The small dead-end crevasse had just room enough to shift her weight around. It allowed her to claw out a small, handwidth, flat canvas and some charcoal from her satchel’s pouch.

The canvas was brightly white and as flat as could be with rough, unfinished edges. The girl shouldn’t have it, but those stuffy librarians wouldn’t miss a scrap piece. She scrunched her bag into a bundle, pulling it beneath her chest and freeing her hands. The girl smiled as she pulled out a length of zalbia root from behind her ear.

The girl lightly embossed the general shapes of her subject into the paper with her root, periodically checking her progress by rubbing down the sheet with charcoal to bolden the lines. If the proportions looked right, she’d continue to set the lines with harder pressure. If not, she would let the paper relax back flat. Proportions were critical to get proper and would bless or curse the final product.

The general shape of the head, eyes, lips, nose, and brows flowed onto the parchment with deliberate strokes before she moved to finer detail. The girl worked the form with detail and hatched shadows to breathe life into the canvas.

The subject had long hair that partially fell in loose curls to spill around toned shoulders and arms, the rest held up by a bandana, while a spotting of freckles hopped along the bridge of the nose. The girl pressed in lips, fuller on the bottom than the top, ears, and nose, a button.

The girl had saved the eyes for last. She pressed those bottomless pits into the paper before charcoaling the entire piece. The eyes were as black as Rosol was light. They were the girl’s eyes—Aelo’s eyes.

Aelo certainly had a face. That face was symmetrical and proportional in the rendition. Idealized, to be sure—nothing wrong with being prettier on paper. The bandana was the same as she wore today, a light blue fabric stitched with various small blossoming creatures along the edges. And she loved her freckles. They added a bit of distinctive texture to her face that it desperately needed.

Those eyes, however, were a different story. They were voids peering black menacingly, a broken, empty, perfect darkness. They filled Aelo with fire that burned as hot as hatred could.

She froze as voices floated to her from outside.

“—about the Faulkan girl?” a woman said.

“I did. Even with that one, I can hardly believe it,” another voice replied. “The girl won't be paired, I’m sure of it. The Sanuwey won't leave their flock tainted with sinful blood.”

“Quieter,” the other whispered harshly. “It is not our place to pass judgment.”

“Yes, of course. It’s only—” their voices trailed off as the two rounded a bend.

Aelo let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She balled her fists until they hurt. No matter what she did, these people would always talk. Striving got her nothing but scorn. Being her best didn’t matter. “Look at the Faulkan girl trying to be above us. Does she think she is impressing anyone? She just tries harder, that’s all.”

She’d thought they'd leave her alone when she finally met their expectations. Instead, when she gave them that reason to hate her, the whispers doubled. “We knew she was different all along. She did well to hide it, but now we know her true color.” They found whatever they wanted to see. A flood is a trial and a blessing.

Midan-blasted Talo didn’t help the matter either.

She’d draw him tomorrow and make sure he was adequately ugly. Aelo giggled as she imagined his face when she showed him.

“That doesn’t look anything like me!” he’d say, all stupid-like. “Where’s my jaw?”

“It kind of just flows into your neck—quite seamless, actually,” she’d say matter-of-factly. “Oh! Did you notice the scruffy hairs you refuse to shave? The details truly do make the man.”

Drums reverberated through the caverns, startling her. Aelo counted the bass beats: one, two, three, four, five, SIX? She must have missed the five-beat timing while picking up a harvest at the cultivators. The drumline continued after a short staccato break, and she moved in rhythm, triple time.

Roughly stuffing the finished portrait back into the satchel, not bothering to seal the charcoal, Aelo wriggled out of her hole into an alcoved offshoot of the central passage. Cultivated lumivines in spaced clay pots brightened the central passage, their light somewhat spilling into her dark alcove. She squinted at the influx of brightness, but it didn’t slow her.

Aelo lugged up the cart and sprinted down and out, startling a group of passing children in their whites.

“Sorry guys!” she yelled as she wheeled left and continued down the passage.

The light down the wide corridor was uncomfortable but nothing like Rosol’s. Aelo was more or less used to it after a handful of heartbeats, dodging through the occasional pedestrian. She passed by two cultivators in flowery blue robes with their arms interlocked.

“Watch it, girl!” one screamed after her. Aelo kept running.

The passage opened to Plaza, where hundreds of Chosen and youths relaxed beside cool, clear spring water pools, watched puppet plays, or listened to tellings and music. It was tall and open, vibrating with happy energy. Plaza was where people came to relax and share their passions. Pillars of functional stone stood in columns and rows and reached to the ceiling, where lumivine wrapped around them, glimmering soft white onto the crowds.

Aelo struggled up the sloped stone against the afternoon traffic with her harvester’s load, breaking into a sweat. The grade was intentional, as it allowed monsoon floods to drain down and out without flooding, but it was a pain when you were in a hurry.

Halfway up, she stopped by a group of percussionists pittering away, accompanied by a guitarist playing a complex polyrhythm that overlapped in satisfying ways. She turned her cart perpendicular to the slope and kneeled beside a small spring full of floating black lilies. She scooped up handfuls of water and slurped them down greedily. The music stopped playing.

“Aelo?” A gruff voice asked from behind. Aelo groaned inside and turned to face her old man, his long hair braided to the side and beard untrimmed. Shan looked as old as he ever had.

“Hi, Dad,” she said with a quiet smile.

“Are you okay?” Shan asked with a disarming smile, but those old blue eyes were worried, set above dark, sleepless bags. “Can I help at all?”

Despite having no pair, Aelo was gifted a place after Naming like all the others, and her father had been alone since. Aelo saw that gossip around Shalli needled him worse than her. Aelo couldn’t forgive them for that.

“I’m great. Yes, I’m a little late, you know me,” Aelo chuckled awkwardly. “Anyways…”

The man with the guitar behind Shan started playing a sarcastic-sounding tune.

“You’ve got to go?”

“Probably should,” she said, picking up her handcart.

“Would you like to come over for dinner tonight? I’m making your favorite: grilled lumigrubs with soaked, spiced greens.

“Sure, Dad,” Aelo pulled the cart back to the path. “After the eighth drum?”

“Eight it is! See you then, my heart.”

She was off before she could blush. Her father had always been the quiet, sad type, slow to temper and even slower to realize when he was too much. Shan coddled her feelings instead of expressing his own, but Aelo could see them through his eyes—disappointment and shame.

Aelo let those thoughts slip away like sand as she wheeled out of Plaza, across the entry cavern, right at a stalactite, left at a junction, and into the quartermaster's carpeted storeroom.

The seventh cycle harvest filled the room with full rope sacks of plump blips piled into stone cubbies within the walls. Nandi lugged woven baskets full of standard greens, dried insects, herbs, and small-game meats onto the floor to make room for the harvest. Aelo carefully wound her cart through the madness, sure not to knock anything loose and cause a food slide.

As fast as she could, which wasn’t very fast considering the weight, Aelo unloaded her baskets, lugging them laboriously into the few remaining spaces. She worked up a sweat, and her back ached by the time she finished. Nandi finished up another basket before turning to her, not a drop of wet on her brow—the woman was as thin as a reed and twice as wirey.

“Wasn’t sure you were going to show up,” Nandi said flatly. Fetching a stiff page, she waved it like a fan. “I’d hurry if I were you. You’ve got a mark, at most.”

Aelo couldn’t help but blush as she hopped over a basket and snatched the stiff page from Nandi, who returned to work immediately. Aelo read through the items quickly, creating a game plan. There was too much to do and not enough time. Aelo split into two, Ae for the goods and Lo for the navigation.

Ae pulled the cart out front while she scanned the ingredients: one hundred standard allotments, five hundred blips, and a basket of herbs and greens should be more than enough to cover. They reached the front of the storeroom, and Ae got to work loading the goods.

While Ae moved the baskets, Lo scanned the names and made a mental map through Shalli. How anyone got lost on the well-lit, well-marked paths would always baffle Lo. They all said Lo was the strange one when they could barely navigate their own home.

“It’s our home as well,” Ae gently chided, selecting a basket of cloth-wrapped preportioned goods to lift in the cart. “Don’t let them take that from us,” she grunted.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Some home, indeed,” Lo whispered back. Lo stopped short as she read a line of names towards the list’s top. Those were the high-priority deliveries reserved for the sick or pregnant.

Midan Talo and Janna Kol: ten blips, a bundle of tiaj, and two standard allotments.

They turned back, Lo speaking for them both.

“Nandi! Please tell me you have another. Can’t this one wait until tomorrow?”

Nandi’s voice echoed from farther into the storeroom, out of sight.

“You know it can’t. Get it done, or don’t. It's not my hide on the line.”

Aelo went stone cold, her split collapsing into herself as her focus crumbled. Maybe Janna wouldn’t be there? There was no chance. She was with child and would be resting, not working, especially so late. Aelo would be in deep waters if she didn’t deliver their portions.

She forced a split back into Ae and Lo.

Ae continued loading all the old goods from the front as Lo finished the map, saving Janna for last. They loaded up the goods before syncing back into Aelo. Despite the short time with the split, she felt ragged and sleepy as it collapsed. She hadn’t slept well lately, and it was getting to her.

Aelo lifted her burden and was off. She headed down deeper into Shalli, past Plaza, and through a tight corridor wide enough for two carts at breadth. Eventually, it opened up into a high-set cavern with branching corridors that weaved in all directions.

Thankfully, they had begun to dim for sleep, throwing blankets over lumivines while the afternoon traffic filed home for supper. That darkness allowed Aelo to move unnoticed through the caverns, save for the occasional playing child or couple on a late walk.

Name by name, she crossed off each delivery with a mental note. Most Chosen let her leave the goods outside and move on to the next. Only a few had her lug their allotments inside, usually to question why they got this instead of that. Those Chosen would look surprised to see Aelo, but they were polite enough to save their whispers until she left.

The cart grew lighter as the mark wore thin. Still, each step was closer to that last delivery, accompanied by a helpful serving of dread. Then, it was time. Aelo rounded a bend that circled back towards the wing’s entrance.

She stopped short of the tunneled entrance to the home, careful and quiet, before slipping out the remaining goods and tip-toeing towards the beaded curtain. Light spilled gently into the darkened corridor. It was blessedly silent inside. Perhaps they weren’t home after all.

Quietly, she placed the cloth bundles down before stacking the extras into a neat pile. Aelo turned to leave. The beaded curtains crackled like lightning and sent a jolt of fear up her spine.

“I have been waiting for a mark. Where have you been? I have a mind to report you to—” Janna stopped her tirade as she made out Aelo in the relative darkness of the hall. “You? You!”

Aelo turned with a forced smile. “Sorry, I thought you might be sleeping. Let me help you move those inside.” Eyes down, Aelo skirt past Janna and bent over. A hand stopped her.

“Where is Midan? He should be home by now,” Janna said with a sneer.

“How should I know?” Aelo shrugged off her hand to gather the goods before pushing through the beaded curtain into the bright interior. It hurt her eyes until her vision tightened back into focus, and the room dimmed to a somewhat manageable level, if not exactly comfortable.

They had a large room, well-lit by a potted lumivine tucked in the corner, next to a pair of propped-up zalbia spears—an earthy fragrance bit at her nose from the drying herbs dangled from the shelf. Unlike Aelo’s room, this roof was tall enough that she couldn’t reach it if she tried. It felt so open, too open.

A plush, unfinished carpet hung from a weaver's frame, taking up most of the free space in the room’s center. Aelo cleared her throat as she maneuvered past the project towards a flat rock top she assumed they used as a table.

“This is coming together nicely,” Aelo said, gesturing back to the carpet. “Where did you get the blue dye? The shade is so vibrant.”

Janna huffed. “We are given what we deserve, nothing more.”

Aelo set down the goods gently before turning towards the door.

“Right. Of course,” Aelo said with a forced smile. “I should get going.”

Janna stepped in front as Aelo moved, arms folded over a slightly protruding belly.

“You know how long we’ve worked for this,” Janna said, absently stroking her bump. “I’ll be blighted before I let anyone risk this child’s health.”

“What do I have to do with it?”

Janna lunged forward, and Aelo flinched back. Janna stopped short with her face inches from Aelo’s. “Three miscarries. Three,” she emphasized with her fingers held up. “I’m tired, Aelo.”

Janna’s eyes softened, pleadingly. It was a look Aelo was unfamiliar with. The woman was so fiery and commanding that this vulnerability had Aelo questioning everything she thought about Janna. Maybe Aelo had misjudged her as others had to Aelo.

“What would you have me do?” Aelo asked honestly.

“Let him go.”

“Do you think I haven’t tried already? He won’t let me. Midan won’t accept fulfillment unless he sees it as enough.”

“Please, don’t lie to me. Not now,” Janna said tiredly. “I know you have feelings for him. He has feelings for you. His life debt is a convenient excuse for you both.”

Aelo was taken aback and blinked as she took those words in. Aelo had feelings for Midan? It was laughable. Even if she did, so what? She would never act on them.

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying to let him go. He will try to stay close, but give him every reason not to. Do this for me, and I promise to let all our past issues flow. I don’t care what you’ve done together and don’t want to know. But this—” Janna struggled for a word “ —thing you have together? It ends.”

Aelo felt herself slipping into darkness. Her head felt heavy, and her eyes beaded with ready tears.

“I can’t do that.”

Janna’s face twisted into a snarl. The woman grabbed Aelo by her robes and pulled her close. Aelo was half a head taller and much stronger, but Janna was with child. So Aelo didn’t do anything as Janna slapped her across the face, ringing her ear.

“I know you’re sleeping together. I can’t stop Midan from doing what he wants. But if you get with child, you will do the right thing, for all our sakes.”

Aelo felt herself grow hot. They all expected the worst from her. If there were rumors, they were true. In their eyes, there was no “if”. Nothing was off limits to the Faulkan girl. That anger bubbled, boiling just beneath the surface like magma. She lashed out before thinking, slapping Janna hard across the face.

Janna stumbled back, eyes wide while holding her reddening face. “You foul rat!”

“I’m sorry, I…I don’t know why—”

Janna lunged forward with a feral growl, slamming into Aelo. Aelo flew back, her head bouncing sharply off the stone wall and sending sparks through her vision. Aelo saw Janna throw a wild fist at her. It was slow, and Aelo could block it. Aelo let it connect solidly into her stomach, doubling her over.

Her head spun, and she felt like throwing up. What had she done? Aelo had hit Janna. Janna could get her killed for that.

“What is going on here?” Midan’s voice said after the clatter of beads. “Janna! What in the depths are you doing?”

“She struck me,” Janna said simply. “What she got was less than she deserved. What about our child? Do you want me to unseed? Again?”

Midan leaned over and helped Aelo to her feet.

“You’re bleeding. Put pressure here,” he said, placing a hand on the back of her head. “Janna, we’ll talk about this later. I’m going to help Aelo to the clinic.”

All Aelo could do was move along as Midan gently directed her towards the door. The pain bloomed in her head, making it difficult to think.

“You will not!” Janna screamed, but Midan ignored her, helping Aelo into the hall. Janna followed. “So help me, Midan, I’ve suffered enough. There will be consequences if you choose her over me right now.”

Aelo felt Midan stop. After a beat, he guided Aelo to rest on a wall and turned to his partner. “What will you do, hmm? Aelo and I were connected by fate, as were we. You hurt her; you hurt all of us.”

Janna's silhouette was backlit, her face a mask of shadows. Aelo felt the back of her head before looking at her hand. It was utterly black to her light-blinded eyes.

“Don’t be stupid, Midan. Just let me go,” Aelo said, taking an unsteady step. She swayed a bit but didn’t fall. “I’ll be okay.”

“Me, stupid? You can barely walk,” he said, taking up her arm for support. Despite everything, she let herself lean on that support. His arm was firm and as warm as the first dip into a hot spring. It felt right.

“Fine. Just until I get my footing.”

“Fate be damned,” Janna said, running in front of Midan and pushing him. “Choose me, or choose her. But for once in your miserable life, choose!”

The tunnels were quiet enough to hear a phantom ringing inside her head. Aelo groaned, thinking about the rumors this would grow. As words passed from lips to lips, reality tended towards exaggeration and lies.

“I’ll be back soon,” Midan said, gently pushing Janna aside.

They walked past Janna and entered the main tunneled hall. Janna’s weeps echoed quietly behind them as they rounded the corner before fading completely. Aelo hated how she felt bad for the woman, even with Aelo’s blood poring along the back of her neck, soaking her shirt.

They passed glimmering lights that peaked through holes in their covering blankets, making their way upwards. Shalli was peaceful in a way it rarely was in the last mark before curfew. With Midan’s warmth at her side, supporting her, she didn’t feel as alone as usual.

Her head had cleared substantially, but she still held Midan’s arm and leaned into him. Their skin was almost touching, only separated by their clothing. It was taboo to touch outside of sparring or a pair. Somehow, that fact made it feel even better. She remembered that kiss Midan had used to shut her up. It felt so long ago. Aelo looked up to him as they walked.

The stubborn ass had grown a head taller and a couple of fists broader within the last year since Netsu. He was well and truly a man. Infuriatingly, she hadn’t grown much at all.

“Remember when we used to be able to spar?”

Midan laughed, his voice a pleasant baritone.

“I remember you nearly breaking my arm.”

“Sorry,” Aelo said, wincing.

“Don’t be. I should have conceded. You had me as settled as stone. And like a stone, I couldn’t admit it.” His grip tightened on her arm. “I’ve resisted my whole life. Now, I feel more like stone turned to rubble. I don’t know what to think, what to feel, not anymore.”

A group of ten Chosen appeared around a bend, chatting quietly to each other. They didn’t seem to recognize Midan and Aelo in the dark.

“You’re not a stone,” Aelo whispered to Midan as they passed the group, a few of them glancing their way but saying nothing. “You’re a zalbia—hard to bend, harder to break. With gentle pressure and time, you’ll grow into something beautiful—not that you aren’t already,” she said the last bit under her breath.

“What was that?” Midan said. “Sorry, my mind is a mess these days.”

“Nothing,” Aelo smiled.

The corridor funneled into a dark, cramped outlet. Still, Aelo could see the color flush Midan’s cheeks at her words. He fought a smile, knowing she could see him perfectly in that dark. Tentatively, Aelo reached with her offhand to touch Midan’s. He pulled his hand away.

It was her turn to blush as they headed up the carved steps out of the living wing. That blush fueled the growing fire in her heart.

“Why?” she asked curtly.

“Why what?” he asked dumbly. Aelo saw him clench his jaw—he knew what she meant.

“Why do this? You have to see this isn’t good for you.”

He rubbed his red scruff that poked patchily from his face—that stubble was a shade brighter than his shorn auburn hair.

“You are my dàl. Once I repay my debt, you can be free of me. But not a mark sooner.”

Aelo pulled her arm free.

“I’m feeling a lot better. I’ll make it from here alone.”

“Aelo, don’t be like this. You know as well as I—”

“You better get home.” Her voice was flat, emotionless.

Aelo turned and walked away. She heard Midan wait a beat before the echoes of his retreating footsteps reached her.