STORY: Lapis Lazuli

PUBLISHED: ​PodCastle, Andromeda Spaceways  |  1000 words |  Reading time: 5 mins

In Sesara, only the rich wear bright colours. My knight shines in the armour I buff for him nightly, glossy as a jewel. My clothes and skin are the colours of the earth. We stand together with two days of desert at our backs and a forest of black thorns before us. My heart is a bird in my chest.
    I was twelve when the slave traders came from the ocean and stole me. To the Sesarans we Arn all look the same. I was always tall and strong. An unscrupulous trader shaved my head and sold me as a boy to fetch a higher price, and I live as a boy still, because it is better than what waits for me as an Arn girl in this country.
    My new master is a field knight and I am the best help he can afford. Sesaran boys have been in no hurry to volunteer as pages since the dragon came.

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