Sprawled in a narrow bed was Mera, swaddled in a tattered quilt as if he had just been born moments before Zahra flung open his door. Furrowed brows sat atop of his closed eyes, creasing his skin into smooth currents for his sweat to roll down. His skin, pale and sickly, matched the faint haze—or, perhaps, smog—blocking the morning sun that rose beyond the tapestry of partially exposed power cords and twisted branches.
Zahra, however, did not care for his pasty complexion, the overturned ashtray on his nightstand, or the fact that it was 6:21 a.m.
"I'll come get you in a few," Mera had said before promptly disappearing for the night.
Fucking dick, Zahra thought whilst bending over Mera.
"Where were you, Mera?" she snarled, unraveling the quilt off of her startled brother, who fell onto the dingy pile of ash at his bedside. "What was so much more important than helping out your sister, who, news flash, you hadn't seen in—"
"Can you keep your voice down?" Mera said, his voice wispy, as he rubbed his face.
"Where did you even go, hmm? You told me you'd be right inside, and then—"
With every second, more and more fuming words spilled from Zahra's lips. Mera, however, crossed the room, stumbling along like a fresh-faced college student after his first night of binge drinking, to shut the door.
"Why would you just leave me here?"
Mera staggered back to his bed, mouth etched in a firm, straight line. Bending down, he gathered his sweat-infused quilt, holding it in his arms as if it were his infant child he yearned to hold—that's when Zahra noticed it, the oddness of his movements. They were clumsy and clunky like a poorly-designed puppet. His face, usually as dark as wet sand, was flushed, drained of its rich color.
"What's wrong with you?" Zahra asked.
"I'm fine." Mera brushed crust off of his eyelashes. "Why are you pissed at me now? Something about abandoning you or whatever."
"Or whatever?" Zahra repeated as if he had spoken an alien language. "You told me you'd be right back and then you vanished all night."
"So? What's the big deal?"
"The big deal is that you left me here with that psychic lady to probe away at my mind! You knew I was nervous about it and—"
"Well, you're fine now, aren't you?"
Zahra huffed. "That's not the point."
"Then what is?"
"Do I really have to spell it out for you?" She paused, hoping for the silence to be broken by an apology for her brother. Instead, he pushed the quilt off of his lap and retrieved a lighter from his pocket. "I was scared, Mera," she continued. "I didn't know what Aditi was going to do inside my head. I didn't even want to experience that night again, but," she let out a long-winded breath, "I needed you, okay? You're the only one here I actually trust, and you were just...just gone."
Mera drew a cigarette from its crumpled box on his nightstand. "I had something else to do," he said before placing the cigarette between his lips.
Zahra crossed her arms. "And what was that?"
With a flick of the flint wheel, a tiny flame sputtered out of the metallic mouth of the lighter and gnawed away at the end of Mera's cig.
"Well?" Zahra said.
Mera inhaled a heavy drag. His bare chest rose as he did so, which guided Zahra's eyes to its keen unnaturalness. The dipping curves of her brother's breast—the shallow ribs that outlined his stomach like a cavern on the brink of collapse—ceased her heavy breathing for a moment. It was abnormal just as his movements were. He had a sturdy body with toned arms and broad shoulders yet, somehow, the faint edges of his ribs poked through his skin.
"Nothing, Zahra, it was nothing," he answered.
"Are you okay?" Zahra pulled her gaze away from his chest and to his face, which now was turned towards the curtain-veiled window across the room. "Honestly, you look like you just ran a marathon and you're being—"
"I'm being a what, sis? Tell me, what am I being?"
"A selfish asshole!"
"Well, you've been gone for quite a while. People change over time, you know."
"At least we can agree on that! The brother I grew up with wouldn't have left me abandoned with some stranger—"
"Do you really need me to coddle you every time you have to do something remotely difficult?"
Zahra's jaw tightened. "What did you say?" she muttered between gritted teeth.
"You need to grow up, Zahra, that's what!" Mera crushed the half-finished cigarette in his hand. It fell onto the floor as he stood up and jabbed a finger into his sister's shoulder. "You could never handle anything on your own, and I was hoping that by now you'd be mature enough, but no!" Quick footsteps pounded in the distance. "You have to come whine to me anytime you're a bit upset, but guess what? I'm sick of you being a stubborn crybaby, so why don't you—"
Zahra smacked him across the face, silencing him. "Fuck you, Mera," she said, her voice as white-hot as the still blazing embers of the lit cigarette on the floor. With the stillness of a sturdy tree, Mera stood while his sister stomped towards the bedroom door, which nearly hit her in the face as it swung open.
"Zahra," Kanu breathed, swatting the heaping tangles of damp curls from his eyes, "are you—"
"Not now." Zahra pushed past her uncle. Beads of water from his hair dripped onto her sweatshirt. "I'm not in the mood."
"Zahra, wait!" Kanu shouted after her as she hustled down the steps. "What's wrong?"
"Why don't you ask my dick of a brother?" Zahra said. She shoved her way past the star-studded tapestry at the bottom of the staircase, almost ripping it off of its tilted rod. A moment later, the front door swung open, inviting the bustling sounds of the city inside; screeching bicycle wheels, muffled music from car radios, and the shrill rings of smartphones sneaked up the stairwell. As quickly as the noises came, they faded—Zahra had left, slamming the door behind her.
Kanu pinched the bridge of his nose. "Mera, what did you do?" he groused.
Mera averted his eyes away from his uncle's near-naked body; with his free hand, Kanu held a towel securely around his narrow waist, which luckily draped all the way down to his ankles. The rest of his body was, however, exposed, from his rather shaggy chest to the tattoos of various symbols—a pair of outspread wings, an opaque flower, an eye with a jet-black pupil—weaving around his arms.
"It was nothing," Mera said, massaging his cheek. He crossed the room and plopped onto his bed.
"Why weren't you here last night? Zahra was worried sick."
Shrugging, Mera snagged his box of cigarettes from the nightstand. Tightening his towel, Kanu stepped inside the room and demanded answers from his unresponsive nephew. His words were soon cut off, however, by the beating of footsteps on the floorboards, followed seconds later by Miles stumbling into the room.
"What happened? Where's Zahra?" Miles asked, his voice still raspy from a night of inexorable snoring. He blinked at Kanu several times "Wait, Kanu, why aren't you dressed? Jeez, put that chest hair away. It's trapping all the dust in the room."
As Kanu attempted to dismiss the unrelenting Miles, Mera flipped open his box of cigs and lit another.
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On a desolate street, Zahra laid on top of an abandoned car. It sat off of the edge of the road, tucked between the cracked cement and the frost-bitten knoll leading to a set of train tracks. The tracks, rusted and dented, spanned across the field next to the road, snaking its way through the patches of overgrown grass. A slanted roof peeked out above the lavish thickets a few yards behind the car. Between the dense threads of bare branches, a wooden shack—probably, Zahra considered, an old train stop—hid its slit face.
Tilting her head back, the vibrant sky greeted her; so vibrant, in fact, that it was reminiscent of the Nile with its churning swirls of blue dotted with wisps of white—as pure and white as the lotus flowers that she chased after in the Nile amongst the startled catfish and birds with beaks the color of freshly picked strawberries.
A sudden rush of chilled air struck her face. A car had zoomed by, on its way into the city that was a short stretch down the road. A thin smog embraced the skyscrapers, permeating the streets below with a putrid smell.
Out in the field, however, the crisp air cleansed Zahra's senses. It made her sick—but not as sick as her brother's words had.
Grumbling, she sat up and rotated towards the field, legs dangling over the edge of the leaning vehicle. Her phone buzzed like a frantic bee. Snatching it from her sweatshirt pocket, the screen lit up:
7:14 a.m.
Wednesday, December 28
5 Messages from Miles Kenneth
1 Voicemail from Uncle Kanu
She shut the phone off. As she tucked it back into her pocket, her mind aimlessly drifted back to her brother. Streams of sweat had glided down his face, trickling from his unshaven chin down to the ribs that now protruded through his stomach. His shaky fingers had fumbled with his near-empty box of cigarettes, and the smell—he reeked of mint and oregano as if he had bathed in it for days.
You could never handle anything on your own.
With a flick of the wrist, thin streams of lightning slithered between Zahra's outstretched fingers. Their crackles were lost within the breeze. The glowing energy surged between her fingers as she hopped off of the car, lips as tight as a strained rubber band. Turning her head, she scanned the road during her brief trek towards the concealed shack. It was empty just as the field was.
After several more steps, the curtain of dangling branches faced her, swaying along with her kinky mess of curls.
With a sudden jerk, a thin bolt of lightning charred a single branch.
Then, another, and another, and another.
She released a radiant streak with every swipe from her outspread hand. It sliced across the field, incinerating the branch into fluttering, black flakes. One by one, the rotting tree diminished into nothing but a limbless, smoking stump, exposing the dilapidated train stop behind it.
Zahra didn't stop—or, rather, she couldn't stop.
Stubborn crybaby.
A white flash shattered the fractured window of the station. Glass littered the ground like brittle fragments of blackened bone. As Zahra drew back her hand again, she hesitated at the sight of a brown-feathered bird flying above the shack. Narrowing her eyes, she strained to identify the bird—a hawk, she supposed—soaring in her direction, its eyes trained on her.
Her face fell as did her hand when she realized who it was.
It was Ezio.
"Miles followed me?" she said, disgusted at the thought. Clenching her fist, she extinguished the lightning. "Ezio, go away!" she yelled, pointing back towards the city. "Go tell Miles to fuck off!"
"I was hopeful you'd drop the crude language by now, but apparently not."
A faint warmth stirred inside Zahra's belly.
"Riaz?" she said, twisting around towards the footsteps crunching the icy blades of grass behind her.
A stout man trudged up the knoll, coarse hair prickling his upturned lips. "Hello, little warrior."
Without hesitation, Zahra rushed at him. The man, Riaz, bent down, placing a long box on the ground before embracing her in a tight hug.
"Where have you been?" said Zahra, her head resting between Riaz's arm and burly chest.
"Oh, here and there," he replied, his voice still as gruff as she recalled from their long days in the desert valleys. "You know me—I never stay in the same spot for too long."
Zahra snorted at this. Unlatching herself from Riaz's tight hold, her foot caught the edge of the wooden box laying amongst the tall grass. Riaz snagged her shoulder and pulled her forward, balancing her.
"Still as clumsy as ever, I see," he commented, a hearty giggle tickling his throat.
"Still have that dainty, little giggle, I see."
Riaz's giggle burst into a laugh that echoed across the field. His belly quaked as did Zahra's from her own laughter. Dropping her head, she tilted it at the sight of the glossy, black box still resting beside her boots. The shape was peculiar—it was a fairly narrow rectangle with a carved inscription in the center; For When My Little Warrior Returns, it read.
"Wait," she said, tugging on Riaz's coat, "are those—"
"Yes, the one and the same," he replied, scratching his salt-and-pepper beard. "Or, well, two."
Zahra fell to her knees, fumbling with the gilded lock of the box. Flipping it open, the subtle warmth inside her belly ignited as she saw what Riaz had brought her. Standing up, she grasped the hilts of her long-awaited gifts and hoisted them up. With a grin spreading across her chapped lips, she struck the curved blades against one another. A metallic ring pierced the air along with Ezio's shrill cry from above.
It was her twin khopesh blades, as lustrous and sharp as she remembered them to be.
He stands no chance against me now, she thought.
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As always, thank you for reading! I apologize for my unintended hiatus--my last semester at college was brutal, but I graduated and now have ample free time when I'm not working! So, expect more regular updates now that I have a fairly routine schedule!
Chapter XIX Questions (for those that wish to answer):
1) What do you think of Mera's outburst?
2) Who do you think Riaz is in relation to Zahra?