, slightly sticky dark blue material. Sephari letters light up under the material at my touch. I have no idea what it says, but after messing with it, I find I can adjust the weight of each ball with a few taps. I use them to work out until Kora emerges. She steps out of the bathroom in a short towel and a scarf tightly wrapped around her left arm and shoulder. That’s it. The edge of the towel dangles several inches above her knee and the light markings of her skin swirl around her leg and up into the towel, and there’s black text weaving up the inner part of her thigh and into—

Kora clears her throat. Stares at me pointedly. Arches an eyebrow. Suns above, I’m staring. Stop staring! I rip my attention to the window, ignoring the heat of the suns on my face.

There’s a garden outside. A ridiculously elaborate garden with more flowers and plants than I’ve seen my whole life. Who even needs a garden this big? Stars, who has time to take care of a garden this big? How does it even survive in this heat?

And what does she voiding have written on her
inner
thigh?

After she changes, I have the joy of watching her read. For hours. I entertain myself with an extra workout, then inane, pointless tasks, like counting the books on the bookshelves (1,287) and the trees visible from the window (18) and the number of handles in the room (16). I even pet the blazing cat, who seems to have developed a liking to me, and often takes turns rubbing against me, then Kora. I try ignoring him at first, but he nudges my hand incessantly until I give in and rub the base of his ears. Nol would’ve loved this—he always said if we showed respect to the wild, we would receive respect in return.

Though that advice didn’t help the half-dozen people we lost to wildcat attacks over the years.

“Why is he so gentle?” I finally ask. “The only wildcats I’ve ever heard about were bloodthirsty carnivores.”

Kora glances up at me from her book. “What did you call him?”

I hesitate. “We call them wildcats.”

She furrows her brow. “Your people are strange.”

“Well, what do you call them, then?”

“
Kazim
,” she says. “And as a cub, he was injected with nanites that made him docile.”

Frowning, I say, “He’s brain damaged?”

“Naï.
He just doesn’t have aggressive impulses.” She goes back to her book and flips the page, effectively ending the conversation.

But since I’m bored out of my mind, I ask another question that’s been nagging at me. “Why do you have all these books when you can use your glass?” I nod at the discarded screen on her desk. “I thought you could read on those.”