Slave, Warrior, Queen. Morgan Rice

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      “Sartes!”

      Before she could react a soldier seized her brother, and another grabbed her. It was no use resisting. The other soldier swung her over his shoulder as if she were a sack of grain, and carried her away. Fearing she had been arrested, she beat him on the back, to no avail.

      Once they were just outside the Stade, he threw her onto the ground, and Sartes landed beside her. A few onlookers formed a half-circle around her, gawking, as if hungry for her blood to be spilt.

      “Enter the Stade again,” the soldier snarled, “and you will be hanged.”

      The soldiers, to her surprise, turned without another word and vanished back into the crowd.

      “Ceres!” a deep voice yelled over the hum of the crowd.

      Ceres looked up with relief to see Nesos and Rexus heading toward them. When Rexus threw his arms around her, she gasped. He pulled back, his eyes filled with concern.

      “I’ll be okay,” she said.

      As the throngs poured out of the Stade, Ceres and the others blended in and hurried off back into the streets, not wanting any more encounters. Walking toward Fountain Square, Ceres replayed in her mind all that had happened, still reeling. She noticed her brothers’ sideways glances, and wondered what they were thinking. Had they witnessed her powers? Likely not. The omnicat had been too close. Yet at the same time they glanced at her with a new sense of respect. She wanted more than anything to tell them what had happened. Yet she knew she could not. She was not even sure herself.

      There was so much unsaid between them, yet now, amidst this thick crowd, was not the time to say it. They needed to get home, and safe, first.

      The streets became far less crowded the further away they traveled from the Stade. Walking next to her, Rexus took one of her hands and interlaced fingers with her.

      “I’m proud of you,” he said. “You saved your brother’s life. I’m not sure how many sisters would do that.”

      He smiled, his eyes filled with compassion.

      “Those wounds look deep,” he remarked, glancing at her back.

      “I’ll be fine,” she muttered.

      It was a lie. She wasn’t at all certain she would be fine, or that she could even make it back home. She felt quite dizzy from the blood loss, and it didn’t help that her stomach rumbled, or that the sun was harassing her back, causing her to sweat bullets.

      Finally, they reached Fountain Square. As soon as they walked by the booths, a merchant trailed after them, offering a large basket of food for half price.

      Sartes grinned from ear to ear – which she thought was rather strange – and then he held up a copper coin with his healthy arm.

      “I think I owe you some food,” he said.

      Ceres gasped in shock. “Where did you get that?”

      “That rich girl in the golden carriage tossed out two coins, not one, but everyone was so focused on the fight between the men that they didn’t even notice,” Sartes replied, his smile still very much intact.

      Ceres grew angry and prepared to confiscate the coin from Sartes and throw it. That was blood money, after all. They didn’t need anything from rich people.

      As she reached to grab it, suddenly, an old woman appeared and blocked her path.

      “You!” she said, pointing at Ceres, her voice so loud Ceres felt as if it vibrated straight through her.

      The woman’s complexion was smooth, yet seemingly transparent, and her perfectly arched lips were tinted green. Acorns and mosses adorned her long, thick, black hair, and her brown eyes matched her long brown dress. She was beautiful to behold, Ceres thought, so much so that she became mesmerized for a moment.

      Ceres blinked back, stunned, certain she had never met this woman before.

      “How do you know my name?”

      Her eyes locked with the woman’s as she took a few steps toward her, and Ceres noticed the woman smelled heavily of myrrh.

      “Vein of the stars,” she said, her voice eerie.

      When the woman lifted her arm in a graceful gesture, Ceres saw that a triquetra was branded on the inside of her wrist. A witch. Based on the scent of the gods, perhaps a fortune-telling one.

      The woman took Ceres’s rose gold hair in her hand and smelled it.

      “You are no stranger to the sword,” she said. “You are no stranger to the throne. Your destiny is very great, indeed. Mighty will the change be.”

      The woman suddenly turned and hurried away, disappearing behind her booth, and Ceres stood there, numb. She felt the woman’s words penetrate her very soul. She felt that they had been more than an observation; they were a prophecy. Mighty. Change. Throne. Destiny. These were words she had never associated with herself before.

      Could they be true? Or were they just the words of a madwoman?

      Ceres looked over and saw Sartes holding a basket of food, his mouth already stuffed with more than enough bread. He held it out for her. She saw the baked good, fruits, and vegetables, and it was almost enough to break her resolve. Normally, she would have devoured it.

      Yet now, for some reason, she had lost her appetite.

      There was a future before her.

      A destiny.

      The walk home had taken almost an hour longer than usual, and they had all remained silent the entire way, each lost in their own thoughts. Ceres could only wonder what the people she loved most in the world thought of her. She hardly knew what to think of herself.

      She looked up and saw her humble home, and she was surprised she had made it all the way, given how her head and back ached.

      The others had parted with her some time ago, to run an errand for her father, and Ceres stepped alone across the creaky threshold, bracing herself, hoping she did not run into her mother.

      She entered a bath of heat. She made her way over to the small vial of cleaning alcohol her mother had stored under her bed and uncorked it, careful not to use so much that it went noticed. Bracing herself for the sting, she pried her shirt and poured it down her back.

      Ceres cried out from the pain, clenching her fist and leaning her head against the wall, feeling a thousand stings from the omnicat’s claws. It felt as if this wound would never heal.

      The door slammed open and Ceres flinched. She was relieved to see it was only Sartes.

      “Father needs to see you, Ceres,” he said.

      Ceres noticed his eyes were slightly red.

      “How’s your arm?” she asked, assuming he was crying from the pain of his injured arm.

      “It’s not broken. Just sprained.” He stepped closer and his face turned serious. “Thank you for saving me today.”

      She offered him a smile. “How could I be СКАЧАТЬ