Lament of the Slave

 

“As creepy as I remember.”

“Right?” beamed Vara, who together with Elira stood guard in the Hall of Souls. “All those scary cubes floating in the air . . . ”

“Stop it! Can’t you see that Ria is here?”

“Oh, come on, Elira. The girl comes here every day.”

“That doesn’t mean she needs to hear how scared the old woman is of Soul Dice.”

“Bitch! I’m old? You’re a year older than me.”

“Watch your language.”

“Watch your wrinkles, hag.”

“So where’s mine?” I asked over the bickering of two guardswoman and the giggling of Ria.

“There,” the little kitsune pointed to the wall across the hall.

“Wall of the Lost. No less eerie than the other shelves.”

“Cut it out already, Vara.”

“That’s easy for you to say. Unlike you, I don’t sleep like a newborn who just sucked her mother’s tit. Those cubes haunt my dreams.”

“I thought it was dic . . . dice you dreamed about - you know what I mean.”

“Those . . . ” Vara stopped herself from saying the word for men’s privates in front of Ria. “ . . . fight off the damn cubes and make my dreams bearable. Seriously, gals. This soul shit . . . brrr . . . on the right the dice of the living, on the left the dice of the dead, and in front of us the dice of the lost. I always feel like one day I’m going to turn around and . . . ”

“And?” Ria asked as the guardswoman trailed off, curious despite the haunting sound Vara had made.

“ . . . and they will be standing there, girl.”

“They?”

“You know . . . the living, the lost, or worse . . . ” 

“Shut up,” Elira elbowed Vara in the ribs.

To Ria’s chuckle, I wondered how the two of them even ended up here. The last I remembered, they were patrolling the streets of Castiana. But all those thoughts shifted to the shelves the moment we reached the Wall of the Lost. There, among all the Soul Dice, my eyes went straight to the one marked with my name. Next to it hovered a similar black cube, covered in white glowing runes belonging to Stella.

“They have not yet decided on their relocation,” Elira said in a hushed voice. “There is no precedent for your return.”

“They want to make sure you’re really back, if you catch my drift . . . ?” 

My ears perked up at Vara’s haunting allusion and grew longer. “Are you saying I’m not real?”

“Traina’s tits! El, do you see what I see?”

“I certainly do. Doesn’t she look . . . cute?”

“Cute my ass. Now I’m really starting to think that the real Korra is still down there.”

“Maybe I should come and haunt you at night?” I joked as I ruffled the hair of the little kitsune, whose eyes shone with wild adoration over my new ears.

“Don’t you dare!” Vara hissed, then grinned. “Elira wouldn’t mind, though, right, El?”

“Don’t listen to her,” the guardswoman in question blushed slightly. “Everyone knows it’s you, Korra. They just don’t have the right forms to fill out for your case. That’s all.”

“I see.” The bureaucracy here was as rigid as everywhere else.

“Weird, aren’t they, huh?” Vara said after I had stared at my Soul Dice for a while.

“Not as much as I thought,” I admitted, a little disappointed. Sure, it was strange to know that the little cube was somehow connected to my inner self - representing my link to Fallen’s Cry. But that was why I expected . . . I don’t know . . . something more, that I would at least be able to sense the connection, if not actually be able to talk to Traiana through it.

“You have yours here too?” I asked in the end, swallowing my disappointment. After all, there was still Labyrinth Square and Fallen’s Cry itself to try.

“No,” Ria squeaked, all too happy to be here with me and all too quick for the two guardswomen to speak up.

“Be happy, girl,” Vara grumbled. “Biggest regret of my life. If it wasn’t for Rayden . . . ”

“I thought it was shaving your . . . ” Elira didn’t finish her words, blushing slightly as her eyes wandered below her friend’s waist. And frankly, heat rushed to my cheeks too.

“Eh . . . ? Have you grown a beard, Aunt Vara?” Ria wondered as silence fell between the three of us.

“Sort of,” Vara laughed awkwardly, frowning at Elira only to think about it and nod. “It gave me a few sleepless nights, itching all over my . . . ”

“What about Clay?” I blurted out quickly before she could say a word more. “He promised me a rematch.”

“He regrets his decision,” Elira informed me, happy to change the subject she had dug up herself.

“Regrets? He’s sweating his balls off, dreading the moment you ask him about it.”

A smile crept across my lips, and pride brushed against my heart at Vara’s laugh. “Why? If he’s grown in strength like you two, it should be a pretty even match.”

[Guardswoman: lvl 162]

Not bad at all, and Vara wasn’t all that far away from Elira’s level either.

[Guardswoman: lvl 156]

“Oh, you noticed?” the weaker of the two said, pleased, casually leaning against my shoulder. “You see, me and dear Elira here have worked our asses off more than him - more than most of the chicks and chaps in the guards, actually. And what do we get for it? Guard duty in this creepy hall and bitching about not doing enough during morning roll call. Two days in a row. No fucking explanation.”

“Not what I would have said, but . . . I too find the captain’s tirade rather vexing. You wouldn’t know anything about it, would you, Korra? Ever since you and Palemoon came back, Captain Rayden seems to be rather troubled.”

“The woman is always worried about some shit,” Vara waved her off. “This morning, though, she was a real pain in the ass.” 

Ria giggled, to which I spanked her butt with my tail - a playful scolding and a reminder that I hadn’t forgotten her. More giggles followed.

“What did she say? Something about me?” More specifically, about me teaching them?

“Well, I . . . I don’t think so . . . you know, I wasn’t exactly paying much attention. Elira?”

Her friend shook her head, worn out. “For once, you might. But no, Korra, she didn’t mention you. Should she? Is this about what you were talking about behind the closed door? The Oath?”

“How do you know about . . . ?”

“Oh, come on.” Vara nudged me. “Did you really think something like that would stay a secret in the barracks? Now spill the beans, woman. What did you talk about in there?”

“I can’t really talk . . . ”

“I know, I know,” the little kitsune squeaked, excited to share what little she knew. I, on the other hand, was at a loss for words and worried. 

“Y-you do?”

“Um-hmm,” Ria giggled mischievously at me and looked proudly at the two guardswomen. “Korra’s going to teach in the barracks.”

Relief and dread washed over me at the same time as both women fixed their eyes on me. “Now, sounds interesting, doesn’t it, Elira? Speak . . . ”

***

Explaining to them that my teachings in the barracks regarding skills and the system was nothing set in stone proved to be impossible. Honestly, my stupid mistake. I should have kept my mouth shut in front of the little kitsune. Her enthusiasm and joy seemed to be unquenchable. Well, at least until I freed myself from the two guardswoman and had to leave while she had to stay in the City Hall. Only the promise that I would show up at the end of her shift for my lesson on writing the Standard - and playing - kept her from ditching her work for the day.

My next stop, the Labyrinth Square.

The place was as busy as ever, full of seekers searching for treasures in the depths beneath the city, having no idea what kind of place it actually was, and merchants eager to make a fortune off the clueless bunch. Being neither, I made my way relatively undisturbed into the middle of the chaos, straining my senses and scanning my domain for anyone looking my way. And there were a few. None with any apparent malicious intent, though.

And so, standing at the top of the stairs leading down to the teleportation platform, my eyes traveled to its center and the statue upon it.

She was there, just the same as when we returned, and the days, years, centuries, and millennia before, both Ronnu and Traiana, alive and yet not, depicted in her final moment - the moment Stella and I didn’t really get to see. Her moment, not ours. Her scream of grief to the heavens, frozen in stone, but unheard by them for millennia. The lament that made my eyes well up with tears, now for the second time, echoed in my mind, even outside the Fallen’s Cry. 

Nothing more, though. Not a word from woman of past herself.

“Traina’s tits, it wasn’t just a bullshit rumor,” came from behind me, and I turned with a jolt, awakened from the dream of her shared cry of grief, only to be faced with a handsome man, out of his armor yet still with a sword at his waist, hands crossed over his chest, a smile on his lips, and interest in his eyes.

“W-what did you say?” I asked, swallowing the remains of the last sob.

“You, returning from the depths of Falen’s Cry not being mere tavern gossip.” His voice, deep as it was, reverberated through my entire body, causing my cheeks to heat up and reminding me of a possible encounter with a dragon. The coincidence of my body reacting similarly to two guys was hard to believe - and wrap my head around.

But if he wanted me dead, I would be lying on the floor in a pool of my own blood by now, so I straightened up, trying to calm my pounding heart. “What makes you think that?”

“I’ve never seen anyone shed the same tears as that statue.”

“What . . . ?” I paused, noticing in my domain how white the tears shone on my cheeks. But when I wiped them away with my hand to look with my own eyes, the tears dissipated like dust blown by the wind. Any doubt about my stay in the heart of the labyrinth having no effect on me was gone. What it all meant, though, if anything at all, I did not know.

“Well, I guess there’s no point in denying it, Mister . . . ?”

“Timves Hatrilba, vice leader of Silver Threads. I’m sure you’ve heard of our company, Korra’leigh Grey.” Knowing who I am, a bit of presence - a show of knowledge and strength.

“I’m afraid not . . . although I have been elsewhere the last few months. What do you want from me?” I asked, my heart fluttering at the mere thought of an answer as the man’s stalwart expression failed to crack over my ignorance.

“Isn’t it obvious? The same thing as these guys,” he said, motioning with his head to the people around us. “Join the Silver Threads. We’re willing to pay whatever price you name.”

The shock wasn’t just mine. People I thought of as mere bystanders gasped as much as I did, trying to process what the man had just said.

“You . . . you can’t do that, Timves!” shouted the tall woman whose leather vest bore a different emblem than the one on Hatrilba’s shoulders. In fact, all of these people wore different emblems on clothing of different colors, indicating their affiliation with different Labyrinth companies.

“I can do whatever I want, Heshe,” the vice leader of Silver Threads growled, silencing the woman and the others. His tone and his gaze were unyielding, his eyes never leaving mine. They were different from the amber ones of the not-really-peddler, yet . . . they made my guts flutter.

‘Seriously. What the fuck is happening to me?!’

“I am aware of your affiliation with the City Guards, and the Silver Threads are willing to pay the cost of you breaking your contract with them on top of your price.”

In other words, that’s what I was worth to them - a hell of a lot.

“I . . .”

“Here. My seal. Show it to anyone in the Threads when you make up your mind.” After pressing a metal disc into my hand, he turned on his heel and walked away, leaving me confused, my heart disappointed, and his competitors shocked into silence.