How Shadows Turn to Ash

Chapter 23: Octavia

Katars, as it turned out, were very hard to use.

The weapon was a blade with horizontal handles. Octavia would grip one like she was about to throw a punch, except instead of the recipient meeting her knuckles, it would be the tip of a blade.

"Terrible," Jacques said when Octavia tried to stab the wooden post, only for the knife to point downward as it slipped through her grip. He walked over, grabbing her wrist. They had given her two pieces of thick leather to wear from her forearms down to her fingers as armor. Jacques studied her arm for a moment. "I'll meld the metal to the leather," he decided. "The handle is too complicated for you."

"It is not!" Octavia objected, but Jacques had already snapped the blade away from her. Whatever. She wasn't as useless as they seemed to think she was. If Octavia could just  use her magic...

Staël snickered from where she was feeding some chickens. 

"I know this is a trap," Octavia said, feeling her face grow warm. Staël gave a mocking look of interest. "You're trying to distract me until the Revolutionaries show up. I bet they have some sort of ransom on me-"

"If we wanted the Revolutionaries here, we would have called them days ago," Staël said. "Besides, we aren't the liars here. You said you could use knives."

Octavia groaned. Jacques and Staël seemed to mean well... but Octavia refused to trust them completely. She had considered leaving several times, but the truth was that she had no idea where she could go, and she was still recovering. Who knows how long she could make it without a constant source of food and water?

It appeared, however, that her luck might be changing.

Octavia stood near the edge of the farm, curiously watching as large cages rolled by with a group of people all walking, singing bright songs. Staël set her pail of water down and joined her near the fence post to follow her gaze.

"Have you been to a circus before?" she asked. Octavia shook her head. Savoy had once had a menagerie where she could see whatever animal her heart desired. When she was six, he decided the animals were too much work and returned them. "Come on, then." Staël hopped over the fence. Octavia frowned. "Unless you want to stay here?"

Octavia looked down at her hands. They still hadn't healed. It was getting worrying. Octavia felt as though the anxiety of waiting for her hands to absorb magic made the farm seem smaller with each passing day. Maybe it was time for her to take a step away from it.

...or maybe this was a trap. Were revolutionaries hiding under the guise of a circus?

"One second," Octavia told Staël and sprinted back to where Jacques was still working. He looked up at her, giving a small wave in greeting. Octavia returned it, looking around a few times before spotting her katars on a tree stump. "Did you already modify these?" she asked.

Jacques glanced at the weapons before nodding, getting up to help her wrap the leather around her wrists. The blades were now embedded on top of her hand, unable to move unless Octavia directed it otherwise. They felt like part of her almost. As if these blades were somehow now bound to her in a way she couldn't explain.

"Thank you," she said, holding the blades up. It was strange to think the metal had come from Friedrich's axe. She could almost pretend this wasn't the weapon that had sliced through her father's neck weeks before.

"Be careful," Jacques told her sternly. Octavia smiled - a real smile - and gave a murmured promise to do just that. If he ended up truly being her friend and she lived through this... she would buy him so much yarn.

Dashing back to Staël, she held up her hands and hopped over the gate.

"Ridiculous," Staël muttered but followed Octavia toward the large tent and the surrounding enclosures. Octavia tried to contain a childlike excitement as she got closer. Even Savoy's menagerie hadn't been so extensive and wild. Octavia stared in wonder at a pile of colorful seashells that began popping open at once, revealing small birds with glowing eyes that squawked before fluttering into the sky, helping workers tighten ropes and straighten tents. To her right was a large pile of rocks that began to form into some semblance of a creature. Octavia stepped back.