At the same time, she couldn’t fault Torvald’s decision to only allow his oshota to preside over the event.
The Houses’ participation would have been an invitation for bloodshed. Their feuds likely to rage through the adva ka even more than they already did.
Nor could she blame Torvald if he did take advantage of that small loophole to kill future enemies.
Maintaining the balance of the Tuann was a delicate thing.
Also, just because he could do something didn’t mean he would.
Kira moved past several columns, finding a set of steps leading upward. Vines crept over the walls. A carpet of gently glowing purples and blues that seemed to almost pulse with a heartbeat.
Kira set a hand on the railing, following the spiral staircase upwards.
She forgot about Baran, lost in the murals that depicted several battles.
Kira paused in front of the first, her gaze lingering on the artist’s use of light and dark. It drew the viewer’s attention to the hundreds of Tuann kneeling in the rain. They were guarded by shadowy figures whose features were indistinct and veiled by the rain.
The use of light threw the expressions of the Tuann into stark reality. The blankness of their faces. The way their eyes screamed with a pain so deep and stark it felt like Kira’s own.
The world faded as the sound of rain began to drown out the gentle babble of the brook.
As if from a distance, Kira heard Jin ask a question, but she was too immersed in the sensations of the painting to respond.
Water soaked into the knee of her pants as she knelt on the muddy ground. She bowed to the person in front of her, dread threatening to choke her.
Evil radiated from the outline of her master. A corruption she knew would destroy her soul.
There was no escape. Not even in death.
Kira became aware that she was crying. Tears trickled down her cheeks to be washed away by the falling rain.
“Kira!”
A sharp pain lanced the web between her thumb and forefinger jolting Kira out of the vision.
“If you don’t answer me right now, I will bite your finger off,” Jin snarled through their comms.
“Do it and I’ll destroy your spawn,” Kira retorted as liquid ran down her index finger to drip onto the stair where she’d paused.
Kira lifted her hand to find two deep pinpricks in the skin between her thumb and forefinger.
“I can’t believe this! You bit me!”
Kira’s anger made her almost forget that Baran was still watching her. It meant she didn’t yank up her sleeve to grab Jin’s spawn and stomp it into a million little pieces—but just barely.
Baran’s forehead wrinkled as his gaze landed on the injury.
Kira dropped her hand, tugging her sleeve over it before he could say anything.
“You know how I feel being ignored. If you didn’t want the consequences, you should have responded to any of the five times I called you.”
Kira paused. Five times?
“I didn’t hear you.”
“Hence the reason I gave you a snake bite.”
Unsettled and wanting to distance herself from the mural, Kira started climbing again.
