Half of her face was on fire. 

That was all Piyumi could think about, all that she could feel. Not the shards of glass slicing her skin to tatters. Not the wind whipping around her as she plummeted to the ground. Not even the fact that her hand was drenched with something viscous and hot and red- 

Tears sprung freely from the only good eye Piyumi had left. 

How had she ended up here? 

When Hisa had stumbled towards her, breaths coming out in shallow gasps and completely alone, General Gaia Gwendolyn had known that something was very, very wrong. 

But she hadn’t expected this. She could have never expected this. 

Even through the blindfold she wore to keep the light from damaging her near-blind eyes further, General Gwendolyn could see the scene before her like it was vividly painted. A few paces from the cliff’s edge, a woman in her mid-forties was sprawled unceremoniously across the ground, a knife curving up from her throat in a terrible smile. Her eyes were wide and open, lips pulled over teeth in a soundless scream. Scratch marks littered the black armour she wore, an ugly slash dividing the scarlet lotus emblazoned on the chest-plate into two. Her prized bejewelled sword was tossed a ways from her body in several pieces, the shard with blade’s tip entrenched deeply in the trunk of an oak tree nearby. 

“No…” General Gwendolyn choked out as she plummeted to her knees. 

Trembling, she crawled to the woman and gingerly shifted her head onto her lap. Her poor vision did not prevent her from noticing that the woman’s ordinarily vibrant red locks were now clumped into grimy, muddy crescents. The woman had constantly preened over her hair in her youth, boasting endlessly the colour was a sign of the favour the Goddess Padmadevi had bestowed upon her. 

“I’m lavished in her brilliance,” she’d say dramatically. “Such is the fate of one such as I.”

Back then, General Gwedolyn would respond to the woman’s spurts of self-aggrandisement with a whack to the back of her head. But now…

But now…

Footsteps, blundering and uneven, alerted General Gwendolyn to Hisa’s arrival. Tears streamed down the lieutenant’s face as she clung to the oak housing the tip of the red-haired woman’s sword like it was a lifeline.

“This...this is all my-” 

That was all she managed to say before she turned to the side and the contents of her stomach came streaming out between her teeth.

The general swallowed back the sob swelling in her throat, but her protégé’s open sorrow was enough to dislodge a few tears. How could she have let this happen?! As the woman’s right-hand and the leader of the Lotus Guard, it was General Gwendolyn’s job to keep her safe, to protect her. But the general’s loyalty went far beyond frivolous, arbitrary notions such as status and duty. 

Funny. When she was alive, General Gwendolyn was loath to admit the woman in her arms was her closest, most dearest friend. Now, she wanted to scream it from the rooftops. She wanted to cry and beg and hurl curses at the Goddess until her tongue was tattered and bloody. As if a symptom of the woman’s death was the dissolution of her pride, her inhibition, her reticence.

“This was a simple reconnaissance mission. How could this have…” 

“I’m so sorry,” she heard Hisa whisper behind her. “I’m so sorry…” 

General Gwendolyn reached out a shaking hand to brush away the strands of hair that had fallen onto the woman’s face. The general’s pale, milky eyes fell onto her friend’s scarlett ones. They were unseeing but they burned, the frozen flames a clear snapshot of what she’d felt when the dagger had stolen her life. A preservation of that moment in ruby resin. General Gwendoyln suddenly knew exactly what the woman would say if she could see her now. 

“Get up, you oaf! Are you going to shut down every time something mildly inconvenient happens? And you call yourself a soldier of Palaedia!”

She was right. Even in death, she was right. Now, more than ever, wasn’t the time to fall apart.

“Get to the palace,” General Gwendoyn said to Hisa, tone carefully even as she bundled the woman against her chest. “Alert Princess-General Sharn and tell her to convene a meeting of the Lords of the Five States.” 

Hisa jolted as if the command had taken physical form and slapped her across the face. Her mouth opened and shut like she wanted to say something at least halfway coherent, but her words came out in nothing but blubbers and whimpers. 

But General Gwendolyn was having none of it. “Hisa,” she barked as she rose to her feet. “Go.” 

A shudder slipped down Hisa’s back like a slab of ice. The vermillion streaks of the setting sun framed General Gwendolyn’s form like she was a blazing angel of death, ready to cast the woman hanging limply in her arms into the depths of despair with just a step back over the cliffside.

Her next words might as well have.

“Queen Piyumi of Palaedia is dead.”

“I demand a refund!” 

Piyumi Perera, age twenty-two, stopped counting the bills in her hand to look at the bag of Collins’ Original Crinkle Cut chips being shoved under her nose. Being an employee of a milkbar, she was no stranger to nightmare customers, but this had to be a new low. The fact she was just about to close up for the day made the whole thing worse. She had been this close to a bullshit-free shift.

“I unfortunately can’t do that, sir,” she said. “I apologise.” 

“I want my money back!” the customer yelled with so much of his chest, the buttons of his shirt threatened to pop off. Piyumi wondered idly if one would hit her in the eye. Being blinded would be less painful than dealing with this crap. “The chips were bloody stale!”

Piyumi scoffed. “I guess that’s why the bag is completely empty. Just had to try every single chip to make sure they were ‘stale’.” 

The man looked like he was going to combust. Piyumi was almost impressed — his face was almost as red as her hair. “Listen here, you-” 

“I’m sorry for the inconvenience, sir!  Here’s your money!” 

Piyumi baulked as Hunter Watson-Jones, her best friend and, technically, boss, tumbled out of the storeroom behind her and slapped a bill onto the counter.  “In fact,” he grabbed a couple bags of chips from a nearby shelf and pushed them into the customer’s hands, “have these as a token of our remorse. Have a wonderful night!” 

The customer looked a little spooked at the sudden over-the-top hospitality but his angry flush subsided as he snatched up the money and stalked out of the milkbar. 

Piyumi, however, had some choice words. “Dude, what the fuck,” she said in disbelief. “You may be the one running a business here, but even I know that’s no way to turn a profit.” 

Hunter sighed, slumping onto the counter as he held his head in his hands. “That man was about to throttle you senseless. It’s not worth it.” 

“You gave him fifty bucks! That’s like 10 times what the chips were worth! Hell, if you’re just giving away money, why not shoot some my way? I could use a raise!” 

“No. You’re fired.”

The red-haired woman rolled her eyes, leaning her back against the counter as she stared up at the small television set mounted in the corner. Having known Hunter for almost a decade, Piyumi was painfully aware that there was no remedying his aversion to confrontation. For such a passive person, he could actually be quite stubborn. That shred of determination was probably the only thing keeping the Jones Family Milk Bar afloat the past few years. Hunter’s mother had charged him with the store when she’d left town to care for her elderly father.

“Wow! It sure is morbid in here. Who died?” 

Piyumi glanced over her shoulder to see a woman about her age. Her hijab fluttered in the wind before she let the door to the milkbar shut behind her.

“Me. God, I hope it’s me,” Hunter lamented, face still plastered to the counter.

“Piyumi’s company is that bad, huh?” Waliyha Nadir smirked, high-heels clacking against the tile as she strode to the pair. “I figured her mere presence would have a body count someday. You’re notorious, you know that?” 

“Well, count yourself my second victim then, because I’m about to beat you over the head with Mr. Vuitton over there.” Piyumi gestured to the handbag swung over Waliyha’s shoulder. “But who knows if it’ll actually do anything, since you don’t have a brain and all.” 

“Hah, that’s rich, coming from you. Though, it is fitting for a monkey to only perceive others as belonging to the same species.”

“Yeah? Well, you’re-” 

“And this is why we’re banned from nearly every restaurant in town,” Hunter whined. “Please…just stop.” 

Piyumi and Waliyha exchanged a glance and before breaking into laughter. “Okay, okay, we’ll give it a rest, since you asked so nicely,” Waliyha teased, patting Hunter’s head before turning her attention back to the redhead. “It’s been a while, Piyumi. Mum says that you haven’t shown your face around the shop in some time. Morrell doing okay?”

Being the daughter of a woman who ran an auto-repair shop, Waliyha had been tinkering with cars and motorbikes before she could talk. While other children lugged stuffed animals around, little Waliyha had been inseparable from a six-piece screwdriver set she’d pinched from her mother, refusing to go anywhere without it. While this made her decision to study law come as a shock to some, it hadn’t surprised Piyumi at all. In their high-school days, Waliyha had been school captain, valedictorian and an absolute menace on the debate team. It was a wonder how she’d become acquainted with Piyumi at all, who’d opted to just put in the effort needed for a passing grade. In any case, Piyumi was grateful. Having a mechanic for a friend meant free round-the-clock maintenance for her beloved motorbike.

“Now that you mention it, she is due for a checkup,” she said. “Think you could swing by my place tomorrow morning?” 

Waliyha grinned. “Sure thing. I would offer you the friends and family discount but…” 

“Ew. I’d sooner gouge my eyes out than be your friend. Then I wouldn’t have to see your ugly mug.” 

Hunter groaned. “Didn’t I just tell you two to drop it?” 

Piyumi looked down at Hunter curiously. While he was vocal about his disdain for the attention Waliyha and Piyumi’s good-natured bickering brought, he normally wasn’t this sullen about it. Not to the extent he would bury his head into the counter for an entire conversation’s worth, anyway.

Waliyha, however, gave him a knowing look. “Uni kicking your ass?” 

Hunter finally lifted his head. It was then Piyumi noticed the dark bags hanging from his eyes. “Now that’s the understatement of the year,” he grumbled. “Between the store, lectures and assignments, I’m purely running on caffeine at this point. Who knew a business degree could be so demanding?”

“You’re telling me,” Waliyha sighed. “Don’t get me wrong, interning at the Office of Public Prosecutions is great but it’s completely upended my work-life balance. Yesterday, I got scolded by my boss for losing my pass to the police centre. And I was on such a roll too!”

Waliyha then turned to Piyumi. 

Uh oh. 

“But…” she said pointedly. “I’m happy to go through all this, because it’s what I have to do to get where I want to be — to make my dreams come true. You understand what I’m saying, right, Piyumi?”

Damn it. 

“Sure thing!” Piyumi said cheerily, pushing down the urge to vault over the counter and run out the door. She pointed up towards the television set. “Hey, isn’t that Valentine Vortex doing an interview? Did you hear about the new phone Vortex Corp’s gonna be putting out? Everyone’s going crazy for it online.” 

Waliyha’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t change the subject. It’s been a year, and Hunter was kind enough to give you a job here until you got back on your feet, but I think it’s time. Hunter and I, we…we...” 

She faltered, but Hunter gave her a reassuring look before clasping one of Piyumi’s hands with his own and giving it a squeeze. “We love you, but we’re worried.”

“Woah, a coordinated attack,” Piyumi joked to alleviate the heavy mood that had suddenly set in. “Where was this energy when that customer was in here, Hunter?” 

“Piyumi-” 

“Look, I...I just need a little more time, okay,” Piyumi sighed, shrugging off Hunter’s hand. “Give me another six months, tops. I promise.” 

From the corner of her eye, she saw her two friends give each other a glance, a silent conversation passing between their eyes. Maybe this ambush really had been premeditated.

“Okay. Six months,” Waliyha acquiesced. “But mark my words, I’m going to hold you to this, Piyumi-” 

A sudden ping interrupted Waliyha’s words. Piyumi snatched up her phone from the counter and glanced at the notification that had popped up on the screen.

Finally. 

“Hey guys, I have to go,” she said, already retrieving her purse and motorbike helmet from underneath the counter. “Hunter, you’re good to lock up, yeah?” 

“Uh, sure?” 

“Hey, I stopped by to ask if you two wanted to have a late dinner together!” Waliyha cried. “Where do you need to be at this hour?!” 

Piyumi fished her keys out of her coat and gave her friend a placating smile. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Waliyha? For Morrell’s checkup?”

“I guess, but-“

But Piyumi was already out the door.