Chapter Thirteen

“Indeed, I am all that remains.”

 

As Leshin reentered the dormitory, she kicked off her sandals and flopped down face-first onto the soft sheets. Shina followed close behind, but she just stood in the doorway, tapping her feet, almost expectant. The day had gone by so slowly, even with the numbness tempering the worst of Leshin’s boredom. Even so, Leshin couldn’t fall asleep fast enough.

“L-Leshin,” Shina said.

The High Sister stirred, lifting her head off the pillow and turning to face the attendant. Fuck, I’m not sleeping tonight, am I?

“Ilaki told me,” Shina continued, fiddling with her tailfin.

Leshin glanced around, clueless. She stayed silent, but her eyebrows spoke for her.

“It was a while ago,” Shina said, “but she… She told me that she told you… That you know.”

“I know what?” Leshin asked, her voice creaking in exhaustion.

“You know… about me.”

With a long-suffering sigh, Leshin hoisted herself upright and dangled her feet off the bed. How many years had it been since she’d forced Ilaki to confess her history with the tall woman in the doorway? Had it been years? Or was it months? Or decades? Could’ve just been weeks—Leshin couldn’t tell. Regardless, it had been a while. Either Ilaki hadn’t disclosed their conversation until recently, or it had just taken Shina forever to pursue the issue. And considering how dramatically Shina flinched when Leshin sat up, she decided it must be the latter.

“I know very little,” Leshin began, “and what I do know is not my business. I’ve no quarrel with you, Shina—I intruded into a matter I had no context for, nor any right to know.”

The girl flushed, looking off and away. “You have seemed… angry with me.”

“What?” Leshin puzzled. “I hardly know you. Why should I be angry with you?”

“Hardly know? L-Leshin… We’ve worked together for almost three months,” Shina said.

“Three months?” Leshin repeated, jolting to her feet. “Three months? When? How? You just started—I didn’t—it’s been three whole months?”

“Y-yes?” Shina stammered. “We’re about to switch again, remember? Every ninety days? Like we all agreed?”

Leshin shook her head, flabbergasted.

“Have you not… Have you not been paying attention?”

For a second, Leshin just stared off into space. She sat back down on the edge of the bed. “I don’t know what’s been happening to me,” she said. “I’m starting to—to drift. Or maybe I already drifted off a long time ago, and I’m only noticing it now. I don’t know. I’m losing time. So much time… I didn’t even notice we’d switched the groups until this afternoon.”

For a long moment, Shina shuffled in place, wringing her tail in her hands. “You haven’t spoken to me once since we switched things around. You haven’t hosted training in weeks, and I—I don’t know, I thought I might be doing something to irritate you…”

Leshin just looked away. “No. No, I’m just… like this, now.”

“G-God didn’t hold back at all for you… did it?” Shina said.

The High Sister said nothing.

“We’ve been having meetings where we talk about things… I don’t know if you’ve… noticed…”

Oh, she had noticed. And she had made a point to avoid those meetings as often as she could.

“It helps, talking about it,” Shina continued. “If it’s okay… If you’re, you know, ready to talk about what happened.”

Oh, God, this again…

“The last time it got to me,” Shina said, “I was … But as long as we… She says it all means that … Ilaki, and that was when …”

As the girl droned on, Leshin’s ears rang. She looked up, her eyes finding a spot and staying there. Her vision blurred. Time meant nothing. All went still and quiet, and—

“Leshin?”

She snapped back to the moment. She shook her head—everything felt fuzzy. “Yes?”

“Leshin, did you… drift away again?”

“I think so.”

The girl took a hesitant step forward. “I’m so sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything,” Leshin said.

“Oh…”

Again, Shina looked around, fiddling with her tail fin and bouncing on the balls of her feet. She took a deep breath. “Um… Leshin? Would you mind if I sat with you?”

Baffled, Leshin tried to object, but she just couldn’t find the words to. Or maybe she just couldn’t summon up the will to speak. At this point, there didn’t seem to be much of a difference.

Taking her lack of a response as permission, Shina slowly stepped closer, then sat on the edge of the bed so gently Leshin could scarcely tell she was there.

“I was mad at Ilaki, when she said that she’d told you,” Shina began. “I’d hoped I could keep it a secret for as long as I could. I always did look the part, so I figured…”

She trailed off, glancing nervously at Leshin, probably to check if she had slipped away again.

“When Kilini found out,” Shina continued, “or… I mean… She walked in on me on the bathroom less than a week into our arrival, and while I’ve had—erm—satisfactory results in most areas, I still—uh—I—well…”

The girl’s face had gone completely red—impressive, considering most people with skin as dark as hers couldn’t blush at all.

“Hold on,” Leshin said, sitting up for a moment. “Are you saying you still have a…” She cocked an eyebrow.

“That’s—I mean… it’s not—I’m not… Oh, my…” Shina clapped her hands over her face with a tiny squeak that again made Leshin doubt the person before her could have ever resembled a man. Still, she had to assume that was a yes, if a veiled one.

“Does… God know?”

Shina nodded. “It’s strange, but it really didn’t seem to care when it found out. I’d expected it to be angry, or at least interested, but then, it’s never paid me much heed in the first place. When I came here, I had feared that, without my herbs, I would begin to look like a man again. But I haven’t. It’s as if I’d never stopped taking them. And I honestly wonder if—if that’s just God’s will.”

Now, that puzzled Leshin. A rare act of kindness from God, and all so a young man could play the part of a young woman? But then, perhaps God didn’t see it that way. Perhaps God saw no difference between seeing oneself as a woman and being one. And if so, it might consider allowing Shina’s body to betray her needlessly cruel—and as vile and terrible a beast as God was, it held an odd set of convictions that were as strong as they were eclectic. No doubt, if it disapproved, Shina would have suffered beyond words. All at once, Leshin started to wonder if—given that at least five of the six servants all seemed to share certain… socially unacceptable qualities—perhaps God had more specific requirements for the sacrifices it took than she had first assumed. That thought, ominous as it may seem, solidified in her mind the more she considered it.

“Do you still love Ilaki?” she asked, the words bursting from her lips before she could even consider them.

“Oh…” Shina laughed, her eyes darting this way and that. “Oh, my. I-I mean, it wouldn’t—but then, we can’t be… But I… I suppose I sort of—sort of…”

Leshin cackled so loud she surprised herself. “Oh, you’re hopeless,” she said in between chuckles. At that, Shina cracked a smile. “Well, she’s definitely still got it for you, I can tell you that much, cupcake.”

The girl’s skin explored several never-before seen shades of red as she buried her face in her hands. “Oh…”

For the first time in a long while, Leshin’s smile was genuine.

And then, the door opened. All levity drained away. Only panic remained.

For God stood in the doorway.

“High sister,” it said, its face not bearing even a hint of a smile. “Gather the others. We have a visitor.”

 

We’ve been in a really dark place in this story for a while, haven’t we? But now, something approaches; now comes the turning point.

Also, happy Valentine’s Day! My fiancée got hit by a semi truck last year on the 13th, and I’m super grateful that I still get to celebrate this holiday with her. Hug your loved ones as much as you can, folks. Life is short.