The next few years, Sci retreated to the rooftop, her back against the cool ochre stone and on her lap at least two heavy books. The rest of Indra's old textbooks sat around her like scrutinising guards, warning her that even if she mastered one subject, seven others fought for her attention too.
At first, she dreaded mathematics and science most, made no sense of the riddles and the numbers that gradually disappeared the further she read on. Then, one mild winter afternoon as the sun of golden hour was shining in her eyes, something clicked. The formulas found a comfortable space in her head, next to the plains and the valleys of the world and the wildest chapters of Scoria's long history. And she came to loathe classics for which she found no room at all—no matter how often she reread the stories of old.
If her paper guards could not contain her, Indra was there to keep her on track, to force her to recite and act out the seventy-seven dances of the Scorian scimitar. At the moment she hated him for slaving her until her sweat glistened in the moonlight, but a first reward came at the age of twelve when he told her to put the scimitar aside, put out a puppet clad in a bag of sand and slipped on iron gloves with spikes. Tiger claws.
She touched the pointy pins at the back of her hand. Blunt.
"They'll help you not to have any accidents," Indra whispered. "I'll buy you real ones if you get in."
She slammed her fist into her brother's muscled gut. "When I get in."
"No, Sci." His strong hand grabbed her wrist. Unfazed, he stared into her eyes. "If... you're a good fighter, but how are you doing with the classics?"
As he tried to pull her down, she ducked. "I only need to convince five Rajas out of nine, four if the head Raja is on my side. I'd rather focus on history and military strategy than turn into a parrot reciting pretty poems."
"The classics are the foundation of our society." He grabbed her foot and dragged her along with him for a few feet. "It's our law, our legacy. It's what makes us Scorian."
She twisted her body, loosening from Indra's grip. "Then why are all the good stories about Alburkhan and the north, and all the evil ones about the lands beyond the volcanoes?"
He let her go, scoffing. "They're not."
"They are." She scrambled up, looking up at her broad-shouldered brother. With the crested helmet adorned with a white horsetail, he towered above her. She touched the outlines of a staggering stallion on the army's brown leather uniform. "The more I read the more I get the impression our Nana and the rest of the Makurdyians are not considered as Scorian as we are. Why is that, Indra?"
"The north and the south have a difficult past. You should know that from your history books."
"I do." She folded her arms in front of her. "I read the passages from the great Raja Mizza that ridicules their speech and calls their skin a remnant of their goblin ancestry. She and many others speak of the abomination that is their belief, but not one book has managed to teach me why it is such a crime that their Gods speak of a balance between virtue and sin?"
"Because a sin is a sin," he said firmly. "You're overthinking this."
"Or you're not thinking enough, Indra."
He shook his head. "You're ridiculous. Get up... fight me like the soldier you wanna be."
"I'll show you!"
She leapt up and pounded him, her tiger claws digging into the skin of his shoulders. With a single sweep, he tossed her aside, then sat on her—not his full weight, but enough to keep her down.
YOU ARE READING
The Witch's Hour (A New Dawn #2.5)
Fantasy[Novella]As a child, Sci was scarred by her own mother for being a witch. While the wound has healed and her shawl now covers her face, Sci struggles to remain deaf to the call of the desert wind. She works hard to get into the Scorian army, taking...
