This time, she was caught off guard.
Sawyer fell to the ground with shriek, her father’s fire wrapping around her arms, her back, her lungs??—
Sawyer inhaled, holding the breath in her core, and letting it simmer with her boiling blood. She slid her gaze to him, clenching her jaw as her skin screamed with agony. “Learned from the best.”
“Find them, Sawyerlyn.”
She watched him leave the room then, leaving her alone in a pile of ash, smoke, and flickering fire.
NINA
NINA HADN’T READthrough so much Rimemere history since her second year in the Wielder academy. That year had been full of books and the smell of dried ink, all while Sawyer and Cas decided to use it as their last attempt to rebel before royal duties became their life. Nina and Alix had aced their tests, received honors, and graduated without penalties—the other two were shipped off to the Jinn den that summer as punishment for failing.
“There has to be something,” Nina whispered to herself, scanning the ancient pages of a dusty tome called Rimemere Traditions and Their Origins.
Ironically, the tradition she sought loopholes for was missing from the reports.
There had to be a way to get both Sol and Cas out of there quickly. Sawyer hadn’t been too concerned, saying Cas just had to yield at the end, and Sol would prove victorious.
Still, there was no harm in having a failsafe.
A knock at her door prompted her to shut the book of Rimemere Laws, sending dust afloat. “Come in.”
Sawyer was always covered in something—mud, dirt, alcohol… but never blood. She never failed to bathe before coming home from the battle stations, at least tried to clean her face before addressing anyone. It was a personal thing, something about not being able to bear other’s blood while hers remained inside her.
So when she stood in Nina’s doorway, face, hands, and neck covered in blood and smelling like fire, Nina felt the ground itself shake in response.
“What happened?” Nina pulled her into the room and closed the door, reinforcing it shut with ivy and branches she kept nearby.
Sawyer’s eyes were hard, distant.
Nina grabbed her hands. The blood was warm. “Sawyer.”
“It’s my blood—just in case it grossed you out.”
Instantly, Nina removed her cloak and wiped her friend’s face. Small cuts revealed along her cheeks and forehead, then gashes around the sides of her neck. Peeking from beneath the neckline of her battle leathers, scarred, red skin bubbled.
Nina’s jaw clenched, icy-hot rage awakening in her chest.
“Who?”
“Who do you think?”
Nina hadn’t missed being away from Semmena’s cruelty. Sawyer’s father wasn’t only a blood thirsty, cruel ruler, but he was the same as a father. If he could even be called that.
“Why?”
“Because I’m useless.”
Nina continued working away the sticky, thick blood from her face and neck, then gently guided her to the bathing room. Theyhad no shame or reservations around each other, not anymore. They had seen all of the intimate parts from an early age, physical and emotional, and everything in between. So much so that Nina often felt like Sawyer was an extension of herself. Not a friend, or a sister, but a piece of her soul.
Nina made sure the bath was cold, but smoke still curled from Sawyer’s shoulders when she stepped into it.
“He wasn’t so bad before,” Sawyer said, her voice small and absent of emotion. “He didn’t even ask how our travels were.”
Nina sighed, a wave of sadness pooling within her at that eternal, youthful side of her friend that relentlessly searched for her father’s care. She grabbed the softest rag she found and lathered it with aloe vera salve.
“You never deserved his cruelty, Sawyer,” Nina said, fury lining her voice as she pressed the mixture over Sawyer's wounds. “None of us did.”
