The Matriarch—or one of her generals—clearly had tried to reduce their scents as much as possible because the residue of lye clung to each, stinging my nose when I tried to breathe deeply. When they first approached me, I nearly gagged on the scent of lye, sweat, and body odor. Over time, my nose adjusted, but I still took small, cautious breaths, never wanting to empty my stomach of what little substance I was provided. But, underneath the masking scent of lye and sweat, were undercurrents of something more personal.
Citrus and spice.A Pleasure Mage.
Clove and geranium.An Earth Mage.
Clearly, there were two guards assigned on rotation.
Over time, I became accustomed to the heavythumpsof the Earth Mage’s gait and the shuffling of the Pleasure Mage.
Neither ever spoke, an order from their Matriarch, no doubt. Stories of my abilities were wild and untamed, though never fully accurate. There were many folk tales of my ability to corrupt a person simply by knowing the sound of their voice.
I internally snorted at the thought. Either the Matriarch was dumber than anyone had thought, or there was an undercurrentof evil that ran beneath her skin. Because if she didn’t believe the fables about me, then she purposefully refused me sound—a form of torture in parts of Elyria. Sound deprivation, even for short periods of time, could really fuck with a person’s mind.
Make them think they hear voices in their head.
Cause paranoia and, eventually, psychosis.
Aside from the crunch of sand, the rough pull of fabric on skin as the tent flap was opened, and the sound of water sloshing in the cup that was forced into my mouth, I heard no other sounds.
No rustle of animals.
No laughter of children.
Certainly no identifying voices.
Days, weeks, months passed like this.
At first, I tried to reach Meru, but it appeared that my connection to the home of the gods had been disrupted. When my attempts to transport my mind there didn’t work, I tried reaching out to my father directly—something I’d only ever done once before.
But my connection to Fate was woefully silent.
I was alone and growing weaker by the day.
I thought someone would come to demand information or my assistance, but no one ever appeared.
Only those two guards and their distinguishing scents.
Eventually, I slipped into a constant state of near slumber—that hazy point where I wasn’t quite asleep but not fully awake either. I imagined speaking to my daughter for the first time as a mother, and not as the teacher she knew me to be.
I replayed the moment where I watched the only man I ever loved die in front of me while I restrained my daughter, preventing her from saving the one person who actually showed her the love of a parent.
Even if she never knew that hewasher father.
Now, I would die here, and she’d never know her true parentage.
Never know that I loved her with the force of a thousand suns. That her father did as well.
Never know how proud of her we were.
Despair took me, and I threw myself into its waiting arms.
Content to die, I relaxed the barriers on my mind completely, and was suddenly pulled out of my body.
“Daughter.” Fate’s voice was strained. I could hear him, but I couldn’t see him. In fact, I couldn’t see anything.
“This isn’t Meru,” I mused, convinced I was hallucinating the whole experience. After months of trying to contact my father, now, when I’d accepted my final fate, he chose to intervene.
That was so very like the meddling asshole.
