What was Lost and Found in the Fire

Ch. 24 Like a Ghost

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Kay'ari's/ Kayli's POV

Location: Diana Tower

Date: October

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I remember a time when Cyan and I would spend hours outside, training with Leninora.

We would wake up early in the morning, sometimes as early as 3 or 4 so we could avoid anyone finding out what we were up to.

Leninora would set up a mannequin and mark it with a permanent marker, usually where a pressure point would be, though I can remember a few times we were told to aim for the eyes or groin.

Cy and I would then stand there, occasionally for hours on end, and jab, punch, kick, claw, the list goes on and on, at the mark, until the mark was either smudged off because of our combined blood, sweat and fury or one of us over-exerted ourselves to the point that Leninora would get bored and make us do laps.

Mirroring Cyan right now, pushing and shoving at the meat-bag of a guard, it takes me back to the garden and the smell of the flowers mixing with my sweat.

Cy feints to the left, and I duck into the opening the man leaves for me in his haste to grab her.

I aim for his ribs, and put the full force of my weight into the hit but it doesn't seem to faze him at all.

The guard hits me hard back in retaliation, and the pain distracts me enough that I have to take a long moment to really acclimate to the new location of one of my ribs. Ribs are so damn fragile, for fucks sake.

"Pay attention," Cyan's voice is loud enough for me to hear her from a few feet away and it catches me off guard. She's never that loud.

Unfortunately that's not the only thing that catches me.

This time, the man punches me so hard, I feel one of my teeth jar from the safety of my gums.

"Fuck," Nausea rocks my stomach as I wiggle the tooth with my tongue and a gush of blood floods my mouth.

My vision blurs, something about the taste of blood always makes me just a little faint, and that's when the guard goes for the kill.

The knife he had earlier makes a reappearance, slicing through the air but Cy is quicker; she grabs the guards arm and with a quick twist I hear the snap of bone.

Something I've always admired about Cyan is her ability to multitask. Like now, she's glaring at me, and giving old limp arm a black eye. She's a genius at multitasking. Really.

"You should just leave," Cy directs that at the guard, even while glaring at me. I spit out blood, the taste and pain lingering, and glare back.

It's not like I asked him to punch me.

"I need to take you home, Little Pearl. Dontavion is bound to be worried sick about you." He presses on, "Do you have any idea how upset he was, when this savage bitch took you away from him?"

Cy and I share a look. Dontavion must not know what part Cy played in the escape. That or he's feeding the lie to his loyal followers in hopes that they'll bring her back to him in one piece. Goodness knows that if they knew what she'd done, they'd be falling over themselves to find and kill her.