Queen's Shadow || Kingdom at the End of the World - Book II

[7.1] Old Friends

Kayla felt her arm burn.

Not the one lying at her side, clutching the bedding. The arm she had lost. She ground her teeth and heaved up. Phantom pain had her mind believing her body whole when it was not. It happened nearly every morning.

The floor was cold. Kayla crossed the room on bare feet, mindless of the freezing temperature. She splashed cool water from a standing pitcher on her face and shrugged off her thin night shirt. The fabric was soaked with sweat. Kayla balled it up and threw it in a corner, then used a handcloth and the water that remained to wash up. Her hand paused at the stump of her right arm.

Thick scars wrapped around the right side of Kayla's body. They pulled the skin over her ribs and above her breast taut, like snarls in a knitted fabric. The field medic had barely gotten to her on time. He'd done his best to stich her up, but it was a hasty job, and it showed.

Kayla dressed slowly. She had nowhere to be, no plans for the day, no orders to follow. Her mind flit to the sword that lay at the bottom of her trunk, buried under clothes and books. Kayla saw it when she closed her eyes most nights, felt the blade at her own throat. It'd be faster with a gun. Mika's revolver, preferably.

Kayla didn't have Mika's gun. They did not let her keep anything that had belonged to her sister.

Kayla's uniform hung neatly near the door, the fabric gray with accumulated dust. Kayla ignored it in favor of a wrinkled black coat slung over a chair. She pulled on her boots and left, not bothering with locks and keys. There was nothing in that room she cared about losing.

The barracks were quiet. It was early, the sun barely over the horizon, but most of the block's residents were either out or fast asleep, depending on their shift schedules. Kayla took the nearest stairs down two floors, to the main hall. She nodded at the few trainees she encountered in passing. They saluted her, but kept their eyes carefully averted. Kayla grinned in her heart. Let them stare. Let them fear. Too many of those who signed up for the army had no realistic grasp of what it meant to be a soldier. It was easy to be swept away by the mundane aspects of life at base – training, lessons, everyday banalities and little tragedies that happened everywhere a large number of people congregated. The first real mission out in the field was always a shock.

That's where it had gone wrong, Kayla thought. Their first encounter with evil had shaken them all, but it had broken Dimitri. The man she remembered from their cadet days never returned from that accursed mission.

Kayla's steps slowed, caught by a sudden burst of voices. The training hall was up ahead. She had meant to relieve some stress at the punching bags but a glance through the wide doorway revealed a class in progress. Young men and women stood at attention at the center of the arena, eyes on their instructor, an aged soldier with heavy facial scars and an obvious limp. At his call, their neat rows broke to form a crescent. The instructor called out names in rapid succession. Six trainees stepped forward. They paired off and began a basic paring routine without weapons. Kayla nodded in approval. Even wooden swords were dangerous in inexperienced hands.

Kayla watched the group train. She did not mean to linger long, but the instructor caught her eye and waved her over before she could slip away. A number of cadets turned to stare before remembering their manners and quickly looking away.

Kayla approached without outward shift in expression. She tried to recall the instructor's name, certain they had met at least once before. The scar stretching the man's mouth in a perpetual sneer was familiar.

"Starr," the man greeted.

Kayla nodded back. The man didn't offer his hand. The breach of etiquette might be a slight, or deference to her injury. Kayla didn't care either way.