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The first time Kalim killed something, it was by accident. Everyone forgave her. It was just a bird after all. She was only trying to hold it. She didn't think she'd have to be so gentle.
But when an awful snap silenced the courtyard, Kalim found out that she needed to hold things more carefully. The damage was already done.
Jamil looked at the limp bird in Kalim's hands and started to cry. Kalim had never seen Jamil cry before. Her lip trembled, and she tried to hold it in as she looked away from the sight. "Murderer.." She mumbled. "You killed him."
The words made Kalim freeze. Everyone else said it was fine. They told her that she was too young to know what she was doing. But Jamil called her a murderer. And she was crying. If Jamil said something, it had to be true. Jamil was so smart, she was pretty, and Kalim's best friend.
The bird was already injured. Jamil spent all of her free time trying to heal it. Kalim had thought the bird was cute, so she just wanted to hold it for a while. But it started to struggle in her hands. Kalim thought that if she held it tighter, it would stop moving so harshly. It did stop moving at least. But now Jamil was crying.
"I didn't mean to!" Kalim quickly said. She dropped the bird carelessly and walked over to Jamil. "Oh.. don't cry! It's alright. I can get you a new one! Do you want a big bird? Maybe one that talks?"
Jamil looked at the bird that was discarded so easily and swallowed the words that she wanted to yell. "No.. It's fine, young master. It's okay, really. I'm sorry for crying." She rubbed her eyes and tried to compose herself.
Kalim felt bad. Really bad.
But Jamil was so pretty when she cried. Also, as pretty as when she laughed. Should she be thinking of this after killing Jamil's pet? Was this bad? Kalim really couldn't tell. Jamil was really cute.
She would look better smiling. So Kalim had to make this right! If only there were a way she could get the bird back. Maybe she could buy the same type? No. That's too easy. Jamil deserved better. Jamil deserved her bird.
Usually, when Kalim wanted things, her father would give them to her without a second thought. So after scooping the bird into a shoebox, she hummed as she walked down the halls of the estate. She smiled at her younger siblings as she passed. Most of them just gave her weird looks.
Kalim gave her father's office door a weak knock before letting herself in. This time he wasn't in any important meetings, not that it would've stopped Kalim; he was just doing boring paperwork.
"Baba, I'm a murderer."
He looked down at her and then burst out laughing. "Sure you are, sweetie."
She placed the shoebox onto his desk. "I killed Jamil's bird."
"Jamil... The Viper child?"
"Mhm. The cute one." Kalim looked at the bird. Flies had already started to surround it. "Can you bring it back? It's her favorite."
The older Asim scratched his head. "Well, that type of magic is forbidden. Punishable by death, too."
"...okay? Can you bring it back?"
He smirked at her. "You're my child through and through." He walked over to a painting on the wall and moved it aside with ease. There was a safe behind it, with a long-sounding pass code. When he was done, he walked over with a big, dusty book. "Here, it's probably somewhere in this book. Make sure you read the warnings."
It was a book. A very big book. Kalim sucked at reading! But.. It will get Jamil's bird back. So she will step up to the challenge!
Every new chapter of the book had a few pages of warnings. It was boring. She understood most of it. Things like keeping natural order, accepting things not going your way, and some doors should remain closed. Blah, blah, blah. She really did try to read it all. But it felt like it was repeating a lot of stuff, and the bird was starting to stink up her playroom.
So she skipped it and went into the good parts. The ones with spells, rituals, and diagrams. They looked cool. But most of them looked like they took forever to draw. And it did.
Kalim spent maybe three weeks failing to get the bird to wake up.
She found a little success when she was trying in the quieter parts of the gardens. The wind shifted around Kalim as the ritual circle glowed and the bird's wing twitched. Kalim held her breath as it slowly moved. Getting onto its feet sloppily.
"It works!" Kalim stood up and clapped her hands happily. The bird looked at Kalim. It was gross. It looked like it was balding. Tiny bugs were falling out from between its wings. More crawled out of its beak.
The bird made a gross clicking sound. Maybe it was trying to chirp. Bugs were everywhere.
Jamil really hated bugs. So much so that she couldn't sleep in her own bed if she even thought she saw one in her room. And the bird wasn't cute enough to be Jamil's. It was gross, and it couldn't even chirp.
She stared at her creation for a while. It made another noise. Yeah, no. This wasn't going to work. With a heavy sigh, she picked up the biggest rock she could see. She gave the bird a little smile. "Jamil would hate you." She then smashed the rock onto the bird. There wasn't as much blood as she expected. But it was still gross.
Well, that plan was a bust.
But also not? Kalim did resurrect the bird. Maybe it's because she took too long that it was all gross. The spell worked. It was kinda cool too. Plus, if Jamil were to ever die, Kalim could bring her back. She could be Jamil's savior! That's super cute.
Kalim wanted to do more research on this. But what other animals could she test this on? Animals didn't really die for no reason around the estate. And if they did, five maids would have it cleaned up within seconds.
She thought about it for a little while, walked around, and asked her little siblings if they had seen anything dead. They all said no. Some called her weird to her face; others were kinder about it. Then, when Kalim sat by the pond, she smiled brightly.
Fishes. They seemed simple enough! Some were the same size as Jamil's bird, too.
They were hard to catch. She just ended up playing in the pond for twenty minutes before she accidentally caught one in her hair. Long hair is good for things! Well, Kalim was the one who wanted to cut it. Jamil said her long hair was pretty; that's why she kept growing it out. See? Even without meaning to, Jamil helps out. She's just the best!
Kalim didn't kill it. Well. She did. But she just let it flop around the floor for a while. Did that count? It didn't feel like it did. The fish died shortly, and Kalim got to work. This time, the resurrection was quicker; it took her ten minutes. She didn't really time it. It left like it took that long.
Unfortunately, the fish smelled horrible. She put it back in the water, and the other fish ate it alive. It was sorta funny. Kalim figured she should write down her tests. The author of the book she was reading seemed to write all of his tests down; he thought his brain would get fried, and he would forget stuff. That seemed silly. But Kalim did it anyway in her pink sparkly notebook.
Kalim tried other birds next, throwing rocks at them to get them down. They looked better this time. Fewer bugs. More feathers. They still acted strangely. She threw more rocks at them to put them down.
Then the next were strays. Cats had nine lives, no? Did they even need magic to come back to life? Kalim tested that. Cleaned off her knife as she watched it lie there for a few minutes. Then she did the ritual circle, and it came back. Not really perfect. Somehow more creepy. Kalim then tried with dogs; the result was mostly the same, albeit less creepy.
Most days, Kalim would be buried in the book. Well, whenever Jamil wasn't around. Because if Jamil was around, why would Kalim need to focus on anything else? Kalim would read some of the other chapters as a bedtime story; sometimes she'd make them into small songs. Servants thought she was interested in history, and tutors said they were glad she was reading more.
The first time someone saw one of Kalim's creations, it was a servant. She screamed so loudly. The cat didn't even look that bad! It just forgot how to walk sometimes. Okay, maybe it did look bad. The servant fainted after screaming. Kalim sighed and dragged the limp cat away before anyone else saw.
A year passed.
None of the experiments ever seemed perfect. Some forgot what it was like to do certain things. Some were just wrong in voice. And Kalim couldn't understand why some tried to attack her. She was their creator! Basically, their father. Kalim didn't really want to kill her father. So why did these animals? Seemed kinda unfair.
Maybe smaller animals were just kinda dumb. She didn't really aim for a bigger kill. Honestly, what happened next was a total accident. Well. Maybe a good opportunity is a better word.
One of the elephants in the Asim Zoo was slowly dying. Old age, maybe. Kalim didn't really listen. She walked over and didn't even take out her knife! But the elephant got scared anyway. It attacked Kalim before she even tried to become a threat. For an animal that was supposedly on its deathbed, it had a lot of fight in it.
Kalim ended up covered in dirt and laughing hysterically. "I won!" The rush was unlike anything she had ever felt before. It didn't really excite her to hurt the animal. It was just when her body acted on its own. Adrenaline? Was that the word for it? Kalim always zoned out during her lessons, so she wasn't too sure.
When she calmed down, she remembered that the elephant was now dead. So she got to work. This time, the ritual circle took longer. It had to be bigger because of the elephant's size. Honestly, the amount of magic it took drained Kalim more than the fight did. When it was done, the elephant stood. Kalim looked up at it, amazed.
Nothing good ever lasted when it came to this type of magic. The elephant seemed to have forgotten how to walk. It tripped into trees. And it made a mess. Kalim left the elephant for the zookeepers to deal with and wrote in her notebook about what happened.
Then a tiger came into the picture. How? Well, after the elephant, everything else seemed boring. She ended up with scratches all over her arms. The tiger was a bit better than the elephant when Kalim gave it life. It seemed to know that it was alive, and it walked easily too.
The big problem was that it didn't blink. It stared at Kalim. And just that. Kalim smiled and made it into a contest at first. She kept losing. It was cheating. She killed it not too long after.
When Kalim went back into the house, she had completely forgotten about being scratched. What reminded her was Jamil quickly pulling her into the nurse's office and treating her wounds. Jamil was so cute playing nurse. She really cared if Kalim got hurt. Kalim could see it with how much her hands trembled to bandage up Kalim.
Then Jamil started to cry. Her shoulders shook first, her eyes teared up. She tried to stay focused, and then she leaned her head forward, more tears dripping down her perfect skin.
Cute.
Jamil was the cutest thing ever.
Kalim bit her own lip harshly. Manners. She learned her manners. Sure. Though her father said it only really mattered if she was around nobles or annoying people in power like that. But still, she should be respectful to important people. Jamil was the most important person out there. It was hard. Kalim just wanted to hold her in her arms and kiss her.
She sniffled as she rubbed at her eyes. "Be careful. You keep going off.. and getting hurt." Jamil finally met Kalim's eyes. Sevens. Kalim won't survive if she keeps looking at her like that. "Are you doing this on purpose? Hurting yourself?"
"No! Of course not.. I kinda found a tiger—"
"Kalim! You know not to mess with animals like that!" Jamil's tears quickly changed to anger. "Geez. You're the heir. You can't be that reckless. You made me think something bad was going on."
If only she knew.
Kalim stopped doing experiments so often. Not because she lost interest. She would rather see Jamil happy. And maybe because she felt like one more moment with a crying Jamil, and she was going to burst.
The days after that were peaceful. Just Kalim and Jamil hanging out! Sometimes, Kalim would try to get her younger siblings to play too, but they didn't seem to want to stay around her for too long. Kalim didn't really understand them. She tried to be a good big sister, she really did, but they didn't seem to enjoy her company! Well, that's fine. Kalim could hang out with Jamil. Even if Jamil got annoyed with Kalim, she never stopped playing with her.
Even during dinnertime, Jamil would be by Kalim's side. Well, Jamil would be working as Kalim's taste tester. Tonight was curry! She was excited to eat it; it smelled so good. But Jamil had to eat first, and that was okay too. Kalim could wait her turn as long as she got to eat from the same spoon.
It was normal for a while. Jamil took a bite and waited a few seconds.
And then she collapsed to the ground.
The first thing that people did was move Kalim away from Jamil. Servants were rushing around the room, and everything turned to chaos in a matter of seconds. Doctors rushed in, made Jamil throw up whatever she had eaten, and then took her away to get further help. Everything happened so quickly that Kalim couldn't process anything. She was pushed back into a corner as if she were in danger. She struggled to get out and could only see Jamil being rushed away.
For hours, no one would be able to give Kalim the answers she wanted. She'd ask every other minute, and it would all be "We don't know," or "The doctors are working very hard," and "Little Viper is strong."
Kalim knew Jamil was strong. She knew that better than anyone else. She didn't need some servants telling her that Jamil would push through this. Kalim already knew that. Jamil wouldn't fall because of some poison! Kalim was weaker than Jamil, and she always survived poison; that meant Jamil would too. She wasn't scared of Jamil dying; she just wanted to see her.
It took a day before Jamil's room was open to visitors; Kalim made sure to be the first person there. And because she was the first person there, that meant Jamil's family had to wait outside. That's fine. Kalim will be super quick, so the Vipers could pray for Jamil.
Jamil's room smelled like a hospital. Which was fitting given the circumstances. Maybe Kalim should bring some flowers to make it smell better? Oh, chrysanthemums would look so pretty by Jamil's bedside.
Kalim smiled as she sat down next to Jamil. She was all sweaty. Her face looked pained. The doctors said she wouldn't be fully awake for a while. Jamil tossed around. Kalim slowly moved her hand to hold Jamil's. It seemed to calm her. Jamil held on tightly.
It wasn't normal that Jamil would hold Kalim's hand back so easily. Sometimes she'd hesitate; other times she'd distract Kalim and make her forget that she even wanted to hold Jamil's hand. But now she was so easy. Gripping onto Kalim's hand like it was a lifeline.
This is why Kalim didn't get why people told her Jamil was strong. That was common knowledge. While asleep and struggling, she was still holding onto Kalim's hand so much it hurt.
She was so strong and so cute.
Kalim couldn't help herself and placed a small kiss on Jamil's lips.
It tasted like curry. And barf. It was really gross. But also, it was Jamil, so of course, Kalim loved it. She giggled as she got out of Jamil's grip and stood up. It was exciting! She finally got to kiss Jamil. She was always a bit nervous that Jamil would get mad at her. But she didn't. She was passed out. Kalim pouts at that; in the stories, the princess woke up after the kiss. Maybe it was because Kalim wasn't manly enough? Next time, she'd wear a suit.
While humming, Kalim walked to the door and allowed Jamil's family in. It didn't take them too long to rush by Jamil's side. Mrs. Viper was crying while holding onto Jamil's hand. Her husband was next to her, looking awfully tired while mumbling prayers under his breath. Jamil's little sitter climbed into the bed with her and started crying into her shoulder.
They all seemed to care so much about Jamil. They were all so worried.
Should Kalim be worried, too? She knew Jamil was strong. She didn't really feel the need to start praying to fake gods, though. Everyone else seemed to think it was that important. Maybe Kalim was missing something? Did they like Jamil more than she did? No. That felt impossible. But still, it made Kalim feel weird.
When she felt weird, she went to her father to fix it.
"Baba." Kalim took a seat in front of her father's desk. "Am I weird?"
"Of course you are." He didn't even look up from his papers.
Kalim frowned. "Bad, weird? Like Jamil hates me?"
"Maybe."
"I don't want Jamil to hate me. I don't wanna be weird!" She bit her lip. "How do I show her I care?"
Mr. Asim paused at that. "Let's see... Well, we know who poisoned her. Maybe start there."
"We know who did it!?"
"Duh. What kind of father lets criminals who try to hurt his daughter roam free? He is in the dungeon."
"But you let the last one roam free, and he actually hurt me. Lots. I can still feel—"
"He was my brother. What do you want me to do, honey? Kill him? My own brother? That's cruel." He sighed as he tapped his pen on the paper. "Plus, if he were dead, someone else would have to run trades in the north. It's hard to find cheap replacements. Also, if anything hurts, you should tell that to the doctor."
Kalim chews her lip, "but it's sorta.. It's in an embarrassing place. And the doctors are guys--"
"Kalim. Didn't you say you wanted to show that you care for Jamil?" He passed her a set of keys. "Here you are. Go on an adventure."
She looked at the keys and then at her father. For a second, she didn't think. Nothing in her mind seemed to hold onto anything. She looked back at the keys and then smiled. Jamil. Just keep thinking about Jamil. She has the opportunity to make the person who hurt Jamil hurt too. Anyone who hurt Jamil is a bad person anyway.
The walk there was short. It only felt that way because Kalim had thoughts running around in her mind. All of Jamil. Kalim thought that the next time she visited Jamil, she should cry, too. Everyone else was. And somehow that kinda felt like she was being outdone.
She will get it right next time. Now she just needs to meet with the prisoner.
The man sat in a cold cell, handcuffed to the bench. He didn't even look old, older than Kalim's father, that's for sure! Kalim remembered seeing him around. He was a servant, just a very boring one. He looked at her with wide eyes, probably not expecting someone to let her down there without some type of supervision. But Kalim is a good girl! She knows not to touch or break anything.
"Hiiii! You were the one who almost killed Jamil, right?" She smiled as she pulled a chair in front of the cell to sit in front of him.
He looked around for a moment, "I.. am sorry! I just needed the money for my family! Please, forgive me, young master!"
Kalim tilts her head, "What kind of poison did you give her?"
"..I don't know. It was.. I was just given a plant and was told to mix it into the food. I'm so very sorry. My daughter is sick and I--"
"How much does it hurt?"
"As I said, I don't know—!"
"Would it affect her for the rest of her life? Would she remember the taste? Would she be scared of eating? Ah! If that happens, do you think she will lean on me more? Maybe she'd want me to protect her. Come on! Tell me already! I won't say a word to anyone else!"
He blinked. "What..?" He then swallowed and got as close to the bars as he could. "It's whatever you want, young master! Just please.."
"Whatever I want?" Kalim tilted her head in thought. While she did like the idea of Jamil depending on her more, she hated the idea of Jamil getting hurt even more. She shouldn't have wanted some random guy to hurt Jamil. So it wasn't 'whatever she wanted' really. "You shouldn't have hurt her. Her family is worried. Everyone is. Why couldn't you get the target right? This is all your fault. If you had just poisoned me, this wouldn't have happened."
"H—Huh..?"
Kalim stood up and then smiled. "You said you had a daughter, right? Is that all?"
"..She's only seventeen. She still needs me. She is very sick, and my wife is working every day!"
"Oh! Okay. A wife and a kid." She nodded to herself. "I can support them. Don't you worry! Just because you did something bad doesn't mean your family gets hurt. I also like hardworking girls! It's super inspiring!"
The man looked at Kalim, confused, before he suddenly started to cough out water.
Kalim leaned her head against the cold bar of the cell. "Have you ever been waterboarded? I know it's kinda a random ask." She waited for an answer but didn't get one. "I have. Baba has many secrets, and they thought I knew. 'Cause I'm the heir, and stuff. But that's kinda different from what's happening to you. You did something bad, so you're getting punished. And because I'm nice, I'll give your family all of the money they need."
He fell to the floor trying to gasp for some air, but he was unlucky. Kalim didn't really use her magic for this. She thought her magic looked better, summoning an oasis! Plus, she had to focus very hard if she wanted to summon a small amount of water into someone's lungs. It was boring! But it fit, didn't it? Jamil was still upstairs trying her hardest to breathe, to stay alive.
"I think... I'm in love with Jamil. Y'know?" She crouched down as she sighed dreamily. "The same way you love your wife, maybe. That's kinda embarrassing, huh? She just makes me really happy! And she cares so much.... And she's so cool, so pretty. I'll do anything for her! So, I hope you don't mind me using your body after you're dead. I'll be super careful. Promise!"