The rich smell of nutty smoke filled his lungs. An instant sense of calmness ringed through his mind. It had been a while since he had smelled it. It had been far too long that he had almost forgotten its bitter sweet scent.
The blurry vision of something in pale orange gradually formed itself. Rami slowly fluttered his eyes open to sunlight in streaks dawning upon him. It took a minute for his eyes to adjust and he realized instantly that he had woken up to a much familiar place. Serotonin rushed his brain.
He was back!
He pushed the comforter away and stood on his mattress lying on the floor in its usual corner. His eyes scanned every inch to make sure that it was indeed his apartment. He was back! He was finally back in his very own apartment.
“Yes!!” he shouted for the first time, not giving a damn about the neighbors hearing him. His feet started a round of jumping jacks turning into cartwheels across the tiny space bumping into chairs and the little furniture he owned. He had never been so ecstatic to be back in his measly apartment in his life before. And today he was celebrating every inch of it to the point he even stood at the corner next to the washer, a corner he’d never quite fit into, just to experience it in its space.
The rich smell that made him wake caught up to his senses once more.
“Ah! Yes, coffee!”
He shouted jumping his way to the kitchen to see the last few drips follow as his mug filled with the black-brown liquid. He had never paused to observe coffee in his mug so much in the mornings before. But today he wanted to take it all in.
He smiled, as he added sugar, then thought for a moment before he pulled out some milk from his small refrigerator and headed over to froth it so perfectly, adding it into the coffee in beautiful layers that he ended up with a clean shape of a white heart.
“I…didn’t know I could do this,” he spoke to himself, impressed by his own coffee art. He brought the mug to his lips imagining the delicious liquid about to engulf his taste buds when suddenly the perfect white heart began to dot in black. Rami paused, checking his coffee to see the dots begin to expand rapidly, erasing his coffee art as if it was being poisoned from within. He gasped watching the blackness overtake his coffee leaving a mug full of black goo. In a flash it began to spill over onto the floor and spread like wildfire erasing his moment.
“No! No, don’t!” Rami tried screaming but quickly found something stuck in his throat. He was only squeaking his way through.
And in a snap everything vanished. His apartment was gone, his coffee was gone. He had no idea where he was except that he was floating in a pitch black room.
The…the dungeons?...
He thought only for a moment quickly coming to the realization that it wasn’t the dungeons. It wasn’t a room or a place at all. The semblance of the floor he thought he was standing on was suddenly no more. And in another snap he was falling. He was falling infinitely, in a loop, forever.
Rami jolted as his eyes flashed open.
He felt the familiar cold sweat at the back of his neck greet him the very next moment. His breathing was through the roof and his palms were pooling with sweat.
His eyes immediately adjusted to the darkness with only the moonlight flooding in through the open window of Azul’s attic. It lit up the room enough for him to know that he wasn’t in his apartment and he wasn’t falling through space in an infinite loop. He was indeed still Azul, in Azul’s bed, where was supposed to be sleeping for the night.
While listening to his heart finally begin to slow to a lull his eyes gazed out the open window giving a slow creak as the wind pushed against it calmly. At least it wasn’t bothering him. It felt more like a companion in the utter loneliness he was feeling after a rollercoaster of a dream turned nightmare he was being whipped through only seconds ago. Even in his sleep he was fighting to hold on.
Rami smiled absentmindedly, listening to the window creak once more as if to bring him back to earth, when it suddenly struck him. The creaking window was not supposed to be open. Right before getting into Azul’s bed he had diligently closed it, clasping the lock tight like Noor had instructed him the night before. Rami’s eyes shot wide open in panic as his arms immediately pushed him up.
“Who–”
A shadow of an arm grabbed his mouth, thrashing his back down to his pillow. His arms pushed out in a desperate attempt to grab his attacker when another arm locked his body in place and pushed him harder against the bony bed making his cries muffle.
“Stay calm!” a harsh whisper sounded next to his ear. But Rami could only think of either getting out of this iron grip or die trying.
“Stop it! It’s me,” the whispers continued a few more times as Rami’s attempts at releasing himself grew weaker and it finally dawned upon him. He recognized the irritable voice in its hush whispers as the hairs on his neck stood in reaction.
His eyes searched for a face only to be met with a mask and a pair of fierce dark eyes. That was all he needed. Those eyes were all he needed to know that it was her.
“Nanji’s spy is on the roof of ‘The Tigress’. Stay down. He will leave soon in a moment,” she whispered as her grip on Rami loosed a slight bit giving him relief. He caught her eyes scanning the outside like a hawk. They were mesmerizing indeed despite their dark color in the monochrome light of the moon. They carried a sort of intrigue almost as if a veil hid them, guarding them behind it not revealing their true colors to anyone.
Rami hadn’t realized he was taken by her eyes so close to him until they were finally staring back at him in question. Dolovan’s eyebrows knit ever so slightly releasing Rami from the spell.
He jerked back as Dolovan removed her arms from him. She quickly moved diagonally to the window and stood behind a shadow, creeping closer as if to scan the area fully, then turned to Rami sitting on the bed quite disheveled and taken aback.
“I suppose this was also an option then, you visiting me to tell me what to do next,” he whispered, watching her walk so softly, not a sound beneath her feet. She was a Commander of the King’s Army after all. The least she could do is learn how to creep up on her unsuspecting enemies.
She lowered her mask then smirked in reply, taking a seat on a chair at the foot of his bed. Rami figured Dolovan perhaps placed it there after sneaking through his window to sit and observe him sleep waiting for the right time to pounce on him.
“How was your first day back, Master Ascari?” she asked pityingly, Rami could tell. She looked so cocky with her legs crossed and her eyes lowered staring back at him like he was a mere puppy in pain.
“Please, it went better than I thought–”
Dolovan let out a snort, “You humor me, toad-head. I hear it was quite a spectacular disaster.”
“Who said that?” Rami barked back trailing to a whisper hoping none of his employees would get alerted and make their way up to find a Commander of the King’s Army in his attic in the middle of the night.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
“Everyone except you. I heard they bled you dry having you drink all that mead. I even heard you danced on the tables all night long till your legs take it no more. You are lucky the word on the street is that you were so overjoyed to be out of the dungeons that you chugged alcohol for the first time in your life.”
Rami bit his cheek at a loss for words, but also in part due to loss of memory. Last night was mostly a blur after he spoke with Heril. He did not know when he started getting pummeled with alcohol again or if he actually did indeed dance on the tables all night long. He had never really partied so hard, so to say, in his reality, he could not begin to even think of how he could have reacted with so much alcohol in his system for this was indeed his first intoxicated rendezvous to begin with.
“That’s just a rumor,” he did his best to convincingly brush it off. But Dolovan did not buy it.
“You are lucky. How sure are you that Nanji would dismiss Azul’s sudden change in personality once news reached him of Ascari making a fool of himself?”
Rami rolled his eyes to lean forward with his elbows to his knees hoping to change the conversation, “Why are you here?”
“To remind you that you are infiltrating the largest criminal organization in Keimitaan for me–”
“Yes well, besides that,” Rami cut her off only to regret the very next moment as she laughed to herself like a maniac before spitting right back at him.
“You must feel quite at home to talk back to me, Ascari.” Her eyes darkened as she leaned forward meeting his gaze.
Rami gulped not knowing what she was going to do. The glint of her sheathed dagger caught his eye. Was she about to pull it out, perhaps threaten him to behave with it stuck to his throat? Or was she perhaps thinking of driving it into his heart, ending him right then and there, abandoning her plans, teaching him a lesson?
“Quite the opposite actually. I feel quite out of place.” To Rami’s surprise he had answered Dolovan’s statement without a second of proper thought.
A beat of silence passed, giving Rami hope that Dolovan’s rage would only emanate from her eyes and not through action. Yet he fell short on that assumption when Dolovan reached her fingers out to grab him by his collar and drag him, knees dangling, closer to her face as she spat back in a whisper.
“Don’t you dare fuck with me, Ascari! You are still breathing because I decided to let you live despite your act to appear weak. You are under me, in my control.”
Rami quivered a reply along the lines of “Yes, fine. Put me down,” but he only felt her harsh breath falling on his face a few more times before his body fell back on the bed and his head hit the wall.
Dolovan stood, pacing in front of him appearing to calm herself as he rubbed the back of his head throbbing where it hit. They both listened for anyone woken or alerted by the sudden noise of a head banging a wall but there seemed no disturbance from the outside world at all.
Rami waited for Dolovan to finally sit back down but she only continued to pace. He avoided her gaze, ashamed of the unnecessary nuisance he was causing. He just simply couldn’t help it any longer, her entitlement to him serving under her was getting to him.
“Have you informed your men of the raid on the North Western garrison yet?” she asked unaffected by the tantrum only minutes ago. Rami shook his head in answer, “The plan was to keep everyone out of it, was it not?”
“Not anymore since your men are back. It will be difficult for you to disappear with no one noticing. I suggest you gather your best men. Only inform the ones you need to. Contain the information only to that circle. You will leave at dawn the day after tomorrow–”
“Day after tomorrow? I still have three more days!” Rami protested.
“It takes two days to travel to the end of the North western border, you fool! What did you think? That you would get magically transported when the clock strikes twelve?”
Rami hadn’t thought of transportation. He only thought Nanji gave him five days to prepare to attack a garrison. He squirmed in place as he looked to Dolovan, still furious at his question.
“I’m trying my best here,” he started to explain himself.
“You need to try harder. You are the head of the coins division of the Circle of Daggers. They are people depending on your success.”
Rami edged closer to ask, “What–what is the plan? I heard Talin suggest you come up with a plan to save Sir Tucci. What’s the plan exactly?”
Rami watched as Dolovan gulped a few times before looking at him, “I will take care of the majority of it, Ascari. All you need to do is show up with your men, the best of the lot, and be ready at the garrison entrance by nightfall three days from now.”
“Will you come get us then? At the garrison gate?”
“You’ll know it then. I don’t want to pressure you with too much information as you are clearly incapable of acting on it anyway.”
Disregarding her jab at his competence Rami pressed on, “How many men should I get? Ten? Twenty? What’s a number that would be enough and not too much?”
“The North Western garrison is not that heavily guarded. There should be around twenty to thirty guards on duty this time of the year. So, let’s keep it to ten or so of your men.”
“Wait…I thought we were raiding the place. Ten wouldn’t be enough, would it? Each of my men will be up against three of yours,” Rami spat back as he suddenly felt quite protective over his underlings, who were thrust into a precarious situation because of him.
Dolovan sighed, “Well, according to my plan, you would only need ten of your men. You aren’t going to announce your arrival at the gate and march right in. You’ll be entering at the right time, when I signal you to begin your attack. And by common knowledge of the Circle’s coinmaster’s excellent raiding skills you will only need ten of your most skilled men. If there were to be more, that would bring suspicion. Besides you will have my help so your men will not be actually fighting the King’s guards.”
“What about Sir Tucci and the rest of everyone at the garrison? Will they know beforehand about the raid?”
“You don’t need to worry about it–”
“But I do! I have to bring the head of Sir Tucci to prove my loyalty,” Rami exclaimed louder, making Dolovan bulge out her eyes to remind him to lower his volume.
Rami quietened and took a moment to himself looking at the moon cornering the window. Dolovan merely stayed silent waiting for him to calm himself and ask again. But he only spoke back to ask so differently.
“Does it not bother you people that I have to kill somebody to prove things?”
She got closer to him as her shadow fell on his being sitting so feebly at the edge of his bed, knees knocking in worry. She stared at him for a few breaths before she whispered, “There are far worse sins you have committed, Azul. Sins that cannot be forgiven through repentance.”
Something in Rami snapped as she addressed him by that name. He looked at her and asked, “Would it kill you to consider perhaps I am not Azul? That this is not a part I am playing? I’m only stuck in this body, in this nightmare?”
Dolovan fell silent, taken aback, surprised even. Rami appeared so vulnerable to her then she stepped back taking a hard look at him.
Seeing Dolovan at a loss for words, Rami cleared his throat to continue, “If your plan expects me to walk up to the garrison and cut Sir Tucci’s head off or honestly anyone else’s head just know that I will not be doing that. And your plan will be ruined.”
She thought for a moment standing so still as he fidgeted with emotion overwhelming his being. He fiddled with his palms before gazing at his feet and saying, “And those sins you mentioned, whatever they are, I never committed them. And I will not repent for something I never did.”
“But you did. Your hands are stained with blood. You can never deny that. Beheading someone is the least of any horror you have committed, Ascari. Perhaps it is time to feel the weight of it all, know that you are not a saint and begin to live as the sinner you are.”
He felt degraded as she tore him down with a few words. All he ever heard of Azul from his workers were praises and congratulations for making it out alive. And here she was berating him on how much of a criminal he truly was without any context. A part of him wanted to take Azul’s side, fight for space. Another part wondered if Dolovan was right and that he was a true scum of the earth.
“Then tell me your plan, tell me what you need to do to fight this evil. I can help, I am already in the Circle,” Rami pressed on as he felt the responsibility to do good.
But she only stared at him as if analyzing every wrinkle on his face.
“Do exactly as I tell you. That is how you can help. For now, we focus on raiding the garrison. And when you return from the raid and successfully prove your loyalty to the Circle I will give you your next instructions…”
Rami dropped shoulders in disappointment of being treated like a pawn in a game he had no power in despite being called the ravenous of all. He was merely a pawn and nothing more. He was Dolovan’s pawn and she would be the last to ever share her power with him.
“...This is how you survive now, Ascari. From now on, this is how you will live your life.”