Chapter Nineteen
Mirari watched me from outside the open pen enclosure with something akin to horror on her face.
“Missiki, please,” she begged for the hundredth time. “This is not fitting for you. Not for aMorakkari.”
I huffed and blew a strand away from my face. Though the air was cool, I felt a drop of sweat run down my back, and my arms trembled slightly as I hefted yet another pile ofpyrokishit with my shovel and threw it into what I called the Shit Corner.
A young Dakkari boy—whose given name was Jriva—was elbow deep in the Shit Corner, sifting through thepyrokiexcrement.Though he didn’t speak the universal tongue, Mirari had translated for him when he said that they used the shit as fuel and to enrich their soil inDothikand throughout other outposts around Dakkar. He told me his job was important, that he took great pride in it.
The boy seemed happy with my presence. He was no older than ten and had told Mirari to tell me that one day he would be a horde warrior. He would prove himself to theVorakkar—to my husband—with his strength and protect the horde and his family.
He’d beamed up at me as he said it, as Mirari translated, though he was surrounded bypyrokifilth. I couldn’t help but admire his tenacity, for someone so young. He reminded me a lot of Kivan, which had struck a chord of longing and loneliness inside me.
Mirari was fisting her hands on her dress. “Careful of your slippers,Missiki,” she called. “They were just crafted, especially for you.”
It didn’t matter. I was obeying theVorakkar. That morning, I allowed myself to be dressed in another skimpy outfit and then I’d walked myself over to thepyrokipen with my chin held high, though I felt the eyes of the horde on me.
After much reflection yesterday and a long night in an empty bed, I’d come to realize that Arokan had been right. I was a queen now and I needed to act like it. I needed to integrate myself into horde life and win over his people.
If that meant getting dirty inpyrokishit and humbling myself before the horde, I would do it. Arokan told me I was Dakkari now. And, despite what Mirari said, I wasn’t above doing dirty work just because my husband was theVorakkar. I’d worked hard all my life. I wasn’t about to stop now.
So, in response to Mirari’s concern, I kicked off the sandals and threw them over the low gates of the enclosure, right next to her.
Her shoulders sagged. “That is not what I meant,Missiki. Now look at your feet!”
Unlike Mirari, Lavi seemed positively gleeful watching me. Her eyes twinkled with delight and amusement as she stood next to Mirari.
Casting a glance over my shoulder, I blew out another breath, eyeing apyroki, which had ventured close to me. Those red eyes watched me and it tossed its neck, stamping its four feet on the earth, when I shoveled yet another pile into the corner.
Somehow, I’d managed to forget how absolutely terrifying they were, how massive they were. And while my hands had been shaking on the shovel for the first hour I’d been in the pen with them, they were now steady. Mostly, they ignored me, which gave me confidence.
Many of thepyrokiwere gone. Arokan had taken out half of the horde warriors with him to hunt down the Ghertun pack and theirpyrokihad gone with them.
An elderly male, who hadn’t given me his name, was in charge of the pen. He looked over at Jriva and I from the troughs he was filling with fresh water, his eyes assessing our progress. Unlike Jriva, he spoke the universal tongue and when I told him that I wanted a job at the pen, he’d told me to clean it out, despite Mirari’s immediate protests.
“If theMorakkariwishes to work with thepyroki, then she must start where I did,” he’d replied to Mirari, his tone unyielding and strong.
He’d expected me to balk and turn away. He’d expected me to leave, I saw that in his dismissive gaze. Despite my title, I didn’t have his respect. I didn’t have the respect of many of the horde after yesterday’s events.
So, he was surprised when I tied back my freshly washed and brushed hair and asked for a shovel. He handed me one hesitantly and I steeled my spine and I went to work.
“If theVorakkarsees you doing this,” Mirari said again, “he will not be pleased.”
“Mirari,” I hissed. “Enough.”
Wisely, she closed her mouth, but she still eyed the large piles of excrement that I had to shovel. It would take me most of the afternoon.
Her shoulders sagged and then she walked to the entrance of the pen, snagging another shovel from where they were lined against the enclosure.
“What are you doing?” I asked, straightening.
“I cannot allow you to work here all afternoon,” Mirari said, tucking her long skirt up into her waistband, leaving her long legs exposed. “I will help.”
“Mirari, you don’t have to do that. This is my task.”
“I am yourpiki,” she simply replied, scrunching her nose when she stepped into the pen.
A little bloom of affection and gratitude for her opened in my chest as I watched her shovel a nearby pile. I shook my head, unable to keep the small smile from my face at her look of disgust.
