Chapter Text
Jamil was a creature of habits. His whole life, for as long as he could remember, had been structured around a rigid routine that rarely changed.
And even though he might complain about certain aspects of that routine—since several were exhausting in the long run and he saw no pleasure in maintaining those—Jamil Viper appreciated having a consistent routine. It was one of the few certainties he had in his life, especially after the incidents involving overblots, styx, and the fiasco in the world of dreams; having that routine was almost a comfort to a certain extent.
Kalim, differently than many might imagine, was also a creature of habits. It was something Jamil appreciated about the boy, that Kalim was easily adaptable to a different routine, yet remained within the one they both knew so well. Of course, after certain events, the routine had changed a bit, but never enough to disrupt the systems Jamil had spent so much time neurotically crafting.
It was completely perfect, unchanging, and—
“Are you going to have more? That’s your third plate, Kalim.” Jamil questioned, shocked, his eyes fixed on Kalim’s completely empty plate as he stood up. Kalim just laughed, that slightly nervous laugh of his, looking somewhat embarrassed by this behavior.
“I know I shouldn’t stuff myself, and I swear I’m not, but I’m still so hungry! Lilia says it’s fine, says it’s my growth kicking in full force, so just worry about me getting waaaay taller, hehe!” Kalim flashes a big smile, his eyes closing just for a moment before he turned toward another spot in the cafeteria to grab a little more food for his plate.
Kalim wasn’t a glutton; in fact, it was extremely unusual to see him going back for seconds. After years of being poisoned, it had become almost second nature for Kalim to never eat more than necessary. So you wouldn’t normally see him overeating, or even really eating in front of people—at most, tiny bits of food or treats given to him by someone else.
However, Jamil had noticed a while ago that Kalim had started eating twice as much as he used to, and even his water intake had increased significantly; now Kalim even carried a small water bottle with him just in case.
It was strange. Not so far outside the routine or standards that Jamil was used to, but enough to raise red flags about the whole situation. Too suspicious to ignore, and as a servant of the Al Asim family and Kalim’s personal bodyguard, part of his job was to question this sort of thing, to doubt the reasons behind his behavior.
As a servant, Jamil had a job to do.
But, alas, Jamil wasn’t really Kalim’s servant anymore, was he?
Sure, as far as their respective families were concerned, Jamil and Kalim still had a master-servant relationship, but for both of them, that had become a thing of the past that neither liked to recall. They were friends—perhaps not best friends as Kalim would have liked, but they were indeed quite close friends, and Jamil somewhat cherished this new friendship they were both delicately building. It was good; Jamil felt a little happy about it, but he couldn’t deny the fragility of the situation yet.
“Jamil? Are you okay? You’ve been staring into space for a while.” Kalim’s voice snaps Jamil out of his thoughts. He had already returned to the table, with a plate of food in front of him that was already half-eaten; Jamil hadn’t even noticed his presence, which in the old days would have been unthinkable for him. Kalim was so loud and noisy, but it seemed that after everything, Jamil could no longer notice those sounds.
Kalim was no longer a major annoyance in his life; perhaps that was why his presence no longer alarmed Jamil.
“Yeah, sorry, I was thinking about an assignment from Crewel. He seemed more irritable than usual.”
“OH, you noticed too?! Ever since he had that ugly fight with Vargas in front of the mill, he’s been so grumpy he’s almost surpassing LEONA’s bad mood!” Kalim’s voice was animated, excitedly recounting things he’d heard from Lilia, Cater, and Azul about what might have been the reasons for such an unexpected fight between their teachers.
Jamil just listened in silence, adding a piece or two of information he’d heard from Ace and Floyd about what had happened, but it was Kalim’s voice that stood out in that conversation. Excited, a little raspy, talking so enthusiastically about a topic that Jamil didn’t even really care about. But he still enjoyed that noise; he’d gotten used to Kalim’s noises, and on the rare occasions when Jamil couldn’t hear them, it felt wrong.
Maybe Jamil should ask about food and water—a subject that bothered Viper so much—but he didn’t. It seemed like something complicated, something that could ruin the little harmony they had. And as Kalim’s friend, allegedly not a servant, he should wait until Kalim was ready to tell him.
A good friend would do that.
Jamil didn’t feel like a good friend.
Yet he doesn’t question it; he doesn’t do anything about it.
“This sure is a fever…” Jamil murmurs beside Kalim’s bed, his eyes fixed on the thermometer as if it had offended Jamil’s entire family. It was rare for Jamil to use one; Kalim’s immune system was incredibly strong, and Jamil had hardly ever seen Kalim with a fever or the common cold.
But, strangely enough, this was the second time Kalim had gotten sick in less than a month and a half. It left a bad taste in Jamil’s mouth, as if something were oddly wrong—very wrong.
“Kalim—”
“Sorry, Jamil, I think it’s my training.” Kalim whispered, his voice much hoarser than Jamil had ever heard before. His red eyes almost seemed hypnotized, blurred with exhaustion and illness that weakened his body so much; even his cheeks were more rosy.
“Training?” Jamil asked, a little confused. Since when did Kalim do training? He’d never been the type to need training; even with a certain mediocrity when it came to things like alchemy and history, Kalim was certainly a natural at any physical activity. It seemed unreal, illogical, that he’d need any kind of training that would benefit him.
“Mhm, you see, I’ve been asking Riddle and Silver for help to improve my magical control! I think I’ve taken it to the limit, haha, I’m really sorry for getting in the way…” Kalim smiled, looking guilty and weak, the corners of that smile trembling from the fever that left him so worn out.
Kalim, even if Jamil wouldn’t admit it out loud, was an extremely talented mage and had great control over his unique magic. It was incredible to see that in such a short time, he had perfected Oasis Maker in amazing ways. However, never for combat—Kalim seemed to have a very strong hesitation about using his unique magic for combat, and it was something Jamil never fully understood.
If it were Azul, Jamil thinks with a degree of mockery, he would have turned Kalim’s unique magic into a powerful secret weapon.
“How much have you been training to wear yourself out so much? Isn’t the point of your magic a lot of water and little effort? You’ve already filled the desert once.” Jamil questions, his curiosity mixed with a certain skepticism. It seemed suspicious, irrational, too strange to go unnoticed.
But then again, what wasn’t strange in NRC? Stress could be a factor in Kalim’s illness; combined with this strange training he was apparently doing, it could also explain why his hunger had increased. He was expending too much energy on it; it made sense that he’d be so affected.
And yet Jamil couldn’t help but have this feeling. A sense of something being off, that something was wrong with the environment around them and with everything he was being told. But everything was the same—the usual environment that Jamil had a routine of tidying up and organizing. The sheets were in their place, the extra box of medicine was full and stored in the bedside table next to Kalim’s bed, the vase of black dahlias was full with flowers but a kinda weird familiar smell, the expensive embroidered curtains were clean and perfect, the jewelry was extremely shiny and perfectly polished, and—
Hold on, there was something in the room that Jamil hadn’t noticed before.
“With all those special training sessions, I think I might have gone a bit overboard, haha.” Kalim’s words betrayed a sense of guilt; he was genuinely bothered by the fact that he’d gone too far. This pulled something inside Jamil’s chest—a feeling similar to pity—that made him focus his attention entirely on Kalim.
”What’s the point of training, huh? Are you trying to become some kind of incredible fighter after the ass-whooping I put you through in the dream?” The tone was casual, though of course there was that hint of snark that Jamil usually carried, but the clear attempt to be playful while teasing Kalim made the heir let out a surprised laugh before his face shifted to a rather offended expression.
“HEY! I hit you pretty hard too! There were marks, I remember that!” Kalim pointed at Jamil, his irritated expression looking somewhat pathetic due to the signs of illness. It was funny; Jamil poked Kalim’s cheek while looking at him with disdain and taunting.
“Mhm, sure, you definitely caught me off guard at one point, but the one who couldn’t keep going after taking a few hits was you, not me. It’s okay, Kalim, you’ve got skinny little noodle arms; of course you couldn’t compete with me.” Jamil shrugs, those rare moments of ego showing through after hiding them for so long. Kalim laughs, a faint laugh, but one so honest that it puts Jamil's heart at ease for a moment.
It was like a certainty that everything would be okay, that tomorrow Kalim would be better, as always.
However, the cough that follows that honest laugh completely shatters the gentle, hopeful atmosphere between them. It’s painful, agonizing; Jamil almost fears that blood will come out of Kalim’s mouth. The heir curls up in bed, his hands covering his mouth so tightly, as if he’s afraid something will come out of there.
“Kalim?” Jamil reaches out his hand toward the heir, a hint of concern in his voice.
“W…water…” Kalim speaks with such difficulty that it startles Jamil a little; his voice was hoarse and almost too hard to understand. As if it were scratching at Kalim’s throat to get out, it almost seemed like it had to force its way through to be heard.
Jamil doesn’t respond at first, driven by an almost morbid curiosity to see if anything would come out of Kalim’s mouth. Perhaps a creature would escape, perhaps the reasons for his strange behavior would become clear to him. It seemed the truth was so close to being revealed.
But then, Kalim’s eyes meet Jamil’s.
“I’ll be right back,” Jamil says, his body moving almost automatically toward the bedroom door. His steps are quick and nervous, almost like he’s about to run.
It was as if he were running away from something, but Jamil couldn’t quite figure out what. His fists clenched at his sides, and there was a bitter taste in his mouth, something weighing on his chest in a strange way.
It seemed irrational, absurd—he was only going to get the water Kalim had asked for, and yet his body seemed ashamed of his own actions. He felt as if he’d done something wrong, but that thought was unfounded, considering he’d done only what his master had asked.
“Master…” Jamil whispers before letting out a laugh laced with pure sarcasm. “I thought he was my friend—isn’t that why I didn’t ask any questions?” he asks himself, running a hand across his face with a touch of anger. Frustration took the place of his previous emotions, which haunted him like ghosts of things he would never understand.
Jamil really didn’t feel like a good friend; perhaps he wasn’t even capable of being one at this point in his life. He had grown so accustomed to the role of servant and antagonist that he seemed incapable of being a good friend.
After all, a good friend would have stayed after seeing the way Kalim’s eyes looked so relieved that Jamil was still there.
But was it really Jamil’s problem?
Whatever was going through Kalim’s mind, whatever he wanted from Jamil, the Al-Asim heir would normally say it out loud. Kalim had never been the type to hide such things from Jamil, and since the events within Jamil’s dream, he had become even more open about his own feelings.
So perhaps this was none of Jamil’s business; after all, it wasn’t as if Kalim were dying right there—Jamil would know if that were the case.
Jamil would know if it were important.
“Would one of you two care to explain exactly what happened?” Jamil rubbed his temples, feeling a sharp pain shoot through his head at this scene. There was Cater and Kalim, looking embarrassed, both covered in dirt and leaves, while Lilia tried to stop the youngest one’s nose from bleeding.
“So, haha, it was this really cool trend we saw in that magazine, you know, the all-girls school magazine from Shaftland. It was a trend that got super popular in Spelltok using a broom, and since we all know Kalim is #thebestofusinflying, he agreed to do the trend with us but—” Cater begins to explain nervously, his fingers twirling strands of hair while his eyes stare at the door. It seemed like he was afraid that someone from Heartslabyul would show up there, and Jamil knew very well that if Trey or Riddle heard about the incident, they wouldn’t let Cater off the hook.
“He crashed into a tree.” Lilia says with a smiling expression, but his eyebrows were furrowed with a certain irritation at Kalim’s nose, which kept dripping. “Sorry I had to call you, Jamil. Kalim mentioned that you didn’t like the smell of the nurse’s office, so we tried to handle it on our own, but his nose won’t stop. And despite my countless years of war and life, I’m not capable of dealing with bloody noses.” Lilia sighs, dramatically and tiredly.
“Lils, you raised a child—are you saying Silver never had a bloody nose??” Kalim says, his voice slightly nasal, stuffing more tissue up his nose as soon as another one gets soaked with blood.
“Oh, I didn’t deal with that. Malleus would always show up like a banshee whenever Silver scraped his knee or bumped into something. I swear, he wouldn’t even let me take care of my own son sometimes! Those overprotective dragons.” Lilia continues his dramatic performance, making both Cater and Kalim laugh at his words.
Jamil didn’t laugh, closing his eyes as he rubbed his thumb across his brow.
Jamil’s sense of smell couldn’t compare to Kalim’s, who had been trained to identify the subtle scent of poisons at a very young age, much less to that of the beastfolks of Savanaclaw. But when he concentrated, Jamil could identify a very specific range of odors.
Blood had a smell that Jamil didn’t like. Old blood, on top of that, was extremely foul to the point that it made Jamil nauseous.
For this reason, Jamil used to strongly avoid the NRC nurse’s office. The smell of alcohol and blood would give him a headache after a while, so it only made sense for him to try to resolve any incident on his own so he wouldn’t have to deal with it.
But now he was here, smelling the stench of fresh and old blood mixed together.
“I’m going to our dorm first to get some things for you,” Jamil says, annoyed, opening his eyes to stare at the trio who looked guilty and remorseful. “Please wipe the blood off your hands and take Kalim to the mirror after the nurse confirms whether it’s broken or not.” The two irresponsible adults nodded in agreement, smiling determinedly at them.
Jamil didn’t trust Lilia and Cater one bit, but he also couldn’t think straight with that horrible smell permeating the room.
“Jamil, I’m fine, no need to stress over this! My nose isn’t broken; I’d know.” And in fact, Kalim would know very well the difference between a broken nose and one that’s just a little bruised—not that it was actually a good thing, but an undeniable reality.
Jamil didn’t respond to Kalim’s words, already too exhausted by the situation to say anything. So he left the room, leaving behind the trio who quickly began chatting excitedly as if Kalim’s nose weren’t gushing liters of blood.
On the way back to the dorm, Jamil took a deep breath, trying to wash away the smell of the nurse’s office with the smells of the school.
Apples, the gentle scent of magic and burning wood, that was the scent of NRC. Subtle, never overpowering the students’ own scents, that aroma that came from their dormitories like a cool breeze. Heartslabyul always smelled of sweets, like an entire bakery that had just opened, mixed with the soft fragrance of roses. In contrast, Jamil felt that Scarabia had a fruity scent of mango and coconut, but with the arrival of Kalim, the scent had also gained a hint of wet earth.
“The aroma of rain” the students in his dorm would say with a big smile, for despite the intense heat and the scorching sun, Scarabia always smelled of fresh rain. It had become a comfort to some—not that Jamil really understood why—but they had told him at some of Kalim’s parties just how happy it made them.
Perhaps it was a reminder that Kalim was there, for although Jamil was clearly more competent than Kalim, the heir was extremely beloved by the entire dormitory. Not because he was the heir, not because of his wealth; the people of Scarabia seemed to love Kalim for his kindness and joy.
This was the reality: Kalim was painfully loved by the students of Scarabia, those who would put on grand, extravagant parades knowing that in the end, Kalim would fill their cups with the freshest, most delicious water ever created.
Kalim, which smelled like coconut, rain, and—
Blood?
Jamil stopped in the middle of Kalim’s room, his forehead furrowed as he looked around. Yes, Kalim’s room smelled of coconut and rain, but there was a third scent there that was unwelcome in that environment. It was faint, almost imperceptible—a smell of old blood mixed with something else.
Where? How? Jamil had helped clean that room; he had diligently cleaned every inch of it. There was no way he could have seen blood and not scrubbed it away obsessively to make sure no trace of old blood remained. He was certain of that—it was impossible.
Jamil would have noticed something, of course he would have; he would have seen bloodstains.
The curtains were spotless, the fabrics on Kalim’s bed a perfect cream color, the floor gleamed from being so clean, and the flowers—
Flowers, yes, black dahlias that Kalim had arranged some time ago. Jamil didn’t like them, but Kalim seemed to have a deep affection for those flowers; after all, the number of flowers in the vase kept growing as the days went by. But Jamil couldn’t understand it, with their ugly color and their abnormal thorns and the bloodstains on their petals…
Bloodstains on their petals.
Jamil reaches out his hand, trembling and hesitant, toward the hideous vase of dahlias. The petals had a reddish tint at their tips, almost impossible to see if Jamil hadn’t been paying such close attention to them. The texture at the tips was different from the rest, looking more like dried paint—it wasn’t natural. With the flower now in his hands, Jamil could also see that the tips of its thorns had the same red coloration, though it was slightly more noticeable.
“Increased appetite, weakened health, need for more fluids…” Jamil mutters to himself. Jamil feels his stomach churn as the grotesque and disgusting realization washes over him. The undeniable reality, the one he’d spent so long ignoring, was right in front of him.
But it was impossible. It was completely impossible.
Kalim would have told Jamil—no, Jamil would have noticed right away. Kalim wasn’t that smart; he wouldn’t have been able to hide something like that for so long without Jamil noticing a thing. With flowers in that state—fully grown and their roots reaching for more—it was simply impossible that Kalim could have hidden his painful coughs.
However, Jamil reflects as he feels the bile in his mouth, Kalim had had a crisis in front of him, hadn’t he? That painful cough, which sounded as if a spiteful creature were about to emerge from Kalim’s dry lips—Jamil had seen that with his own eyes, hadn’t he? It was he who had chosen to leave, not to see it through to the end; it was Jamil who had denied that Kalim had—
“Jamil?” Kalim’s voice echoes through the room, pathetic and fearful. There was fear in it—a dread that Jamil vaguely recognized from the time he was exposed by Octavinelle. It was the same stupidly pathetic tone Kalim had used when he discovered the truth.
“By the Seven Kalim, if you keep acting like this, I’m afraid you’ll end up being sanctified alongside the other Seven, y’know? Jamil’s words drip with venom, loathing, and a disgust that he didn’t even understand where it came from exactly, but which he appreciated.
Jamil felt something in his chest, an emotion he couldn’t quite equate to anger or sadness; it was a kind of sensation that, in 17 years, Jamil had never truly felt. So strange, yet so strong that it overwhelmed every one of Jamil’s senses like a wildfire spreading relentlessly.
“Excuse me?” Kalim’s surprise, with his blood-red eyes wide with innocence, pisses Jamil off completely.
“Of course, after so many sacrifices for the GOOD of others, being the martyr who suffers in silence, I know you’ll have an incredible place alongside the other seven. You must feel so incredibly superior to all of us that we can’t just keep quiet about it.” Jamil laughs, a short, bitter laugh, while Kalim stares at him with a dumbfounded expression of utter shock, looking like a dead fish.
“Is that what you think of me? That I want to suffer in silence—for what?! To feel somehow better than everyone else?!” Kalim looks offended, his expression frustrated, but those pathetic, empty eyes of his reveal something close to sadness and guilt.
Guilt, how dare he.
“What am I supposed to think, huh?” WHY ON EARTH WOULD ANYONE HIDE HANAHAKI LIKE THIS, KALIM?! LEAVING THE FLOWERS IN THE ROOM, AS A PATHETIC WAY TO SHOW THAT YOU CAN TAKE IT ALL WITHOUT BOTHERING ANYONE?” Jamil threw the flower he was holding in Kalim’s face, but Kalim simply dares to dodge it, walking toward Jamil.
“Where am I supposed to put them?! They're flowers—it’s not like they’re to blame for existing for the wrong reasons, Jamil! And if I threw a huge bunch of flowers in the trash, it would look even more suspicious! AND STOP making up stories about me when you literally know nothing about what’s going on with me.” Kalim tries to grab the vase, to pull it away from Jamil, but Jamil snatches the flowers on impulse, quickly stepping away from Kalim. They stare at each other, anger radiating from their eyes as if words they’d never spoken were rising to the surface.
“Oh, so it wasn’t a self-sacrifice. Okay then, Kalim, tell me your amazing reasons for not telling me after you’ve been fucking with my patience for months so we could be friends, huh?” Jamil smiles, anger mixing with that hideous feeling inside him, that emotion that makes Jamil want to puke on Kalim’s shoes. “Was it to punish me? So that when you were found in a few months, surrounded by those hideous flowers, people would know you died because of me? Did you hide it to get revenge for my overblot?”
“HA, I’m not the one petty enough to come up with a plan like that, and we both know it!”
“Petty?! DO YOU think you have the right to call me petty?!”
“I have EVERY right to call you petty. Of all the people in this school, it was ME who had to deal with your petty and malicious acts that had no good enough reason to exist.” Jamil laughs mockingly, holding some of the flowers and letting his fire magic burn them until they turn into glowing embers. As if they never existed, for they had no right to exist.
“Serving the Al Asim family for 17 years is reason enough for me to be incredibly petty, Kalim. I could even be called a slave, if we’re in a bad mood right now.”
“I didn’t force you to do anything!”
The fire rages between them, while the flowers burn and Kalim tries in vain to snatch the flowers from Jamil’s hands. Stupidly trying to save those native plants.
“Your existence forced me into everything!”
“Then why are you so angry?! If I die with these stupid flowers, your misery ends, doesn’t it? So let me die!”
Absurd—how could Kalim be so idiotic? How could he look at Jamil with those fearful eyes, terrified by the idea of dying, and ask Jamil to simply let him die? He’d never thought of Kalim as the brightest person in the room, but the stupidity of the moment was surprising Jamil.
“Who do you think would be to blame for your death after this, hm?! Use a little common sense for ONCE in your life, and THINK about who would be to blame.”
“You think I haven’t thought about that? I’m sorry to say, but I’m not that stupid, Jamil. I had it all planned out. I’m going to stay alive until you’re free and far away from me in some country where you’ve found your happiness and don’t even think about me anymore.”
Only one flower remained. A measly dahlia. While Kalim kept spouting stupid, senseless nonsense.
“You—I won’t let you do that.”
“Do what?!”
“Turn our relationship—whatever it's based on right now—into some stupid tragedy. I refuse to let this be your—OUR ENDING!”
The silence that enveloped them after Jamil’s words was deafening. Louder than the parties Kalim had thrown, more grandiose than any parade he had ever organized.
That silence was suffocatingly loud.
“Jamil—” Kalim starts.
“No! Just shut up! Shut the hell up—I don't want to hear your excuses, your reasons, or your motivations for keeping up this act. I, with all the sincerity you’ve always wanted, Kalim, couldn’t care LESS about the details of all this! What I care about is knowing that this was happening right under my nose and I… I…” The words die on Jamil’s lips, like a reality he wanted so badly to ignore and deny. The truth was so grotesque, so sticky, that it clung to his chest like hot glue.
Jamil didn’t notice Kalim’s pain. He didn’t notice the suffering of someone he knew better than he ever knew himself; he didn’t notice how slowly Kalim was agonizing in his suffering alone.
Jamil, who had lived his entire life alongside Kalim, didn’t notice that the person he was raised to protect was dying silently. He didn’t notice a thing. And that truth, that undeniable fact, was the most painful thing Jamil had ever felt in his chest.
The guilt weighed on Jamil’s chest more than anything he had ever experienced in his 17 years of life.
“Jamil?!” Kalim seemed startled by something, his eyes wide and his mouth slightly open. Jamil didn’t understand why, until he felt an unfamiliar warmth running down his cheeks. Tears, heavy and full of emotions he had spent years denying, streamed down his face against his will.
"You can’t die. I won’t let you, I don’t want you to, you simply can’t die. Not like this, not this way—you’ve been through so much, Kalim, you don’t have the right to die young and pathetic! No, you have to live, be the eldest Asim in your family—you have to keep breathing and prove that kindness is stronger than any nonsense your family taught you—” Jamil chokes on his words between tears. He, who had never cried before, felt suffocated by the heavy tears that dared to spill from him. Shame, fury, and guilt mingled and overflowed like a tsunami inside a glass of water.
Jamil feels his body losing all strength, his legs finally collapsing and his knees hitting the hard floor of Kalim’s room with a sickening thud. His fist clenches the flowers—the ugly dahlias—in his hand, indifferent to the thorns piercing his palm.
Kalim runs toward him, his hands reaching for Jamil, but never touching him. As if Kalim had no right to touch Jamil, as if it would stain Jamil’s imaginary purity with the blood that stained his martyr’s hands.
Jamil wants to scream so loud, hit Kalim, and curse him with all the things he’s always wanted to say. Yet, like a foolish child, he throws himself into Kalim’s arms in desperation. His trembling hands cling to Kalim as if it were a necessity, as if Kalim would disappear if he loosened his grip even just a bit. Fear—the terror of losing Kalim—drowns out any other emotion that tried to surface.
Because, even with so much anger, fear has always been the feeling that has guided Jamil most throughout his entire life.
“Jamil, I didn't—” That cough then made its presence known. The sound was the same, and the way Kalim's body trembled in Jamil's arms was no different from the last time, yet it seemed even more painful than the previous time, which Jamil had barely witnessed in its entirety.
Perhaps it was the lack of morbid curiosity, or perhaps it was the guilt consuming Jamil's body like a hungry beast seeking its pathetic prey. There was also the possibility that Kalim was no longer able to hold back the cough, the blood slowly trickling from the corners of his mouth, and the nails trying to scratch at his own throat.
Could there be nail marks beneath some elaborate makeup? A clear demonstration of silent suffering, of a selfish punishment, of a child dressed as an adult.
So many thoughts raced through Jamil’s mind as he held Kalim’s restless body, which was suffocating painfully from the cursed dahlias that had taken control of his lungs. Those hellish plants, which had decided to bloom in a body brimming with life and water.
Minutes pass, or perhaps hours, until the flower rises completely through Kalim’s mouth and is dumped, covered in blood, onto the golden floor.
Jamil wants to burn it.
Jamil wants to burn that entire room, the whole environment that dared to harbor those stupid flowers and hid Kalim’s humiliating selfishness.
“I’m sorry…” Kalim whispers, tearfully, his voice so broken it sends shivers down Jamil’s spine. It didn’t sound like Kalim, and for a second, that was terrifying.
“How long?” Jamil doesn’t take his eyes off the dahlia. It drips, its black color slowly seeping through the scarlet red so similar to Kalim’s eyes.
“Does it matter?” No, Jamil thinks after hearing those words from Kalim; the duration of this self-inflicted torture never really mattered, but a certain self-centered part of him would like to know what was happening right under his nose. He, with his pride in his sleeve, wanted to know at what point he began to fail to notice something so important about Kalim.
“I wanted you to know, without me having to tell you.” Kalim confesses, a laugh without a shred of sincerity escaping his lips. “Part of me wanted you to force the truth out of me, but you… didn’t do that.”
Jamil wanted to mock him, childishly pointing out that he was incapable of reading Kalim’s mind, let alone understanding his silly and troubling thoughts.
But, he reflects, isn’t that what everyone wants? For someone to notice your pain without it being spoken, for people to look into your eyes and understand everything that’s been stuck in your throat for so long and that you never learned how to express? Humans desperately need comfort, but the moment they try to say what’s troubling them so much, the words die on the way and nothing remains but an empty smile.
Wasn’t Jamil like this before his overblot? Desperate for Kalim to see his chains, his lamentations, without him having to say it out loud.
Ah, Jamil thinks bitterly, could this be a version of an overblot in the narrative of life? Jamil explodes, hurts, almost drowns in the very darkness that still stains his soul to this day, while Kalim would die in a way so ethereal, poetic, and melodramatic that it would be written in storybooks.
What a petty thought.
But by the Seven, he was so mad by all of that he could be compared to Riddle.
“This is so stupid,” Jamil mutters, backing away from Kalim just enough to rub his own face. This felt like some kind of exhausting nightmare.
“Do you hate me more for this?” Kalim laughs a little, that self-deprecating laugh that made Jamil’s head hurt.
“I don’t hate you.” Not for lack of trying. Jamil had tried so hard to hate Kalim—not just the things that annoyed him, but Kalim’s entire being. Jamil had spent months trying to hate Kalim, but he’d never managed it.
That was one of the most infuriating things about Kalim. His inability to make Jamil hate him.
“Do you love me?” Kalim asks, but not in the tone you’d expect. It’s not accusatory, it’s not desperate; there’s no urgency in his words, much less need. Kalim asks as if he were wondering what they’d have for dinner that night.
Casual. Simple. Calm.
Jamil wants to fight and shout at him once again. It’s a pretentious question, he knew that very well, since anything he said carried far more weight than Jamil would have liked.
Jamil’s answer was everything and yet, at the same time, it didn’t matter.
Perhaps because of this, this pretentiousness and duality, Jamil, for the first time in his life, chooses the truth.
“I don’t know.” He didn’t look away from Kalim when he said that; red and black staring at each other, he didn't dare look at any point in that room other than Kalim. "I don’t know if I love you, I don’t know if I ever loved you or if I’ll ever love you, but I know I don’t hate you even though I’ve tried. By the Seven, I wonder if either of us even knows what ‘love’ is? What is it? Someone who doesn’t try to kill you? If that’s what love is, it’s a pretty depressing thing.”
“Pff—I guess that’s fair.” Kalim lets out a laugh that sounds like a mix of disbelief and despair, his hands running over his own face.
Maybe Kalim, after that cough that would haunt Jamil’s dreams for a while, had grown tired of the mask he always wore. Now, with his tired eyes, tiny smile, and trembling hands, Jamil wondered if he himself looked so… small, after waking from his overblot.
“But I think I want to love you.” Perhaps Jamil was tired too. Now that the anger had dissipated, and the flowers were losing their luster on the gleaming floor of Kalim’s room, Jamil let the words slip gently from his mouth.
Lying there, in the emotional wretchedness they were in, didn’t seem to hold any value.
Kalim looks at him as if he’d said something absurd, which would make sense since Jamil felt that the words he’d spoken were completely absurd and had only dared to exist because of his exhaustion from it all.
“What use would it be to you?” Kalim asks so skeptically that Jamil takes offense. Did he look like Azul, by any chance? Was everything Jamil ever done for some vile, malicious reason? “What’s the point of trying to love someone you’ll probably never see again after school?!”
What nonsense is this kid spouting now.
“What? Am I banished from your life after we finish school?!” Jamil asks, confused, not believing the words Kalim had just spoken. It made no sense; after all, even if he imagined leaving home, it had never crossed his mind to cut Kalim completely out of his life.
They were very dependent on each other; Jamil wouldn’t deny that fact, not after crying over the miserable thought that Kalim could actually die and Jamil couldn’t do anything about it. That was still scaring him; at that moment, Jamil was truly still terrified by the existence of those cursed flowers.
“No! Of course not, you’ll always be welcome!” Kalim says in a panic, the nervousness so clear in his expressions as if what Jamil had said were absurd. “Ugh! You know very well that’s not what I mean!” The frustration is less intense than other times, seeming a little more childish.
Jamil wants to laugh at Kalim’s face. Just a little bit.
“What do you mean, Kalim? I can’t read minds.” There was venom in his tone—so obvious it made Kalim’s shoulders slump and his face flush. Shame over his earlier thoughts, likely, over his desire for Jamil to figure out what he wanted without Kalim having to say a word.
“You’re a prisoner of that house, and the moment you leave, there’s no going back—you know that better than I do. You can’t look back; you’ll end up trapped in Asim’s shadow if you do. You need to go so far that not even my family can control your fate. You have connections with powerful people because of Night Raven; I’m sure Leona would love to have you in his kingdom working alongside him, or even with Vil or Idia! Even though you despise Azul, he can help you maintain your freedom for as long as it takes. You’ll be able to truly live, Jamil—maybe you’ll even reconnect with your friends from elementary school.” There was desperation in Kalim’s voice, a need for Jamil to live, whatever fantasy that might be within Kalim’s mind.
Maybe, just maybe, at that moment it was less about Jamil and more about Kalim. Not in a martyr-like way, Jamil observes in the details of Kalim’s face, but with a hope that far from that house there was a happy ending.
Kalim, in a selfish way, was projecting his own desires for freedom onto Jamil. For Kalim, if he had that chance to be free, he would abandon that whole life and never dare to look back. For that silent house, for the dinners alone, for the attempts to kill him even by members of his own family, for all the pain the adults inflicted on them both.
Jamil thinks now; he had thought of so many things that afternoon that he felt a headache coming on. Did Kalim have any allies inside that house besides Jamil?
No, Jamil concludes; he doesn’t think Kalim had anyone in that house looking out for him besides Jamil.
“Do you want me to stay?” A presumptuous question, perhaps just a little—but Kalim’s answer didn’t really matter, because Jamil knew exactly what he wanted to do once school was over. He had dreams now, a determination to succeed and become someone who deserved the spotlight he so desperately craved.
“I’d banish you if you dared to stay.” Kalim says seriously, a tone so rare for him that it leaves Jamil in shock. And then he laughs, loud and messy, disbelieving what Kalim had said.
“So you don’t want me around??”
“Of course I do! But I want you to choose to stay by my side after you’ve seen the whole world, after you’ve truly lived and have a clear understanding of what you’re choosing—not simply staying out of some sense of pity or duty!”
“Then why don’t you come with me? You know, to see the world.” Now, forced to face it, Jamil finally spoke of Kalim’s own shackles. They were different from Jamil’s; they always had been—golden and shiny like bracelets glistening in the sunlight, as if they were beautiful gifts given with love and meant to be treated with gratitude and tenderness. Handcuffs disguised as jewelry.
But it didn’t matter if the handcuffs were made of copper or gold; their meaning was exactly the same. If Jamil was a prisoner of that house, as Kalim had claimed, the heir to the Al Asim family himself was also one of the prisoners of that place.
“No.” Kalim smiled, shaking his head. “I can’t.” Because he wouldn’t return; he wouldn’t be able to go back to his old life if he actually dared to run away. Kalim knew this better than anyone there, given that he avoided their house like the plague even during the restricted school hours. With the freedom the whole world would offer him, he would never fulfill his duty.
Why would a captive bird dare to return to its cage after finally learning to fly?
Jamil could insist, fight, force Kalim to break free with him, but Jamil wasn’t a revolutionary; he didn’t want to change the whole world or make a huge social impact that would help many. No, Jamil wasn’t like Ruggie and Leona, who aimed to change rules and the world; he just wanted to be happy.
Jamil had always just wanted to be happy.
And then the coughing starts again. Always loud, always present, always so stupid.
But Jamil remains there, once again holding Kalim, once again preventing him from hurting himself more than the dahlias already do.
“You’re not going to die,” Jamil says in a low voice, exhausted, his hands gently stroking Kalim’s back.
What’s left after the anger fades? In these moments when they can’t ignore the main problem by talking about a thousand other things, trying to forget this reality that now haunts them.
Hope
It’s hope that remains.
“Even if there’s no cure for Hanahaki, even if I doubt you’d want to give up your memories to rid yourself of it. Kalim, you’re not going to die, not like this.” He forces Kalim to look him in the eyes. The truth and sincerity with which he says these things bring tears to Kalim’s eyes; it’s so silly, but it still makes Jamil smile. It felt like he was dealing with the 4-year-old Kalim, who was so whiny and fearful. “We’ll find a way to lessen the power of the flowers; we’ll ease the pain you feel when you cough and get enough supplements so you keep having the strength to fight them every day. I’ll create stronger medicines for your throat; we’ll find a way to improve this until I find the cure myself.”
“Why would you do that?” Kalim’s voice barely comes out, like a whisper amid a raging sea, a sigh of confusion and hope that fills those eyes shining like precious rubies.
Jamil wasn’t a revolutionary; he didn’t aspire to change an entire society. But he was a fighter, one who would dedicate his entire being to saving what was important to him.
“Because we’re friends.” So simple, yet so strange to say out loud. “And we still have time, we still have time to change all of this.”
Time to learn to love, time to decide whether to stay or not, time to heal from old wounds, time to live.
Kalim and Jamil were only 17; they still had time to be children. Jamil would make sure of that; he would fight for it. Even if he had to burn an entire garden of black dahlias or any other kind of flower.
Jamil would fight for his happy ending.