Black Sapphire | Xaden Riorson | S/H

XLIX

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     The woman before me is tall and slender, one shoulder arched above the other like she plans to seduce me. I'm entranced by her eyes, a narrowed goldish brown focused on me.
     "Leave him." I arch a brow and suddenly feel my entire body. The pulsating rhythm of my warm heart and my blood underneath my skin.
     "Who are you to command me?" I question her.
     "He is mine. Leave him." I draw in a breath and my head tilts slightly as I narrow my eyes at her.
     "He isn't yours."
     "I bore him," she rasps with sneer. Her voice swirls around my head and unfocuses my vision for a moment so she can lean in closer unnoticed. It's terrifying, like a snake sneaking into its prey, but I remain unphased by this familiar woman.
     "And that is all you did." She growls out a breath that sounds like a demon and I mentally pull back into my breath for a moment.

     "He is mine."
     "He is no more yours than he is mine, so I ask again, who are you to command me?" She leans toward me further, her maul hanging open to huff out foul breaths and her shoulders arched like a cat on the prowl.
     "What have you done for him?" she hounds.
     "More than you, I'm sure."
     "I own him. I own him. He is mine."
     "He is not. Fen—" She screeches, withering to the floor like the name alone dispels her into a mound. She slithers like a pile of snakes over herself as I stare down at her. "I am his promise. You gave him one lifetime, I have given him thousands." I stomp my foot and her screams vanish.

     I open my eyes with a start. My heart still beats heavily at her screams and I sit up in my bed. It's strangely cold, which I only notice when I shiver, unprotected by my lack of coverage from the blanket I'm still sitting on instead of under.
     I look over toward the clock on the desk that reads 3:00. That makes me relax into the bed a bit more. I have an hour before I even need to be awake, which is good because I want to try to figure out this hair situation.
     The first thing I do is take some mild pain relievers to help this static headache, and the second is move into the bathroom. I take off the red wrap on my arm—a piece of leftover fabric from my talismans that I'll probably burn after all this.

     It takes almost 20 minutes to find a way to wash my hair without risking getting the handprint wet. If I'd had any doubts that I would die, I would've put a little more pep in my step to get to Basgiath quicker. Not that it would've helped much, but any day less would be a win right now.
     The rest of the hour is my very careful bath. I have to keep the water lower than I would normally like, and my left arm is tired by the end from doing all of the work on its own. In turn, my right is sore and swollen feeling, hanging over the edge nearly the entire time so I didn't even risk wetting the mud. I washed below it carefully and scrubbed it dry with a towel before suspending my arm up to clean my shoulder and bicep.

     By the end of it, I need to lay on my bed for 15 minutes to just let my arms rest before I start braiding my hair. It takes its fair share of time, and it's one of those braids that you can very well stop in the middle of.