Warning: Gore
One of Nwaijaku's falcons swooped down in a circle, dropping the rolled-up missive onto her hand. It was the Carolingian Crown Prince sending her notice that he would not be there in what she imagined could only be called a march.
Servants, maids, and guards were in fewer numbers than usual. Many of whom had taken to avoiding her section of the palace out of Enkidu's deterring stature—a helpful inheritance under the Orakpo clan.
She wore the strappings and dressing of thickly tanned, sewn armor lined across her body, even her forearms. The lightweight would be easier for her to chase if the need appeared for them to run, or in the worst case, if she had to.
As she finished reading the missive, right as she reached the palace entrance, palace guards blocked her. She took it only as an incorrect formation and twisted around them before they shuffled, blocking her exit again.
"Is there a problem?"
"Crown Princess Lawali wishes to see you," one of the guards said. "My apologies, Princess, but she requested your presence immediately."
Jata Niara distinctly remembered her departure from the palace as the wedding drew to a close. She prodded, "The Crown Princess isn't here. What do you mean?"
The guards shared a look and then one said, "She's at her calligraphy house. A kajawa is here to take you."
Jata Niara pursed her lips but knew that Enkidu's notice of the Athari situation and now the movement of the Legionnaires would be brought to Lawali's attention.
She had only hoped never ever set foot in Lawali's calligraphy house more than once in her lifetime. With a nod, she was guided to the kajawa and escorted to Lawali's calligraphy house in the opposite direction of the granaries.
Lawali's calligraphy house was truly a wretched sort of place. Any slaves who couldn't be bought by foreigners, sold to the Campgrounds, or contracted among the city ended up here. A pool of water encircled the housing with papyrus trees of various lengths lining the interior like a gate. There was only one entrance inside the fortress-like building and guards carrying multiple hitched weapons on their hip, back, and hand. No one could enter this building without permission, and as she was further escorted inside, she could hear the sounds of muffled screams coming from below. The smell of dried blood and iron filled the air. Such stone walls as these could muffle the sounds of murder and ward off fog as thick as bricks. She shivered at the thought of how loud those screams were and how much blood had truly been spilled in these halls.
Guards lined up against the walls as she continued wandering forward through the halls. They were more like statues than people. Neither batted an eye as she passed them. When she reached the end of the hall opening up into an interior arched courtyard, her escort said, "Follow me, we'll be taking the northern halls into Crown Princess' research halls."
Layers of long sheets were filled from left to right in writings, notations, and drawings clinging to the courtyard hall walls drying.
The courtyard, contrary to the rest of the building, carried pots of flowers of various colors, sizes, and heights, but when a bitter smell of one of the flowers tickled her nose, she snatched back the suggestion.
That smell was the smell of a poison so strong that it could kill an ox in seconds. There were rumors that a merchant family was wiped out when their stock of meat was poisoned and then ingested. The thing about the murder was that the cows showed no apparent signs of poisoning, but once they were butchered, cooked, and consumed, it killed the eater.
More guards lined the darkened halls with whispering wicks lightly swinging above them as they reached a large double-door, latched with thick deadbolts and a drawbar. She was surprised Lawali trusted her men enough to allow them to lock her in the room, but this was presuming that Lawali was already in there.
A familiar hunching guard stood at the corner watching her with beady, silvery eyes. Scars decorated her arm and along her neck as she watched Jata Niara. She had seen her many times in her lifetime as a part of the Malahi clan but avoided her entirely outside of acknowledging that small fact.
As the doors screeched behind her, she realized this thought was a bit late. It wasn't that she trusted Lawali not to kill her. It was that Lawali wouldn't have requested her visit if she hadn't expected Jata Niara to keep quiet.
Carpeting led her path as the stoned walls and floor opened up into decorative floorings with geometric painted shapes, painted walls with foreign crystal jingling above, mixed in with candlelight bright enough to illuminate the entire room, the size of a small great hall.
Her eyes blinked at the sudden brightness after traversing the dimly lit halls and swiveled around when she heard the sounds of heavy shackles and chains on the wall.
Along the walls were four naked omegas, their hands cradled above their shoulders, ankles locked together loosely, leaving them barely seated over their hips. Their bodies appeared well taken care, well fed, with few bruising and none purpled or discolored. But their eyes trembled with fear and tears tracked down their cheeks as they huddled under their shackles.
Three of the four sat heavily pregnant with round, distended bellies, while one was only halfway along. This fourth one was familiar, with colored eyes and red lips that she swore she had seen in the Campgrounds once, but her attention was dragged away. They couldn't be her concern. Lawali always covered her footprints and ties to illegal slave markets. If they were here, it was because she was given the jurisdiction to handle them as she saw fit.
"Did you know?" Lawali's voice echoed in the room but Jata Niara couldn't trace from where. "That if poison spreads across the body fast enough, it's indigestible. Ah! Poor unfortunate souls! I only wanted him to taste, but alas, he was not meant to live long."
Her nose lifted in the air as a strong fragrance of mint wafted over, and Jata Niara didn't need to question where Lawali was. Although there was the smell of mint in the air, it was only due to the surrounding plants Lawali put around her station, covered with fresh human carcasses, as her hands were covered in leather gloves up to her elbows. She dug into the bodies, pulling out organs, cracking, shaping bones to be tucked on the other end of the table. Plants and foliage were pulled out from the stomach of the person, whose face was unrecognizable as its flesh had been meticulously cut off, leaving a sinewed skull behind.
"Have you seen the new toys I was given?" Lawai said as her hand twisted into the flesh of the carcass, and a wet crunch sounded. "Siddiq was one of yours, you know. That one, on the end. When you let them free from that underground mess your grandfather created, he fell right back into a contract, and then that contractor was found making illegal dealings with the former Commander. Akhutenan had Siddiq listed as a criminal. One of my men found him on the run and brought him in four months along." She began twisting the bloodied organ with its long tubing until it wrapped around itself and then tucked it into one of the many jars also lined on the end of her table. Whatever mixture sat in the jar, the organ sizzled as it sank in. "He's pretty, isn't he? It's no wonder he was jumping from contract to contract."
Siddiq appeared like the people far, far in the south, with rounded oval, tilted eyes and a flush of smoky obsidian skin. His eyes were the only ones of the four whose fear was tempered and controlled.
"Then there's Chamai, right next to him," Lawali added and then faced her, laughing. "He's the one from that merchant family. You know the one. Ah, it's so exhilarating when one of my poisons works its magic. Of course, I had to see how it all worked out. Can you imagine it? It wiped out all one hundred and seven people--of all sizes, constitutions, and ages! It makes all this mess worth it. As luck had it, I saw how pretty he was and fed him the antidote just in time. He's been mine ever since. I'm even keeping the occupied lands as future dowries for our children. Or marriage gifts. Whichever happens first."
Chamai's fear was palpable. He shook viciously as Lawali spoke about him. She could almost hear his shaking, rattling in his chains. With a similar look to Siddiq but with smaller eyes and longer lashes, she could see his resemblance to the merchant members of the family she saw in passing.
"Then there's Musa Iteru, here," Lawai sighed. "Another merchant family gone wrong, and now that we're going to war, well, anyone falsifying manifests needs to be made an example. Since I wanted their trees for shipbuilding and the farmlands for resources, I took him in as a legal captive. Just in case, as you know, some people's eyes get a little hungry when they stare too long at things that aren't theirs."
Musa Iteru had round eyes and a soft, yet pointed nose. His hips splayed out beneath him and Jata Niara was starting to see that Lawali's interests lay in those who looked like--
"You're starting to see the resemblance?" Lawali pointed out. "You've always been one of the smartest of my siblings. And it's not because you're an alpha. You can see greed. You can see it oozing out of their disgusting eyes, coveting things they don't own or deserve. It makes you capable of making them bark when you need a dog and jump when you need a cricket."
Jata Niara fell to her knees and bowed deeply as she said, "I don't covet the position because it's not mine."
Flesh squished beneath Lawali's hands, and the sounds of blood splattering, pouring into an empty jar sounded. The Crown Princess said, "You covet it because you find me undeserving," and pulled out a serrated blade as she began sawing through bone. A sharp shriek sounded as she repeatedly swung the blade until the bone was cut through. "And I can't say I've ever wanted such a position."
For a moment, Jata Niara thought she had misheard.
Was Lawali giving her permission to be Crown Princess?
"You see the last one over there, a former relieving servant of the Campgrounds, supposed to be sold off to another city or some such, but I remembered him. He's the one who ratted you out all those years ago to the Empress' Consort," Lawali reminded her and then picked up a rag, wiping her stained gloves off, before tossing it in a bowl of what smelled like alcohol. "You should listen to what he has to say."
The trembling omega's bluish-green eyes peered up at her, then briefly glanced at Lawali before lowering his head towards the ground, shivering.
"I told them--because," the former relieving servant wet his lips as he continued nervously. "Enzo told me to do it. He wanted to be a soldier, like Commander Roy is now, but he was shipped off to an educational house, where he was trained to be a noble and not a warrior. So--he--"
Lawali cut in, "Get to the best part. Who did he get this help from?"
"Babatu Cissé."
"And who plotted for the Athari to arrive here?"
"Both of them."
Jata Niara twisted her hands together at the thought. If what he said was true, Enzo knew everything. Chances were he stopped being the Empress' Consort's hand when the Crown Prince of Carolingian arrived. Any information Babatu Cissé received over the years regarding the Campgrounds was directly due to him. The start of all their spiraling issues with the Campground was Babatu Cissé's increased hatred of foreigners, but if it was all a scheme to skew their minds from one extreme to the next, it was too much to feasibly do.
Perhaps, even Micah was only a distraction in Enzo's scheme, put in her way to appeal to his needs. And after all that talk, she spat on Srinivas about who was in control.
She gritted her teeth, and said, "What does Babatu have to gain?"
"Originally, his omega son was supposed to marry Enzo, and then the idea was that they would propel his alpha son on the throne with Enzo as an adviser," Lawali tsked. "They thought if our Imperial Mother could be placed on the throne, then why couldn't his son? If we go far back enough, we have to be related somewhere. Ultimately foolish though."
"Why?"
Jata Niara's curiosity was genuine. Their Imperial Mother, whether rumors or gossip were true or false, was questionable in all ways and didn't even desire to be Empress, yet has been on the throne with little pushback.
"Our Imperial Mother was not placed on the throne because of our bloodline, because of our connections, and not even because we were convincing," Lawali said and then strode towards the omegas chained against the wall, pacing back and forth in front of them as she eyed them. "It was because of the El Mahdy's magic."
Jata Niara furrowed her brows. "I thought you didn't believe in--"
"I don't believe in mysticism and rituals," Lawali interrupted. "But magic, a force we can't understand that pulls our hands in mysterious ways, that's all around us. In fact, her journal, the former Matriarch El Mahdy's writing, foretells that dynamics are just a layer of existence. When we reach other dimensions, by birth, fate, and luck, we can bend the world not just our dynamics but the objects we touch and the minds we reach. Being a Crown Princess isn't power, you can have it, but magic? What I wouldn't give."
Jata Niara realized that the Crown Prince of Carolingian and Lawali would get on a bit too well if they ever actually spoke and reminded herself to prevent that. It was one thing to lose an ally out of negligence and another thing entirely to lose one for not being "interesting" enough.
"Is that what you're doing here? Magic."
"No."
The words settled in the air heavy like the miasma of blood she knew would cover them without the mint trees blocking.
Jata Niara felt that there was little not questions for her to ask but as she opened her mouth, Lawali started to speak again.
"Kinya Sarakh has, indirectly gone against me," Lawali sighed. "Usually, I don't care but because his actions have led to a disruption of my routine, I think he needs a reminder of who the Molokiyya are. Mother was far too soft on him. I'll send some of my private soldiers to help you and I support on the end of appeasing mother, when she finds out. You should ensure that if things escalate, we are not to blame. Understood?"
"Yes."
"You may leave."
Lawali gestured for her to leave, and Jata Niara turned her back, reaching the door and knocking on it as it squealed open. When she turned around, she could see Lawali leaning down, clutching Chamai's fast, tight in her palm as the omega struggled.
The door closed behind her, and she realized, not once, even with her weapons clasped to her body, did she think to kill Lawali.
She shook her head.
There was much for her to learn.