A Priestess for the Blind God (Legends of Rahasia Book 1)

Chapter Twenty-Two

"A woman should know her place. Stealing my tent. Gaining a prince's favor. Spitting in my face. You've ruined everything I've worked for, gaining it and squandering it at will!" He leans down and lifts me by my hair, drawing tears to my eyes. "You're just a whore." Alef kicks me again. I curl onto my side, my fingers fumbling for my Diviner's mirror.

"And this useless thing? It's about time somebody treated it like the garbage it is." He slams his boot into my Diviner's mirror, the surface splintering into shards.

I grab one of those shards and stab it into his ankle. He screams and stumbles away from me, kicking me again as he falls. The impact causes the shard to dig into my palm, a rivulet of blood spilling over the mirror's broken reflection.

I blink, thinking I've lost my mind. The blood runs around the cracks in the mirror, filling in the glass until the surface gleams violet. Gasping for air, my fingers scrabble for the handle. I flip the mirror over with a wheeze, the reflection whole again, facing Alef.

Alef lifts me up by the back of my robe, choking me on my own collar. I kick furiously, my legs lifted above the earth, my toes hitting nothing but air.

"Ah," Alef watches me squirm with pleasure, "that's it! Try and escape, little fly."

I manage to call on my spirits before my vision fades away, before my lungs wither away from lack of oxygen. I call, desperately, for my mirror. My ghosts come as they usually do.

But this time, their teeth are stained with blood, my blood.

I'm so struck by the horror of it all that the pain fades away.

"What are you looking at?" Alef follows my gaze. "That old thing? I thought I smashed that ugly antique."

He throws me to the ground, putting his boot on the small of my back. It's difficult to breathe with the weight of his leg there, but it's still better than being strangled. He reaches for my Diviner's mirror, bringing the surface closer to his face for inspection. I try to wipe tears, snot, and blood, from my eyes. "Let's see..."

He drops the mirror, stumbling back so that he falls into the sand. His legs kick desperately at the earth, trying to find purchase to scramble away. "What the hell is that thing, witch?" He turns to me, his eyes wide and wild. "Make those demons go away."

Feed us... I shudder to hear their same gravelly whisper. Despite having summoned these spirits constantly since my mother died, I never realized just how horrifying these things truly are. I'm not sure if I own them so much as they own me. Nice flesh. Living flesh. Mistress gave us blood to drink, now we want to fill our bellies with something thicker.

"Wait..." I crawl toward Alef and my Diviner's weapon. I wrap my fingers around the handle of the mirror. My ghosts smile at me. Papery skin pulled over skeletal faces. Ashen hair falling upon bedraggled cheeks. Rusted armor and sand dunes in the background of their reflective cavern, their realm stretching to infinity. "I haven't said the command."

"Please," Alef turns a shade paler as he sees what I imagine to be a gruesome sight. Me with blood on my face and hands, bruises blooming as black as my robes, covering my body like dying flowers. Me, my hair pulled out of my crown-like braids, surrounding my warrior features with the color of night. "Have mercy."

"What did you call me?" I wince, getting shakily to my feet. "Sand fly. Whore. Witch." I point my mirror towards him. "You saw me as a woman first, and a threat second." I shake the mirror, and the spirits inside hiss and spit, turning feral. "That was your mistake!"

"Mercy!" Alef throws his hands over his head, a sobbing drunk.

"How does it feel?" I grin, looking at the amorphous blobs rolling from the mirror, the skeletal hands stretching from translucence to dark totality. The screeching sounds as the ghouls break through from the spirit world. My mother's bastardized gift of life now turned to violence, magic tainted by the blood of my warring father.

My grin spreads. Infectious. "How does it feel to be the sand fly?"

I feel a hand on my shoulder, pressing carefully down with a strong grip. When I turn back, snarling, the figure leans away as if I'd burned them.

The mirror slips a bit as the final ghoul writhes through.

Prince Elio stands behind me, staring.

***

Hello my Champions!

Alef, Alef, Alef...

Payback's a witch.

-Sophia