From Ash and Gold [ ongoing ]

| prologue |

tw: scenes that depict violence // blood

A   M U R D E R 

Her life had begun in ashes.  Ashes of the wooden frames that built her house, and somewhere mixed in the rubble, shards of glass, and the memories she would not have, were the ashes of her parents. In the middle of the barren land, far from the bustle of the city, lay a small, untouched baby, midst the destruction, wailing, her face lined with soot-streaked tears. 

The baby was a survivor, perhaps not without the old fortune-teller who had come to the site with a cotton-lined basket. The old woman with wrinkled skin, and large colorful beads hanging from her neck, cooed as she picked up the baby, calming the cries as smoke began to drift up into the clouds. She gently flipped a small wooden pendant from the baby's shirt, a name engraved choppily in the middle. The old woman smiled and sent a silent thank you prayer to the gods. She planted a soft kiss on her forehead, before whispering in her ear, "You are the one."

**

Akira looped the pendant's string around her finger, a natural instinct, as she pushed a cart of gold jewelry into the Fishmarket, which wasn't really a fish market at all, and more of a black market for small thieves and cheapskates. The fortune-teller had sent her here, here for a task that seemed impossible. 

"Nothing is impossible for you, Akira. You have trained for this for years." Akira ran these words in a loop in her mind as she trudged through the twist and turns of the dark alleys pooled with still oil and rainwater, a small jewel-crusted scythe jabbing her ribs under her shirt. 

Akira felt her heart pound in her chest. She had been prepared for this. Akira's memories consisted of her fortune teller taking Akira to boxing matches and eating jamuns from the stalls on the street. It also consisted of khani teaching her how to throw daggers at the smallest of targets, wield the sharpest of swords, and spit the foulest of words mankind had created. It seemed almost fitting that she carried out this horrible deed on her eighteenth birthday, an evil coming of age. It wasn't fair, really, that she was putting her life at risk, the kingdom at risk, for something an old woman had told her to do. But Akira couldn't ignore the vision she had seen. She couldn't live with that on her conscience.

After walking for a good amount of time, she stationed herself next to an old, worn-down building that towered over her, blocking the sun and drowning the alley in darkness. Khani had told her that she wouldn't have to find them, the King and Queen would find her. 

The sun had reached its peak in the sky when she heard the pounding of hooves and marching distant from her. Her thoughts muddled up, and now she was following her training and instinct. She felt them coming before she saw them. The air had stilled around her, and she could hear the blood thrumming in her ears. Calm, calm, calm. 

From the corner of the street, Akira finally saw them. It looked strange, to see such a beautiful couple, with milky soft skin that shone in the darkness, walking in a black market, with soldiers dressed in bright red coats and swords sheathed by their hips. Royalty didn't belong here, not in this part of the town.  As they came closer, Akira felt a jolt of guilt run through her. They looked fairly young, the Queen, a tall woman with sharp almond eyes, and the King, a man with posture and an air of pride around him, his hair falling in graceful gray wisps.

The hilt of the scythe hidden under her shirt poked at her ribs, snapping her back into the present and the job at hand. She counted four guards behind and four guards in front. There were two exits to this street, one the path the King and Queen had come from, and the other, an alley behind the building which led to a corpse house, the latter her final destination.