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Fat plops of tears landed on the page, smearing the black ink. Anoor would never see her family again.
“Mere shreds of meat…” It churned her stomach with grief and horror.
One of the laws the Warden of Truth had instigated many centuries ago was the requirement for all wardens and disciples to document their daily lives. The journals were then preserved in the warden library for future generations to learn from. But the library was kept locked, only accessed by bloodwerk attuned to the wardens themselves.
She hadn’t accessed the library by choice when she had stolen the journal. Blood recognizes blood, but it would never recognize hers. Because she had the blue blood of the Sandstorm. She was a child of the greatest revolution the empire had ever seen. They thought it quelled, but how could it be with Anoor living and breathing in the center of the Keep.
“I’m not a maggot,” Anoor growled out and snapped the book closed. Her mother hadn’t looked closely enough. She was a caterpillar, and at some point, she would fly.
I can do this. Not just for me, but for the family I never knew. Maybe I can make them proud somehow.
She hid the journal away; it was stolen property and no matter who her mother was, she’d be punished. And she dreaded to think what her mother would do if she found out she had taken it.
Anoor returned her gaze to the window, her face dry of tears, her back straight. She looked beyond the Duster Quarter and beyond to the plantation fields. The map tugged at the corner of her vision on the desk by her side, but she’d exhausted herself from staring at that corner.
An old song called to her from the edge of her memories. She’d once heard the launderers sing it while they worked, though the echo of it was familiar to her as if she wasn’t learning the words, merely unveiling them from her mind. She thought it was from before, but she couldn’t be sure. She’d only been two years old.
She let it out. Softly. Slowly.
O-o the tidewind came from sky afar
The penance for the blood power.
Anyme sings, Anyme brings
The winds wept for the sky they knew
The Farsai Desert mourned anew
Churning rivers, swirling seas,
No mercy from the bruising breeze.
O-o the tidewind came from sky afar
The penance for the blood power.
Anyme sings, Anyme brings
Smoke and fire, they do bow
For the tidewind is here and now
Here and now ’til atonement’s paid
The debt for power is the trade.
O-o the tidewind came from sky afar
The penance for the blood power.
Anyme sings, Anyme brings
Its cleansing wind that leaves us bare.
Succumb to nightfall and be judged fair.
The tidewind takes, the tidewind gives
