Of Whispers and Daggers ✓ [TLRQ #2]

Chapter 57.2 - Leavi

In the floor of Riszev's room, she fills bottles with honey and some liquor Aster rallied quietly from among the servants. The Ladies' drink of choice wouldn't have been strong enough. I stuff a bottle with a paper wick and a rag. It's quick work, much easier than trying to make black powder and less likely to explode on you.

"Where did you learn to do this?" Riszev asks.

"Year-two science," I answer distractedly.

"What?"

I look up at her paused hands and berate myself. My fingers roll up another piece of paper for a wick. "My home. It's something we all learn there."

Glass clinks. "I thought you said your home was peaceful. Why do you all learn how to make weapons?"

I drop the wick in and seal the bottle with cloth. "It's not a weapon there." It's an alkemi lesson. My heart pangs. I forgot how much I used to love science for its own sake. How strange for that to be a foreign concept here.

"All my life, I have never met a woman who never thought of war." The honey oozes into a bottle. She sets the jar down and passes me the next container. "You have changed with surprising ease."

I break her gaze. "I learned when I left home that it doesn't do any good to hold onto the past."

She hums thoughtfully. By the time we finish, thirty bottles of incendiary nestle into carefully packed bags.

"Do you think that will be enough?" Riszev asks.

"It will have to be." I push up. "That's all the alcohol we have."

She rises as well. "Thank you, Leavi."

I shake my head. "I just hope it's enough to see you all home safe." Worry rises like a wave, and in my mind, I see all the ways this could go wrong.

Riszev and her guards surrounded by the blistering fire they set themselves—

Morineause soldiers cut down and beat back until they're the ones that scatter—

Aster's eyes, staring silent at the stars, blood soaking into the flowerless field—

"Leavi?"

My eyes snap up to hers. "Yes?"

"What is it?" She takes my hands, concern creasing her face.

I swallow, overcome with a fevered impulse that scares me almost as much as the dark daydreams. "Let me come with you."

Her grip tightens. "You are not a warrior, Leavi."

"No, but I bet I can light these cocktails faster than any of your women."

"Then show us how."

"Riszev, please."

Her lips tighten.