Hesi stared at the ceiling, studying the mural. For uncivilized creatures such as the Mayaware, it was intriguing. Yellow and orange blended in an explosive mirage depicting a demon warrior aboard a golden chariot pulled by growling, spotted cats. The warrior's face froze mid-scream, his arm pointing forward as though leading an army towards a battle that never happened.

Around the warrior sat the other personas, each bearing different animal heads. They represented the gods the Mayaware concocted. There was Haqtep, with his snake head rearing back and his frills splayed. He was the god of nature and the divine representation of the demon reptilian race. Feretu, the goddess of the moon and death, spread her wings and soared above the battlefield, her long beak propped open as though issuing a war cry. Opkher, the sun god, sped through the dramatic landscape as a giant ball of puru.

She wanted to roll her eyes at the sight. It was a tacky imitation of the grand murals in Ser-Djare's temples before the city flattened to rocky stumps. She could have called them out for replacing the holy gods with beings who reminded her of the carnage brought upon her people, but refrained. The pointed look the lecturer gave her told her it wasn't the time for her face to show such sentiments. Instead, she leveled her chin to the ground and smiled as sweetly as she could. "I was admiring the ceiling," she said, swallowing every drop of acid from her tone. "The artists made excellent work."

The Mayaware lecturer, Yobekh, waved his hand at the mural. "Ah yes," he said in perfect Birejyet, which shocked her the first time she heard it. Now, she was merely annoyed at his reedy voice. "Humans outdid themselves. I hear they made an excellent dinner for the Demon King as well."

A painful twinge roiled inside her gut. If it was a normal banquet, "making an excellent dinner" would have meant a harmless experience of cooking and serving the host. But with the Mayaware involved...

She didn't even get to finish that thought because the lecturer clapped his hands. The loud sound made her flinch as it echoed across the hall's empty stone walls. She stuck her lip out, dropped her chin on her palm, and leaned against the low table she sat behind. The day started early, with her eating from a literary spoon what it meant to be a Mayaware in the empire. The sun wasn't even out in its full glory. Most information passed through her mind, but there were things that stuck out like bleeding stumps.

Such as the time when Uzare raised a hand two hours in and asked, "Why does the Mayaware need human women? What is the need for the trials?"

Yobekh's eyes bulged, as though the question caught him off guard. They talked about Mayawares and how the demons evolved from pits of relentless hunger to people who exercised a degree of control over their desires. Maybe his meager demon brain couldn't understand the connection Uzare made or whether the bride meant for the question to connect.

He cleared his throat and answered. "Your kind has the most powerful puru we know, and we want that quality to pass on to future generations." He strode towards the sheafs of parchment betraying maps of Iren-Washep. "And we want our descendants to flourish more than we do."

Hesi bit down against her lip but not deep enough to draw blood. Yobekh might get triggered with the smell. The lecturer swept his eyes across the room, past the passive glares from the older women and the terrified expressions of the younger ones. "That is also why the Mayaware prefer your kind for nourishment. Humans are...delicious," he continued, crossing his arms. The flesh rippled underneath the short sleeves covering it. "Now, on to the trading customs among the Mayaware—"

Tagara raised her hand.

A miffed look crumpled Yobekh's face. "Yes?"

"Why do we need to know these things if we are merely bearing the prince's offspring?" she asked. Hesi nodded along to show her support despite Tagara not needing it. Tagara has the largest chance of making it among Festophis' slate. Not Hesi. "We should learn how to take care of the saplings."

The lecturer, to his credit, didn't explode in anger. Instead, he smoothed the cloth wrapped around his legs and rubbed the golden bracelets around his wrists. "We teach you to prepare you to rule over Berheqt," he answered. "As for taking care of the saplings, you'll learn that when you live through the birth."

A wave of silence passed among the women. So, what was the point of the competition and studying useless information if the bride wouldn't make it? Hesi clenched her fist. She didn't hide it under the table. Before any of the women beat her to it, Hesi raised her hand. "You have something to say?" The lecturer raised a sculpted eyebrow.

"Yes." The pause afforded her tension and control over the room. "How can you say our puru is more powerful? How did you know that the offspring we bear for the High Prince would be ideal for your race?"

"Good question." Yobekh's lips spread into a dry smile, his long fangs glinting against the sunlight pouring from the arches. "We observed that the union between the reptilian and mammalian races produces beings who are more durable, more feral, and more..." He stopped to roll his hand as though searching for the right word. "Demonic."

Hesi bit back a laugh. Such richness pouring forth a demon's mouth. "Only with the strong puru from our kind, we produced such traits. It made us ask: what about a union between us and humans? Wouldn't it result in good—if not, better—generations who will carry our legacy to a brighter future?" Yobekh asked no one.

She truly rolled her eyes. It didn't matter if the lecturer kicked her out. Again. Brighter future, her ass. Demons were only good for the eternal darkness and suffering promised to all deviant souls in Ristep's domain. Assuming they even have souls.

She gritted her teeth, but schooled her face back to neutrality. The lecturer considered her question answered and assumed she was satisfied. They moved on, talking about how the Mayaware hunted and traded human bowels. The market placed different prices on eyeballs of various colors, and the rarer the shade, the higher the amount went. Her thoughts recoiled at the fact that these women and more after their batch would bear creatures who would be their next oppressor.

But it was not her divine right, not even her proclaimed duty, to stop it. She didn't come here to be humanity's savior. Revenge—it was what she wished for, and she would only achieve it once the Mayaware bowed to her blade's edge. She was here to save her siblings, and she couldn't do that if the system—these...creatures—held power.

The Mayaware used humans, and her people didn't have a choice but to give in. Her kind wasn't in a position to refuse, and they learned that with millions of lives sacrificed. Only a fool thought prey had hopes of beating its predator, and she was the most foolish. Perhaps Kharta was on the same rung, but she refused to think about him more than the snippets that invaded fleetingly.

A few minutes before midday, the lecture ended, and the brides fled the study hall and returned to their communal room with their escorts. They must wait here idly until someone requires their presence. A phantom of pain settled on her shoulders, and her fingers twitched with ghost prickles at the sight of the unfinished work straddled on a square frame by her cot.

Rehema sauntered behind Hesi and laid a hand on her shoulder. "It's a new session for you," she said with a wink. Before Hesi could reply, the bride caught up to her clique consisting of Otraqte, Khono, and the youngest, Semret. The older women seemed to take the girl under their wings. They wouldn't let anyone tell Semret off, not even Hesi.

Hesi couldn't give a mule crap about it, but there were times she wanted to tune out their bickering. It reminded her too much of Pai and Unsu's nonsense. Guilt would then worm its way to her gut at all those times she brushed them off to the side, took them for granted, and chided her siblings for being children. She didn't see it coming—how that day harvesting charbi would be the last one they would spend together.

She heaved a sigh and picked her way towards her cot where her project awaited her. The spools of threads of different hues and shades sat in a small wicker basket near it, needles sticking out of some like splinters on hair. Out of all the art forms available, embroidery was the only thing the brides thought she could master quickly. It was such a consensus that she didn't get to say anything.

So, she was stuck with this since the beginning of the week, getting endless needle-stabs on her fingers and failing to come up with a legible shape of a flower. Of all the things these demons would test them for, why the arts?

"How's it going?" Uzare dropped next to Hesi, followed by Tagara and Isueri. Perhaps they ran out of things to do so they passed time watching Hesi suffer instead. "I'll believe in Barteset's magical hands if she can save...that."

Hesi looked down at the thing she conjured. She meant it to be a field of flowers, but it came out as a dozen colorful blobs let loose on the canvas. "It's abstract, alright?" She defended weakly. It was amazing how they learned crafts while being on the run for half their lives. "If you will not offer help, you can flit off and practice your art or something."

Uzare's hand zipped across Hesi's periphery and snatched the needle still stuck on a line of pink thread. She stuck it into the canvas then drew it up from alternating sides of the off-white cloth in a series of mesmerizing gestures. It was similar to how Barteset did it, down to the forefinger tapping on the bump the thread made when checking the state of the stitches.

"Give it back." Hesi attempted to grab it, but the woman swiveled out of reach. "The trial is an individual test. I need to practice."

The square loom's feet tapped the floor gently, Uzare handing the needle back to her. The thread emptied to a length no longer than a nail. Now, Hesi has to painstakingly lock the figure and re-thread it. Which meant more needle stabs.

"Try to copy what I did," Uzare advised. "You can repeat that design across the canvas if you are aiming for a flower field. For the grass...well, you can ask Barteset."

Tagara sidled over and offered the shears when Hesi patted her cot for it. "Consider it Uzare's payment for telling us what and when the next trial is," she said. "Are you sure it's next week?"

Hesi bobbed her head, both in thanks for the shears and as an answer to the inked woman's question. "My source is reliable," she answered. That was all she wanted to say about Kharta. She picked at the middle groove of the shape Uzare made with a thread of a deeper shade of pink. "How did you do this?"

Uzare, who was more patient than Barteset, demonstrated and made Hesi do it again. And again. It didn't matter where on the canvas. Soon, Hesi had the basic structure and gestures in her mind. Now, to do it on a proper canvas...

"Has anyone seen Mensa?" Petra asked from the lulling silence that descended on them. All heads turned towards the ocher-haired woman. "I haven't seen her since Yobekh's lecture."

Hesi was about to go back to her project when Tagara spoke. "She left the chamber at dawn," she said. "Told me something about meeting the High Prince."

The needle stopped its ascent. The thread fell on the canvas without Hesi's pull. Her eyebrows knocked together. Would the prince meet them one by one? Was that the reason for the breaks in between trials and why they have to wait here? Kharta didn't tell her that. But...it wasn't as though she asked.

Why was Mensa picked first? Was it because she was from Festophis' slate? The next time she saw the steward, perhaps she would squeeze the schedule out of him. If she attained some time alone with the prince...

Her plan might have gained an unprecedented boost. If she killed the prince with Kharta's poison, if she ended the heir of the Mayaware King there, then she would be half-finished with her goal. This was perfect—an opportunity she almost lost when she thought she would deliberately drop out of the trials.

She might have beamed like a lunatic because her cheekbones hurt after a while. But, her amusement seeped out when Barteset and Asrate strode into the room in rigid strides. They wore grim expressions, a cloud of dread shadowing them. What happened?

"It's Mensa," the older woman reported. "She's hurt."

Hesi shot up. Within seconds, she was out of the room, running after a woman she never considered a friend, much less someone she couldn't bear to lose.