Page 90 of A Reign of Storm and Madness

“Why did you not inform anyone of your mother’s…” He glances at the body as the gardener, a tall buff man whose name I decline to remember, chokes out a breath as he nears the scent of urine and death. “Situation?” Mandrake finishes.

I shrug, unconcerned. “I am not a servant,” I say. “It’s not my job to inform you of anyone’s situation unless they request me to.” I gesture to the body that the gardener and cook arrange before another maid comes in—not the weeping Brigita—holding a sheet. They take the sheet and cover the body with it as the cook starts barking orders for someone to retrieve supplies to make a stretcher and carry her out of the room before Azai gets back. “She did not request it of me,” I finish. Not that she could since she’d already been long-dead by the time I arrived.

Mandrake stares at me for a moment longer, silence stretching between us as the noise of the other servants clangs at my aching ears. Distantly, a familiar voice filters in from the open door. Ruen’s voice.

“What’s going on?” I hear him ask.

Mandrake whirls around as I hear Brigita beg Ruen not to go inside, but Ruen doesn’t listen. He pushes the door wide and stops as the gardener quickly covers Olivia’s face with the sheet and steps back. Now, it’s truly silent. Even the annoyance of Brigita’s quaking sobs have ceased. It’s as if everyone is holding their breath as my brother—my older brother, Azai had told me, though it’s only by a few months—takes in the scene before him.

Tilting my head to the side, I watch and wait for his reaction. Will it be yet more screaming and crying such as when he has those nightmares he refuses to tell me or anyone else about? The scar that runs down the side of his brow crinkles as his face blanches. The horror quickly descends into sorrow and then placid apathy.

“I see…” Ruen looks away from the sheet covering my mother’s body to where I’m sitting by the empty fireplace with an unopened book in my hand. His eyes fall upon the book before rising to my face once more. He sighs, as if he’s unsurprised by my lack of melancholy. “You should get this cleaned up before Azai returns,” Ruen says to Mandrake. “He’ll be upset if his study is ruined.”

I bite down on my own lip to keep from chuckling. We both know Azai won’t care unless he’s brought back guests. Sometimes he does, just to play house for a short while. Some of his Divine bed partners refuse to have children of their own since they’ll simply be taken away eventually, so he allows them to dress both Ruen and I up and play pretend.

It is from Azai that I’ve learned my role. Objects can be broken and replaced, but people are like dolls. You dress them up, you own them and care for them, but in the end—the only real value they hold is what they can do for you. Olivia has been unable to do a thing for me since giving birth to me. Therefore, her death … albeit frustrating in this uproar of the household was not unexpected nor is it truly life altering. Her death doesn’t affect my life. Though I’m sure she’d meant it as a punishment to Azai, both Ruen and I know that when he learns of it, he’ll care even less than we do.

Eying my brother as Mandrake seems to sag in both disappointment and a small amount of apprehension, he nods to Ruen and begins setting about the task of helping the other servants clean up the mess Olivia made in her suicide.

By the end of the half hour mark, the body has been removed to somewhere else in the house and Ruen sits across from me, staring at me somewhat blankly.

“Do you feel nothing?” he asks once the last servant has left and closed the door behind them, not a single one suggesting that the two of us should leave this place. It’s just a room, after all. Who cares if it’s seen death now?

“I feel a little hungry,” I admit, placing the unused book back on its stack.

Ruen’s eyes narrow and his brow furrows, that white scar splitting his brow in two practically glowing against his skin. Azai gave him that scar. He doesn’t say as much, but I know it. What else but a Divine creature can harm another of Divine descent?

Ruen inches forward on his seat and stares at me. “Even if you don’t feel the emotions, Kalix, sometimes, you should at least pretend that you do.”

I know which emotion he speaks of. My gaze leaves his and returns to the spot on the floor that’s now been cleaned and the books and crates and chair removed. “You want me to act sad?” I ask, turning back to him. “Why?”

“It unnerves others that you don’t seem to feel,” Ruen states. “It makes them scared of you.”

I shrug. “Their fear is not my problem.”

Ruen makes a sound of frustration. “If too many people fear you then the Gods will take more notice of you,” he bites out. “Do you want Azai to start noticing you more?”

I stiffen. Azai’s interest has always been a vague sort of thing in the back of my mind. For my earlier years, before I realized the futility of my mother’s schemes and desires—and how they had very little to do with me—I’d attempted to gain his favor on her behalf. The God of Strength had merely looked at me with either amusement or irritation. The caustic disinterest had left me feeling … unwell. I didn’t care for it, just as I didn’t care for him.

No, I did not want Azai’s interest.

“I think you and I can work together, Kalix.” Ruen’s words are quiet, but resonating with a deep seething sort of sound that I recognize. It is the same feeling that crept into my chest when I wanted to play with a servant but they were too busy for me or they didn’t want to do the things that I wanted. It is the same sort of sound I hear in my own voice when I use my persuasion on the animals that roam the grounds. Azai had caught me once and though he’d not seemed angry, the garden cat I’d been using it on to force it to acquiesce to my demands to pet it had disappeared for several days, showing up later beneath the wheel of one of Azai’s carriages.

I’d buried that cat in its favorite place in the gardens, angrier than I’d ever been. I didn’t hurt the animals. No. They were my toys. I had to take care of them. I had been careless to let Azai see my interest in the wayward creature. Cats were special. They scratched and clawed at those they found unworthy and I enjoyed bending them to my will, forcing them to see me as worthy of their affections. Azai had killed the creature to teach me a lesson and that, I did not forgive.

It had been mine. Mine. And I had failed to protect it.

Now, I don’t play with the animals anymore. At least, not the ones that Azai could see. Now, only the slithering creatures that every other servant fears keep me company when I need it. Those beasts, I will not fail. Those beasts belong solely to me.

“Did you hear me, Kalix?” Ruen’s question pulls me out of my thoughts and I shake my head, turning my attention back to him.

“What?”

Ruen huffs out a breath, annoyance making a muscle in his jaw pulse. “I said that I think we can work together. Azai doesn’t care about us, you know that. He could have us killed in an instant if he wanted. He—and all the other Gods merely want to use us. You don’t strike me as the type willing to be used.”

I think about that. He’s right. I dislike the idea of Azai using me for his benefit. He doesn’t deserve it. “What are you suggesting then?”

Ruen leans forward, dark blue eyes glittering with intention. This is the most I think he’s ever interested me. Perhaps Ruen is like that long dead cat I’d lost. Perhaps he could be another companion—a far more durable one.

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