live out the rest of my life among the Dakkari, never to see my brother again.
And now this.
The ceremonial outfit was only a short, hide skirt, embroidered with beautiful gold swirling stitching accompanied by a heavy gold necklace. The necklace had one wide strand that wrapped around my throat and one thick plate that hung at the level of my breasts. My bared breasts.
“Where’s—where’s the top?” I asked, my voice sounding breathless and light.
“No top, Missiki,” Mirari replied, taking a pot of gold paint from Lavi. She dabbed her fingers into it and then smeared it over one of my pebbled nipples, making me screech in surprise and dart away, rounding the bed. The necklace bobbed against my breasts, cold and heavy.
“What are you doing?” I cried, looking down at my nipple.
Mirari eyed me carefully and then let out a long sigh. “This is the Dakkari way, Missiki.”
“N-no,” I said, holding out my hands when she approached me. “Stop.”
“Missiki, this is for the Vorakkar. You must.”
“How does this have anything to do with him?” I cried out, my voice climbing higher and higher in my panic. My heart was racing fast and my rushing blood was loud in my ears.
This might just be my breaking point. Out of everything, a short skirt and painted nipples had broken me.
“He will take the gold into his mouth tonight, consume it so it is a part of him,” Mirari explained, as if she were talking about how clear the skies were today and not about Arokan licking my nipples clean. “It is the Dakkari—”
“The Dakkari way, I know. I know,” I whispered, staring at the little gold pot like it was a blade in her hands.
Goddess help me. What was with the Dakkari and gold?
I knew there was no escaping this. Just like everything else that had happened thus far.
Inhaling a sharp breath, I snatched the pot from her grasp and said, “I’ll do it myself.”
Mirari let me have the pot and shuffled backwards, to stand next to Lavi, who I thought looked a little amused.
Hands trembling, I painted my nipples and areolas gold until they glittered in the candlelight of the tent. Once I was done, I tugged the necklace plate, encrusted with red jewels, so that it helped cover my breasts. But it wasn’t enough.
“You are ready,” Mirari announced and another jolt of fear and nerves shot through me.
I felt like a stranger again, that desperate emotion rising inside me. I’d allowed Mirari and Lavi to have their way with me. They’d brushed and dried and volumized my hair until it fell in soft, big waves down my back. Into the strands, they’d threaded in little gold beads and cuffs that I heard jingle whenever I moved my head.
To my face, they’d taken a surprisingly light hand, only outlining my eyes with thin, gold strokes, bringing out colors in my irises I hadn’t even known I’d possessed. To my cheekbones and lips, they’d dusted both with a shimmery gold powder.
When I looked at myself in the small mirror they’d brought, I hardly recognized myself. My chest was heaving with shortened breaths as I took in their handiwork. My hair had never been fuller and my face seemed softened by the gold powder. My eyes looked desperate and wild and I couldn’t stand to look at myself for long, so I turned the mirror away.
“I’m ready,” I whispered, taking in a long breath. Better to get this over with.
Night had fallen hours ago. One of the darkest nights too, considering it was a ‘black moon.’ Or a new moon, as the humans called it. Mirari and Lavi guided me from the tent and when I stepped outside, shivering a bit in the cool air, my eyes found Arokan’s. He was waiting for me.
Breath hitching, I took him in. He’d gotten ready elsewhere considering that he wore a hanging fur cloth and not the pants he’d had on when he’d left the tent earlier. His hair was loose and long down his back, his tail was decorated in gold cuffs, and his eyes were lined in black, making the yellow ring of his irises that much more intense.
My belly quivered. He was watching me with a silent ferocity that made me feel like prey and when I straightened, the necklace bobbed at my bare breasts, drawing his gaze there.
Even from a distance, I heard him make a sound, almost like a growl. It made my nerves jump even higher, especially when I noticed