Kamira
Kamirabreathedindeeply.The room smelled like almond and fresh mint leaves mingled with the herbs she had ground down for her ointment. She sighed as she mixed the mint and herbs in beeswax to create a paste, trying to settle her tightly wound nerves.
That had not been how she wanted that conversation to go. He had such a deep-rooted hatred for Sorcerers and she could completely understand why. A Sorceress had ripped him from his life—torn it apart for something that he had no part in.
At first, she was going to tell him she would no longer help him. Partially because she didn’t actually think he was cursed, but mostly because of his extreme prejudice toward her people. But there was something in his face, hidden behind his hazel eyes, that showed her he wasn’t fully convinced. That, maybe, a small piece of him didn’t really want anyone to die—that, ultimately, he just wanted to go home again, to walk on land once more.
She wanted to believe she had actually seen those feelings in his gaze because if she had, then maybe she could prove to him that Sorcerers weren’t all bad, that they simply wanted the same thing that all of Emmoria did. Peace.
The realm didn’t need another dictator to eradicate an entire race of people. It needed a savior. It needed something to bring complete peace to the realm, and maybe, just maybe, if she could convince Doraan, and show him that it was possible, he could be Emmoria’s savior.
The bringer of peace.
Kamira had practiced her gifts everyday since boarding theCursed Soul,and every time she did, she pushed herself a little bit further, gently prodding the well within her, gauging how far she could take her sorcery. She had never really been interested in power and politics, but maybe that was her true purpose in life. Maybe this was her way to help the ones she loved, as a Sorcerer consort to the Emperor. Was it fate that brought them together?
Kamira looked over at Doraan, noticing the fatigue through his heavy-lidded eyes and the way he was slumped against the wall. “You should lay down,” she said. “If you fall asleep like that, you’ll have pain in other areas of your body tomorrow morning.”
He smirked and scooted down, resting his head upon the pillow she had been using for the past week. Kamira gestured to his pants that were still covering his injury. “May I?”
He propped himself up on his elbows, nodding.
Kamira gently rolled Doraan’s pant leg up to reveal his limb. He watched her intently to gauge her reaction, but she kept her face completely void of emotion. It wasn’t pretty, she could admit, but she knew the difficulty it caused him for her to see it. The skin at the base was deeply scarred. She could see several jagged, puckered pink lines where someone, probably Lindor, had tried their best to sew the flesh together. She glanced up at him with a frown noticing his face scrunched into a sneer of self-loathing before he fell back against the pillow.
“How long ago did this happen?” she asked.
“Almost eight months.”
“The scars and tissue have probably not fully healed yet on the inside. It takes time. That's likely why you are still feeling a lot of pain.”
Doraan only grunted in response.
Kamira took the herbal paste and began to rub the mixture gently into the scarred flesh. Doraan groaned at the pressure, but made no move to pull away. The ointment was truly only a ruse—something to distract from the actual work that she was doing with sorcery. The paste would simply cause slight tingling, along with a cooling effect due to the ingredients she used, but it did little more than make you smell good for a bit.
The type of sorcery she was about to use was challenging. It was something that only a Legion could perform. Growing up, Kamira had asked her mother question upon question about her healing process. She wanted to know how she did it—how to use the elements together as one, where she learned to use her sorcery, and anything else she could try and pry from her mother’s mind. Eventually, she was forbidden from asking any questions at all, left only to observe and learn through her eyes alone. She used what little she had learned to practice on Adonis and the occasional creature.
Once, she had helped a rabbit who was trapped in a snare, foot bleeding and skin torn from the wire trap. She had melded the elements together, using their combined power to stitch the torn skin of the rabbit closed. It was an amazing feat that she still couldn’t believe she was able to do. Another time, she had found a small sparrow with a broken wing that surely wouldn’t have survived another day without her kindness. That had been one of the most difficult uses of her sorcery to date. Mending bones was complicated work. It required patience, persuasion, and extreme mental and physical focus to move the fragmented bone back into place before weaving the pieces back together. Skin was more forgiving and much more pliable.
What Doraan needed was neither of those things. She wasn’t going to move the scar tissue, or tear and knit it back together in a more pleasing way. And she wasn’t going to mend something that was broken either. What he needed was the movement of fluid and gasses in the body—a release of pressure building on the nerves around his knee and severed limb.
Kamira forced heat into her hands as her fingers massaged over his skin. She took a long, steadying breath before she closed her eyes, feeling the swelling of his muscles and the thickness of the fluid surrounding the area that was causing him the most discomfort. Kamira pushed the warmth through him, leveling his internal temperature, while at the same time moving the fluid build-up away from his leg and distributing it evenly all throughout, restoring balance in his body.
Doraan moaned and his entire body relaxed as the pressure released, easing his pain. She continued to knead soothing circles along the base of his leg until he closed his eyes, and she heard the telltale heavy breathing of sleep. Kamira gently rolled Doraan’s pant back down and grabbed the blanket folded at the end of the bed to lay atop him before smothering the lantern flame and quietly exiting the room.
She slowly closed the door behind her and just about jumped out of her trousers when a deep voice spoke beside her from the shadowed hallway. “Kamira.”
She turned quickly to see Cormac standing there. “Skies, Cormac. You scared me. I didn’t see you standing there.”
He always stood in a proper sort of stance, hands clasped tightly behind his back, no doubt from his days as a Navy Admiral. This must be his casual, at ease stance.
“May I speak with you privately for a moment?” he asked. There was an earnest expression on his face that sparked worry in her chest.
“Is everything alright? Did the fleet fully pass us?”
“Yes, we are preparing to set sail. I have another matter to discuss with you. Please, let’s speak in my quarters,” Cormac said in a low voice, walking the few paces down the hall to his room and pushing the door open, motioning for her to step inside.
She furrowed her brows but headed into the room anyway. Cormac followed, closing the door behind him. “Please, sit,” he said, lighting the lamp beside the door.
Kamira sat in the chair at Cormac’s desk and anxiously squeezed the armrests so hard that the wood creaked beneath her grip. “So, what's this all about?”
