The sound of forks scraping plates isn’t enough to cover the raging silence echoing throughout the adorned dining room. Nor is the plethora of garnished and perfectly seasoned food enough to distract from the looming aura of the man that sits at the head of the table.
Karma doesn’t have to raise her eyes to know that her father rests in his chair, his elbows improperly placed on the table. She knows that his hooded eyes are darkened with something far viler than anger, something she often sees reflected in her own.
Still, she focuses on her food.
She dips her silver spoon into the bowl in front of her and raises it to her mouth, her back straight and her curls tucked safely behind her small ears. Just as she was taught by her many instructors, she rests her spoon on the plate sitting below her bowl as she swallows.
Never in her life had she ever thought she would enjoy a snakeskin soup.
Just as she is about to reach for her spoon again, her father finally reacts just as she imagined he would. His fist bangs on the wooden table sending a splintering crack racing down the middle. Karma’s eyes raise as she gently pushes herself away from the table.
She’s just fast enough to miss the splashing and crashing of all the dishes as her father yanks at the end of the previously white tablecloth. The young woman just barely manages to hold her sigh in, though her younger sister is not so smart as to contain her feelings.
The young teenager to her right lets out a yelp as Karma’s hot soup flings into her chest and drizzles down into her lap. “Absolutely disgraceful!” The man grunts. She stands as her father does and watches as he paces, his form momentarily blocking out the setting sun’s rays.
This is not an uncommon display in the Rinafi manor. For as long as Karma has been alive, she has recognized the molten anger boiling within her father’s veins. When most look at him, they don’t understand the extent of the fury that burns in him. She didn’t when she was younger.
But she knows well enough now.
“Has something happened, father?” The lace of her fingerless gloves rubs together as her hands clasp in front of her. She looks to the Lord of the manor and the current ruler of Hillanta. If she were anyone else, she would not have noticed the slight softening of his eyes as he looked to her.
He would admit it to no one, but the way Karma held herself reminded him dearly of his late wife. He held the smallest of soft spots for her, which was only amplified by the fact that her teachings had served to carve her into an heir that he felt he could be proud of.
Karma was the eldest of four and the only one of King Karmic’s children to be born of the late queen. “I suppose it is within your rights to know. Leave now,” He shoes away the studded guards that stand at the archway of the dining room.
It must be serious if he does not trust his royal guards to overhear the information. “Those foul and retched beasts have managed to push our forces in Onq back to Shal.” His face goes dark. Karmic had declared war with the Kingdom of Zagra six months ago on the night of his birthday. He had been drinking straight from a bottle of spirits, dancing within his study as the formal he had thrown was in full swing in the dancing chambers.
It was no secret that the peoples of Zagra were the result of the Hillantan’s nasty displays of magic. Because the chi that their magic requires can neither be destroyed nor created, once it was used for a particular casting, any residuals float freely within the air. The previous king of Hillanta had found a way to divert the chi to reserves in the east. Should their people ever require the energy, it would always be there.
What he did not expect was for the subservient humans that served at the reservoirs to begin to absorb the chi. Only sourcers, people of the Hillantan empire, are able to manipulate chi in various ways. But it seemed that keeping generations worth of humans chained like animals within the lands filled with magical energy led to them developing certain attributes of their own.
Who would have thought?
Karmic wanted those stores back, though no one is sure as to why or what he’s planning to use it for. “A waste of resources those soldiers have been.” His eyes are directed towards his first son, Finious.
Once a royal child has finished their training, they are given a sector of the Hillantan government to run with their father’s overseeing eyes. Finious, the torturous little brat, was a mere two years younger than Karma. Despite this difference in age, Finious was the first to finish his training, and thus the first to choose his sector of the government to look over.
Finious is a brute, a nasty one at that. All his destructive urges are only enhanced by his father’s praise, and his mother was a head case at that. He chose to oversee the military, his focus mostly on creating stronger, faster, and more brutal warriors.
And as far as father had been concerned, Finious had been doing a wonderful job. While the Empire of Hillanta and the Kingdom of Zagra have been officially at war for a little over five months, Finious had been improving military power for at least a year before the declaration. In those five or so month, Hillanta had managed to capture a fair bit of Zagran land. Unfortunately, it seems that their rival kingdom has started to receive wise war council.
A small smile creeps up the corners of Karma’s mouth as she witnesses her pesky half-brother’s scowl form at their father’s disapproval. The Emperor sucks his tongue as he paces. “Their numbers have grown, though I don’t know how. And ever since that prince has stepped into the place of his father, the battlefield has become soaked through with Hillantan blood. You can imagine my embarrassment, can’t you little Fin?”
Finious, ever the wounded pup drags his eyes up to meet his father’s. “Yes, sir, I can.” Karma tsks in her head, for Fin had made the wrong choice of words.
One of her father’s brows raises as he turns to fully appraise the fruit of his loins. “Oh, you can?” Before Finious can open his mouth to say more things to anger their father, Karmic is standing before him, and the echoing sound of flesh hitting flesh is filling what was once silent airs.
Finious stumbles back a few steps, but ultimately stays standing, which seems to anger Karmic even more. “You understand how I feel, and yet you continue to fail me? Is it because you have no respect for me?” Finious shakes his head, his fists bawling. “Oh! So it is because you lack actual tactical talent? You’re inept? Is that it?” Again, he shakes his head, his mouth opening to oppose their father. “Out.” That one word is more powerful than most. As soon as it falls from his lips, the three remaining children, Karma included, walk to separate walls, their backs to the pair still standing by the destroyed dinner table.
What happens after is also nothing new in the Rinafi manor.
All three of the children stand with their backs straight and their hands clasped in front of them, as their father teaches Finious about the consequences of speaking wrongfully. The harsh pounding soon turns to wet slaps and after that, only Finious’s agonizing groans can be heard.
Karma doesn’t know how much time passes before Finious finally goes quiet. What she does know, is that if she wishes to not end up like him, she must be very careful with the next words she exchanges with her father. “In.” The children turn in and are met with a quite gruesome scene.
Their brother is a grotesque puddle of sourcer meat and bones. Karma swallows. “Trilana, go get a healer for your brother.” Karma’s young sister bows her head before stepping over the puddle of leaking blood to do as her father asks. “We must change tactics. The beastly prince must be put down. And we all know the best way to take down a man is with a woman.” He refers to the death of the King of Zagra, who was suspected to have been killed by his wife, the current ruler of Zagra.
It was never confirmed, but Karmic knew the Zagran queen well, and he let it be known that she was a scholarly woman versed in many fields, most of which were dangerous. Karma keeps the heavy sigh from escaping her. Her hands wishing to flutter to her neck, where her necklace should have been. “Perhaps Trilana will prove useful in some respects. I have been told that she greatly resembles her mother.”
Trilana was the daughter of a very high human courtesan. Karmic had taken the woman to be one of his consorts the night she showed up to one of his formals. She had been hanging on the arm of a nobleman that thought he was smart enough and funded enough to climb himself up the social ladder.
He had believed that having one of the nation’s most beautiful and exotic women hanging from his arm that night would win him some honor. But when he had tried to pawn her off to a lord higher than himself, the woman had pulled the tiny little blade from seemingly out of nowhere and threatened to stab him through the neck in front of the entire party.
Karma had been seven at the time and had watched from her small throne on the corner of the marble platform as her father had ordered the woman to follow through on her threats.
And she had.
And he had pardoned her moments later, claiming the the nobleman had been selling secrets off to the barbaric Zagran creatures to the east. While the human, Talia, had a far better temper than Minoa, Finious’ mother, she was also a whore through and through. It wasn’t long after the birth of Trilana that Karmic had her sentenced to life imprisoned for adultery.
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That was fourteen years ago.
Trilana does take after her mother more than most of Karmic’s children. Her hair is straight and so black that it looks blue at certain angles. She has wide green eyes with brows shaped in a way that makes her appear constantly afraid. The young girl is just barely five feet tall, which looks strange when compared to all her tall and lithe siblings.
She has the demeanor of a child, and that can be attributed to the fact that she still is one. Trilana is the only one of Karma’s siblings that she actually cares for. And she knows that if her father sends her out with the intention of her killing the prince, she will die.
And Karma should let it be.
She’s been flowing with the will of her father since before she can remember, and life has been well enough for her. But as she thinks of her bumbling and graceless sister who had managed to escape training, as she lacked any magical abilities, she found that she didn’t have it in her to send her off to her death.
So, Karma clears her throat. “If you will permit it, father?” Karmic waves his hand for her to go on before continuing to wipe his hands on a handkerchief. “While I have much faith in your ability to plan assassinations, I do not believe that Trilana has it in her to successful carry out your wishes. Her mother was weak-willed, and she very much resembles Talia, my sire.”
He thinks for a moment, tossing the soiled cloth onto her brother’s slumped form. “Then what you would suggest?” Her father leans against the wall, his hands resting within his pockets as he stares at her.
“I should go. If I cannot get close to the prince romantically, though I doubt that would be a problem, my abilities work well at a distance. All I would need to do is gather a bit of his persons.” A hair, some blood, maybe a chipped fingernail would be all that she needed to do what had to be done.
That raised yet another reason as to why Karmic favored her.
Karma was useful in many aspects. While her first brother’s power stemmed from his emotions and mostly served to enhance his physical capabilities, Karma had an ability far more useful in scenarios such as this.
She could kill anyone.
Their strength didn’t matter, their standing in high society didn’t matter. If Karmic or Karma herself, for that matter, wanted them dead, it was only a matter of time. A smile, dark and dangerous and so very close to her own, takes over her father’s face. “It is as you wish it, my heir.” He thinks for a moment. “You have six weeks. Two for travel, three for killing the prince, and one more for escaping the chaos that’s sure to ensue.”
She bows her head, her eyes never leaving his own. He’s cold even as they talk of assassination. “Should you fail, or die for that matter, Trilana will pay the price.” Her throat closes as anger rises. She should not have been so quick to come to her sister’s rescue. She’s sees the glint in his eyes. She he’s his nasty humor in the quirk of his lips.
Now her father has something to hold against her.
“Of course, my sire.” She raises her head, her eyes quickly darting to the dining room doors as they open. Trilana slips through with a medic not too far behind.
“Get yourself ready. You leave at first light tomorrow.” Karmic turns to leave as the medic greets him. The king waves his hand, dismissing the healer to his work. Karma watches briefly as he begins to work his magic on Finious.
Her eyes return to her father’s figure. “Yes, my sire.” He leaves, and soon enough Finious is rising from his unconsciousness. His eyes are crossed and his face is twisted with fury and dried blood. Karma extends no help to him as she checks her black veil. It hangs down to her neck and has a a hole where her mouth is that opens when her fingers get close. Her hand, once again, itches to travel to where her pendant should lay.
Even when Trilana follows her out of the dining room, she says nothing. There’s an anger in her, and it’s an evil vile thing produced by the environment in which she was raised. It’s living and hungry, and it wants something, anything to latch onto. So, she ignores her little sister, the pure one, the untouched one, as she travels down the long and harrowing hallway.
Her hands never move from their position clasped in her lap, and her eyes never stray from right in front of her. Eventually, the little girl stops following.
Karma’s steps echo throughout the dank stairwell as she travels deep within the manor, the light drifting away the further in she travels. When she reaches the final step and stands at the looming and insidious iron door, she turns to the guard standing at his post. “Open the door, take me to the prisoner in cell 323.”
His face is a new one. “I cannot do that without direct authorization from his majesty, ma’am.” Her anger grows tall enough to peak over her shoulder. It whispers in her ear, who is he to stop us. Karma blinks at him once and almost forgets herself.
Her heeled boots scrape the ground as she invades the guard’s personal space. “I said open- the- door.” With each word, her voice grows colder. Though a shiver sends trembles down the guard’s body, his face stays stoic.
“I cannot do that withou-”
“Hendrix!” Another guard, this one far older, enters from what Karma believes to be a relief room. “I apologize profusely Lady K. He does not know who you are.” The guard bows a multitude of times, and if he had been anyone else, Karma might have very well let him continue.
But she knows this one. She recognizes this face, and it is a friendly one. “Captain, I ask that you train my men before they’re stationed, so that this might not happen again.” He nods.
“Yes, Lady K, of course. Hendrix, this is Lady Karma, projected heir to the Hillantan throne and Overseer of reconditioning at both the royal dungeons and the other five in the nation.”
While Finious had chosen a position that made him one of the many figureheads of the country, Karma had opted for a less visual position. Though eventually all of the realm will know her name and face, she prefers to remain shapeless as it is. Karma runs the incarceration institutions. She deals with the extraction of information from terrorists and the reconditioning of criminals within their nation.
She is the head of every prison in the country and the captains of her institutes are her eyes and ears. Captain Grion is one of her more familiar work acquaintances as he is stationed within the royal prisons, the one in which Karma visits most frequently. “Why is the door still not open?” Her left brow raises, and the unfamiliar guard’s spine straightens.
“Right, my apologies my Lady.” His apologies indeed. Her eyes narrow as she regards him. He is quite tall, landing a few inches or so above her. His shoulders are on the narrower side, a fact that’s greatly emphasized by his guard uniform. The skintight black ensemble leaves little to the imagination. His sword is stationed at his hip along with the keys to the mechanical prison doors.
She watches closely as he inserts the key, her anger whispering to her yet again, how dare he? How dare he make us wait? She couldn’t agree more. “Make haste, Mr Hendrix. This is not the only thing I must do today.” The door finally opens revealing another set of guards.
Karma walks through and notices that Hendrix doesn’t follow. “Mr Hendrix.”
“Yes, my Lady?”
“You’re to lead me to cell 323.” Her annoyance grows with every passing second. Captain Grion usually has a good eye for people. How could he have made such a mistake with hiring this man? He slides by her, his face now hidden by the darkness that the wall lanterns can’t quite illuminate.
They walk down the initial hallway for twenty meters, all the while their ears are assaulted with the sounds of groaning and crying and screaming and pleading. The royal prisons are not the most filled prisons, yet it feels squished to the brim with weeping souls. How the guards endure this claustrophobic sensation all day is beyond her comprehension.
“This way, my Lady.” Hendrix turns, leading them down yet another dark and dank hall. Karma will really have to talk to someone about the moisture problem down here. It might end up producing poisonous mold, which would be bad for both the prisoners and the guards.
“How long has it been since you started working here, Mr Hendrix.” Karma is not one for idle chitchat. She says nothing without a reason, and this is no exception.
“I was posted at the beginnin’ of the month, my Lady, but I have been a trained guard since three years ago.” She looks his figure up and down. He does not look like someone that is skilled in combat, so perhaps his abilities lie in his magic or his strategy.
They turn again. “And where were you last working?” Her heels clack against the cool stone.
“You need my entire work history or somethin’?” His body freezes, as if just remembering who he’s talking to. “My apologies, Lady Karma! I don’t know what came over me.”
“You’re from Mumiasia, aren’t you, Mr Hendrix?” She takes the lead, her back to him as he trails behind, his face scrunched like he’s waiting to have his hand slapped. Karma reads the numbers along the cells.
“Yes ma’am. May I ask how you know, ma’am?” Her eyes roll.
“Only someone used to rolling around with the humans of Kambian would be ignorant enough to speak to their future monarch in such a tone.” He also drops the ending of words like those born to the United Republic of Kambian. They’re always in some type of rush to finish their sentences.
It’s off-putting.
“It’s right around that next turn, Lady,” The guard points out. She doesn’t miss that he didn’t actually tell her his last place of employment.
The pair reaches the cell right at the corner. Karma places her hand on the lock and is satisfied when she hears it click. Karmic had her chi added to the magic used to keep the cells locked once she became Overseer. The satisfaction of a lock coming undone with just one touch simply can’t be beat.
Karma pushes the door all the way open, and once again, that living figure in her head flounces up to incite the anger that had begun to settle. There she is. You know what we must do. It whispers to her. And it is not wrong. “Mr Hendrix.”
“Yes, Lady Karma.”
“Let this be your official welcome to the royal rehabilitation task force.” Her smile is made of ice and it melts away as quickly as a block sitting out in the burning sun. The woman that was sleeping in her cell finds herself waking quickly.
She trembles, her hands flying out as if to keep Karma from approaching her. “Wait, please! I’ve told you everything!” She cries as she rises from her cot on the stones.
Karma’s hands, still clasped in front of her, twitch. Her head tilts to the side and her hair swooshes behind her. “And your country thanks you for your service. Now bow.” The guard jumps back as the cell door swings shut. Karma’s voice has taken on another quality. One that greatly resembles the sounds of someone screaming underwater.
The prisoner has no choice but to bow, her body acting on its own.
Karma walks to her, her right hand extending until her nail scrapes along the woman’s cheek. And that’s all she needs. “Pagna Tionmi, you have been sentenced to death for crimes against the crown. You will receive no public trial. It matters not how you plead, but do you have any final words for those you’ve left behind.”
“Ple-”
Karma puts her finger to her mouth, taking in the essence of the woman before her. And before she can let out her final plea, the Lady breaths death into the air. Her eyes roll back as her lips form words in a silent language that no one, not even herself, can decode.
And then Pagna is dead.
Her eyes have gone milky, and her bones have dried. Before both Hendrix’s and her own eyes, the woman succumbs to disease and perishes in a matter of seconds.
This is the nature of her magic. This is why Karmic, a man of such terribly perverse tastes, feels that his eldest daughter is good enough to fight to inherit his throne. “What…” The guard trails off behind her. But she pays him no mind, for the fury that was once rumbling has quietly slid back inside her, so that it might slumber peacefully beneath her skin, yet again.
A relieved sigh releases itself from her. “Dispose of her, disinfect this cell. If the captain has not told you how to do so yet, get him involved. Strike her name from the books and have all of the belongings found on her persons searched and tagged before they are sent to her relatives.”
Karma opens the cell from the inside and steps through the threshold. As she makes eye contact with him on her way out, she says, “Welcome to the team, Mr Hendrix.”