After a couple weeks, I learned much more about Ygh and the religion of my mother, more than I wanted to really. However, I also got the benefits of my scheme. All of the work and labor of my long awaited plotting was coming to fruition. I was now in a spot where I felt in control. I was...unlimited by father and I was free to do as I pleased. If only once a week, I was now in control of my fate for a couple hours at a time at least. It was a greedy desire, as I dropped off Nela to be indoctrinated by a man I despised. But it was an exchange. Or so I told myself. She would suffer in this time (of lying and being told things she didn’t agree with) and she would grow from it. At the same moment I would be allowed the freedom. The freedom to master my own fate and to truly set right the injustice that my father had done against our family.

I began to stalk the “woman of sin”. That is what I called the woman that my dad was pursuing, in exchange for destroying our family. I hated her only a tad less then I hated him, since she was allowing him to play the devil in a play that was sending our family into a hell that he was making. Only now I was the one writing the play, watching as the actors resumed their parts. I could change the course of this story's conclusion, if I but waited. Watched. Studied. I would have my chance to strike the knife where it would cut most deep. My father would be severed from us, and my mother would come into her own, no longer held down by his heavy hand. I would play the savior. But for the sake of my mother, at most. If not for us children, then for her. I firmly believed we would survive. My mother though, I pitied. I pitied her most of all.

This woman though…this Tesim…was an embodiment of desires that my father would’ve found in any harlot. And so she meant nothing. She was nothing. Still though...I desired to meet her. To get the satisfaction of knowing myself right in the matter. With each day that I read and gained mastery over my language and my world, the more self-assured I became. I grew. And along with my growth the assurance of my righteousness followed. It was a heady time, as I found that I was following a sense of justice not only aligned with my mother’s religion, but also with the state as well. I would tell myself that I did not embody justice. Yet the truth was that I believed so, just under the surface of my thoughts.

To that point, I was blessed one afternoon:

The original book was nothing like I’d imagined. It was supposed to be bound with gold lacing or real leather or something. But it wasn’t. I was looking at the book, so humbly named “King’s Domain” (and not “the” King’s Domain as I thought) sitting on the shelf of the bookstore. It wasn’t gathering dust, only because it was a new book. Many of these books sat for a while when placed in the back, before some random collector would pick them from the eager masses of literary works. I envied the patrons, with their expendable incomes. I would rule the world if I were able to buy books and read them at leisure. But no. I needed to debase myself to scrounging for Gahn’s scraps, in exchange for meager payment, to read at times when I could steal myself from spying eyes back home. No one had found my collection and they wouldn’t. It was great lengths to make sure of that.

The book continued to sit there, and my hands trembled for only a moment as I considered whether to pick it up. I was giving this thing too much respect. It was merely a record. A record of laws that were currently in effect, to keep peace in the realm. It was nothing too special. I moved to pick it up. It was heavier than it looked. As I cracked it open, it was far denser in word spacing than I had thought. There were pages upon pages of interpretation dedicated to each premise: each law was expounded on and mused over, to make sure the proper interpretation of it would be ensured by the reader.

For a moment I considered whether to let my curiosity get the best of me. I was looking for a certain section in this book, hoping it was there. As I contemplated, I thought it best to put it back on the shelf. I didn’t want to be caught looking at it strangely, without buying it. There was no one in the back of the store and I didn’t have line of sight with the clerk at the moment, but I didn’t want to take the chance. It was placed back on the shelf. I took a deep breath and thought as clearly as I could. I could wait. I don’t dare give away a single clue to my real intent. Not now. I’d suffered too much and done too much already to let a little slip up cost me my goal.

The store was left, book in place, unmolested.

“Here ya go”.

Gahn handed the finished copy of King’s Domain to me a few days later, right when he said it’d be ready. This one was nothing special on the outside. But then again, nothing was that Gahn gave me. They were simply pages transcribed by him with what he had to do for me without anyone knowing. This one followed his own familiar tidy handwriting, same as the others, and was perfectly legible, yet now it was like reading my own handwriting, having spent so much time staring at words Gahn had written. This one though, had been a rush job, and as I flipped loosely through it on top of his building, I found the ink was smeared or a drop of it had been placed by accident. Gahn had fixed these in this book by only rewriting his mistake afterwards and correcting it with a comment as needed. I had considered greatly whether to let him take the usual time (three or four weeks) of writing most copies for me. They were always in pristine condition, and I expected to keep them for long amounts of time. This though. I could take the quicker route. The book was a tool and I didn’t need it to be perfect. Only accurate. With luck, in time, I would be able to buy the actual copy, and I would pay extra to have it emblazoned with flourish, to commemorate what it had done to me. I only needed to confirm it contained what I needed.

“You called it ‘the’ King’s Domain’. Why?”

“Oh. It’s just a way to refer to it.”

For all his simple views on life and straight answers, I knew Gahn bested me in pure knowledge. He’d read more, just by the nature of his job. And absorbed most of it. He would tell me of books that I’d never heard of, and I envied him for his work that he got paid to read so much.

“Why are you so interested in this thing?”

I stared at Gahn. Straight stared at him for a couple seconds, without blinking. I didn’t know how much I could tell him or trust him. I had to weigh a lot of things in my head and determine if I even could. So I broke the gaze after a bit. “It’s personal, Gahn.” I was about to sigh but he stopped me.

“Say no more.” I looked up and saw that he was putting a hand up in a gesture. The matter was concluded for him.

“Thanks.” My head bobbed slightly in tandem with my words, conveying my deep thanks.

Gahn didn’t say anything. I gave him a quick nod as I looked him in the eyes and then I left.

On the way back home with Nela I debated where to best read the book. It was a momentous occasion and I was thinking I would remember this moment for years to come. Whether it contained what I wanted or not, the words on these pages would set me on a path one way or the other. Nela had stopped asking me questions after a couple weeks. The whole R'osy and Bela conspiracy had fascinated her but I told her “Wait. I need to work on this before I can let you know.” The answer had bothered her so much that I would cry at night when in my room, away from anyone who could hear. She was such a kind caring person and I knew that I was well loved. The lies I was telling to her were eating away at me little by little and I knew that I enjoyed it in some sense, or else I wouldn’t do it. I was enjoying being in power, even if it meant using the people who loved me. Even if it meant killing parts of my own soul. Because doing so was bringing me things like the book, which carried a heavy and comforting weight in my bag. To hide it from Nela, I’d put a cloth and several pieces of bread for lunch on top of it.

I had decided that I would be the most practical and secretive as necessary for this next part. I had originally thought about leaving the book in I'lochin, and waiting until next week to go back and read it. However, that was a week too long. I wanted to find out before then, because based on a gut feeling, I knew I might want to visit the woman and deal with this sooner than later. I had no idea what this book would contain and I was wondering if I would even find something that could give me the satisfaction I wanted. So, in the end, I decided I would need to read it as soon as possible. If it came up blank, I’d go searching for something else. Whatever I needed to bring my dad his earned fate as soon as possible.

The next morning, mom tasked us with cleaning weeds from the garden. Again, school was given a lower priority, and I’d gone to great lengths to not draw attention to myself, in regards to my continued reading. A lot of the words I’d learned in reading so many books had to be “forgotten” so I wouldn’t use a bunch of words that my mom hadn’t heard. If I accidentally let one slip, it would possibly give away the whole conspiracy. And the first couple weeks had been the hardest. Words were my first love nowadays and I became quite dumb for a bit as I was super selective in what words I could use. It was a learned skill to know how to regress myself back to a place where I didn’t know what I knew now.

As for the weeding of the garden, I did not do it. Or rather, I did ask Bela if he could do my part for me. I wanted to spend some time by myself and I would pay him back by doing some of his chores. He agreed, and there was no ask or follow up from him. He simply trusted me. A slight twinge of guilt again, as I walked to the other side of our land, out of eye sight, before sneaking back to the tree line. The trees stood there, having previously been used to shed my blood. They continued to not care about my existence, continuing to outlive me, carefree, unless I should decide to take an ax to them. They were at my mercy, in a way. But on the other hand, if I didn’t touch them, they would live longer and easier lives than me. I had to respect them somewhat for what they were: living things with greater time given to them to enjoy a much simpler way. I was respected by them, for what I was: a cursed things, doomed to suffer greater joy and suffering, with the ability to kill them for my own gain...did I see the trees in the same way that I saw some kinds of other people?

The thought passed by as I looked at Gahn’s copy of King’s Domain.

It opened with a silent thump, pages making their familiar rustling noise as I played carefully with the twine. Gahn would thread the pages together meticulously, which I surmised he knew from his paid work - legally paid work that is. I appreciated the attention to detail he paid, even with this rush job. As I fiddled with the strings delicately, it seemed they were sturdy and may last for several years, even without tender care (though I would be careful for them, regardless). As I gingerly moved through its contents, the papyrus was making the only other noise besides a light breeze.

I paused and looked up at the tree branches above. The wind was moving. The wind moved the trees. I looked out over the field, out to where our house lay in the countryside, where in the side yard I saw the tree I sat under just a month or so ago. It was such a lifetime ago it seemed. I'd read so much in a fury and taken in so much information that my vocabulary had grown probably several times over. It was odd to look on that spot, imagining myself as what I might regard as a child. A sigh escaped me as I tried to embrace the moment. The pages were before me but this moment seemed to need a moment for reflection. It was necessary to myself that I pause here, and reflect on how far I'd come in the past few weeks...and how much farther I would be willing to go even yet, depending on what I would find…

"By the founding of King M'ark,

These pages do chronicle here in,

Laws and regulations (

On the nature of manners addressing the *establishment of rule…"

I started in with a quill I'd brought, writing "need to look this word up" next to words like “regulations” and others. Eventually I resolved to just putting a * next to all the words I didn’t know. And I gave up after a couple pages. Thumbing through the pages took a bit of time, but I found what I was looking for after all this work:

"Law *decree: lying

On the matter of lying,

Those found guilty in the matter of giving false words that are made to *deceive,

The king’s justice will be met by means in *accordance to the judgment used by the King’s *Bastion.

To *Wit, the King’s Bastion will ensure that punishment is made according to what lie is performed and how the damage of that lie is realized. The Bastion carries the fullness of the King’s “Mind” and all outcomes are given with the same weight as if the King were acting *thusly.”

I stared at the words I didn’t recognize: decree, deceive, Bastion, wit...thusly.

“Deceive” I guessed to mean some form of lie or to trick someone, based on how it sounded. Also, the other laws were spelled kind of the same way, where the words would change to explain the illegal act. They didn’t use the same word twice, many times. Deceive must be something to do with lying then.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

The rest of the words I’d have to look up by other means. For the words that I had to know, I would ask Gahn. And if he didn’t know...well I didn’t know who else to ask, although he could probably find out from the owner of the book shop. I didn’t want to ask Gahn for too many favors though. I was paying him, sure, but I knew he had to be giving me a deal, based on what things cost normally at the shop itself. Or maybe the shop owner was just making a lot of money off the things and wasn’t paying Gahn much. I didn’t know, and I didn’t think I could ask without making him mad.

I did have my answer though. Lying was illegal, and I could probably get dad on that crime. Mom didn’t know what was happening, and obviously I hadn’t either. If necessary, I would do what I had to make sure everyone knew that he’d lied to me. But the question was still there: how to do it. How to get him to answer for what he had done. What he was still doing. I would need to use the law to get at him.

And for that, I would need the “King’s Bastion”...Which I didn’t know what that was. It might be some kind of thing or person or idea or...even game or part of Ygh. I didn’t know.

I put the book back into the little box I kept buried next to the tree. Inside that box, I was careful to make sure it stayed clean while wrapped in some clothes. Those spare clothes I’d made one of my little ‘spies’ steal from a random I'lochin resident.

When I walked back on to the farm from the nearby forest, I didn’t know something was terribly wrong until I was already inside the house.

Dad was sitting at the common table, with pieces of paper laid out before him. The papers looked familiar, and a second later when he looked at me, I’d already felt my heart drop out of me.

“Did you think…” He said, as he put his left hand calmly onto a pile of them. “That I wouldn’t find these. And that I wouldn’t know they’re about us?”

I had no words. I thought about the stories. About the writing I’d done. The emotions I’d poured into Tyth and his good family of heroes. What had I written? He’d been reading books, my main hero. He’d been buying them with money his dad gave him. His dad was a king. His sister was a healer. His older brother was a soldier. His mom was the queen, who was the writer of the books that Tyth read. Would that be enough for my own secret book stash to be found?

“ANSWER ME!” Dad shouted and I noticed, somehow, that the whole house had been quiet since I’d walked in. Thank the morning sun that I didn’t keep my books near my writings, which were under my bed . . . in my room . . . oh no. I’d left the papers on top of my bed. Like a simple minded fool . . .

When my dad got no response he rose from the chair. “ANSWER ME!”

I had no words. Shock. Fear.

He closed the space between us in two steps. When he grabbed me by the shoulders I gasped quietly. Pure rage in his eyes locked my gaze on him. I couldn’t look away.

He took my right arm and yanked me over to the table where he bunched up the papers with a free hand and then dragged me into the kitchen. Mom had her usual dinner fire going.

The papers were tossed into the fire.

“NO!”

Dad smacked me in the face. “YOU DON’T WRITE ABOUT OUR FAMILY!”

Something in me came at him. My right hand turned into a claw as I tried to scratch at my dad, getting only close enough to the jaw before sinking fingernails there. He screamed curtly and almost in surprise, but a second later his hand, which had never left the grip of my own right arm dug into me. I cried in pain.

In blind fury, he took a knife from the nearby rack and cut me on my right palm, near the thumb. Nothing too shallow, but I cried out in more surprise than immediate pain. “YOU MOTHERLESS CURSE!” The words left my mouth before I could think them.

Dad looked at me with shock for maybe the first time in his life. And then his brow furrowed. His jaw became set. And he glared at me with an anger I’d never seen before. Slowly he overpowered me as he took both hands ahold of my right arm now. The blood from my palm had started to slowly drip onto the floor.

When he started moving me towards the boiling pot of food, it took all of a split second for me to understand his intention. I fought him as I could, but he was much bigger and stronger. All I could do was as we became inches away from the scalding water, I laid hold of the rim of the cauldron, to keep him from putting my hand in.

Pain shot through my hand all the way up to my skull. My legs began to feel weak, not wanting to hold up any weight. My mouth opened slightly as every sound within me escaped. My mind went outside of itself, watching a child lean away from a mad father while that same child also held onto a burning hot basin. My hand was now gripped in a lock it seemed, almost unable to let go of the burning feeling, even while my father tugged to try and shove my hand further into more pain.

After a couple hours worthy of eternity, the legs gave way and my body fell to the floor. Because my hand was still death-latched to the rim of the pot, I fell sideways and down near the fair underneath. Heat brushed my face immediately, but my mind no longer cared. I would cook.

The last thing I remembered was dad picking me up from the ground. My hand let go.

When I awoke, my right hand was bandaged. No one in the house said anything about what happened. My papers were destroyed.

Life continued on in our family, unchanged. Same as it always had.

A week later

As Nela continued her education with Dran, I watched the woman of sin perform the chores that every devil must know by heart: going to the market, buying gifts as her little child begged her for them, talking with other women in I'lochin. She lived a totally normal life on the outside. Even from several blocks away I would be within earshot of catching loud laughter and faint muddied sounds of her name being called by men with smiles too good for their own good. She seemed to be liked by many. I may have been (besides my father) one of the few that knew her sin existed.

This day, she was walking back to her house and I was several blocks ahead of her. The route down this street would always lead her back to her place, so when she had stepped on to the change in cobblestone patchwork a quarter mile back, I was able to sprint ahead, waiting. It was a simple little trick, to not let her know I was following her. I’d been very careful to make sure she didn’t notice me, as most of the time, I kept to the rooftops when I could.

Other times, after learning her routes, I was able to grab several different colored bottles that dad would use for potions. By pretending I was making deliveries for customers, I was able to make a “route”. That allowed me to pass by her frequented places. With the brightly colored bottles and a few trays that looked nothing alike, my hope was that she would think I was running errands to customers or something. To help me stay in one place, while spying, I would make runs to different doorsteps or vendors. If anyone would ask what I was doing I would whisper to them “secret spy stuff” and give a sly look. The grownups would wink and smile most of the time or shoo me away at others. If so, I would just find another place to “drop a secret bottle”. Kids would sometimes ask why I was writing such weird symbols in my little notebook (a little paper I had folded up to resemble a notebook). The answer would be the same, “secret spy stuff” as a whisper. Most of these kids would get mad that they couldn’t be a spy too. So to keep them quiet, I would recruit them: go follow this person, or go deliver a message under this rock out in the countryside, but make sure the message is in code, like this (the symbols would be scrambled and only I knew the fake code I was using, which was mostly invented based on a simple line system and would be easy to crack). But this took care of the kids with too much imagination or time on their hands.

On this particular day, it had been a few moments, and I was still waiting for the woman of sin to turn down the alley. Turned out that keeping my new found army of kids away from me was harder than usual. What turned into a very complicated game with many stories, I had worked a time to be alone from them, while in town, while the woman was at home, and while dad wasn’t here. It was a very small window but I’d done it. And at this moment, I wondered if I should put my head out into the street to find her. No, better to wait. I was observing only, to learn what I could of her, and this was part of my ritual while I waited on “book days”, for Gahn to get done with his regular job. I was unable to reach out to him while he was working, and I could only really talk to him from the roof without drawing suspicion while it was darker and the streets were even more empty than they usually were. This was probably the real reason I had asked Dran to work with Nela near sunset as it would-

While I was lost in thought, hiding behind empty crates in the alley, R'osy sat down beside me.

She did it with such swift quietness that I hadn’t even looked around to the end of the alley to watch for the woman of sin. Usually I heard her by her footsteps. As for R'osy, she wasn’t wearing shoes. The dress barely made a sound either as she sat down beside me.

I looked at her, wide-eyed and mouth open. A sound would have escaped me but she simply reached over, pinched my lips shut, and put a finger to her own, telling me silently that I needed to be the same way. A moment later, I expected to hear the woman of sin's footsteps. But they never came. I looked quickly around the corner, before R'osy could stop me. No one there. I looked back at her. The mood on her face was somewhere between mad and tired. I would think more like angry boredom. I’d seen it on Nela’s face sometimes when she would be upset about having to visit Dran.

“So where’s Nela?”

I looked at her without thinking, wondering why such an obvious answer would be asked. “At hom-” I stopped. She was with Dran. How quickly I forget things when I’m in my own little world, doing things for myself. Was I really so selfish? “She’s with Dran.” There was no harm in telling her. But I didn’t know why she was asking.

“Oh? So you found a babysitter then?”

I still hadn’t caught on. “A babysitter?”

“Yeah. Someone to look after her. Like say during a festival or something…”

The harvest had been weeks ago, and I’d spent so much time reading and plotting, that it felt like years had gone by. It really felt like I’d seen R'osy so long ago...when was the last time I’d talked to her in Uncle Nelg’s shop?...I tried to remember…

And then it dawned on me. “Oh.”

“Oh?”

“I forgot to get back to you.”

“Yeah. And I missed all of the festival for nothing.”

“Were you really going to go to it?”

“I don’t know.” *sigh* “I don’t know now. I’ll have to wait til next year.”

“There will be other festivals.”

“Yeah but that’s not the point...you should’ve told me that you found someone else to watch Nela.”

“Yeah. Sorry. I got distracted.”

“Why?”

I paused in my response. What would I tell her? “Why what?”

“Why did you ‘get distracted’?”

“Oh…”

“There’s that ‘oh’ again. Going to say sorry again?”

I thought about what I had learned and what I’d been through in these past few weeks. A lot of emotions came out without thinking. “I don’t have to explain myself to you.”

That seemed to disarm her. Something switched. She grew soft, and the anger pretty much disappeared. It was swift. Too fast for me to really understand. “I wasn’t asking you to. I mean, I wasn’t needing you to. I was just mad at you.”

“And I’m sorry. I really am. A lot is happening in my life right now.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah. But I can’t really talk about it. At least, not yet.”

“Can I ask why?”

“You can ask. I can’t tell you.”

This was the most one on one and open conversation I’d had with her in a long time. I had forgotten that I missed it. And that hurt. Keeping things from her seemed to be wrong, somehow, even though she wasn’t family. “Again, I’m sorry.”

There was a slight nod from her. “I understand.” The faintest whisper of a sigh and voice cracking seemed to be in her voice. Wind swept through the alley and made some leaves rustle past us.

A beat later she moved us off the topic. “So what are you doing hiding behind boxes while waiting to scare a pretty lady?”

“I’m not hiding. I’m waiting.” A better lie came to me. “I’m thinking.” Then I made a connection. “A lady?”

“The lady you’ve been following around all day.”

“How do you know about her?”

“I...Saw...You...Following...Her.”

“Why were you watching me?”

“Because it’s the first time I’ve been able to catch a glimpse of you for weeks. Usually you’re with your dad…”

“.....”

“So when I saw you I followed you. You seemed really keen to know where she was going. Who is she?”

“Can’t tell you.”

“Huh. Well, I think you owe me something. You left me without a word or explanation. Now I see you acting like an assassin or some other kind of creep, following around a woman. Is that why you wanted me to see to Nela for you? So you could go off and do whatever perverted thing you mi-”

“I AM NOT A PERVERT!” I said this louder than I meant to, but only because I needed her to know I wasn’t one.

She stopped mid-sentence and went slightly red in the face. “.....why should I believe you?” She folded her arms a moment later, demanding an explanation.

It was there. Waiting on a ledge. Do I tell her everything? It was all there, really just waiting to spill out into someone. But I had no idea if R'osy could be trusted. She’d been let in, sure, but maybe not enough. Would she keep my secrets? Would she agree with my plan? Would she help? Or would she tear it all down and ruin me. It was too much to trust at one time. I supposed I needed to make at least some kind of attempt to soothe her. Give her what she needed to at least stop, if not truly be an ally in my fight.

“I’m following her for very specific reasons. I’m not going to tell you why.”

Something looking like disappointment shone behind her eyes for a moment and she looked away and squinted. I could tell that she was weighing things in her mind, but would need to wait to see how she responded. “Thought about blackmailing you.” A shrug came from her shoulders. “But if you can’t tell me, I guess I won’t know anyway.” Another diversion from my eyes. “And I’m not going to hurt you….” She noticed for the first time that my right hand was bandaged. One of her fingers gingerly came out to touch it.

I drew my damaged hand away.

I had so much indescribable rage in this moment, I almost started convulsing. Everything. All of it. It was at the surface. I hated myself for not being able to hide my emotions. I felt like crying. Like hitting her. Like killing myself. Killing my father. I’d been carrying this all by myself for a couple weeks, and it was starting to weigh on me. I wanted to unburden myself to...someone…

I didn’t trust R'osy.

If anything in life had sunk in, it was that I couldn’t trust people. And that made me even angrier. I was mad at all of humankind. And that I was part of it. That I had been born. And now I wanted to be alone. I’d wasted enough time with this distraction...this silly little girl who could not know my pain...so I just stood up and walked out of the alley, away from all of it. R'osy called to me, but I didn’t turn.

I’d return when I would be alone.