1st 5 Pages February Workshop - Dagher Revision 1

Name: Helene Dagher
Genre: YA Fantasy
Title: Reborn


Ever had it been that the young woman knew darkness. She was hardly of age; bony, bare legs sticky with blood. It had trickled into the chamber pot below, and melded with the stench of her prison. With her neck chain bolted to the wall, her flea-bitten hands grasping at air and feet teetering on a splintered beam, she could not adjust her position without penalty of death. She would suffocate on her collar, the fate that had befallen the four rotted men decorating the cavity where she hung.

She chose to survive. Testing the limits of her restrained reach, gobbling what little food and water was provided. To pass time she depended on the strength of her imagination. She was often disappointed.

Memories were her familiar diversion until the rusty door squeaked open. She threw an arm to shield her eyes from the sudden light but lost her balance and flailed like a newborn still attached to its cord. Callused hands restored her to that damned perch, and searched her faded, knee-length tunic. Had her mind the focus to attack, she would not. Outnumbered and weakened: a clear disadvantage. She shivered. Her throat had dried in the empty cold.

When the iron clanged free, she hesitated; her jailer did not. The behemoth lifted her to the floor, wet with excrement. Her legs wobbled. A headache threatened. Her heart beat much too fast. He manacled her wrists and ankles, and towered over her along with nine guards. Swords readied, daggers hidden. Her past was well known.

"If you would follow us..." The jailer paused, unsure of how to address her. She would smile if those muscles were not as stiff as the rest.

Light sliced across the crest of dancing lions on their plated armor. A royal contingent. The group clanked past the moaning of other prisoners, the criminal stacks of hardened bread and shriveled dates. Several times they had to stop so that she could catch her breath—and sneak glances at their surroundings, though her aching joints and blisters were a distraction. Her training had not conditioned her to the pain.

Trooping through the courtyard proved exhausting. Immaculate grass crunched beneath their boots and stabbed her feet. A sea-breeze whipped through the ivy and reed ridden towers and into pine trees, their needles budding in the recent spring. Over the murmur of water, the slap of sandals on stone from those noble gossipers, the jeers echoed. An officious gaggle of veiled women and men in coats of mail laughed from beside a fantastical fountain of a dragon, its eyes scorched with fire.

She stared. The statue held her gaze while she was dragged past cultivated gardens and stationary knights. Finally they reached a familiar lavish room.

The morning glinted through the stained-glass windows, a mockery of all that she had lost and would find in these sun-favored soldiers. Intricate arrangements of bluebells draped the long chamber, leading to a stately man with blonde hair seemingly fresh from a chamomile oil wash. Robed in red and gold, Ibn Ash'ab al-Fat'h reeked of hyacinths.

Dubbed al-Hashim by his enemies, he had led several of his father's conquests. Before she had been imprisoned, he was known to have journeyed to the farthest edges of Albinar where the borders were not enforced. Villagers had whispered of his adventure and the treasures he would bequeath upon his return, earning their loyalty without the bloody, taxing choke-hold that his father had embraced. Certainly his soldiers looked well-fed and unwavering beside the north exits, stairwells and alcoves tucked twenty paces beyond their arches. Al-Hashim leaned forward so that his curls concealed his broken nose while she stood on her cold feet, waiting.

He did not announce her name. Every loyal man had his price, and al-Hashim need not risk revealing that she was alive.

"What do you know of Ibn Shaddad?"

Aside from the guards, she had had but one visitor. He had shared kindness, not information. She shook her head.

"You have no knowledge of the thief?"

Al-Hashim gestured, rings gleaming in the shards of light. Ridiculous trinkets. Albinariyye commitments were consecrated with firmer means. Rubbing her palm, she stared into his dirt-colored eyes even as her own watered from the hyacinth-heavy air.

"Why, just last night the rogue pillaged the castle kitchens." Al-Hashim watched her face. His expression hardened. "Well then, tell me of my sister."

"What of her," she croaked, "O wise and generous prince?"

"King. My father has finally passed, thanks to you. And," said Ibn Ash'ab, his chest heaving, "impudence will not aid your cause. Where is she?"

"Rue for both of us, my most merciful king." The young woman lifted her chains. Her wrists were sore, and well could she remember previous beatings. Rarely did her answers please these foreign sovereigns. "I have been dancing with death myself. Your sister may have drowned in the Faraway for all that I know."

"You dare—" He clutched the knobs of his elaborate throne, studded with sapphires and rubies. "And what of your brother?"

He had matched her dishonesty with cruelty. Al-Hashim smiled. "Shall I burn his remains? Will that ensure your cooperation?"

Had the king not intervened, she would have joined her brother. She could never forget how his cheeks had puffed, his arms had flapped and his bulging eyes had met hers across the putrid prison air: green slashed with red. Staring at his body—and the other three—was revenge from al-Fat'h, punishing her for the months that he had likely spent as an invalid before dying, his daughter still missing.

In the beginning, her anger had burned deep; fire that died less quickly than her brother had. With time her shackles became leaden and ashes coated the smoking embers. Thinking of al-Fath was like breathing onto the old flames. Yet he had been succeeded by his fanciful son, and she remained in that twilight between waking and understanding. Knowing that she had learned how to sleep while standing and wondering whether fortune would truly allow her to fix what she had started. She needed to honor Khalid's death.

"How may I please you, O compassionate crusher?"

Above his right eyebrow curved a distinctive mark. A new memory: the soft feel of jeweled hands when someone with that claw-shaped scar snuck into the dungeon with additional food and water. He was the gentle whisper of fingers that erased the trace of tears on her cheeks, and the one-two echo of fine boots on the floor of a cage that she could only hope to forget. For whatever reason, her visitor had been the son of her enemy.

Like an eagle among rukhs, he glided toward her in a monstrosity of trailing cloak. He had the build of a military commander but the finery of a fat sultan. "I want peace. I want my sister returned. Most of all, I want to know the extent of your foolishness. My father locked you away. Perhaps that is not the answer."

He examined her left palm. Between dirt and scars lay an eye tattooed in purple. Al-Hashim smiled before digging his nails into the talisman. The pain was as if he had snapped her forefinger back while holding her hand and wrist steady. She collapsed onto the marble floor, his silhouette a blurry halo against the domed ceiling. Evaluating his guards, he looked frustrated.

Forehead creased, he rubbed his hand while she curled her fingers to protect the reminder of what she once had. They had both lost their families because of her crime, but hers had not deserved its fate whereas his continued to profit on the blood of Albinar. His lips flattened.