Ruby Ruins

by J M D Reid

  The door to Charlis’s office opened and a smiling Deffona stepped out, her cheeks rosy with delight. She adjusted her veil and then clapped her hands together. With a girlish squeal, she rushed around her desk to Avena.

  Avena matched her gleeful excitement.

  The two embraced as words poured out of their mouths, both speaking so fast at and at the same time, their words merged to form something akin to birdsong. Avena greeted her friend while Deffona apologized for not visiting her more while she recovered. Their excitement echoed through the room as they rocked together in a tight hug.

  Finally, Deffona broke the hug and took a step back. “Why are you here? Did you want to take me to tea? There’s this wonderful tea house nearby. They serve a delightful Relashim oolong.”

  “No, no,” Avena said. She turned to her satchel and pulled out the thick envelope. She thrust it at her friend. “Dualayn’s answer to Charlis.”

  “He’s been expecting this,” Deffona said, hugging it tight. “We’re trying to head off the king’s mad ambition to seize all of the Border Fangs for himself.”

  Avena smiled. She felt like a tiny link in a jewelchine network, not unlike the one she’d built for her earthen gauntlet. She wasn’t an important cog, but her turning had done something to arrest this looming disaster. A war with Roidan over something as petty as jewels made little sense to her when the two countries traded all the time.

  Deffona set the envelope on her desk, then her eyes flicked up and down. Her gaze narrowed. “Is Ōbhin being delicate?”

  “That’s a word for it,” Avena answered.

  “Yours?”

  “Disappointed in me and reticent to see my weakness get me injured again.” A weight pressed on her. Avena’s good mood evaporated.

  “Weakness? You? He said that?” Anger flashed across Deffona’s face. “I thought he had some sense. Maybe he’s as blind as a cockroach in the sun, but surely he could have recognized you’re not weak.”

  “I’m not strong,” Avena said.

  “I don’t mean physically!” She waved her bare hand in the air, her yellow sleeve rustling. “That’s not the strength that counts, and you know it. Look at you. The only time I’ve seen you look more miserable was after Chames’s death.” Deffona’s face tightened. “I should have been clearer with him. Maybe it was the rosebush metaphor that confused him.”

  “Rosebush?” Befuddlement rippled across Avena’s expression.

  “You know that it isn’t your weakness he’s worried about.”

  “Fingers said he’s scared of seeing me get hurt, but I wouldn’t have gotten hurt if I didn’t mess up. I just can’t remember how. It’s all jumbled up in here.” She tapped her head. A fuzzy ripple ran through her body, a strange disassociation. She felt unreal for a moment. Alien.

  “You okay?”

  “I just . . . I still get dizzy sometimes,” Avena muttered.

  “You did have a sword stuck in your head. It’s a miracle that you’re alive. Elohm’s Colours healed you through His gems.”

  “Through Dualayn.” Avena swallowed. “How can I prove to Ōbhin that I’m strong if he’s running away from me? He won’t let me train. I need to get better so I won’t mess up again.”

  “Why do you think you messed up?”

  “I took a piece of steel in the head.” She rubbed at the spot, feeling for any leftover damage. Her fingers caressed whole skin over hard bone. “How else could it have happened?”

  “I don’t know.” Deffona cocked her head, her veil rustling over her wimple. “Even if it was your fault, that’s not why Ōbhin’s acting this way. He doesn’t want to see you get hurt again.” A smile blossomed on her lips. “He wants to keep you safe like a prized treasure.”

  Avena furrowed her brow. “You really need to stop reading those books. They’re not realistic. I don’t want to be his prized treasure. I want to be at his side.”

  “Even though it’s dangerous?”

  “How can I keep him safe if I’m not beside him?” Avena asked and then blinked at her words. They shocked her. “I . . . I don’t want him to go off and do dangerous things when I’m not around.”

  “You’re finally realizing it, aren’t you?” Deffona clapped her hands together and sighed again. “Love.”

  Avena sank down into the chair beside her. She shifted her skirt out of habit. She went to reach for her braid of hair but found nothing, instead brushing one of her small tails. “A month ago, I was afraid I couldn’t love anyone at all.”

  “You were just confused. Now you love him, and he’s trying to drive you away. That’s not good. He shouldn’t hurt you like that.”

  “He just doesn’t want me to get injured, but I can’t just remain behind. I can’t be helpless.” The emptiness in her swelled. “Never again. Maybe I should be more careful in a fight, but I know I was useful during the raid. I can remember fighting the local gang. My invention worked. It was exhilarating. I was so happy. He trusted me to watch his back, and I don’t want to lose that.”

  “You can’t let him push you away. You have to defy him. If he tries to run, tackle him.”

  “What?” Avena gasped. “Like grab his legs or something?”

  “Yes! I know it’s romantic that he wants to keep you safe while he goes out and fights evil, but you’re not that type of woman.”

  Fights evil? Avena favored her friend an exasperated look.

  “You’ll have to be persuasive. I know he can be a delicate man, but rosebushes are resilient. You don’t let him get away. You beat it through his thick skull that the best way for him to protect you is for you to be at his side when things are most dangerous.” Deffona sank into her own chair on the other side of the desk. “Fighting monsters and braving evil together. And when you’re not fighting, when you return to your bower, you can share in other delights.”

  “My life is not one of your novels,” Avena muttered, her cheeks warm. She’d seen Ōbhin shirtless a few times. Memories of his brown, strong body flashed through her mind. Then the way he’d touched her bare face after Ust had attacked.

  “My novels aren’t this exciting. The women in them just wait to be saved. You have to be proactive about it.”

  “I don’t need to be saved. He’s already done that, remember?”

  “I know.” Deffona’s voice grew airy and distant. “You are so lucky.” She sighed again. “So, this is what you have to do. March up to him and give him a talking to. Let him know that you will not be wrapped up in swaddling cloth. That you’ll do . . . whatever it is you two are doing.”

  “Protecting Dualayn,” Avena said, her cheeks burning.

  “Right, right. Tell him that you’re there until the end.”

  “I will,” Avena straightened in her chair. “When I get back. I’ll corner him.”

  “Try the grove by your house.” Deffona leaned forward, resting her cloth-wrapped chin on her bare hands. “Alone. You can kiss and make up once you have this all worked out.”

  “Maybe,” Avena said. Her mood lifted, she glanced at the door behind her friend. “How is this new job?”

  “I like it,” Deffona said. “It’s so different from working at the hospital, but Refractor Charlis’s work is important. We’re the bulwark against the king and his madness. There are clergy who are taking bribes. It’s disgusting.”

  Avena grimaced. “They’re holy men.”

  “I know.” Deffona shook her head. “Holy men can be weak, too. Charlis fears our new high refractor is being influenced, but I’m doing what I can. Our high refractor is a great man.”

  “And his stance on the war?”

  “He’s talking about being neutral on this matter of war,” Deffona said. Then quickly added, “Not supporting it, but he’s not denouncing it, either. You have to understand, he’s the holy leader of Roidan and Ondere, too. And those nations on Busil if they’ll ever stop being heretics. He can’t play favorites.”

  Avena gave a slow nod, though she would appreciate a more
proactive high refractor. “Well, I’ve heard the other nations think our church is too influenced by Lothon.”

  “Exactly!” Deffona said.

  “But if he’s not denouncing it, then other clergymen in the House don’t feel as pressured to make a stand. Right?”

  “Charlis is trying to make a coalition with those in the House of the Serfs who recognize this for the true danger it is. Conscription and chaos. It could be another ten years of war if this spirals out of control.”

  “I hope he’s successful.” Avena shifted. She owned no property, so she couldn’t do much to influence the House of Serfs, and she had no title to petition the the House of Lords.

  “Tomorrow, the House of Clerics is going to pass Charlis’s bill,” Deffona said, her voice breathy again. Her cheeks were bright with her excitement. “The high refractor himself was in here just a little while ago to lend his support. I’m not supposed to talk about the details, but you won’t gossip.”

  “Of course not,” Avena said, leaning in. Excitement quivered through her at being included.

  “It’ll say that peace with Roidan is necessary and will ask for a lessening of tariffs. To lower the cost of buying gems from them and encouraging them to purchase our jewelchines.” Deffona tapped the letter. “That’s what is in here. Information to help sell this idea.”

  “Wonderful. I’m glad you’re happy here. You look alive. No bags under your eyes.”

  “No Eldest Sister Anglia harping about every fault I have. She was furious that Charlis hired me, but she couldn’t say no to a refractor. I even have my own room at his church.” Deffona gave Avena a studious look. “You should come to mass. Being a good person isn’t enough if you don’t attend any.”

  “His church is so far from the estate. There’s one I go to when I can,” Avena said, shame skittering through her. When had she last gone? Dualayn never bothered, but many of his servants went to a small church in the Breezy Hills Slums. “I’ll try to come and visit yours so we can talk after mass.”

  Deffona beamed.

  They chatted for a little longer before Avena’s eagerness to confront Ōbhin and put this entire mess behind them grew too much. She embraced her friend, the pair exchanging kisses on the cheeks, then Avena departed.

  Ōbhin occupied her thoughts. Being around him was exciting. A joy. She didn’t feel that bit of her scraped out by Evane’s death around him. Like with Chames, Ōbhin filled something in her. What she’d felt for Miguil was a pale thing. She’d been tricking herself into thinking she loved him.

  If Ōbhin had kissed me that night in the inn . . . Avena smiled. Maybe once they had made up, they could start doing things like kissing. Maybe other things. She swept out of Parliament and navigated through the protesters.

  There seemed like more of them than before.

  She reached the street, her skirts rustling as she moved through the afternoon traffic. The day’s heat roiled around her. She fanned her face and shifted her satchel. When she was about halfway to the city gate, the Rainbow Belfry chimed. A loud note washed over her. This close, she felt it dancing across her skull.

  She swayed, almost disoriented by the sound of the artifact ringing in the house. The fuzziness returned to the tips of her fingers. She gasped as a dizzying wave flooded through her. She stumbled, clutching at her temples. Her fingers felt alien as they squeezed her skull. Sounds grew muted, like she’d ducked her head underwater. Her legs wobbled. She lurched to the right. She stumbled into an alley before catching herself on a building’s wall.

  Cool darkness.

  She staggered forward two steps. The world swam as she passed a stack of old crates. She grabbed one for support. Darkness rippled across her vision. Fear gripped her in slimy hands as her flesh felt more and more unreal.

  Her thoughts were mist about to blow away.

  She sank down the wall to crouch, whimpering. The world spun around her, the alley flipping topsy-turvy. Her body felt remote. Distant. Then she felt shorn from it. Darkness plunged over her as she lost all connection to her flesh.

  Her thoughts drifted through a void until a bright, white light gleamed. She tumbled towards it, drawn to it like a diamond lamp illuminating a dark street. She reached out for it, touched it, and fell into a dream.

  Chapter Ten

  “She hasn’t returned yet?” Ōbhin demanded of Cerdyn as he stood guard at the main gate. The sun was sinking to the west, shadows growing long, the world staining red.

  “No,” Cerdyn said, the grim-faced guard scratching at his neck. He wore his chainmail coat, a binder hanging from his left hip, a backsword on the other. His brows knit together, squishing his thick, black eyebrows into a single, fuzzy line. “Would’ve told you.”

  “Niszeh’s Black Tone!” Ōbhin spat, icy fingers clawing at his guts. He’d heard the Rainbow Belfry chime five times since she’d left.

  “No sign of riots,” said Smiles. “Maybe she’s stayin’ in Kash. She’s meetin’ with her friend. Least wot my Jilly said.”

  “She wouldn’t stay the night.” Ōbhin rolled his shoulders. His leather jerkin clung to his sweat-soaked skin. “She’s just delivering a letter, right?”

  “Accordin’ to my Jilly.” The fake Smiles rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe we should go look for her. Night’s fallin’. She gotta pass through dangerous slums to get back.”

  Ōbhin nodded. He wanted to avoid Avena, but he couldn’t let her get hurt. I should have just gone with her. If she’s hurt . . .

  Pain punched him.

  “Let’s go,” Fingers said, stepping out. “Light’s fadin’.”

  “Right,” Smiles said. “I can get my binder. Be back in a lightnin’s fart.”

  “No,” Ōbhin said, glancing at the guards. Bran and Dajouth stood nearby, both looking worried. “Bran and Fingers, with me. Smiles, you have the command.” The words tasted bitter, but Smiles was here to protect Dualayn, or so Ōbhin believed. Until Dualayn stopped being useful to the Brotherhood, Smiles wasn’t a danger.

  When that day came . . .

  “Ain’t nothin’ gonna happen here,” said Smiles. “Unless there’s another bandit chief you done pissed off and who knows a sorcerer to enchant him.”

  “Only one of those,” Ōbhin muttered.

  The Rainbow Belfry’s resonating note drifted through the air from Kash.

  Ōbhin marched out of the gate, his shadow stretching long before him. Fear squeezed his chest. He struggled to breathe as he marched forward. He shouldn’t have let her go off alone. He should have gone with her or sent Fingers or Bran to be a second pair of eyes.

  Bile tickled the back of his throat with every step he took. The pressure crushing his chest grew and grew. Panic nibbled on the edges of his self-control. He forced his back straight as he tromped across the Tendril Bridge and entered the Breezy Hills Slums.

  *

  Avena kissed a man in her dreams.

  She held him tight as she lay beneath him on a bed. The sheets were sleeker than anything she’d felt. Smoother than the Demochian silk gowns that hung uselessly in Bravine’s wardrobe. The cloth set her skin alive; almost as exciting as the man upon her.

  He had brown skin and coal-dark hair. She shivered in his embrace. They were naked, bodies pressed tight. She felt the cooling heat of passion dying in her nethers. For a moment, she thought it was Ōbhin she kissed, but when he lifted his head and opened his eyes, they were sapphire. A pure blue instead of Ōbhin’s dark brown. This man had delicate features, handsome, almost beautiful.

  He spoke; his words were musical, a language Avena didn’t understand, but they were reassuring words. Loving words. He stroked her cheek as he stared down at her. Then his fingers drifted to her hair.

  He brought a lock to his lips, kissing not her familiar brown strands but a white-silver lock. He said something that made Avena laugh in delight. She pulled him back to her lips, kissing him, joy bursting through her mind.

  The dream slipped from Avena.

&nb
sp; She woke up on something far harder, the stench of sour dirt in her nose. She blinked. Eyes focused. She lay in a dark alley on her side behind a stack of crates. She groaned, pressing herself up. Detritus from the alley’s cobblestones smudged her cheek. Some spilled off as she sat up. Confusion swirled through her.

  “Dark?” she muttered. It had been early afternoon when she’d left Parliament. She could remember the strange dizziness that had beset her. She stared down at her fingers, flexing and closing them.

  They felt real. Solid. Her hands.

  She leaned her head back against the stone wall, drawing in breaths. A cold terror nestled in her belly. She had passed out in the middle of Kash. She gasped, feeling for her satchel that held her binder and her earthen gauntlet.

  Missing.

  She suddenly felt dirty. She bolted to her feet, violated by being robbed while she lay helpless. Her skin crawled. Whoever had burgled her could have done much, much worse to her. She patted herself, probing for pain, new bruises, finding none. Acids churning in her stomach, she darted out of the alley and almost crashed into a man in a waistcoat and felt hat.

  “You okay, madam?” he asked.

  “I’m fine,” she lied, wanting to get away from here. Back to the safety of Dualayn’s house. He had walls.

  Ōbhin.

  “Do you want me to fetch the guard? You look . . .” The man’s delicate tone trailed off.

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Just fell, that’s all.”

  “If you say so. Perhaps, I can escort you home?”

  She shook her head and pushed from him. She rushed forward with the flowing traffic down the street, feeling so naked. She’d lost her weapon. Her glove to strengthen her. Night was falling. She’d have to walk through the Roida Slums in the dark. Defenseless.

  I passed out in an alley. Anyone could have violated me. I’m lucky to have only lost my satchel. Fear slithered through her. What’s wrong with me? Am I not healed? Dualayn said there could be issues. Is this it?

  She chewed on her lower lip as she walked at a brisk pace, skirts swirling about her legs.