Summer, 4702
“Gods, Kali! What happened?”
Kali shook her head but said nothing. Ameiko could see she had been crying: her eyes were puffy and red, and there were smears of dirt on her face where she had been wiping away tears.
“You’re bleeding.”
Kali nodded her head twice, but still stared silently at the ground, not looking at anything at all. Ameiko, concerned, sat down beside her to get a closer look at the cut on her left cheek. It was still weeping but for the most part, it looked like it had clotted.
In a whisper, so soft Ameiko almost couldn’t hear it, Kali said to her, “I can’t go home like this.”
“I’ll walk with you to the cathedral. What’s left—”
“NO!” she yelled out suddenly, startling Ameiko. “I am not going there again.”
Ameiko thought about this for a moment, remembering how that had gone the last time, then said, “Yeah, OK. Niska then. Or Koya.”
Kali was silent for a while but eventually nodded her head and stood up. They would ask questions, too, but they wouldn’t try to get involved.
Ameiko got up with her and they walked slowly into town.
“Kali?” she asked tentatively after they had been walking for a couple of minutes.
“What?”
“Tell me.”
They were laying in wait for her as she rounded the corner of the tannery on her way to the bridge. Marlena and Ianca stepped out from behind the building and blocked her path.
“Where are you going, Kaaalllli?” Marlena drew her name out in a patronizing tone.
Kali turned to run, but found Dimir was just a few paces behind her. She hadn’t even known he was back there. She spun back around looking for another way to get out of this: the tannery was to her right, the ridge to the boneyard at her left…and then she realized there were more than three of them.
“Hey! I asked you where you were going!” Marlena said sharply, shoving Kali’s shoulders. She stumbled back a couple of steps, and someone—she assumed Dimir—shoved her forward again. She saw one of the Theern twins on her left now, and two more girls out of the corner of her eye on her right. They had her trapped in a circle.
“I said, ‘Where. Are. You. Going?'” Marlena shoved her a second time, only much harder, and Kali staggered backwards. Then she was roughly shoved again, sending her across to someone else, and then again and again until she lost count, followed shortly by her balance. She remembered falling down, and the impact of something hard to her cheek.
Kali looked up to see Marlena looming over her. She was saying something, but Kali wasn’t listening: the space that Marlena left in the circle had Kali’s complete attention. Marlena pivoted around to address her chorus; Kali’s fingers closed around sand and gravel. When Marlena turned back, the handful of shot was already on it’s way to her face.
Before Marlena’s shock could turn to rage, Kali leapt to her feet and bolted through the gap. No one even tried to stop her. They just stood there, dumbfounded.
It took less than half an hour. Koya’s spells not only healed Kali’s cut and scrapes, but also mended the tears in her clothes. When Koya was done, and Kali had cleaned up, there was not even a hint as to what had happened.
“You should tell your parents, child. I know you won’t, but you should.”
“I can’t,” Kali said quietly.
“It will just make it worse,” Ameiko added.
“They need to know. And you should trust them,” came Koya’s reply, but she didn’t press it further.
Ameiko walked Kali home. They made the journey in silence and it wasn’t until her house was in sight that Kali finally spoke.
“Thank you.”
Ameiko stopped them both and gave Kali a hug. “You’re welcome,” she replied. As they pulled apart, Ameiko looked at Kali, her expression very serious. “What you did…Marlena…she’s going to make you pay for that. You know that, right?”
Kali nodded solemnly.
“I can help.”
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