Chapter 4 — Itzima
Itzima woke well after Arsanguir. She had the luxury of a quiet morning: sell the grain, cook dinner, nothing urgent. The bread left on the table was already cooling—Arsanguir's doing before he left at dawn. She ate slowly, then shouldered her sack of grain and walked into the village square.
Her parents had died only a few months before Arsanguir's father, and grief had bound the two of them together deeper than friendship. Almost like family. Still teenagers, they had pooled what little inheritance they had, selling everything else. The land became Arsanguir's fields, the house hers. Since then, they had survived by leaning on each other and no one else.
Passing through the lanes, Itzima stopped at the small temple of Ix-Tazel, goddess of the moon. The temple's walls were carved from lunar stone, the surface catching the sunlight in pale blue shimmer. Villagers prayed there for all manner of things: rain, harvest, even luck with royal taxes.
Further along, taller buildings loomed—the blacksmith, the vast library. The library in particular always drew her. Its walls seemed alive with Kucholel, tapestries shifting and reforming into half-forgotten battles. Scholars still argued who had built it. The empire had simply found it, then raised the village around it. No one had ever entered the sealed chamber of the Ajtaseeb, where the library's keeper was said to dwell.
Itzima kept a habit: sell her grain, then spend an hour or two inside, reading. Today she lingered over texts on Kucholel, tracing the words with her fingers until they sparked faint threads of possibility in her mind. No teacher guided her, but she was already able to shape flickers of energy into form.
When the light shifted, she left. Fresh produce from the market under one arm, she walked home. She set herself to cooking, knife steady in her hand, until movement outside her window caught her eye.
A man stumbled past. Bloodied.
She froze, then turned back to her chopping board, pretending not to notice. The man came closer. She risked another glance, and her stomach lurched.
It was Arsanguir.
He stopped at her porch, leaning heavily. Itzima yelped despite herself, the knife clattering against the table.
Arsanguir's journey home had started almost proud. Replay after replay of the fight circled in his head, already shaping itself into a story. How he might tell Itzima, bending the truth, making himself more impressive.
But the closer he drew to the village, the colder it felt. Parents shielded their children's eyes from him. The elders' stares followed his wounds, their lips curling in sneers. Some even looked pleased to see him broken.
Whatever mood he carried back from the fight rotted into bitterness. Even saving their lives was not enough. To them, he would always be an outcast.
When he looked through the window and saw Itzima, safe and unhurt, relief washed over him. He chuckled as she flinched—pretending to ignore him until he was close enough to be unavoidable.
She rushed out, slid under his arm, and helped him inside.
"Arsi—what happened? Who did this to you? Why?" The words tumbled out, overlapping, not giving him space to answer.
Arsanguir hesitated, running the story through his head one more time. Then he grinned, though his voice was low.
"It's a… it's a long story, Itzy. Maybe later."
She caught the cheeky grin under the dirt and blood and sighed, half relieved.
"If you're well enough to joke, you're well enough to explain. Tell me now, or I'll hang you with the bandages."
She laughed as she fetched cloth and water.
While she wrapped his wounds, Arsanguir gave her the story—stretched, magnified, told with boyish swagger. Itzima listened, half crying, half laughing, relieved just to hear him sound young again. Too often lately he had been cold, stoic, hiding his troubles from her until it felt like he was drifting away.
Dinner came after. Arsanguir ate slowly, lost in thought, the taste of iron still in his mouth. The dead bandit returned again in his mind. The image of all of them slaughtered.
"Are you sure you're alright, Arsi?" she asked again, voice low.
"I'm all good," he lied. "Just glad to be alive. Glad to be home."
Later, he set his few belongings on the table. His eyes lingered on the broken pitchfork, prongs twisted and useless. He sat it down gently, like a relic, before collapsing onto the sofa.
Not wanting him to be alone, Itzima brought blankets and lay down beside him. Neither spoke. They moved together in silence, each gesture careful, as though words would break something fragile.
In the dark, as she blew out the candle, she whispered into the space between them:
"Aris? You really are something special. You know that."
She fell asleep against him.
Arsanguir stared into the dark. He let himself cry, quietly, while her breathing evened out. Not sadness. Terror. He pressed a hand to his chest, felt his heart pound too heavy, too uneven. This world of battles and glory—his dream since boyhood—was darker than the stories had ever told.
The days that followed blurred. Itzima tended his wounds, repeating words of comfort. For her, the bond they shared shifted—less sibling, more something she couldn't quite name.
On their last night together in the living room, Arsanguir kissed her forehead before pulling her close. Sleep came with dreams of more battles, more journeys.
But Itzima did not sleep. Her face burned red as her thoughts spun restlessly, her cheek pressed to his chest.
Weeks later, the routine returned. The fields. The markets. The same tired paths. Arsanguir healed enough to speak of leaving again. This time, a hunting trip. A long one. To make up for lost time. To stockpile for winter.
Itzima tried to smile.