Page 54 of The Gilded Ones

This answer doesn’t sit well with Acalan, and he quickly rises. “Oyomo is kind to everyone, from the highest of the high to the lowest of the low. And you might not want to share such words in mixed company. The priests might accuse you of blasphemy.”

He quickly walks away, back stiffly upright. I can’t help but feel this is out of fear more than anger. Unlike us, the recruits get only one death.

“I’ll go talk to him,” Britta’s uruni, Li, says, his expression apologetic as he makes his exit as well. Kweku quickly does the same, leaving us in silence behind him.

The moments tick by until finally Britta sighs. “That went just as well as expected.”

We all laugh nervously, but we still follow the other boys with our eyes until they disappear down the hill to the barracks before we turn back to each other. Keita remains, much to my surprise. Despite our somewhat closer relationship now, he’s still not the sort for idle conversation.

He turns to Belcalis. “Have you died many times, then?” he asks.

She shrugs. “Only six – from the bleedings, mostly.”

“Six?” he sputters. When Belcalis shrugs, unconcerned, he shakes his head. “And – bleedings?”

“Sometimes, priests like to take our blood and sell it,” Belcalis says, mixing the poultice faster and faster. She doesn’t want to talk about this any more.

“They always take lots of it,” I add quickly, drawing the attention away from her. “Once, as the village elders were dismembering me, I woke up and the entire cellar was covered in blood. That was unpleasant. And painful. But mainly unpleasant. I’d gotten used to it, you see. They dismembered me quite a lot.”

I’m used to saying this without feeling any of the old fear and nausea now, so the expression that takes over Keita’s face startles me. It’s horror. Pure, unfiltered horror.

“I have to – pardon me,” he says abruptly, scrambling up.

His body shakes as he walks away.

I watch him go, then sigh. Sometimes, I forget how sheltered the recruits are. Yes, they’re soldiers, and yes, they live with brutality, with horror, but they have no understanding of what life is like for us. The pain we’ve all endured.

I should have told him about my past more gently, eased him into it, but now that I’ve said the words out loud, I don’t regret saying them at all.

“I think I’ll take some time to myself,” I say as I rise.

The others nod as I walk away.

My favourite tree is the blue-flowered nystria on the next hill. It’s a towering old giant, its branches so broad, they block out the view of almost everything else. The rest of the Warthu Bera always seems far away, a distant memory, once I slip into the small space under the branches and breathe in the delicate fragrance wafting from the flowers. That’s where Keita finds me later, lying quietly in the shade.

“My apologies for running off,” he says, crouching down beside me. “You were telling me about the most horrifying thing that ever happened to you and I fled like a child. I just… I could have never imagined that, what they did to you. I still can’t…” He looks away, struggling for words.

Finally, he composes himself, turns back to me. “I’m sorry, Deka,” he says. “From the bottom of my soul, I’m sorry for what was done to you, sorry for what was done to all of you. I know it doesn’t make a difference, but I just want to say it, so you know how I feel.”

I blink, startled by his words. Whatever I was expecting, it was certainly not this. This may be the most Keita has ever said to me in one go.

I nod as he takes a seat, then turn and smile at him. “I wouldn’t compare you to a child,” I say. “More like one of those tree lizards.” I point to a pale-green lizard scurrying across the nystria’s branches.

Keita’s mouth quirks. “I’ll take nothing less than a horned lizard,” he says.

“Horned lizard it is,” I agree.

His smile widens for a moment. Then he sighs. “I’m sorry,” he whispers again. “Sorry for what happened to you, sorry that I didn’t stay to hear you finish what you were saying.”

“It’s all right,” I reply. “I shouldn’t have told you in the first place.”

“You shouldn’t have had to go through such horror in the first place,” he says, his eyes grim. “What those elders did – that’s not what’s supposed to happen.”

“But what do you think the Death Mandate is?” I ask him softly. I know he knows about it. All the jatu in this unit do. They were once tasked with enforcing it if the priests failed. That was, of course, before alaki became necessary. “It’s there. It’s always been there.”

Keita looks away guiltily, so I move closer. I don’t want him to turn away from me, from this conversation. This may be the only chance I ever have.

“My kind, we don’t have a choice,” I say. “Fight or die – either way, our lives are not our own. Belcalis is right, you know. They call us demons, but are we really?”

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