Page 84 of An Honored Vow

“Five.” I cleared my throat. “Feron will train all five of you.”

Fyrel held up her hand, recounting the number of cots in the room.

Dynara squinted at me with her fiercely amber eyes. “What do you mean, Keera?”

“She means me.” Gerarda walked through the split grain in the wall. She lowered her hood to reveal her amber eyes.

Feron turned to me. “The council will not like this.”

“What is done is done,” Syrra said from the corner. She walked over to Gerarda and put her hand on her shoulder. “And we need every warrior we can get.”

Gerarda’s eyes fell to Syrra’s scars. “Does that mean I can get one of those?” She chewed on her lip, unable to look away as Syrra laughed.

“You must master your magic first.”

I crossed my arms. “And win a war.”

“Challenge accepted.” Shadows leaked out of Gerarda’s hands as she lifted her chin. She looked over my shoulder at Riven, whostared at the shadows like they were ghosts. “And you’re going to help me.”

“Are you certain?” I asked Syrra through the looking glass.

She swallowed. “I trust you will not cut me?”

My lip trembled as I lifted the curved shearing blade to Syrra’s shoulders. Her long black tresses hung over the back of the chair in a braid.

“You needn’t cut it all,Raava,” Nikolai said softly, holding two bundles of his own curls in his lap. All his hair was now the same short length as the sides of his head.

Syrra’s teeth gritted together so loudly Vrail flinched. “Do it. Now.”

I took a deep breath and gathered Syrra’s thick locks together. The leather fastener could only loop around the strands twice before I had to tie it. I lifted the thin blade and held it against Syrra’s scalp.

I looked at her through the looking glass once more. She nodded. I pulled back on the blade. The Elvish steel was so sharp it left no trace of the hair behind, only bare, brown skin in the middle of Syrra’s head. I took another breath and did it again.

And again.

Seven passes was all it took to remove a warrior fully of her braid. I passed the bundle of her hair to Syrra without a word. She ran a hand across her scalp and nodded. “It is tradition that the one who cuts a mourner’s hair is the one to accompany them.” Syrra’s voice cracked, somehow turning deeper than before. “Will you do that for me today?”

My chest tightened, unbelievably touched that Syrra would ask me. “Of course, my friend,” I said in Elvish, grasping Syrra’s hand as tightly as I could. “It would be my honor.”

Syrra opened her mouth to say something, but a shadow appeared in the doorway of her burl. Nikolai’s immediate scowl told me who it was before I turned around.

Riven.

“I just came to see if anyone needed anything,” he said, staring at his boots after a quick glance at Nikolai.

Nik grabbed a canister of water from the table and hurled it at Riven’s head. Riven didn’t even duck out of the way, letting the metal crash into his chest and the water soak through his stained clothes.

“How dare you show your face here.” Nikolai’s voice was feral; there was nothing familiar in the way his mouth seemed to leak poison as he spoke. “Have you not done enough?”

The words fell to the floor of the burl like a fallen tree, smashing through the dwelling to create a line, us on one side and Riven on the other.

Riven’s neck flexed as he tried to find the words but knew there was nothing that would appease Nik. Not today.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered to both of them, but Nikolai had already turned away, unable look at his best friend for a second longer than he needed to.

I wanted to run to Riven, to grab his hand and fix the fracture between us all. But he had told me to stay out of it, that he would have to find a way to do so on his own. He sulked away, bent at the middle like a soldier wounded in battle, and I let him go.

Soft drums sounded in the distance and Vrail stood from the bed. “It’s time.” She lifted her hand to Nikolai and sighed with relief when he took it.

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