fall from grace

CW: mentions of death and violence

Fourteen-year-old Azalea knew her life had truly started the day of her first murder.

Contrary to her brother’s belief, it wasn’t intentional. But sure, looking at the facts that he so graciously pointed out, she had been given the assignment that afternoon to collect herbs and vegetables from the gardens for supper, along with a few of the other girls her age. 

And sure, she had been slightly extra angry that day, because during after-lunch downtime, she had gone out to the training circles to eye the swords, and some of the boys had found her and heckled her; they knew that she hated the girls’ duties of cooking for the boys and cleaning up after the boys and essentially slaving away for whatever the boys needed, but they also all knew that, as a Courtless Fae girl, not born into a royal line or a line of any worth in society, she would be destined to do that for the rest of her life. She would be destined, from the moment she turned eighteen, to be sent off to one of the Courts — Spring, Summer, Autumn, or Winter — to be a servant, a cook, a maid, at others’ beck and call for the rest of eternity.

Good for anyone who enjoyed it, but there was something about stirring a vat of soup while she watched the boys roughhouse and throw daggers at targets (and each other) outside that sent white-hot rage curling in the pit of her stomach at her lack of choice.

Because the Courtless boys, like her twin brother Calyx, were raised to fight. From the moment they could stand on their soft, chubby toddler feet, they were handed swords, daggers, bows and arrows. Because when they turned eighteen, they were guaranteed to be sent off to the palaces, to serve in the Courts’ armies, to be bodyguards.

The boys she grown up with for the last fourteen years knew she was angry. That she would do anything to learn how to spar with them, to let some of her innate anger out in the release of a soaring arrow, the glorious clank of a sharpened sword. They all knew, too, that if she dared touch the equipment, she’d face punishments worse than death, inflicted by the head of the camp himself, an angry man who wasn’t satisfied with how his life turned out, either, so he took it out on the children around him.

So, sure, that day, she had been less cautious with which plants she picked for dinner. She had just yanked up anything green in her eye line, feeling some sort of satisfaction in pretending each plant was a different person she despised (there were quite a lot), and that, instead of simply ripping the roots from their home in the soil, she was separating heads from bodies.

That was the type of entertainment that got her through long days at the camp. Not that she would tell her brother that, either.

It came out, later, that some poisonous plant must have made its way into supper that evening, and killed the camp head, who lay in bed that night, sweating and convulsing and choking on his own tongue until his heart finally gave up its fight. When the children were told the news the next morning by one of the older girls, Azalea knew, deep down, it was her lack of caution that led to this.

She also knew that it wasn’t any of the other girls who had been in the kitchen making supper that evening receiving side glances when the news came, nor any of the other girls whom her peers began to whisper about: 

I bet it was Azalea who killed him. She always looks as if she’s itching to kill someone.

Nobody’ll let ‘er pick up a weapon, so I guess she learned how to poison. 

Guess I’ll be skipping meals when she’s on the kitchen shift. Who knows who’ll be next?

I always knew she’d snap. Didn’t I tell you? I always knew.

You know what I say? Good for her. Not like anyone liked him, anyway.

Crazy bitch.

In all of her fourteen years, she had never smiled so much. She had never pranced around the camp with such pep in her step, and she had certainly never made her way to the training ring in the middle of the day. But who would stop her now? She could handle some whispers, some glances, if it meant she had the opportunity to really, truly train. 

She couldn’t have cared less about the reputation she was beginning to form, because she started being left alone. Nobody would say a word when she joined the boys, sidling up next to her brother, who helped show her how to hold her arms when pulling an arrow taut, how to swing an axe. Her scrawny limbs would be left shaking by the end of each day, unused to the strenuous activity, but every time she watched the boys, their muscles flexing, their stances firm, the desire to prove that she could be just as good as them — better, even — only grew.

But she should have known that an accidental murder wouldn’t solve everything.

Azalea went out to the training ring alone one evening, after supper (which everyone appeared to have lived through, despite all the eyeballing). As she ran her fingers along the hilt of each sword that hung on the rack, trying to find the one that felt right, she heard heavy footsteps behind her.

Instinctively, she whirled, her body tensing before she even laid eyes on her companions.

Five boys stood at the edge of the ring. Azalea recognized them as boys that often sparred with Calyx; though they were older, sixteen-year-olds, Calyx was big for their age, so he was always paired with the older boys.

“Azalea,” the one in front said. He was just as tall as Calyx, though he was thinner, more lithe. She knew this one, because he was one that had heckled her relentlessly over the years, long before the rumors that Azalea was a poisoner — an intentional one, at least — started to swirl the camp. And even though she had, she had thought, escaped his heckling, he had still cut her glares after the rumors started, his gaze following her whenever they had been in a room together, his thick eyebrows sitting low over his dark eyes.

Azalea curled her trembling fingers into fists, holding her head high.

“What do you want?”

The boy — Ivor was his name — only chuckled, the corner of his mouth curled in an almost sinister smirk as he glanced around him at his friends.

“We want to see what you’ve got. After all, you’ve been getting your practice in. And you’ve obviously got it in you to poison an adult, so, why don’t you show us what you’ve been working on?”

He nodded to his friends, and they were on Azalea before she could register what was happening. Two were grabbing her arms, their grips impossibly tight around her biceps, and the other two practically dove for her legs. She fell back, her back colliding with the cold concrete and knocking the breath from her, sending a shooting pain down her spine.

Her mind clouded with panic, her body writhing as the boys pinned her down, their laughter ringing in her ears. Ivor kneeled down next to her, and at his smirk, Azalea felt that familiar flame of rage curl within her.

“Let me go!” Her voice had an embarrassingly clear note of desperation to it. Though her mouth had run dry, she gathered up all the spit she could muster and spat in Ivor’s face; it spattered, glistening, across his left cheek. He flinched back, wiping it away, his mouth twisted in disgust, which stayed on his face as he glared down at Azalea.

“You wanna fight so bad, Azalea, then fight! This is what you want, right?” He twistedly grinned as the boys increased the pressure they had on her wrists and ankles. Strands of her long, unbound hair was caught under their knees, her scalp burning as she struggled. The rage within her was starting to be doused by something unfamiliar — fear. Their grips weren’t relenting, and though they couldn’t stay here forever, holding her down, what would they do while they did?

She had to get out.

“Calyx!” she screamed, thrashing from side to side as they laughed. “Calyx!”

“That’s right,” Ivor sneered. “Call for your brother. You’ll never be as strong as us, no matter how hard you think you’re working, so you might as well give up. But you gotta beg for it.”

She couldn’t shake them off; they were strong, too strong. 

Think, Azalea, she told herself, her vision blurring with unshed tears. Don’t cry, you pathetic coward. Use your head. He’s right; you’ll never be as strong as them. 

Not all of them, anyway. Focus on one.

She grit her teeth, focusing her energy on her right leg, her dominant side. If she could just wiggle it out of his grip, she could kick. Where, she wasn’t sure yet, but it’d be a start.

She started moving her leg wildly, up and down, side to side, and she felt the boy at her right ankle struggle to keep his grip on her, could see it in his reddened face. She bent her knee and pulled it towards her with such force that he lost his grip entirely, and, using her momentum, she sent her booted foot flying straight back out, connecting right with his nose with a satisfying crack.

The boy howled in pain, falling backwards as his hands flew to his face. The boy next to him, holding Azalea’s left ankle, let go in surprise, whirling around towards his friend. Azalea saw her opportunity, with both legs free, but it was taken from her in the same second that she felt a second set of hands on her right arm.

“You bitch,” Ivor snarled, twisting her arm until it was white hot with pain, accompanied by a snap that caused Azalea’s unshed tears to cascade down her cheeks, a strangled, almost animalistic cry forcing itself from her lips. Her vision was blinded, but she could manage to register that the boys were standing up; she felt Ivor nudging his boot into her side with a low chuckle, just before he leaned over her, close enough to where she could feel his breath, hot and rank on her face.

“Stay out of our way, Azalea. Consider this your warning.”

They left, then, huddled around the boy whose nose Azalea had obviously broken, but her momentary triumph over that small victory had been shattered along with her arm. The pain felt like it had traveled through her entire body as she lay on the concrete, staring up at the spinning, starless sky. As she forced her heart to slow, taking deep, slow breaths like her brother had taught her, her mind cut through the agony, coming down from the spiral of panic.

No.

Using her left hand as leverage, she pushed herself up from the ground, her right hanging, useless, at her side.

No. She wouldn’t let them win. She couldn’t let them win. She had — albeit unknowingly — poisoned the one person who had, seriously, stood in her way of pursuing the life she wanted. She had killed an adult man — why the hell would she let a group of boys, hardly older than her, stop her?

Once Azalea felt she was steady on her feet, she walked over to the weapons rack closest to her, gritting her teeth as pain shot through her arm. She willed herself to push through it, along with the humiliation, the shame that had come with letting Ivor and his friends think they had won, that they had scared her.

Well, they had, she could admit. For a moment, she had been terrified.

But they had guaranteed one thing with that: she would do anything to never feel that way again.

She never wanted to feel weak again. She never could feel weak again. This time, a broken arm.

Next time, what?

She grit her teeth against the pain as she shimmied off the light jacket she had been wearing, securing the sleeves around her neck to use as a sort of sling. One day, she swore to herself, she would show them. She would make them feel the shame, the humiliation, the helplessness, the fear that they had made her feel.

And with her left hand, Azalea picked up a dagger.