Seren

  "Can we talk?" Vida asked, ducking into our tent.

  "Is it about the Darkness or my magic? Because I don't really—"

  "It's about us, darling."

  Us. From the tone of her voice, I couldn't tell if this was good or bad for us. I set aside my mending, Nayan hopping into my lap as soon as my hands were free, and tried to pretend my stomach wasn't attempting a barrel roll. "O-okay."

  She settled beside me and reached across my lap to take my hand. Her fingers shook when they touched my skin. "Love… First, you have to know, it's not your fault."

  "Are you breaking up with me?" I blurted out. Light, that would be so awkward.

  "What?" Her hand jerked back, catching on my fingertips. "Not unless you want that, I only— I've been feeling—" She sighed and shifted to tuck her feet beneath her. Taking my hand more firmly between hers, she said, "Love, if you were discontent with anything between us, you'd tell me, right? As you did when you wanted me all to yourself?" She winked, teasing, and I cracked a smile.

  "Yeah… What's wrong?"

  "It's only, it feels strange to know people think I'm dating a man." Vida shook her head, letting out a little noise of frustration. "I know it's safer, but it still irks me. It feels like hiding that part of myself" —she pressed a hand over her heart— "and I've always had to, but not… like this. Letting people think I'm with a boy instead of just being stealthy…"

  I went very still, my hands still in hers. What was she saying? That she wanted me to be a girl again? I felt sick at the thought, tried to swallow it down, and couldn't. I didn't know which was worse: the idea that Vida had been hurting inside, or the idea that I'd need to go back to being a girl to stay with her.

  You’re mates, Nayan scolded. Boy, girl, crow. You’re you. Don’t be stupid about it.

  You don’t understand boy and girl. You don’t know how much I hated everything about being a girl.

  Nayan was skeptical. Loudly so.

  Everything except Vida’s love, I amended. And long hair was nice…

  See. She’s important to you. There was the sensation of them flicking through my memories, and their tone softened. She loved you as a girl, and as a boy, and now. I don’t think she wants you to be less you.

  My hands tensed on Vida’s. “Can you explain? Like, why you dislike it, or…”

  She let out a breath, just as shaky as her inhale. “I don’t know that I can, yet. It’s… new.”

  “So you haven’t been uncomfortable with people thinking you have a boyfriend? You haven’t been hurt and not telling me?”

  She shook her head uncertainly. “I don’t think… Well, it took me time to figure it out.”

  I squeezed her hands again.

  “Destiny?” Vida said softly. “I don’t want to lose you like this.”

  I swallowed, momentarily unable to breathe. Something in my heart broke at the fragility of her voice— the way she’d voiced my fear. “I don’t want to lose you either, Vida. We can, we can work it out, as long as that’s important to us both.”

  “True.” Vida twined her arm around my waist, pulling me close.

  I leaned into her. “Nayan says you loved me as a girl, and as a boy, and as a…” Whatever I was now, instead. Me.

  “Crow?” Vida suggested with a chuckle.

  I laughed. “Yeah. Close enough. Better than a worm, yeah?”

  “Oh, much. What else did they say?”

  On my shoulder, Nayan ruffled their feathers. “Mates,” they said aloud, in my voice.

  I yelped and jerked away from them, batting them off my shoulder. You can’t just go saying that!

  Vida laughed and caught them in cupped hands. “Nayan, don’t go breaking my Destiny now.”

  “Our Destiny,” Nayan corrected. They nudged their head into Vida's hand.

  “Ours now, yes.”

  My heart warmed at that, at being wanted like this. "I love you."

  Vida smiled back, and shifted towards me. “I talked to Blythe about this earlier, I didn't know how to talk to you. Believe it or not, she and Seren have had their share of difficulties, although not quite this sort.”

  “What did she say?”

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  “She said it’s not fair for me to expect you to pretend to be a girl when you spent most of your first twenty years doing just that and it’s not who you are, and that it’s not fair for you to expect me to be okay with looking like I’m dating a boy when that’s not who I am either.”

  “But I don’t,” I said. "Expect that, I mean."

  Vida’s lips twisted briefly into what might almost have been a smile. “Blythe didn’t say that’s what either of us expects. She just said that’s not a fair expectation and we have to sort things out or break up.”

  My heartbeat got louder. "We figured that out on our own, though."

  “I know. So I asked Seren for advice too. She said that sometimes people have expectations they don’t realize they have, and that’s why introspection and communication are important.”

  “I don’t understand.” I frowned. “Not realizing we have expectations?”

  “Like, Seren said she was surprised when Pryderi wasn’t a multiple, and it was only after thinking about that she realized she’d been expecting twins again.”

  You didn’t expect me to talk, Nayan said with a trace of smugness.

  Neither did you expect to talk, I replied. “I get it, I think. So, if you subconsciously expect me to be a girl still, or be okay with pretending to be one, or if I expect you to be absolutely fine being with someone who’s not a girl for the first time, then we have to figure that out in a way we can both be happy with.”

  Vida nodded, worrying at her bottom lip. “It’s, ah. It’s not the first time. And it’s so much more than that.”

  I paused. Nayan and I tilted our heads in sync. “Vida… that’s really confusing.”

  “The man I was to marry,” she explained. She pulled her knees to her chest and rested her chin on them. “I liked him. Maybe I could have loved him— but never the way I was supposed to. He was more like a cousin I didn’t see often. I remember kissing him once, and it felt… wrong. Just, wrong. I couldn’t stand the thought of living like that.” She looked up, something soft and wistful in her eyes. “And then I kissed a girl for the first time and there were sparks.”

  I reached out and took her hands.

  She squeezed them and continued, “But, Destiny… for all the girls I’ve kissed, and a couple of boys too besides my betrothed, honestly, you’re the first person I’ve wanted like this.” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. Her voice caught. “Girl, boy, crow, or worm, I think I’m in love with you.”

  I couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up as I leaned in to press my forehead to hers. “We’ve been dating months now and you’re only now saying that? Light, Vida, I love you too.”

  “Don’t tease,” she accused. “I’m not used to this.”

  I nuzzled her neck. “V, what if I wear a skirt next town, pretend to be a girl again—”

  She was shaking her head before I finished. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

  “Well, people thinking you have a boyfriend makes you uncomfortable.”

  Vida sighed, unable to deny that. “It’s sweet of you to offer, darling. We can talk about that tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow.” I kissed her cheek.

  I wish there was a way we could both have what we want. A way we could be together and not have to hide at all.

  Maybe there is. Nayan poked at my memories again. “That’s what the Darkness wants to do, change things like he didn’t,” Vida’s voice echoed in my mind. Nayan added, Maybe we can make them change this for us too.

  I smiled into my pillow. I’ll ask Blythe tomorrow.

  Blythe was gone by the time I woke up, but I caught Seren pulling down their tent. “Seren? I need to talk to you.”

  Ears pricking up, Seren turned. “Yeah?”

  “I want to know more about the Darkness. What are their– your goals?”

  Seren let go of the tent pole she was holding and started counting off on her fingers. “First and foremost, to create a better world for our descendants. This includes abolishing the dictatorship we live in so that power over the world does not rest in the hands of one man, destroying the system that let him take power, changing his damn laws to abolish his made-up hierarchy and let people love who they love, and giving everyone a voice in the world, not just nobility and Lightguard.”

  “Are there…” I gestured at my chest and the tight leather vest I’d found in the costume chest to flatten it. “Others like us?”

  Her gaze softened and she bent to scoop up the tent pole. “Oh. Yes, love. Not many, but more than I’ve ever met outside of the Darkness. When you’re already living outside of what the Empire deems acceptable, what’s one more deviance?”

  I swallowed. “What about people who aren’t men or women?”

  “...Not that I know of,” she admitted. “But I’m sure there are others. I used to think I was the only one.” She pressed something on the pole to collapse it and began bundling the tent up. “Help me with this? People have been people for a long time. I wasn’t the first woman born a boy, and I’m sure you’re not the first to be neither. Just, perhaps, the first to learn it from a crow.”

  I let out a shaky chuckle and helped roll up the tent until it would fit into the carrying bag. “Are you sure?”

  “Sure as I am about anything.” She took the bag and tossed it into the wagon. “We’ve been in this world forever, as much as the Empire would like to pretend otherwise. And I have a promise, straight from the leaders of the Darkness, that it’s one of the things they’d change. Better: in our towns, it already doesn’t matter.”

  I looked down at the grass and swallowed. “What can Nayan and I do? We’re just…”

  “Maybe not much,” Seren said softly. “Maybe everything. Your magic is forbidden for a reason, Destiny. It’s… I know people who think that it’s because it’s the only thing that has a chance of equaling his.”

  “Oh.” That was a terrifying thought– the Emperor was a god. I was just– me. “What… do you think?”

  She chuckled. “I think a god would have no reason to rule like a king, and no god worth anything would scare people into fragile peace instead of helping them understand each other. He’s just a powerful mage, and mages can be defeated.”

  “And you think Nayan and I can help?” My voice shook.

  “If you choose to, yes. But it’s your choice, love.” She touched my chin, leaning down to meet my eyes. “It’s important that you know you don’t have to. This has to be your choice, it has to be what you want.”

  I looked down again, feeling my hands tighten into fists. I think I want to, I told Nayan. And I think I need to, too.

  Then we need to.

  Their approval was all I needed. “It is. Nayan too, we both want to help.”

  Seren opened her arms, offering a hug. I leaned into her, enveloped by her wolfy scent as she embraced me. “It’ll be difficult, I won’t lie to you. Even just the entry process to join won’t be easy, since they need to make sure you're choosing it of your own will, but if you still want to, it’ll help prepare you to fight with us.”

  “I want to,” I said, firmer. “I promise.”

  “Then we’ll start heading southeast soon. It’ll be nice to pass the winter somewhere milder for a change.”