OH, TO BE HERE ON THE GROUND
The city is a prison and only mice slip through the cracks in its walls, they say, but El Toro knows that he has done otherwise and when she turns on him and runs her voice through his ears he knows she has too. Toro nods. ”This is Hajduk. Thank you…” She lives and he does not know what else to say but he does not need to, not yet.
”I’m going to kill Raum.”
He thought the spy shenanigans would end with Anzhelo. They did not.
”He’s gone too far. But I can’t kill him on my own - will you help me?”
Soft air flushes through his nostrils; it is times like this where he still imagines his lung is a crushed paper bag and now his ribs curl in to puncture them both. ”Of course.” He paused. ”You won’t be the first. That - that I’ve aided in this…or attempted to. You know. I mean…there are more of you, then…?” It’s almost a question, but he knows the answer, he’s certain but perhaps not quite on the scale she has organized. He wants to ask her how she is alive. Instead he says, ”They say there is another bull, working for Raum. A…torturer…executioner…something.” He clears his throat. ”It is not me. I figure- that you know - but…we are not…the same.” In truth, he has not even seen this bull, rumored to be huge and black with horns like some apocalyptic creature. Sideways glances have increased exponentially; it seems that protruding ribs fill in when accompanied by horns. But those serving Raum know him to be a civilian. Being a bull grants him no status. He would only feed Hajduk with it, anyway. His home is now more of a haven than it has ever been, and yet more unsafe than before. Liquor bottles are buried beneath the ground with a handful of seeds and dried fruits, as if they could feed either of them for much longer. The white bull dreams of the pomegranates and ginger that once filled bowls on his windowsill, the cups of spices and hanging herbs that brushed against him while he cooked. There was something to it, that life. Something to this place that was seeping through the cracks and disappearing. He was missing the Solterra he had come to know.
His words fail him in favor of trying to clear his name. Say it. ”I’m glad you’re alive.” He glances down at the little cub, who half-curls his form around Toro’s pale leg, gaze fixed on Seraphina. She smells like blood.
Yes. But she is a good thing.
Liar. You don’t know. Hajduk marches forward, paw prints seared black and hot into the ground. He spits a scratchy mewl at her, chest puffed. El Toro stifles a grin; he thinks this cub is the only thing keeping him sane now, and every day he fears some guard will snatch Hajduk away. Such beasts are walking weapons.
@
"What I say,"
What I think,
What Hajduk thinks,
