Ravage

A hand landed on my shoulder pulling me from the memory. Avto was looking at me in concern.

“Miss, are you okay?”

“Yes,” I whispered, then shook my head, “I don’t know. It’s just all so … I had hoped and prayed that he had survived, that both of them had, but when nothing was heard in all of these years, I had lost that hope. It, it is all too much to take in.”

A sinking feeling hit my stomach. “Are you certain, Avto? I’m not sure I could take it if this was a mistake. My heart has been broken for over twenty years; it cannot take any more pain.” Avto’s gentle brown eyes softened. “We are sure, miss.”

I frowned. “But is he in hiding still? Who has been protecting him all of these years? How has his identity been found out? Is he in danger?”

Avto’s soft gaze turned sorrowful. My hand jerked out and wrapped around his arm. “Avto? Tell me. Where has my sykhaara been?”

Avto sucked in a long inhale and said quietly, “Miss, the Jakhua took your brothers and used them.”

“Used them? How? I don’t understand?” I wanted answers.

Avto tensed and said, “Miss, there are things in our world that you are unaware of. People that exist, places that exist, only in the underworld. Only in secret.”

My eyebrows pulled down. “Avto, what are you trying to tell me? Where has my Zaal been? What did that man do to my brothers?”

Avto’s arm muscle was rigid under my hand. Taking a deep breath, he explained, “Zoya, the Jakhuas were developing drugs.”

“What kind of drugs?” I asked.

“Obedience drugs, miss. Drugs that wipe the memories of the victims, coerce them into doing horrific and despicable acts.”

I swallowed, my chest tightening. “Like what?” I whispered.

Avto’s shoulders slumped. “Killing. Murdering. Doing anything their Master asks of them. And I mean anything. No matter the moral implications.”

Bile built in my throat, but I choked it back down. “And Jakhua.” I swallowed again when my voice broke. “Jakhua used this drug on my brothers?”

Avto nodded, but his face blanched.

“What?” I probed.

“Miss,” Avto rasped, “Masters Zaal and Anri were not simply put under the influence of the drug. It was on your brothers that the drug was developed.”

I stared. I stilled. My hands trembled. My throat closed in, but I managed to ask, “He, Jakhua, he used my brothers to test his drug on? He experimented on them like laboratory rats?”

Hot tears streamed down my cheeks when Avto answered, “Yes, miss. Since they were twins he used them to test all the stages of the drug’s development. He compared the results.”

Jumping to my feet, I ran to the wastebasket and threw up.

Avto followed behind, his old hand gently pressing my back in comfort. But there was no comfort to be found at the thought of my brothers, my strong and brave beloved brothers, being injected with that, that poison, for years and years, until they had no memory—

Gasping, I wiped my mouth and turned to face Avto. “Their memories? Zaal’s memories?” Fear filled me as I confronted the possibility that my brother would not know who I was. It had to be the cruelest of God’s jokes, my twenty-year wait for their return, only to find one of my brothers, my only family, could be a stranger.

“We have heard that his memories are returning each day, and Zoya, we believe he remembers you, but—”

“But what?” I said almost inaudibly.

“Miss,” Avto said, and stepped closer, “he believes you died in the massacre. He has no idea that you survived. He never got word that your body was never found.”

My head fell forward at the thought of Zaal remembering his family after all of these years of blackness, only to believe we had all perished. “He is all alone?” I asked, imagining what he must be going through.

Avto did not say anything in response. When I lifted my head, Avto was rigid, his seventy-five-year-old body taut with tension. This time I didn’t ask what was wrong. I simply waited.

“He is not alone,” Avto admitted, after many strained seconds.

“He has minders that found him? People loyal to our family?”

Avto shook his head, his crepe-thin skin paling. I edged forward and placed my hand on his arm. “Avto?”

But Avto did not say anything; instead he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled put a picture. My heart kicked into a sprint as I stared at the white back of the photograph. Zaal. I knew my Zaal was in that picture.

I reached out my hand, but Avto pulled it back. I met his eyes in annoyance. Avto cleared his throat. “Zaal is not alone, Zoya. We have heard the news that he is recently engaged to be wed.”

My lips parted in shock and I shook my head. “Engaged? How is that possible? I thought he had been imprisoned by Jakhua? When did he have time to find a woman? I don’t understand how any of this is possible.”

Avto stared down at the picture in his hand, then pushed it out for me to take. My hands shook as I reached out and grasped the picture. I brought it to my chest and closed my eyes. I’d always wondered what Zaal would look like older. Would he be as tall and strong as I always thought he would be? Would he still wear his black hair down to the middle of his back, like the Georgian warriors of old? Would he still smile with carefree abandon, yet be quiet and reserved in personality?

The picture against my chest felt like it was burning a hole through my clothes. With a deep breath, I pulled the picture back and dropped my gaze to the two figures captured in the scene.

My heart swelled in my chest at as I stared at the man. The hugely built man with olive tanned skin and long black hair that fell to his back. His green eyes were bright, three moles standing proud under his left eye.

And he was smiling.

He was smiling so wide. The smile packed with an abundance of love, as my brother—my now adult and strong brother—stared down at a woman with nothing but adoration.

My eyes drifted across the picture to the woman and a lump clogged my throat. She was beautiful. Long blond hair fell down her back. She was slight of build, utterly captivating, and her deep brown eyes were looking up at Zaal, her lips smiling, too.

It felt surreal. My brother who I thought had died was very much alive. Alive and in love. My heart was full and warm.

Bringing the picture closer to my face, I could see tattoos marring Zaal’s skin, and on closer inspection I could see scars littering bare arms revealed under his short-sleeved shirt. I had to close my eyes as a wave of sorrow washed over me. What must he have gone through under the hand of that evil man?