Abolisher [Drothiker #2]

2.

Syrene was trembling, her legs buckling, when she stepped out of the bathroom with bone-white skin.

She hid her hands in soft pink gloves, her neck with a shawl—the frigid weather made a good excuse for them both—before approaching the living room. Navy was already waiting there, sorting out her weapons on the table before a dark-blue couch, hadn't returned to bed. The mass of her silken blue hair was bundled up, two pencils shoved through it. Her back was to Syrene, but Syrene knew Navy was aware of her presence in the living room.

She approached the water-wielder, and slumped down in the couch beside her. "Why haven't you returned to bed?" Syrene asked, trying to avoid all the weapons sprawled on the table. She couldn't show her curiosity regarding weapons, for Cerys Omdrial was an untrained woman who took no interest in things as such, and was most likely to harm herself if she touched a weapon.

"Which one do you think is the prettiest?" Navy's face was solemn, focused, as she examined her all sorts of daggers. There weren't many things Navy took seriously, but when it narrowed down to her daggers and knives, she was like a she-wolf guarding her cubs.

Syrene threw her head back on the lip of the backrest, and shut her eyes. "They're all hideous." Lie—they were all very beautiful, and she wanted nothing more than to run her finger along the edges of their blades.

"If it'd been someone else, Cerys," Navy murmured, "they would have been tasting blood in their mouth right now for uttering those vile words."

Syrene's lips quirked. "Very unfortunate for them that they're not me." Wrong thing to say—Cerys Omdrial's attempt at joke would have been: That's very kind of you, Navy. But Syrene was too exhausted to think over her words.

A sigh from Navy had her opening her eyes and lifting her head off the backrest. Her heart sank. Her friend's shoulders were slumped today—she doubted the water-wielder was conscious of that. She'd only known Navy for months, and ... not once had Syrene seen her shoulders slumped, and that sigh ...

Worry.

"What's wrong, Navy?"

Navy seemed to snap to attention—her shoulders shot back up. "I asked you a question," she grumbled, cutting a glare in Syrene's direction.

Syrene arched a brow. "Since when do you care about others' opinions—especially when it comes to your weapons?"

At that, Navy smirked. "Since I've stopped relishing in whimpers and groans of dying men."

Syrene lifted a brow.

"Since never, Cerys. Take it as a test of your taste." She returned to her weapons. "So?"

"Test of taste?" mused Syrene. "I could pick the most hideous one and you'd still find it beautiful."

"Of course. Weapons are all beautiful, unlike humans. Weapons are seen as they are: sharp and deadly. But humans ... beautiful they might be for the eye, but for all you know, their insides could turn out to be profane and putrid."

Syrene heaved out a defeated sigh and sat forward to have a good look at the swords and daggers and knives and ... Navy's favorite: a fancy hatchet. Golden decors were carved in its blade—not steel, dresteen—like a tattoo. The handle's wood was the same blue as Navy's hair—natural.

Syrene smirked and jabbed a finger at the hatchet. "That one."

Navy looked baffled. "One moment you refuse to near an animal at all, and the next you're setting your eyes on the dragon?" She waved a hand, and a glamour hid the hatchet—as if guarding it from Syrene's greed. "Choose from the knives and the daggers, Cerys."