The Vixen Trials

I Blame The Tattoo

"Why did the cold despair in his eyes
tear at her heart and make her
want to give him hope?"

Alyssia

Keilah seemed determined to fill any silence with endless prattle, mostly about the Prince, sometimes about the Hattavah and always about herself.

Alyssia stabbed herself with a needle out of frustration as once again Keilah changed her mind about what gown to wear for the upcoming ball with the Prince. Now she'd have another gown to press and make ready. Alyssia let a small sigh escape her. 

Keilah turned away from the three dresses spread out on her bed and sniffed. "This effects you too."

"How so?" Alyssia tried to sound interested, but kept her head bent to the small tear she was mending in Keilah's favorite linen shift.

"Because if by some chance I become his bride, you will be coming to the palace with me."

The idea jolted her. Leaving here. Going there. Not that she particularly loved the House of Lavilyn, but she was making friends among the other slaves. She welcomed the idea of leaving the soldiers though, especially Jalen. "You're right, my lady. I hadn't thought of that." 

Which resulted in another monologue on what life with the Prince would be like.

Alyssia managed suitably spaced murmurs of interest even as her stomach churned. Was her life really just to consist of Keilah's dreams and plans? Could she have none of her own? Her fingers quivered as she finished sewing and folded the garment. Her family was gone, her friends, her farm and her village. The only thing she had brought with her was her faith, but walking away from Captain Tannaach had killed it somehow. Yet she couldn't end up like Keilah, obsessed with a man she hardly knew. She longed to do something real, something risky even. The idea of the danger decided her. "My Lady, I have a favor to ask you. Can I hold a meeting here in your chambers?"

Keilah left the mirror and sprawled on the rug beside her. "A meeting? Who with?"

Alyssia suppressed a smile at even as the realization dawned on her: Keilah was bored with the waiting too. "I'll invite the Hattavah."

"Dakkoul?" Keilah straightened and her eyes seemed to grow larger, the colors more intense. "You think he might come?"

"I'll persuade him. It will just be a small gathering - Malek and Pipsqueak, the kitchen boy, and you of course.

Keilah frowned. "A meeting for what, exactly?"

Alyssia flattened and folded the mended shift as she spoke. "I'm of the faith you call Jagur's, my Lady. It is usual for those of us who follow Jagur's God to meet together, to pray, sing and discuss the teachings."

"I follow the Fox," Keilah said sharply.

"Yes, my lady."

Keilah rubbed her finger across her lips. "At this meeting would you pray for Jagur? Ask his God to keep him safe?"

"Of course."

"My village used to hold such meetings," Keilah mused, twirling a lock of her white hair that had escaped from the elaborate hairdo Alyssia had tried to create. "I even used to go with Jagur. Now of course I am now fully Wayvolkan and one with the Fox, but I don't see why I can't do this as a kind of leave-taking. But only if the Hattavah comes. I want to see him again. I was not myself with the Prince and I want to explain."

"He'll come," Alyssia promised and for a moment her golden eyes danced.

At second meal, Alyssia went over to the Hattavah's table, a steaming bowl of lek-duck soup in one hand, a large piece of bread in the other. His expression darkened at her approach. She sat down anyway. "Don't tell me to leave, Hattavah. I won't."