Private Tales Denoument

The groaning of the great doors was like a death knell through the hollow chamber. Nym stepped into the cavernous silence with her chin held high, her bare feet whispering against the marble floor. A single guard shadowed her, moving her along as she faltered for a moment at the sight of Medja.

Nym’s emerald eyes, heavy with exhaustion, lifted to the throne. For the first time in years, she allowed them to linger on Medja. The sight of her, the woman who had once been her shield, her teacher, her only true mother, drove a spike of heat into her chest. Shame coiled through her like smoke in her lungs, but she swallowed it down. She would not bow her head.

Her lips pressed together, trembling for a heartbeat before she schooled them into stillness. She did not kneel. She did not beg.

She stood tall in the hollow hall, ragged and scarred, her chin defiant as though daring the Empress to carve her down further.

“…Medja.”

Her voice was quiet, but it carried. "I was, summoned..."

The sound of Medja’s voice, that raw betrayal in it... Nym felt it coil around her throat like a noose, strangling the air from her lungs, making her chest ache with the weight of it. Her lips parted, but no words came at first. Only silence, thick and suffocating.

Her gaze, sharp as a serpent’s, wavered. She forced it steady, jaw tightening, her spine stiff. The glassy sheen in her eyes betrayed her, though she refused to let a single tear fall.

When she spoke, her voice was quiet, fearing it might crack if she spoke too loudly..
“You should not have trusted me.”

Her chin rose, a brittle act of defiance, though shame burned hot in her gut. "I did not fight, when your hands came for me." she frowned. She knew what she'd done, and she'd accepted the consequence of it before word had likely even reached Medja. "Not so long ago, I would have. I would have had them slaughtered. Might have done it myself.. I might have brought my armies here, and fought you.." she laughed under her breath but the sound was mirthless. She'd have lost, but she'd have convinced herself otherwise, drunk on power and thinking herself as immortal as her father thought himself..

“It was.. Too much… All of it. Your trust. Your care. Your faith. My freedom.. You gave me everything, and I wasn't ready for any of it… I wanted them to believe I was worthy. My people, after what my father left behind in Salitra. They needed to see strength. So I showed them.”

Her breath caught, unsteady, “They did believe. I gave them victories. I raised armies. I took cities. They looked at me, and they saw power.”

Nym’s shoulders rose and fell, trembling with the effort of restraint. Her handless arm hung heavy at her side, she looked down at it for a moment, brow furrowed.

“But I betrayed you,” she finished, the words falling from her lips like ash. Her jaw clenched, her expression hard, daring Medja to see anything else in her face. “That is the truth you already know.. I failed you - but you failed me too. One shouldn't set loose a viper and be surprised when it bites." she said quickly, hurrying along the inevitable.

"So pass the sentence and get it over with." she swallowed.

Nym's heart was racing as she awaited the inevitable, adrenaline flooding her system, causing nausea to churn in her stomach. She had expected fury, fire, some great display of Medja’s wrath, expected to be torn apart by the woman’s power and left in pieces on the palace floor.

But this quiet? This calm? It stripped her bare.

As Medja’s words fell over her like cold water, Nym’s mask faltered. Her gaze dropped, her breath hitching as tears finally spilled over, hot and sharp as acid against her cheeks. She could no longer meet Medja’s eyes, not when she spoke of loving her like a daughter. Not when she accepted any of the blame when she should not have. Not when she still could not hate her.

‘I saw greatness in you... I thought you could be more…’

A sound escaped Nym, sharp and humourless, her shoulders shaking with a quiet, bitter laugh.
“Why does everyone keep saying that to me?..” she muttered, her voice hoarse.

Her chest hurt. Everything hurt. She swiped at her tears with the back of her remaining hand.
“Just. Fucking. Hate me,” she breathed out, a sigh that almost broke into a sob. “It’ll make things easier.”

Finally, she forced her chin up, her eyes crushed emeralds. “Don’t give me choices, Medja,” she said, her tone sharp despite the quaver that betrayed her. “I don’t know how to make them, I think that much is clear. Just do what you need to do. And be done with it.”

Nym hated that look in Medja’s eyes. Hate, rage, even mockery she could survive - she could spit in the face of those things, strike back at them and feel some small victory. But pity? Pity made her want to crumble to dust where she stood. Pity made her want to cease existing.

She swallowed hard, the motion sharp and painful, her head tipping back to stare up at the vaulted ceiling as though it could hold her together while Medja spoke her sentence. Be thrown to a pit of savages or leave everything she had ever known behind.

And go where?

She had never set foot on ground that wasn’t hot and dry. The world beyond the Empire was just a name, a story told by travellers and traders. The thought of stepping into it made something deep inside her shrivel. Fear, sharp and real, lodged in her chest like a rock.

She wished she’d never gone back. Wished she had stayed in Ragash. Wished she’d remained in that quiet room with Settra on the way to Salitra. Wished she’d turned her back on her father’s shadow and chosen peace. Wished she’d been brave enough to be nobody.

How many times could a broken heart splinter? Hers had been shattered long ago, yet still the pieces seemed to find new ways to break.

“Yes,” she whispered finally, voice raw, head lowering again until she met Medja’s gaze with tears on her cheeks that she didn't care to clear any more. “Yes, it is.”

Her throat worked as she fought to speak the next words, but when she did her voice cracked like glass.
“If I can ask one thing of you… Settra—” she stopped abruptly, breath hitching, and turned her face away to blow out a hard breath, steadying herself. “I have been… terrible. And he loved me anyway.” Her mouth twisted into something between a frown and a grimace. “Please do not punish him for that. He deserves peace.”

She drew in a slow, shaking breath and forced herself to look Medja in the eye again, chin lifting with what remained of her pride.

“I will not leave the Empire to die on foreign soil,” she said, her voice and her decision unwavering. “I’ll die here.”

Stupid girl...

There it was. The anger and frustration starting to breach the surface of Medja's composure. Something loosened in her chest.

She shook her head slowly, almost in disbelief, a hollow laugh rasping out of her as she lifted her arm, staring at the space that her hand should have occupied.. "Start again.." she achoed. "I don’t know who I am now. I don’t know what I would even start as. You speak like Gerra did, as though there’s still something left of me worth saving, but all I’ve done is prove there isn’t.”

She flinched slightly and her throat worked, hard, as Medja's hand pressed to her chest, but her pulse was calm and steady as she held the Empress' gaze.

“You tell me I can live, that I can go and see the world, that I can be free, as though I deserve that.. But I’d carry this with me wherever I went. Every name, every scream, every body, every drop of blood I spilled because I thought that was who I had to be. Do I choose pride over life? No. I choose not to let this thing I’ve become walk another step beyond these sands.”

She swallowed hard, her jaw trembling, her voice dropping to a quiet, almost broken whisper.

“Could you live with yourself?” she asked, her gaze sharp and wet and pleading all at once. “If you realised you became the monster? If you realised you’d killed everything good in you, and that the only mercy left was to stop yourself?”

“I see now. I’d rather die as what's left of me, in clarity and in my right mind and where I belong, than keep living as her.”

Nym’s brows knit tighter as Medja spoke. She was never capable of being as strong as this woman. Medja had clawed her way up from the ashes where Nym had been born into fire and had only ever managed to dig herself deeper into it, choking on smoke and ash until there was no way out.

When the Empress’ arms closed around her, instinct made her body tense, every muscle tight as though bracing for a blade. But it didn’t come. It was just… warmth. It was just Medja, holding her. Nym’s breath hitched sharply, and then the sobs tore out of her chest without permission. She buried her face in Medja’s shoulder like a frightened child, clutching at her with the one hand she still had.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered between uneven, trembling breaths. “I was weak. I am weak. I’m… afraid.” The last word came out so small, as though saying it aloud might shatter what little pride she had left.

She shook her head against Medja’s shoulder, tears soaking into the fabric there. Painless. She did not deserve painless. She deserved to be torn apart, to have every drop of blood she spilled repaid to her tenfold. And yet, she could not bear to be in pain again. Not like the venom she had tried to use. Not like the forge. Not like the white-hot coal searing her severed arm. Not like waking up every day with her chest feeling like a hole had been carved into it. The Haathee clan would ensure she suffered, she was sure of that much.

Her breath trembled as she tried to gather herself, to make her voice steady enough to speak again.

“I thought you were going to give me to the Haathee,” she murmured finally, her throat raw. There was no anger in the words, only quiet confusion. “That is justice. That is what I’ve earned..”

Nym shook. When was the last time she had allowed herself to cry like this? To shake like this? Had she ever been so completely undone in her life? She wasn’t supposed to be vulnerable, she had spent her whole life armoured in anger and venom, but then, she wasn’t supposed to be held like this either.

“I deserve pain,” she said at last, her voice small.. “I… tried. I should have died with venom in my blood. I chose that. And that choice was taken from me.”

Her gaze fell to the stump of her arm, and her face twisted in something between grief and disgust. When her eyes found Medja’s again, wet and glassy, pleading in a way that seemed almost childlike. “ I will not take the easy way. I have angered the Gods enough."

Nym stayed pressed into Medja’s side, the warmth of the Empress’ body a strange and unfamiliar anchor. Her tears soaked the fabric of the woman's robes, but she made no move to pull away. The quiver in her chest was slower now, the jagged ache in her stomach dulled only slightly by the nearness of someone who had once been her guide, her protector.

Screaming in agony didn't sound fun. She'd done that before, many times, but she had always still been alive whenever it had stopped. She had been prepared to argue her case, even as Medja pleaded with her, but then she mentioned how Settra would feel and her eyes squeezed shut, squeezing loose more tears.

She was silent for a while longer, head resting in the crook of Medja's neck as she savoured a comfort she'd never been afforded by her own mother. Perhaps if she had, she might have been better.

"I don’t mean to hurt him,” she murmured again, voice small and fractured. Her remaining hand clutched at Medja’s arm as if she could tether herself to that steadiness, to the knowledge that someone cared enough to hold her when the world had not.

Her head lifted just enough to let her lips brush against the Empress’ shoulder. “Or you,” she whispered, each word weighted with shame and fear. “I’m sorry, Medja.”

The apology hung between them, fragile and jagged, like a shard of glass pressed against skin. Nym drew a shaky breath, closing her eyes against the thought of all she had done, all she had failed at, and all the blood she had spilled. She had wanted punishment, but now, pressed against the one person who had tried to give her everything, it felt as though a painless death was something she might not reject entirely.

"Make it painless, if that's what you wish."