Page 39 of Scaled Hearts

And I don’t.

It’s strange to consider what it might have been like to grow up in this world without magic. I don’t like imagining how vulnerable I would be without the ability to shift into a dragon or defend myself against enemies. It’s almost impossible to imagine being so powerless that I might gohungry. “You were hungry often?”

She laughs, but I don’t think anything about it is funny. “I was raised by orcs.”

“But you had parents, surely.”

“For a while.” Her expression turns wistful, and something in my chest twists painfully. “But it was hard, especially in the winter. The orcs never decide our tributes are enough; it’s always too little. And in the winter, when the sicknesses come, it’s hard.

“My mother caught a bad cough when I was seven or so. It’s damp in the mines, a lot like here, but narrower. Everyone is so close together, and if one person falls ill, everyone gets it. She’d just had Kara less than a year before, so I guess it hit her and the baby harder.”

I’ve only ever fallen ill due to cursed magic. The mere memory of it nearly makes me want to break something. I’d been so helpless, and it had been unbearable. What must it be like to live one’s entire life so vulnerable? I don’t like to think about how fragile humans are, how one sneeze can cause them to fall so easily.

“Anyway, my father, he had to work double time to keep her out of the mines. Her cough was the bad kind of wet, you know? All crackly. The healer told him she’d only survive if she could get some rest. That if she worked, she and Kara would both die. I tried to take care of them the best I could, and Kara got better, and my mom did, too. But then my dad got sick, too, and there was no one to cover for him. He died in the mines.”

“And your mother?”

Kelly doesn’t cry, or look upset. She takes another bite of gallus and looks at me with hard, worn eyes. “Well, she had to go back to work. Double-time, since my father couldn’t. And she wasn’t fully healed. She died about a week later. I think she knew she would, because she’d already started weaning my sister on capra milk. It wasn’t too expensive, since we were friends with the farmer, but it wasn’t free. She wouldn’t have done it if she’d thought she had more time.”

But she didn’t have any more time, and Kelly had to learn how to raise an infant. As a child.

“I was lucky my cough healed up quick, because I had to learn how to work the mines once she went.” Kelly stretches her hands out toward the cave wall and drags them along the edge. “I’ve always been lucky with that. Healthy lungs. Kara, too. She gets sick but heals up quickly…until this whole mess.”

She blathers on, blissfully unaware that there’s something terrible and strange tearing at my chest.

Grief.

Why, by the gods, am I grieving for two humans I’ve never known? It’s a bizarre sort of mirror, as if her pain is mine. And it’s so powerful it nearly cleaves me in two.

I don’t want this.

I’ve never felt like it in my life, this strange sort of…of…I don’t even know what to call it. Unpleasantness. Has she told me this story just to elicit this horrible response from me, or is this just a by-product of our bond?

Whatever it is, it’s all her fault. All her talk about deep, abiding love and sacrifice is starting to melt my brain.

“Angurus?” Kelly blinks up at me, confused. “Are you well?”

“Quite.” I keep my voice short and roll aside when she tries to stroke my cheek. It feels as though she’s just pried open my ribs and climbed inside – I could do with a bit of distance for the moment.

The servants bring her a bed roll, and I signal them to bring me a separate one. Her eyes widen when she realizes we won’t be sleeping together, but either her good sense or her pride makes her keep her tongue.

Still, I can see the hurt flash across her face, plain as a sunrise. “I guess we should get some sleep.”

“Yes.” Ice drips from my voice.

The pain in her eyes only makes that awful sensation in my chest worse, so I turn away from her and face the opposite walls of the cave. The servants still play music, soft and haunting. They pluck at the strings and flood the cave with beautiful, mournful chords.

I don’t see them.

All I see are Kelly’s young hands, bleeding as they chip away at the walls of a mine. Bleeding as they struggle to get a young child to eat.

I want to set something on fire.

18

Kelly

When I wake up from my restless sleep, I see Angurus already up and pacing around.

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