Sarafyna

  With one hand in my pocket, I roll the persistently silent whisper sphere between my fingers. I waited. On the other side of the border. For two days I waited, so I could check in on Visenar and the towers. And it took me another day to make it back here, to Orvata. I must have tried to call everyone a thousand times by now. Not once has anyone answered. I can feel Annie, somewhere in this city. I know she is still here. I can always feel her, especially now that I am conscious of our connection. Or original connection, at least. As her anchor to this world, I will always have some idea of where she is.

  But no matter who I call or how many times, I receive no answer. From Annie, or Ember, or the twins. Nothing from any of them. Even my precise control can’t prevent the rapid beating of my heart, not really. Because the source is still there. The anxiety. I left, and now the woman I love won’t answer me. No one I left here will. I sit down at the bar inside a local pub, just outside the inn we’d been staying at. They aren’t there anymore, but this is unsurprising considering the news I’ve heard since coming into town.

  “What can I get for you little miss?” the man behind the bar asks, startling me only a little. I take a sharp breath as the stale but comfortable smell of the bar settles back into my nose and the sounds around me return to reality.

  “Oh, uh . . .” I trail. What does Annie usually drink? I remember her calming her nerves with alcohol or green mist, from time to time. That idle thought brought me here, but I don’t actually drink much. “Wine?” I answer.

  “Is that a question?” he laughs and I blush. I pause for a moment, then shrug.

  “I guess so,” I respond. “Sorry, I don’t drink much. Just looking to calm some anxiety.

  “Self-medicating, huh?” he says. “I wouldn’t advise it, truth be told.” Even as he says this, he fills a mug from a barrel and slides it in front of me. “But, seeing as you aren’t my daughter, I don’t really give a shit. This will do the trick. Your size and no experience? This beer won’t knock you on your ass as quickly, and the taste is a bit easier on an amateur. Besides, it’s cheaper.” I’m not really worried about money. You don’t live with a woman like Annie without learning to liberate a few wealthy wagons and hotel rooms of money when you get to a new city. Still, I’ll take his word for it about the strength and taste. At least until it is in front of me. The smell isn’t all that strong, but enough to know I’m not going to particularly enjoy it. I examine the foam on the top as another man settles in on the stool next to me.

  “Are you sure?” I ask. “My girlfriend always drinks wine. She seems to like it a lot better.” For some reason, the man who just sat down groans and stands again, leaving without ordering anything.

  “I’m sure,” the bartender replies with a laugh. “This will do the trick.” I shrug and lift the mug, taking a large gulp, and immediately coughing all over myself. I put the mug down, cough a few more times, then wipe my face on my left sleeve.

  “This is the milder flavor?” I ask, receiving only a hearty laugh in return.

  “It’s an acquired taste. It’ll do the job though, if you power through,” he answers. I wrinkle my nose at the foul drink. But I hesitantly take another sip. “So, what brings you to Orvata?”

  “What makes you think I’m not from here?” I ask.

  “This pub is near the city border,” he shrugs. “Your dress is an odd style, and if someone who looked like you lived anywhere near here, my customers would have told me all about it a dozen times in the first week. I figure you either just got to town, or you went out of your way to avoid someone when you came here. Obviously not an alcoholic dodging anyone who would recognize you, and you openly brought up your girlfriend, unprompted, so not avoiding her. Call it an educated guess.” I put a few fingers up to my face as he comments on my appearance. My fingers meet smooth skin, and I realize my scars are absent. It must be my distance from Annie. Or my time away from her.

  I don’t know when it happened, exactly, but it did. Strangely, my heart sinks at the thought. I hated my scars for so long, but now . . . it feels like I am missing something. A part of myself. My scars are something Annie looks at and loves, and I love the way she looks at me. Her absence and my insecurity seem to be erasing them, as I used to do unintentionally when I was afraid of what someone would think of me. In a way, their presence has become a badge of my comfort and confidence. When I can wear my scars and the past that gave them to me, well, that’s when I am me. In the last few months, my ‘pretty’ and smooth skin has felt ugly to me. I want to be the Sarafyna who wears her scars. I want to be the woman who kisses them with gentle affection.

  “R-right,” I stutter. “You’re right, I just got here today,” I answer. Another man takes the seat next to me, which is strange, since there are more private stools open at the bar, but I shrug it off, assuming he just wants to get the bartender’s attention.

  “I thought so. So, what for?” he asks again. I pause, wondering how I should answer this. Annie would probably just tell him to mind his business. Or maybe lie? Or maybe she would just laugh and change the subject. I’m not sure, but I’m not a great liar, except by omission. All I really know is I am taking way too long to respond.

  “Getting some space from that girlfriend, maybe?” the man beside me asks, startling me again. Do people just join other people’s conversations in bars? Or is that just this guy? Maybe everyone here is just really friendly.

  “No, not at all,” I answer. “I’m just . . . traveling, I guess. It’s personal.” It’s a lame answer but the bartender shrugs it off.

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  “So she came with you, then?” the man asks. Something about the tone in his voice makes me itch. He’s strangely happy about the idea that I’m traveling alone.

  “Uh no but she–” I start and he cuts me off.

  “So whatever your reasons, you have leeway to try some new things, right?” he asks. I blink at him.

  “I don’t know what that means,” I answer honestly. Then I return my attention to the bartender. “I hear there has been some unrest lately?” The bartender returns the implied question with a single laugh.

  “That’s an understatement. Demon queens turning out to be real, five sages murdered by her, and a sixth dead by heart attack, only a few days later. The cult took over the colosseum for a day too. Same day the sixth sage died, actually. People who died in the colosseum supposedly returning alive. And I’m sure you’ve heard about the Void Sage’s emergency election. A new leader of the country months early, and rumors of a draft to fight demons already circling the town. There haven't been so many insane rumors in this city as long as I’ve lived here,” he replies. I’d heard some of this already, and I nod along. Even only being here a day, most of it is hard to miss. Almost every conversation leads to a discussion of these events, and I barely have to prod to get details out of anyone. The detail of the sixth sage is new, however.

  “I hadn’t heard about the heart attack,” I say. “That’s strange timing.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about it, sweetheart. Let the sages deal with the sages. You’re on a trip; you should be having fun! Experimenting! Not worrying about the bartender, gossiping like you’re both housewives,” the man next to me says. Again, I’m not really sure how to respond to that.

  “Well, I am interested anyway,” I reply, then look back at the bartender. “So what happened there?”

  “No one is sure,” the more pleasant man answers, filling up another mug for someone sitting further down. They’d ordered with a hand signal alone, declining to interrupt our conversation. “Sages don’t often die of natural causes, except old age. All but the Original Sage succumb to that eventually. But the Thread Sage was only a few hundred years old. And yeah, he was a weaker sage. Controlling hair is a strange power to have. Even so, a heart attack is unheard of. A lot of people think the Demon Queen killed him too.”

  I would believe that for sure. Annie does have a habit of poisoning powerful men. The ones she doesn’t dismember or decapitate, anyway. Usually both, actually. “You think so? They didn’t capture her when she killed the other sages?” I ask.

  “No one is really sure about that either,” the bartender shrugs. “Some people say she was killed in the Colosseum. Others that she was captured. Others that she escaped. And, well, since it’s the Void Sage who stopped her, I tend to believe she escaped. If the rumors of a draft are true, in any case. A demon army isn’t much of a threat without a demon leader, right?”

  “The colosseum? Where you said the cult was?” I ask. He shrugs.

  “I suppose so, but that was days later. Why, you think they are working together?” he asks. I sigh internally. That’s my best lead for now. I’ll have to see what I can find out about this ‘cult’. I know Annie was accused of being one of them when a guardian saw her arm. That’s a decent place to start. Maybe I can search for other people with prosthetics, or just see if I can track them from this colosseum.

  “Don’t worry about it either way, Honey,” the irritating man cuts in. “I’ll protect you from the Demon Queen if she shows up. Provided having a girlfriend doesn’t mean you only like girls, if you catch my drift.” And then his presence falls into place. I hadn’t heard the term ‘girlfriend’ before meeting Annie, but the people in this city seem to know it. Perhaps he thinks I am like Gilbert, interested in polyamory, as Annie calls it.

  “Oh!” I exclaim in genuine surprise. “That’s why you are here! You want to have sex with me!” I have had men approach me before. Even attempts at marriage arrangements when I was a kid. Even when I was wearing my scars. But this is easily the most blatant. He is being so forward I actually didn’t understand what he was doing. He doesn’t even blush as I announce it, simply shrugging.

  “Yes, obviously. So the question remains, are you interested?” he presses.

  “Oh, no,” I reply quickly. “I only find women attractive, and of those, I really only have more than a passing interest in my girlfriend. Uh . . . sorry.” He scoffs and raises an eyebrow,

  “Are you sure? Have you ever been with a man?” He asks. I’m a bit taken aback by the question. What does that even mean? I want to ask if there have been any rumors about the so-called cult, but I am so confused I make the mistake of engaging with him further.

  “Am I sure I’m not attracted to you?” I ask, genuinely flabbergasted. Ember says that, while changing your body is forbidden here, relationships like Annie and I have are fairly normal. Is she from a different region entirely or is this man just poorly educated?

  “I mean, how can you know if you haven’t tried?” he asks.

  “Do you have to try to be attracted to people?” I reply.

  “Tried fucking, I mean. Damn, it’s a good thing you’re pretty, because you’re a bit dim. If you’ve never ridden a man, I’m certain I can convince you that you like them, given the chance,” he insists. I’m rapidly traveling from irritated, to confused, to angry.

  “Is that how it works for you?” I ask. “Do you have to have sex with someone before you know if you’re attracted to them?”

  “What? Of course not! What does that have to do with anything?” he says. I just stare at him blankly. I don’t understand why no one else is looking at him like he just pulled his pants down in public. He’s talking like a man unfamiliar with literature. And women, I suspect. It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t matter. I need to focus, so I turn back to the bartender.

  “Have there been any other rumors about the cult in town? Kind of scary to think there are that many of them here, isn’t it?” I ask.

  “Don’t fucking ignore me, slut,” the man next to me snarls. He tries to grab my shoulder, and for a moment I am the monster who roamed the Radiant Woods, barely conscious and fighting for control of my body. Just the idea of being touched by him feels like grease running down the inside of my dress. I have control of my abilities, I have for a long time. But in that moment, I act without even thinking. He makes contact, but not with my shoulder. Before I even process my own actions, the razor-sharp teeth of my shoulder's new mouth have liberated three of his fingers.

  “Oh,” I say as screaming and blood erupts in concert. “Oops.”