The hardest lesson Minerva ever had to learn was how to move on. Now it looked like she'd have to do so again.
"I don't want to talk about it," she grumbled.
Kodak turned his head and spat.
When Minerva looked behind them, a glob of blood splashed on the cobblestones.
"Doesn't matter," Kodak answered. "We're going to talk about it because it's important to our respective ... conditions. This is a two-way deal, so you can't ask for my conclusions then refuse to share yours."
In a better mood, Minerva might have taken Kodak's frustration in stride. She wouldn't enjoy the taste of metal in her mouth, a crying boy soaking the front of her shirt, and only a sullen woman for company either.
As it was, she couldn't muster up the sympathy.
She stuffed her hands in her cloak pockets. "Maybe I don't really care what happens to me. Hope is such a traitorous thing—leaves you emptier than when you began—and it looks to be all we're gambling on."
"Fine." Kodak coughed and spat again. "You might be ready to give up and die, but frosts take me if I'm about to go quietly."
"Not going out quietly? I'm sure Nodon will be happy to hear you hacking out your lungs as you make the crossing," Minerva said with venom. She wasn't really angry with Kodak and regretted the ill remark as soon as she made it. I'm sorry. I'm just a useless failure who's angry with herself for making the same mistakes over and over again.
"At least I'm not the one who already looks dead," Kodak said drily. "Can you take Kaji for a bit? My arms are falling asleep."
"Only if he doesn't mind being carried pick-aback." They made the transfer and Minerva hoisted the boy up when he threatened to slip off. Kaji had likely worn himself out with crying. "Put your arms around my neck and try not to doze off," she said.
"I don't like eggsecutions," Kaji mumbled into her hair.
"Me neither," Minerva whispered. Taking stock of the sky, she estimated it to be a couple hours until sunset. They'd best have Kaji home and leave the outer ring before night fell.
Already she could feel eyes on them, causing the hairs of her neck to stand on end. Men sat against the walls of houses, smoking their pipes. A few children scampered about, seeming to disappear around corners and into cracks in the siding of buildings. Here in the slums of the city, the streets had no recognizable pattern. They intersected at odd angles—some led to dead ends. If an enemy breached the wall, this would be a nightmarish place to fight.
"Kaji, I need you to give me directions."
The boy yawned and leaned to the side whenever he wanted her to turn, much like a rider would with their toka.
Minerva wondered if he was leading them into a trap. It wasn't uncommon for shadier guilds to use a young child to lure their targets into a building. Such a tactic would even bypass the hollow place's warning since Kaji wasn't the one who intended to harm her and she wouldn't sense others until it was too late.
She shook her head as if that could banish the threat. The air here hung heavy and oppressive. With the buildings closer together, walking on the rooftops was less of a challenge, but it also meant the streets narrowed with less sunlight reaching them.
Minerva softened her footfalls, all too aware of how the terrain did not favor them.
Kaji pointed over her shoulder at a door. "We're on the ground floor." It could be hard to tell where one residence ended and another began—they were all squashed like kats trying to fit themselves into a space too small for them.
When they pushed it, the door creaked on its hinges. The hallway smelled of must and spiders spun thick lace webs in the corners. Stairs spiraled up into the gloom with the clatter of pots and muffled voices above. Kumiko landed on the dusty floorboards and scratched at another door.
Kaji handed Minerva the key to unlock his door but it took significant jiggling for it to open. He slipped down from her back, took the box of food from Kodak, and padded into the dim room. Some coals glowed in the fireplace. Minerva's eyes adjusted to the absence of light enough for her to take in her surroundings.
Kaji's home, while clean, could compete with Amarante's hut for bareness. A woman slept on a bundle of bedding in the corner nearest the fire.
"Mama, wake up," Kaji said gently as he knelt by her side. "I've brought you food."
"Shut the door. The light," his mother whispered. She had a cloth over her eyes.
Kodak pushed the door until it clicked and retreated to the far corner of the room.
"Kaji ... who do you have with you?" she asked. The woman reached out with her hand and touched his knee.
"I found some friends. Please eat now, Mama." Kaji grasped her hand in his.
Minerva considered whether they should be given privacy and moved toward the door.
"Stay!" The woman lifted a trembling hand. "Don't leave. I have yet to meet and thank you."
How had she heard? Minerva didn't think she'd made a sound.
"It is an honor to be in your presence, majestic one. I am known as Nariko," Kaji's mother said.
This woman possessed some power. Kaji had told her nothing and Azuki held his illusion of a six-tailed kat. He climbed down from Kodak's shoulder and neared Kaji and Nariko. Unlike Minerva expected, he didn't protest against the use of his true title. "You see much," Azuki said. "You see as we do."
Nariko smiled, though her mouth tensed in a rictus of pain a moment after. "Not exactly."
Too late, Minerva remembered that if Kaji's father had Phoenix Kin affiliations, then his mother could too. Rumors of trading for gifts and power always circulated about such people. It's why they so easily suspected the Pale Viper of dealings with the supernatural ... and they weren't wrong.
Kaji had helped his mother sit up and spooned porridge to her mouth.
The cloth fell from her emaciated face, but she kept her eyes shut. "Please, make yourselves comfortable. I'm afraid I'm a poor hostess and have no tea to offer. Our circumstances have seen fit for us to sell what little we had," she whispered.
"Please don't trouble yourself. We're only too glad to be of some help and comfort to your family." Kodak took a couple steps forward and sat down in the center of the room.
Minerva stayed where she was.
Nariko only swallowed a couple spoonfuls before declining more. She sent Kaji outside to feed the rest to some of the neighborhood's kats with Kumiko and Azuki accompanying him.
She sat with her hands folded on her lap. Every second, Minerva thought the woman would open her eyes and denounce them as her husband's murderers.
"You know who we are," Kodak said, breaking the silence. "How?"
Nariko tilted her head in Minerva's direction. "Her Highness has a very unique heat signature. A core close to burning but cold at the outer edges, as if she does not let what is inside reach the exterior." After so many words, her voice grew scratchy and the effort she put into breathing became visible.
"We're sorry for what happened. For our part in it," Kodak said.
Nariko drew in a shaky breath. "They took him long before you did. What's done is done." Her hands shifted in her lap. "Come closer, both of you."
Kodak took one of the woman's hands, but Minerva hung back.
"I won't hurt you," Nariko said to her. "I have a request to make and there isn't much time left for me."
Reluctant, Minerva complied. There was no weight to the woman's hand, no substance. A summer breeze could blow her away.
"My friend has some medicinal knowledge," Nariko murmured. "I've been sick for years. She said the shock of yesterday should have killed me, amid scolding me for being a fool for going. I think the only reason I'm not yet gone is Kaji." She gripped Minerva's hand with surprising strength. "Please. Take him with you. I couldn't—couldn't bear—" She choked on a silent sob.
"We will," Kodak said gently. "It would be best if you don't overexert yourself."
"This is all that I have to give," Nariko cried. Her black hair stuck to her forehead from sweat. "Let me give it. Don't let him think that I abandoned him. That I didn't love him. That I didn't have the strength to fight to live for him."
As weeping racked Nariko's frail frame, Minerva could feel the strength ebbing out of her grip and could sense in a strange manner that the woman's body grew colder.
"That is all I ask. That my son, my baby" —her voice cracked— "not be left to face the cruel world alone." Nariko opened her eyes and looked at Minerva through her tears.
Minerva bowed over the woman—so much younger than she first expected now that she could see her untouched eyes, immune to the affliction that had aged the rest of her—and held Nariko's hand over her heart. "I swear it. On the name and memory of my beloved aunt, I swear to you."
She looks so much, talks so much like her that I can't bear it.
"Thank you." Nariko released her hand. "Kaji is waiting outside. Let me be with him."
As she left the room, Minerva thought of Nola dragging her away from Edina's bedside. Her last few precious moments with Auntie Dina and she'd wasted them. Her last look had been at the pain and panic in her aunt's eyes while voicing her hatred for Kovine and Vren.
I should have told her I loved her. I should have held on to her and never let go.
Minerva didn't realize just how many tears were rolling down her face until Kodak hugged her.
Everything seemed to stop.
He held her in a loose grip around the shoulders. She could break out of it. Push him away.
But she found she didn't want to.
She leaned into his embrace and his arms tightened around her as she gave release to all the grief she'd kept pent-up inside for so long. Her crying wasn't loud like Kaji's had been, but the hurt was no less deep.
For the first time, she let herself believe the truths behind the words Nariko had spoken.
Auntie Dina hadn't abandoned her. She'd fought to live with all the strength in her.
And she'd loved her. Would still have loved her even now.
Minerva heard Kodak's heart beating fast in his chest. Soft notes touched her ears and it took a few measures for her to realize that he was singing. She couldn't understand the words, but the tune was simple and sad. By the third stanza, she was able to hum along with him as they gently swayed on their feet.
The song ended and the warmth of his arms receded. He brushed a strand of hair back behind her ear. "Feel better?"
She nodded and wiped at her face with her sleeves. "Thank you."
He took a step back, not meeting her eyes as if embarrassed, though he seemed preoccupied by a worrying thought more than anything.
"What was—what were you singing?" she asked.
Kodak cleared his throat and blinked several times. "It's one of our lullabies that we sing to children."
"It sounded sad though."
"Oh, it is." He smiled ruefully. "But my sister would sing me to sleep with it every night, so it's my favorite. It's called 'Goodnight'."
"It must ... be very special to you." Minerva did her best to smile back at him, but the corners of her mouth quivered and the tears tried to return. "I'm sorry. I'm not quite myself yet."
"Crying again won't make me sing more," Kodak teased, his mood flipping back to his natural cheerful state. "And don't apologize for this version of you. She's much nicer than the one that declared us enemies without my consent and told me to go jump in a lake."
Minerva couldn't help but laugh. "I've been terrible to you, I'll admit." She held out her hand. "Can we start again as friends, maybe?"
Kodak's smile faltered, but then it was back in place so quickly that Minerva guessed she'd only assumed it had. He took her hand as if it were delicate and likely to be crushed and crumble in his grip. When he bowed, she wondered whether his blood would be left on her skin again. This time, however, his lips only hovered above her knuckles and didn't touch.
"Friends," he agreed.