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Prillu nodded and bowed deeply before he dismissed her.
He returned to the tent to begin his own preparations. Just because the Omega had agreed to give them information didn’t mean their work with her was over. She would lie and misdirect and cheat them to protect her people, and each time she’d need to learn how much of a mistake that was. Nothing was more important than invading the green world. He hadn’t wavered from this goal for decades and he wasn’t going to start now just because the key to success lay in a deliciously-scented Omega.
When they returned home, she would be questioned and interrogated and treated like the prisoner she was. And if he decided to observe her on the journey, it will be from afar where her scent couldn’t reach him.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Naya submerged into cool water and savored the weightlessness.
Her skin tingled, some parts of it stung, but she ignored it and absorbed the relieving sensation of hydration. After a long moment, hands pulled her up to the surface and lathered her hair and face. Naya let herself be turned and rotated while she tried to take in where she was. This tent was larger than her usual one, and had furniture, but she didn’t remember how she got there.
After the horrifying realization about the beast, things had dissolved into a hazy existence. Her mood had sunk so low, she couldn’t tell if she was awake or in a nightmare. Exhaustion had finally ripped its way to the core of her, and she couldn’t bear to think anymore. She just shut herself away, refusing to speak or even look at anyone who entered.
But the feeling of water couldn’t be ignored. Neither could the act of being bathed, if that’s what it could be called.
She floated in a fat tube of water that extended vertically into the ground, but she couldn’t see how the structure was possible. This tent had a hard wooden floor instead of sand, but the tube would still have to extend down past the wood and into the sand. After a moment of difficult thought, she gave up trying to work it out and enjoyed the soothing sensation of water on her blistery skin.
Two women floated alongside her, scrubbing her hair and carefully cleaning her body. Then they pulled her out, dried her, and applied an ointment to her cracked lips and the sores and welts across her body.
They gave her one of the knobby plant stems to drink, gesturing that she sip it slowly, while they coated her burns with a sticky salve and rebound the dark red bands to her forearms, this time forgoing the one around her torso.
After she drank half of the stem, they led her over to makeshift bed in a corner of the tent and forced her to lie down. A powerful drowsiness pulled her into darkness within a few moments.
When a loud commotion bled into her consciousness, she woke, her mind refreshed and sharp.
Naya lay for a moment, listening to the racket. Her mood had lightened, no doubt due to being clean and rested, but the unpleasant shadow of her conversation with the beast remained. She forced him out of her mind and sat up swiftly. Her focus now should be figuring out who these people really were and how she’d alert her father when she got back home.
Carefully she pushed up onto shaky legs and was surprised that there was no pain. A tacky residue covered her burns and the bruises on her torso had almost faded. The bands around her forearms were looser but stiff, more like armor cuffs instead of skin-tight like before. She tugged them down to her wrists, but as they slid over the heel of her hand, they tightened instantly—clearly being a “guest” of the beast didn’t mean being free from magical bindings.
The commotion outside grew louder. Lots of voices called to each other, layered with conversations and commands. Some shouted while others spoke normally, but none of them seemed aggressive, and yet it was the most noise they’d made in all the time she’d been here.
She glanced around the tent, wondering if she’d have a chance to slip away in the commotion, but hesitated. She still didn’t know how to get out of the desert. Running across the sand hoping she wouldn’t be seen wasn’t a plan that would get her home. It didn’t work last time, and she couldn’t afford to make mistakes when her home and family were at risk.
Papa always told her not to let information go to waste, that something seemingly insignificant could be the piece of information to turn the tide in a war. So she sat back on the bed and listened to the people outside, even though their language was so different from anything she’d heard before.
The Known Lands, which spanned across the three continents, were united by the common tongue. Each region, and in some cases individual countries, had their own native tongue but for trading, official, and legal purposes, the common tongue was used. In the Lox Empire, it was used almost exclusively, which was why she was only fluent in three other languages, and she rarely had the opportunity to speak them.
She closed her eyes and listened, hoping she could figure out a few words, but they were speaking too fast and the accent wasn’t familiar. Most languages in the Known Lands had developed together, so they used words or dialects that were similar enough to figure out. This sounded completely different.
It was a hard, guttural language softened by frequent use of the sh sound and lots of variation of the n sound. They used their voices in ways she hadn’t heard much before, and the more she listened, the more rhythmic and harmonious it sounded.
She was so focused on listening, she didn’t notice anyone had entered the tent until a brush skimmed her arm. She tensed, her eyes snapping open, and two women jumped back, watching her warily. They wore the same unusual tunics that everyone else wore, one brown and the other tan. They were larger than her, with toned arms and lean frames.
“Please stand,” the woman in brown said slowly, the Common Tongue words heavy with her accent.
Naya rose to her feet, watching them just as warily.
They pulled a calve-length tunic dress over her head. The other woman clasped her hands together, fingers interlocked, and held them out in front of her. “Like this.”
Naya repeated the action, then the woman in brown reached out to touch her fabric bands, and Naya watched closely.
The woman rubbed a quick, complicated pattern on the edge of the fabric, alternating between the pads of three of her fingers, and soon enough Naya’s wrists were restricted from moving apart. The other woman wrapped the same fabric around her knees and rubbed another complicated pattern into its edge, using two of her fingers, restricting Naya’s ability to walk too quickly.
Naya stared at the fabric, dismay sinking into her. It would be almost impossible for her to figure out those patterns.
They escorted her out of the tent, one in front, one behind. As they crossed the tent, Naya noticed that the tube of water had disappeared. The tent floor was intact, with no sign that it had ever been there. Maybe she’d imagined it.
The hot, bright glare hit her as soon as she stepped out of the tent, and Naya pressed her lips together to avoid a whimper escaping. Even though she knew she wasn’t going to the stone to be tortured, the fabric, the sun, being escorted outside… the familiarity sent a sharp unease through her chest. If she never spent another day in the sun, she doubted she’d miss it.
