The sound of ceramic smashing filled the room.
The Okpalaeze staggered.
His body stumbled back against the door.
He lifted his fingers to his forehead and felt something warm.
Blood.
His fingers shook as he saw red.His vision swam as he tried to look up.All he was allowed to witness was a pair of cold golden eyes, the eyes of death.
"Azul?"he whispered with a fading voice, but the woman did not reply.
Azul stood above the prince’s body, eyes red, bruises blossoming around her neck.Lightning struck, and her back glowed with deep-carved markings, a ritual circle that vanished under human eyes, one Azul hadn’t noticed.
She knew one hit was not enough to kill him, but he needed to pay for what he'd done to her.So she looked around the room, eyes landing on an ornamental sword hanging on the wall.She dragged her heavy body there.Her hips hurt, and she wheezed with each breath.Her hair clung to the tear stains on the sides of her face, her mind and heart fixed on only one outcome.
Grabbing the blade by the hilt, she pulled it from its scabbard, and it gave a sharp hiss.It was heavy, so it instantly dropped by her side with a thud.
That did not stop her.
Her weakness was no reason to let this man live.She was merely a passerby, and yet the rage of a dead girl had driven her to near insanity.She couldn't think of anything else other than beheading the fool who dared to lay hands on her, to see his blood dampen her dress.And so she dragged the metal behind her, the sound like the gnashing of teeth.Each step came with significant strain; each breath burned from the depths of her lungs.And yet she pressed onwards until she stood before the perpetrator, panting.
Lightning struck once more, but this time, the light was obscured.A shadow was cast along the wall; perhaps it was Ukhel, for it had horns on its head.Did the god of death come to watch her?It mattered not; her mind was set on one thing and one thing only.
And so Azul raised the sword with great effort and shaking hands.
"May Ukhel kiss your corpse," she spat.
But as she attempted to kill him, a hand caught hers.
The blade clattered to the floor, sliding under the Okpalaeze's bed.Azul looked back at who dared to stop her, who was foolish enough to come between a woman and her fate.
It was a stranger.
The scent of rain and earth clung to him.Something in Azul's chest tightened with recognition that her conscious mind couldn't access.She knew him—or rather, the dead woman whose body she inhabited knew him.But those memories were too old and stale, like trying to read faded ink on water-damaged parchment.
"Why did you stop me?Does he not deserve to die?"she hissed, as though she were a feral cat.
He looked down at her, his body wet, droplets glistening down his exposed torso.The tangele around his eyes had smudged and his hair stuck to his back, but the red feathers interwoven with his braids still looked vibrant nonetheless.
"If you kill a member of the royal family, you condemn your family to its ninth generation.You might not care for your life, but shouldn’t you care for your family?"
Azul gritted her teeth.She had already gravely injured the man; punishment would be administered either way.Besides, Azul might have held some semblance of care for her so-called family, but she did not.
Let them burn in hell for all I care, she thought, blinded by her anger.
"Should we die, then we die!I don't understand what that has to do with you."She yanked her hand from his grasp, her eyes looking around for the sword to finish the job.
"Do you truly not care?"
She was already moving towards the bed when his voice stopped her in her tracks.
A skull-splitting pain pierced her head, and for a moment she found herself unable to move as memories superimposed themselves—twisting and replaying.It was as though her mind would shatter by sheer force of her own emotions, as though her body had just realised another soul had come to inhabit it.
Clutching her head, she groaned, falling to her knees, her breathing erratic, palms sweaty.Her vision seemed tinted in red, and something warm dripped down her nose.
"Azul?"the stranger called to her, but she couldn't hear; it was too far.
