Against the Wind

11.2 || Raya

"I can scarcely believe this," Rana Kel-Jabir huffed.

It wasn't the first time she'd made that known, but Raya wasn't going to be the one to point out any needless repetition. Head down, she trailed a step behind her mother, Yasmin a nervous cloud hovering at her shoulder.

"Injured." Her mother drew to an abrupt halt, drawn stiff as a needle with her arms folded, and Raya nearly tripped over her own feet in her haste to avoid a collision. Her mother's skirts fluttered as she spun on her heel, irritation lit up as indigo lightning in her eyes. "Who left the girl out there alone all night in the first place? Zephyrine is supposed to be the best of us. No catastrophe should be a surprise to her."

Raya winced. They were hardly alone; numerous families like theirs milled about the streets near the arena, making similar sounds of disappointment and incredulity, though none quite as loudly and as scathingly as Rana. She was already earning a few sideways glances. No-one would dare argue, but still Raya felt a shifting discomfort in her chest and the urge to speak. "I don't believe it rational to speak ill of the high mage." She kept her voice soft and eyes not quite on her mother's.

The words did land; her mother's sharp-peak shoulders relaxed a little, but the fire in her expression didn't diminish. "And what?" she spat, albeit quieter this time. "She should take responsibility like anyone else. To leave that girl there under such danger..." She trailed off with a shake of her head.

While Raya gnawed on her lip, her will to argue deflating, Hariq stepped up beside her. "In defence of her highness," he said, voice more smoothly placating than hers had been, "this attack was incredibly unprecedented. I'm sure she had reasons. A religious vigil—"

"Is an outdated custom," their mother cut in with a roll of her eyes.

Hariq wrung the top of his cane in his hands. "Perhaps." His conviction had waned. He turned his head, inclining in a direction away from the crowds. "Shall we move?"

"We better had," Rana said in a sigh. Her earrings rattled with another vehement head-shake. "Unbelievable," she muttered as she began to walk, dragging the rest of the party obediently behind her. "Delayed by three days. Three days longer I could've been hunting those foul creatures if I'd known."

Venom spiked in her tone, razored and targeted, though it wasn't clear who the target of her blame was. Like usual, however, Raya felt as if it were somehow her fault. She bit down on her tongue. On the surface, all she wanted was to stay silent and untroublesome while her mother's anger simmered, but the squirming ache buried deeper flapped like a feathered creature in her ribcage, a frantic reminder of the much larger shred of trouble at stake. The cause of Amina Shi-Sabri's injuries, as recounted by the unfortunate messenger sent to inform the crowds gathering for her delayed trial—a surprise hybrid attack in the dead of night—had clawed Raya's panic to the fore and held it there to fester. Her legs shook, but at least the constant, terrible presence of the issue, like a swelling in her skull, had forced her to scramble together some shred of a plan.

When her mother's complaints finally trailed into nothing, she cleared her throat. "The thought of such a vigil does serve as a reminder." She lengthened her step until they were both level, doing all she could to act as a mimic until her limbs were stiff as wood. Her mouth filled with the dry taste of kindling to match. "It's been so long since we were all together."

Though impatience still drew taut lines in Rana's expression, the sentiment snagged her attention. "It has."

"Since the day is now free, I thought we might visit the temple together?"

The question's end lifted neatly, just as intended—sweet and polite, request rather than order—and Hariq snapped up the bait immediately. His hand found her shoulder. "An excellent idea. That would be lovely."

His calm was so constant that eagerness was a difficult note to paint with his voice, but she heard it anyway, a drop in a pond that rippled outward. His thumb traced the curve of her shoulder, and she glanced his way to find him showing her a smile. Gratitude warmed it. He saw this as a favour to him, she realised. This was exactly what he wanted: the place he loved most, and a complete family, one that moved as one and sank into one another's company, not one that fractured and grew more distant with every new year that passed. The delight he found in that papered over a shred of the guilt that trailed her lie.

She wanted that too, but it was a fantasy. Maybe that united family existed in another version of the world, one where her mother was a different person and Raya knew how to fit, a version where the perfect girl she saw in the mirror every morning could step out and do it all herself.

For all her mother's talk of family and the Kel-Jabir name, it was impossible to tell whether such a dream was one she shared, but nevertheless Raya could pretend that she softened at the suggestion. "It is about time we shared a prayer again," she said, gaze already tracing the city's angular skyline to locate the tip of the temple. "Very well."

Hariq looped his arm with Raya's, and they lapsed into a startlingly comfortable silence. Raya's chest gave a grating squeeze. Forcing herself to speak again felt like breaking something, as if she'd wrestled together two jagged halves of a splint only to take out a knife and cleave them apart.

"Wait." She stopped suddenly. Hariq's arm slid away, and she felt cold without it anchoring her. "I must go home and change. This is not a dress befitting of prayer."

A frown shaded Hariq's features. While he returned to rubbing the top of his cane, her mother scanned her up and down, stern gaze picking over every stitch of the dress with blade-like precision. She hummed, then hissed a sigh. "Be quick about it."

"I will. Of course." Fighting to ignore the beginnings of hurt scrawled into the set of Hariq's mouth, she stepped back, curtseyed in offer of apology, then turned and marched away without looking back. As soon as she was out of sight, she broke into a sprint.

--◦༄ؘ◦--