Ruby Ruins

by J M D Reid

  Black-gloved hands.

  They froze before grabbing her. Shame burned through Ōbhin. What could hands clad in sable do but destroy what they touched? He could never do that to her. He had almost killed her with his recklessness. Going after Creg had not mattered one whit. Not when it had almost gotten her killed.

  “Ōbhin?” she said, her voice tight. Her hands took his, her pale fingers squeezing about the stained leather.

  “I am deeply sorry for getting you hurt,” he said. “Aliiva’s Tone resonates through me. I am glad you survived. I will not endanger you thus again.”

  “Will not endanger . . .” Stubborn anger tightened her expression. “Don’t blame yourself for what happened. It wasn’t your blade that stabbed me. It was Creg’s. You listen to me, Ōbhin. I won’t let you do that. I chose to be there. I can remember that much. I put myself in danger. You didn’t have any say, so you can’t have any guilt.”

  Her words were sweet, but Ōbhin knew the truth. He had to search for answers alone. He had to uncover what Grey and the Brotherhood wanted with Dualayn. Had to learn how to unmask the thing masquerading as Smiles without allowing it to steal another person’s life.

  He released her hands and took a step back. “I promised Deffona to inform her when you came awake. I’m glad you’ve recovered.”

  “Ōbhin,” she said, her brow furrowing.

  Though he marched away at a steady pace, Ōbhin fled the pain in his heart.

  *

  Ōbhin’s sudden coldness stung her. She lowered her hands as Dualayn cleared his throat. “I am sure Deffona will be ecstatic to learn of your recovery.”

  Avena nodded.

  “Come, come, let’s get you to the kitchen. I am sure Kaylin will have something warm and filling for you.”

  “Yeah,” she said, her thoughts churned up. I disappointed him. It stung hard. I wasn’t good enough to stand at his side. I thought with the earthen gauntlets and my training, I was.

  She would have to do better. Try harder. She would show Ōbhin that she wasn’t as fragile as he thought. They had started this together, and she wouldn’t let her weakness ruin that. She would be better.

  She would show Ōbhin he could count on her.

  “Avena!”

  Jilly, Smiles’s wife—no, she’s his widow and doesn’t know it, thought Avena—rushed down the stairs, her dark skirts swirling. The woman, a few years Avena’s senior, swept her up in an embrace, rocking her. Jilly’s cries attracted attention. Other maids drifted in. Shebani, Chobay, Deshvi, and plump Layni soon joined the hug. For a moment, Avena was all smiles as they kissed her cheeks and gushed over her.

  “You need to eat,” Jilly declared. “Dualayn, sir, why are you just letting her starve right here?”

  “My apologies, madam,” Dualayn said, a smile on his lips. “She keeps getting distracted with greetings.”

  The front door opened. Miguil and a few of the guards stepped in. Her former promised grinned, transforming his handsome face into something beautiful.

  Dajouth pressed forward, his blond hair spilling about his head. “Avena, I am heartened to see the world is not diminished by the absence of your beauty.” He spoke with the flowery tone he used with every woman. “I could feel your brightness shining through the walls. It called to me.”

  The fake Smiles slipped his arm around Jilly. He had that infectious grin, mimicking the real one so much. “It’s a blessed day to see you up and about.”

  “It is,” Jilly said, hugging the thing tight. She had no idea. She carried Smiles’s child, conceived before his death and replacement.

  Fingers held back as Bran wiggled through the maids to give her a hug. She smiled and embraced the boyish guard. Even gave him a kiss on the cheek. He blushed as he broke away only to be replaced by a hopeful Dajouth.

  She hugged him but didn’t give him a kiss. Normally, his flowery compliments grated on her, but not even the impostor’s presence could dampen her elation right now. Not with the rest of her friends around her. The family that had come to replace what she’d lost to her mother’s madness.

  She glanced at Fingers standing in the doorway. He had such a look of relief on his face, an awe not dissimilar to Ōbhin’s. She had always found Fingers off-putting. The way the man talked about his estranged wife infuriated and embarrassed her in turns.

  Right now . . .

  She smiled at him and held out her hand, beckoning. He swallowed and a dark look flashed across his face. Guilt or shame or some other emotion, she wasn’t sure. Then he slipped out the door. It closed behind him with a clunk.

  Just like Ōbhin, she thought. Why do men have to be such great fools? Ōbhin should have yelled at me like he did after the riots. Does he think I’m that weak? And Fingers . . . How can he possibly think this was his fault?

  She would have to talk to them both. Later. The smells from Kaylin’s kitchen were savory.

  After she’d eaten a thick broth of wheat noodles and fish seasoned with soy and ginger, she was ushered up to her room on the second floor by the maids. She objected to being tucked in like a child, but Jilly and Layni overrode her protestations. In moments, they had her safely ensconced beneath the covers.

  Exhaustion seized her, but sleep didn’t come right away. Ōbhin lingered in her mind. She wanted to speak with him right now. To find out what he thought about her. Did he see her as some sort of burden? She refused to be one.

  She would show him. Tomorrow, I’ll resume training with the guards.

  Next time they went into danger, she wouldn’t get hurt.

  Chapter Eight

  Fifty-First Day of Forgiveness, 755 EU

  Traces of exhaustion lingered in Avena the next day as she pulled on her boots for training with Ōbhin and the guards. She had to push herself through the lethargy that hollowed out her guts. She couldn’t afford for Ōbhin to see her as weak. As a woman.

  What’s so wrong if he sees me as a woman? wandered through her thoughts.

  Warmth rippled through her. She smiled. Would it be so bad if he saw her as a woman? He had the night he’d tried to kiss her. After, he’d backed away, respecting that she was promised to Miguil. Not any longer. She wouldn’t marry a man she didn’t love and who could never love her back.

  Miguil had his secret desires that were condemned as sin by Elohm’s Church.

  Avena hadn’t really thought of Ōbhin much that way. She’d been so focused on training, on learning from Dualayn, and protecting the healer from the Brotherhood and their foul creation: the simulacrum posing as Smiles.

  She had to regain his trust. Being around Ōbhin made her feel alive, especially doing dangerous things. She didn’t dwell on her past and the guilt she felt for standing by and watching her mother drown her twin sister in whitewash. Ōbhin filled something inside of her. Something ripped out that Black day.

  Something Chames, her first love, had also given her.

  “You’d like him,” she whispered to Chames as she laced up her boots. “He’s direct and honest. Once you get him to open up. If you earn his trust, he doesn’t hold back.”

  Boots tied, she stood. Her legs were a little stiff. A week’s sleeping had reduced her weight. She’d been ravenous. When she wasn’t sleeping, she’d feasted. She’d broken her fast on a heavy meal of fermented beans coating toast with thin slices of fried ham, and not the canned variety that flowed out of the factories and sold to the poor of the city.

  She grabbed her binder and thrust it through a loop in her belt. The iron rod’s weight felt comfortable on her side.

  She marched forward, her short hair swaying loose about her shoulders. That was . . . different. She’d been braiding her hair since childhood. She’d never cut it so short, only trimming it to keep it from falling too far down her back. Now it tickled her neck and brushed her cheeks with every step.

  It irked her. She liked twining ribbons in her hair. A nice mauve went well with her brown locks. She pondered new ways to style it as she descended the
stairs. Maybe I can gather it into twin tails on the sides of my head like Onderian children.

  She’d seen children like that roaming through the Onderian quarter where the people from the Lothon’s southern neighbors lived in Kash. They came to find work and new beginnings in the largest city in the Arngelsh Isles. The girls looked cute with their short hair gathered up in the two tails that thrust from the sides of their heads.

  At least it won’t itch my neck, she thought as she reached the bottom of the stairs.

  She nodded to Jilly and Chobay as they swept the entry hall. Dualayn was back into research. He had a do not disturb sign out. She sighed, wanting to get in there and tinker more on her creation. She had ideas for a bodysuit of emeralds to strengthen every bit of her. A network of them that she could don and doff. There would be vulnerabilities with the wire. If they were cut, it would short out the entire network.

  And there’s the problem of joints. Too much flexing could snap them. Maintenance would be necessary.

  As much as she exercised and trained, Avena couldn’t quite match even scrawny Bran in strength. They were similar in weight, Bran having only a stone on her, and he wasn’t much taller, but he had just enough of an edge on her. Against Cerdyn or Fingers, she didn’t stand much of a chance in a direct contest of brawn.

  She needed brains. To think when she fought. Her jewelchine invention was one such tool.

  The others were gathering for the daily exercises at the fourth hour from dawn, midday still two hours away. A gray overcast hid the sun, keeping things cool until it burned through and allowed summer to shine.

  Ōbhin stiffened when he saw her.

  The pain in his face stung. She had failed him badly. She had been there to watch his back, and instead her injury had allowed Creg to escape. They’d lost their chance to find out some solid answers in a way that wouldn’t endanger Dualayn by angering the Brotherhood.

  “Is it wise to be out of bed so soon?” Fingers asked, his brow heavy and face tight. He popped his knuckles as he studied her approach.

  “I’m fine,” she answered.

  “She’s fine,” Smiles said, rolling his eyes. “Only a week ago, you was spasmin’ in Ōbhin’s arms, a piece of metal as long as my arm thrust into your head. But now you’re ‘fine.’”

  “Yep.” She forced herself to smile. “If you’d been hit in the head, nothing would’ve happened.”

  Smiles’s grin grew and then he burst into laughter. “True, true. My Jilly can tell you that there ain’t nothin’ betwixt my head. Why I can take a thumpin’ and keep goin’.”

  “You’re not training with us any longer,” Ōbhin said.

  Avena stiffened. “I’m recovered.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” He turned his back on her, his leather jerkin creaking around his torso. “I never should’ve taught you to fight. It’s not a woman’s place.”

  “A woman’s place?” she demanded. “When did you get to decide where my place is?”

  “It’s my guard to run.”

  The others tensed. Bran swallowed while Dajouth released a nervous laugh. “I know she’s a pretty thing, but she’s a better fighter than me or Bran. She’s as good as Smiles.”

  Ōbhin shrugged. “It was a mistake. Men fight, women tend the house. Way it’s supposed to be.”

  “I see,” she said, her voice frigid. Pain tore through her soul. She no longer wanted to win back his approval. Anger bubbled in her. “Then don’t let me stop you. Go on, do your exercises.”

  “You’re still here.”

  “And?” She planted her hands on her hips. “I think you made it quite clear that I’m not a part of your guard, so you can’t give me orders. I can stand here if I want to.”

  Ōbhin shrugged, still not looking at her.

  That infuriated her even more. Was she that weak? How badly had she messed up? She couldn’t remember the fight. It was all hazy. A patchwork quilt stitched together wrong. What mistake had she made?

  Smiles muttered, “Not what a smart leader would do.”

  She gave him a sharp look. The simulacrum’s memory of Smiles’s life seemed complete. It made her doubt what she’d seen the night of the attack. The real Smiles had said those words over a month ago when only she and Ōbhin had been around to hear them.

  “Never give an order you know won’t be obeyed,” were Smiles’s words on the subject.

  Right now, Ōbhin was being an idiot by giving her orders she would defy.

  Bran and Dajouth flicked nervous eyes back and forth between her and Ōbhin while Smiles rubbed at the back of his neck. Cerdyn didn’t seem to care, and Fingers just studied her with concern, the digits of his right hand tracing over the swollen knuckles of his left.

  “Calisthenics!” barked Ōbhin. “We’ll start with push-ups.”

  Avena never could do as many as the men most days, but she normally could manage as many as Bran. Today, she could hardly do any.

  Her arms felt noodly and weak. She panted and gasped as she forced herself to push up and down, lifting and raising her torso. Ōbhin was upfront, not looking at her as he grunted through his exercises. She glared at him when she wasn’t fighting the burning pain in her arms.

  She collapsed after fifteen. Half her normal amount. A dizzying wave washed over her. She pushed it down and waited for the others to finish. Then they launched into the jumping exercises. She gasped and wheezed by the time they finished, only just managing to keep up with them.

  Running, however, broke her. She didn’t even make it around the perimeter once. She grew dizzy as they jogged past the reed-lined shore of Lake Ophavin. The world swayed about her. She gasped, bent over, and seized her knees to keep from collapsing. Her stomach growled.

  Fingers fell out and studied her as she struggled to catch her breath. Sweat poured down her face. The day’s heat was mounting. The sun burned through the thin clouds. She swallowed excess spit, the back of her throat tasting coppery.

  “You know he’s scared,” Fingers said.

  “He’s disgusted with me,” she hissed. “Did you hear what he said about me?” The pain welled. “I thought I’d proven myself. I had, right? That I could fight. That he could trust me to watch his back.”

  He cocked his head. “That’s important to you, huh?”

  “I want to protect us all!” she snarled. “Why should my sex bar me from doing it?”

  “Don’t see how it is,” he said.

  “Ōbhin disagrees.”

  “No, he’s scared,” Fingers reiterated. “Boy don’t handle it well.”

  “He’s a man.”

  “Maybe to you.” Fingers spat. “You’re all boys to me. And a girl. Too young and serious. Bah, you and Ōbhin should be sneakin’ off to kiss, not whackin’ at each other with pipes.”

  “What business is it of yours?” she demanded. Fingers hardly ever said a word to her.

  “Just tellin’ you, he’s scared.”

  “And that’s a reason for him to turn his back on me? I survived.” She swallowed. “How badly did I mess up that day? I can’t remember it all. It’s just pieces shattered in my mind. I can glimpse bits here and there. None of it makes sense.”

  “Girl, you didn’t—”

  “Don’t ‘girl’ me!” she snapped. “I’m twenty. A woman.”

  Fingers released a long exhale. “Give him a few days. You really scared him. He wants to run. You keep chasin’ him, it’ll just make him run faster.”

  “What are you talking about?” Her legs quivered, sore muscles wanting to collapse. Her clothing trapped in the heat. The sunlight warmed the back of her neck, her short hair sticking to her sweaty skin. “Scare him? How?”

  “You know how. It wasn’t your fault, but that don’t change it.” Fingers rubbed the back of his neck. “Wanna reassure him, then make sure you’re mended before you try ’n show him you’re not weak. You look like you’re ‘bout to pass out.”

  “Feel like it,” she muttered.

  “No shame in
takin’ some time to recover,” Fingers added.

  She studied him. “I thought you hated women.”

  “Don’t hate women. Just my wife.” He sighed. “And I don’t even hate her, which makes me the fool. Makes it hurt all the more. Elohm’s Colours, girl, go. Sleep. Get well. Give Ōbhin time to realize he’s an idiot, and then you two can go back to your plots.”

  The tips of her ears burned. “We’re not plotting.”

  Fingers snorted. This fatherly smile crossed his lips. “Go on, girl. Don’t wanna see you hurt neither. Ōbhin weren’t the only one scared to see you with a piece of metal stuck in your head.”

  “You?”

  “Bah,” he growled. “Smiles. He almost pissed his pants, and Dajouth didn’t have no flowery thing to say for days, to the delight of every maid and cook.”

  “Do you have children, Fingers?”

  He stared at her for a long time before he said, “No, thank Elohm. I’d be a lousy father.”

  “I’m not so sure.” Her stomach rumbled. “I think I’ll eat an early lunch and then take a nap.”

  “He don’t hate you,” Fingers added. “Or think you’re weak or that being a woman is holding you back.”

  “He said it,” she muttered. As much as she wanted to be back working with Ōbhin, training, plotting, and venturing out on secret missions, she wouldn’t swallow those words.

  “Make him sweat when he apologizes. My wife always did that.” Pain flashed across his face. He jogged on, leaving her standing there.

  She felt bemused by the entire conversation. Confused. Was Fingers trying to say that Ōbhin, in an infuriating and demeaning way, wanted to protect her? I didn’t fail him, he just doesn’t want to see me hurt. Like I want that for him.

  She headed inside.

  If he expects me to wait around dreading dark news while he goes and does something reckless . . .

  First things first; she had to recover. Then she would figure out how to make Ōbhin see reason.

  *

  Fifty-Fourth Day of Forgiveness, 755 EU

  Ōbhin hadn’t seen much of Avena. She’d been spending time in her room for the last three days, taking care of herself. He hated the pain he caused her, but it was better to drive her away than to see her bleeding out on the floor again.