When father had left them, mother had taken them to the Chamber, to the only other family she still had left. Straia was queen, but she was also Oksana’s sister, not by blood but in all the ways that mattered. Ilka had stayed in the Chamber for a long while. Days turned into months until finally a year had gone and still there was an emptiness in her heart that not even her family could fill. The Chamber wasn’t home, it didn’t fit- Ilka didn’t fit.
So she had left for the Gates to see if that would be a better fit. Opposite worlds and her place was settled somewhere in between But now, with the soot stained grass and the ash that felt like snow, the stale scent of the Chamber on her dark skin felt like treachery.
When Shahrizai approaches her she’s still lost in her thoughts, drifting, sinking. So when he does speak and those pale brown eyes jump uncertainly to his face, there is hesitation etched into the hollows of her black and white face. But before her mind has a chance to consider him, to consider the importance of the words falling from her dark lips, her heart spills over.
“The Gates burned today.” Her voice is just a shattered sound, a tremulous whisper tipping at the edge of a bottomless chasm. Alone, that confession is disorienting, like part of a dark riddle. But she has nothing more to give him, nothing more to tell. “We burned” She says again, even quieter, and she wonders if he’ll notice the ash on her skin and the soot on her face.
But this time when her chin lifts and her eyes resettle on the pewter of his quiet face, she notices something. A familiarity resonating deeper than his face, an ache in the depths of his eyes. Like knows like. She steps closer, still trembling, still uncertain, but there is a new softness in her tone when she stretches her mouth to his cheek before pulling away to let the cold air fill in between them. “You have ghosts too, I think.” But she doesn’t ask because he hasn’t told her and there was nothing in her willing to pry out his secrets to leave gaping chasms behind on his heart. They all had their private haunts.
ILKA
makai x oksana