Fly Away, Part I
Roshil wiped her forehead on her tunic sleeve. She inspected the statue again, looking over the stone for any more chips or cracks.
“I think that’s everything,” Sirshi called from the ground.
“That’s what you said earlier, but I still found some.” Roshil adjusted the magnification on her goggles again. Her gaze swept up and down the statue. Even the tiniest flaw was unacceptable. Only the best for Sirshi and the Temple of the Rising Sun.
After another five minutes in which there was total silence, Roshil pulled off her goggles and began climbing down the ladder. “Now that’s everything.”
“Thank you so much,” Sirshi said. “Your help means a lot to the temple.”
Her smile twisted Roshil’s stomach into knots.
“Oh! You’re welcome!” she shouted. “Um… Master Grund says it’s good for me to practice repairs, since that’s a lot of the job too.”
She looked up at the ceiling and wondered if there was anything she could do there. The more work she found, the more time she could spend with Sirshi.
“I’m glad you’re not wasting your time on me.”
“Of course not! I like spending time with you.”
When Sirshi didn’t say anything, Roshil realized how ridiculous she’d sounded.
“Anyway, you should probably go eat,” Sirshi said. She looked up at the darkening sky through the windows. “It’s almost dinnertime.”
“I’m not hungry.”
Her stomach betrayed her by growling.
“Much.”
Sirshi laughed. “It’s fine. Go eat.”
“What about you?”
“I still have some tidying up to do. You don’t need to stick around for it.”
A pain grew in Roshil’s stomach. Despite popular opinion, she was well-adjusted enough to recognize when she wasn’t wanted.
“I’ll see you soon, then?” she asked, still hoping Sirshi would change her mind.
“There’s nothing else we need you for,” Sirshi said. “But I’ll see you tomorrow morning at the Sun Welcoming Ceremony, right?”
“Bright and early.” Far earlier than Roshil had ever wanted to wake up in her life, but seeing Sirshi in her robes was worth it. Roshil wasn’t good with words, but one day, she wanted to find the right ones to describe how Sirshi looked.
Maybe it’d be easier in Arcane.
Roshil waved bye to Sirshi, knowing full well it would be a while before they got to talk again. Roshil liked talking to Sirshi; she was one of the few people that didn’t think she was weird. Sirshi got angry too sometimes, so Roshil didn’t feel so out of place when she yelled or growled at people. Before her time in the castle, she would’ve gone to Oshal, but just like back then, he had his own friends, and they all thought there was something wrong with her. Even Aonva was spending a lot more time with Kurgm, and Roshil couldn’t talk to Sirshi in the morning because she’d have to start cleaning the temple or putting away mats or practicing more rites and rituals. According to Aonva, who was a fountain of knowledge about the Temple of the Rising Sun when Kurgm was around, there were hundreds of them.
There are the routine ones, celebrating birth and death, the coming of the sun and the start of the warm season. But priests must know how to appeal to their deities in times of need. Those are especially difficult. It’s a little like magic, but it takes a different sort of precision.
Roshil liked it when Aonva talked, but now she felt ignored. Aonva’s attention was always on Kurgm, and Roshil didn’t know what she had to do to get it back.
She reached the great hall. Judging by how quiet it was, the officers were about to walk in and take their seats. She scanned for Aonva, but couldn’t find her. She did spot Oshal, sitting with a few apprentices she didn’t know. Instead of being ignored by her brother in favor of people that didn’t like her, Roshil chose to sit at the end of one of the long tables. At least people couldn’t insult her to her face if she sat alone.
The officers walked in, and everyone stood at attention. His Majesty followed and everyone sat down. Food appeared on the table, but Roshil wasn’t that hungry. She looked around, wondering whore Aonva was.
Probably in the kitchens with Kurgm. Again.
Aonva hated eating with everyone in the great hall, but it’d never occurred to Roshil that they might be able to eat somewhere else. But it had occurred to Kurgm; he knew the castle better, and he was better with people. He was a better friend to Aonva than Roshil could ever hope to be.
Roshil picked at her food until dinner was over and she was allowed to leave. The moment she could, she raced down to the kitchens. Sure enough, there were Aonva and Kurgm.
“Roshil,” Aonva said, smiling. Roshil liked her crooked smile. It reminded Roshil of her own awkwardness, and it was nice to know that it wasn’t only her like that. “How was dinner?”
“The same as it was yesterday.” When I sat on my own. “Remind me again why you’re allowed to skip dinner.”
“I have standing permission to eat down here,” Kurgm said, “and Master Kaernin granted Aonva permission to be here.”
“We’re not skipping dinner,” Aonva added in her usual panic when the idea of breaking the rules came up. “We’re still eating, we just do it down here. And like Kurgm said, we have permission.”
Roshil had asked Master Grund before about eating in the kitchens, but he refused to grant her permission. His concern was that she’d use it to skip dinner entirely and keep working in the forge like she’d done before she’d had friends.
“Dinner’s over, so we should get going,” Kurgm said.
“Do you want to go to the library?” Roshil asked, hoping her friends would want to spend some time with her.
“Kurgm and I are going to walk around the gardens before bed,” Aonva said. “Sorry.”
“Oh.”
The last time Roshil had tried going around the gardens with them, they’d learned that it was where many of the druids slept. Aonva had explained that they needed to be among nature to maintain their powers. That didn’t ease the discomfort Roshil had felt when many of them had glared at her and one of the younger druids had shouted at her (although “barked” was a more apt description).
“It’s fine.” Roshil turned and left.
I told you, Roshil. No one will ever love you.
“Roshil!”
She stopped near the entrance of the kitchens.
“What’s going on?” Aonva asked. “You can talk to me about it, whatever it is.”
Roshil fought back tears as she turned to face Aonva.
“Everyone’s got their own lives. I thought… I thought that maybe I could belong here. I thought for a second that maybe I could have friends, but you’re all so caught up in your own lives now that you’ve all forgotten about me.”
“No we haven’t. You can come eat with us, it’s okay.”
Roshil turned on her heel. “Master Grund won’t let me, and even if he did, I’d sit around and watch you two make eyes at each other. Sirshi only wants me around so long as I’m useful. And my brother’s new friends all think I’m a monster!”
“I’m not making eyes at Kurgm!” Aonva glanced over her shoulder and lowered her voice to a whisper. “I mean, I… I don’t know really, I sort of like him, but… that’s not the point!”
“No. The point is that everyone feels weird looking at me, and it’s only getting worse.”
“What’s this about? It can’t be about me and Kurgm! So what if I like him? That doesn’t mean we can’t be friends!”
“Don’t you get it?! He was right! No one will ever love me! So just leave me alone!”
“Kurgm never said—”
Roshil spun around and ran through the corridors. She felt people staring at her, but she blocked them out. She ran until she reached the entrance to her room. After she was safely inside, she collapsed on her bed and allowed the tears to flow.
No one will ever love you Roshil.
That voice. It was getting harder to ignore the memories. That creeping feeling that they were the same. She wanted it to go away again, like it had when she’d been with her friends before. She wanted things to go back to the way they’d been, but that wasn’t going to happen, so a new wish formed.
She wanted to sprout wings and fly away.