On Thin Ice (Prequel to Guild)

Chapter Three: Tasked

                At first, there was nothing but the blade and the target, and then there was only Dai and yet another mess he had to find someone to clean up.

Screaming at nothing, Dai kicked the wall. His foot stuck in the screen and he yelled even louder as he fought to tug it out.

"My Lord?"

The pounding of his fists against painted silk and wood didn't scare the servant away. He couldn't force his tongue to tell him to leave. He couldn't control anything- anyone. He was Commandant of the Little Army, that was all. He didn't even have authority over himself.

Marrying him off. They were marrying him off!

And even more disturbing? It was a northerner they were giving him to. His proud, noble, pure-blooded, Outskirts-hating, Hikarishi parents had offered his hand- and other parts of his body- to the Mongonai princess. Why? He didn't know.

But he didn't care to find out.

Giggling from the corridor. Feminine, but with a sharp, cold edge that made his hair stand on end. Jia. Sighing, Dai knocked his head against the wall.

"Leave us," she purred, and then there were footsteps. Two sets: the servant leaving, and his sister coming nearer. Slinking nearer. He felt her breath on his neck. "Have you tried steeling?" she teased. "Truly, you should have accepted it by now. You shouldn't still be... breaking swords, walls, targets-"

Dai whirled around. "Make them call it off!"

"Call what off, Little Cub?"

She knew. He could see it in her smirk. See the gleam in those silver eyes that told him she was enjoying this.

"I would rather carve out my own eyes with a chopstick than marry-"

Jia threw back her head and laughed into the air. "How would you know? You haven't even met her."

"-Anyone."

"Now, now, Cub. I hear northern women are well-broken. Perhaps she'll come with a bell so you can summon her for-" She didn't finish. She didn't need to. The widening of her grin told him all he needed to know about the end of her sentence.

"Change their minds."

"What makes you think I can? What makes you think I have any influence on mother and father's decisions?" Another rhetorical question. A bigger grin. His sister came up beside him, tracing the scars in the wall with a clawed finger. "I can't do that, Dai."

"You won't."

"Correct."

He frowned. "What do you want?"

Jia considered for a moment, her lips pursing, brows knitting themselves into a line. It was obviously a feint to give him hope. She did that a lot when they sparred. She did that a lot in his trials.  

 "Nothing I can't take for myself," she said.

Before she disappeared, Dai Kimsura swore he saw her wink.

...

              Alone. Yuina Mongonai was so painfully, blissfully alone with her face pressed against Komet's fur, the Great Curse of Cold freezing her tears to her hair.

Hikarishi. They were sending her to Hikarishi today. She had less than an hour for goodbyes. Less than an hour to calm her spooked horse... and herself.

Both were proving difficult.

"Shhh. Shhhh!" she half-choked, glancing over her shoulder to make sure they were still alone. She couldn't be seen this way. Not by anyone. "I'm not supposed to be here, boy. So please, please don't make noise."