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Fate would have Yisa Taimiev born a month after the Chechen Republic declared independence. And it would be for that reason that years would pass before she'd ever set foot on her homeland.
Her father, Abbas Taimiev -- part of the republic's ruling class and one of the few noble-blooded dignitaries forced to maneuver a new government against the outbreak of war -- shipped his wife and daughter off to safer environs. Only Yisa's older brother would remain, twelve years her senior, to assume his given duty as the family heir.
Her mother raised her in Paris, France, where life was slow and gentle, and Yisa grew up surrounded in luxury. Living in the Parisian finest, she attended its best private academies, receiving a solid education while her countrymen fought and died to Russian troops. She did not know any of the troubles of her land or even her father, only ever seeing him one or two times a year on visits for Mawlid and Ramadan. He was always an intimidating figure in Yisa's childhood memory, a towering, humourless man who had few glances and fewer words to say to her.
But life was a frivolous, happy thing for Yisa, who never possessed a single worry. Eventually her mother would give birth to her two younger sisters, and she did her best to be a responsible elder sister to them. She minded extra hard to them because it was her raison d'etre to be more like her elder brother. He was her hero. Unfortunately, she saw him as often as her father, but soon he eclipsed much of her family and became Yisa's entire world. He was kind and patient with her, and appeared to love hearing her stories about school and friends. He had some sadness in his eyes, much like her father did, and seemed to be burdened under that same kind of worry, but he kept his spirits about him. She doted on him immensely. And the fact she barely ever saw him only worsened her veneration.
As she grew up, Yisa demonstrated herself something of a leader among her playmates. She was friends with only the richest and most distinguished daughters of the Parisian elite, and despite her own dark skin and Sunni Muslim religion, she was consistently treated like royalty. And it was easy to assume the role everyone expected of you, as a bossy, entitled brat who expected everything because you've always received everything. There was no expense spared by Yisa's mother to enrich the lives of her daughters, the urge aggravated by her own ever-present worry for her son countries away. There was a war going on. One from what she wished she could shelter all her children.
Not that Yisa would ever care about it. Throughout her childhood years, her life was moved between the best parts of Paris, Rome, and Tokyo, spending time and receiving education in all three respective countries. She experienced everything. She had everything. What else mattered?
By the time she was ten, Yisa was back in France and living at the dormitory of one of the richest all-girls academies, already demonstrating herself to be one of the most commanding personalities at the school. The power held by her father and the pride of her family name made sure not even adults would cross her. She felt invincible, beloved by a circle of girls who catered to her every amusement, and she took a special joy in directing the lives of her peers. This was Yisa's entire world, schoolwork and play and expensive gifts sent by her mother, where classes consumed her day and silly girl's games dominated the evenings. Phone calls and constant letters to her brother filled in the rest.
Then, one day at the academy, Yisa and a small group of her friends learned of a strange, almost silly game from some of the other girls -- what they called "la danse de l'inconnu". They tried it for themselves, laughing and shouting out for "la persona" into the night until the academy instructors shushed them for bed.
That night, Yisa had a strange, half-remembered dream. Usually she dreamed such macabre and incomprehensible things, of foolish songs and riddles, of objects and people she could barely parse and never understand. But this dream was disturbingly simple to her, containing only a man whose face she could not see, and whose voice she would never be able to recall. He simply asked her a single question: "Where shall your journey take you?"
And Yisa answered, "To my brother."
It ended, breaking away to the reality of one of her academy instructors, in the dead of night, shaking her awake. The woman looked pale and wild-eyed. She only explained to Yisa that it was time for her to leave. Her father was calling her home.
Within the span of an hour, her things were packed and life as she knew it had ended. She was given no further explanation. She had no clue why her father would order something like this. She'd not even seen him in over a year. At the time, he had said less than five words to her. The flight back to a home she'd never known was the longest and most frightening she'd ever taken in her life.
When she stepped off the private plane, immediately hustled away by waiting security and escorted in darkened car through several cities, Yisa finally got her first glimpse of home. She'd never seen Chechnya for herself. She heard stories told by her mother about the pride of roots and the beauty of her homeland growing up. She'd painted a romantic picture of her head of the majestic place where her family had always flourished. But this was different. It was ugly. The cities were rotting. Some buildings were fallen. Others were smoking. And there was no one. It was empty everywhere.
Her brother was dead.
Within a few hours of finally returning home, Yisa was attending her brother's funeral, sitting as the only child and only girl in its attendance. It was because of the war. Neither her mother nor her two sisters were there; they had no place there, her father explained, because it was not their roles. She was the second born. She was a girl, but she would have to suffice. He needed to instruct an heir.
The next two weeks Yisa spent in a walking daze, unable to react and unable to feel. She was away from her mothers and sisters, away from her friends, away from the only life she'd ever known, and trapped in a hell with her brother dead and her father expecting her to fill his shoes.
She couldn't even cry. Oh, she wanted to, and she nearly did, but her first tears didn't last under the initial explosion that tore open her father's home. It was one of her family's last hidden estates, and still the Chechen militants found it, hitting it with anti-tank ammunition in a clear act of distaste against the Taimiev alliance with Moscow. Yisa, dreamy with shock, didn't even remember her father's people pulling her out of the falling, fiery house, and through her bleeding eardrums couldn't ear any one of their screams.
She woke up in a quiet room. Quiet, but not alone. There, she met her great grandfather for the first time.
She had heard stories about him. She would overhear her father relaying tales to her brother of Mansur Taimiev, the man who taught him dignity and power. He was the oldest remaining member of her family. He was a decorated soldier and dignitary who earned the highest honours in both the Chechen states and the Soviet Empire. She had heard that he impressed the enemy so much that they decorated them as they would their loyal officers. He accepted those honours proudly as he was ex-communicated, as long as the rest of her countrymen, to Siberia under Stalin's order. He spent a decade alone in a gulag reserved especially for men like him.
As de-Stalinization took force at the start of the Cold War, he would be able to return and help rebuild the family into the powerful machine it was. And now he was seated beside her bed.
She was injured, but still on Chechen soil. She was relocated to a safe-house reserved for republic officials. She would be living with him until the war was out, as it was deemed too dangerous to remain with her father. She would be the first girl he would ever teach. He did not like to teach girls. But she had to be ready to take on the family's duties. They had no other options.
He looked down on her like he expected her to cow away from his weathered face, his hard eyes, and all of his scars. Like he was already regretting his task. Like he was already ashamed of her.
And little Yisa, all ten years of age and with one ear still bandaged from the concussion of the explosion, hit a breaking point and looked him in the eyes. Everything was changed, the life she knew was over, but one constant would not change -- she always got what she wanted.
She told him she'd only do it if he told her how her brother died.
Mansur laughed for a long time.
He did not ever look so witheringly on his great granddaughter ever again. As they grew into each others' company, Yisa would in fact learn the circumstances of her brother's death, its retelling possibly the first real injection of the adult world into her normally-careless life. She learned that while she was living in luxury and doing foolish things, thinking herself so entitled as to take pains on things as idiotic as schoolwork and friendships, he was fighting a war. He was fighting the Russians. He was also fighting her father, who appeared to be facilitating an allegiance of her family with the Kremlin. Her brother thought it cowardly and treasonous, and rebelled secretly to fund the Separatist forces.
Her brother was not killed. He was murdered.
Months later, Yisa watched the trial on television. He was found dead, strangely enough, his body among hundreds dead in a small village south of Shali. It was his corpse that brought about the subsequent inquest, as even the Russian government could not hide a nobleman's death. An officer who commanded the mass-killings was dishonoured, even if the international court ruled it an accident. Captain Daniil Rumyantsev was their scapegoat.
It was a brave thing her brother did, said Mansur, but it was not enough.
Whatever it is, it was a shock for Yisa. She hated herself. Hated every one of the ridiculous letters she sent him. Hated every last useless thing she told him. How could he have tolerated her, being such a stupid child, when he was fighting a war? Why didn't he ever tell her? Why did he smile at her like nothing was wrong?
She was so angry. At her brother. At herself. At the Russians. It felt like her insides were boiling. Like she was breathing fire. Yisa was sure if she stood still for a moment, her anger would consume her.
So she kept moving. Over the next few years, she gave herself totally to her great-grandfather's instruction. His was a different sort of education than she was used to. Past the tutors hired on behest of her family, it was Mansur Tiemiev who taught Yisa how to become a perfect heir. He taught her the rules and tenants of the family name, and all the obligations nobility are expected to maintain over the common people. She is meant to use her bloodline to guide and protect. And if asked, she must also judge and destroy.
Her great grandfather told her his war stories as he trained her physically, his bent, half-broken body still having enough life left to duel her and kick her down until the pain eventually lessened. He taught her the importance of strength, and that skill holds no candle to the force of conviction.
And out of the long, dignified line of men he trained -- sculpted to become leaders and crusaders -- Mansur would agree Yisa was his favourite. She was a girl, but she shared his soul. He came to love her like his own daughter. She became his greatest victory, so much that he entrusted her with an object both her late grandfather always wanted. Something her father always hoped to acquire upon Mansur's death.
It once belonged to her great grandfather's most hated foe. He was a Soviet officer of similar privilege, though he had forsaken many of his own titles to the Revolution decades prior. As leaders and military officers, the shared an animosity that consumed their fighting lives. Their rivalry was decided during the Chechen insurgency of World War II, where they met in battle. Mansur stood victorious, most of his own blood around his feet, his face shredded, his lungs full of bullet holes, but alive. He took the officer's dirk as his trophy, a top relic among the Soviet forces for its prestige. Its proper title proclaimed the weapon "the Left Hand," named after the officer's unusual dueling style.
Eventually the Second Chechen War drew to a close, and though the ashes were decades from settling, and her country was far from safe, Yisa was released from her great grandfather's tutelage. Spending a year in his company had irrevocably changed her. The careless, entitled brat had matured beyond her years in many ways, returning in that girl's place a resolved heiress set to continue her family legacy.
And in the ensuing years, she was her father's pupil. Entering her teen years, she devoted her life to schooling and enriching her mind with his lessons, her days full of learning to navigate the political field. It was not something she was especially passionate about, watching how her father waged negotiations with the Kremlin, bartering conditions against their dignitaries as their troops remained in occupation of their country, but Yisa struggled to maintain focus. She read of the deaths of the separatist leaders. She saw her own family ally with the pro-Moscow occupation of her land. It was hard to understand it all, but her father called it an act of survival. She missed her great grandfather and the days she spent with him. It was the only time where life made sense, the only time when she didn't miss her brother so virulently.
By the time she was sixteen, Yisa's life was dominated by textbooks, paperwork, and her father's critical, disapproving eye. She was not all that happy, but she was content. That is, until the day she heard word from her mother back in France. Her father was seething anxiously for the news.
Her mother had become pregnant just when the family figured she was too old to, and Yisa's last nine months were smothered by her sisters' excited, antsy phone calls regarding her condition. Today was the day. She'd given birth to a boy. Yisa had a little brother.
And her father was beside himself. He immediately announced his intentions, what Yisa was already half-expecting what would happen. She was no longer the uncontested heiress of the family. Not for long. She was still heiress in an official capacity, but when he would come of age, he would oust her from her place and take on the family responsibility.
She felt a dispiriting mix of dismay and relief -- relief that she would not have to obligate herself to what was not clearly making her happy. But dismay to wonder... what else would she be good for? Her entire life was set in that direction, to become something. Not even she was aware of the person she was. In some ways, she was still that child in France. What is she now?
While her instruction did not end -- her father intending Yisa as the "fail safe" in case something became of her treasured brother -- her feelings did. For close to a year, she felt completely lost. She felt like she belonged to nothing or no one. She was a heiress, but would never lead her family. She wasn't a heiress, but could never be free.
Then one day, as she was leaving a car in Grozny to attend a family meeting, Yisa watched a Russian soldier use the rifle butt on an old man, knocking him to the road. It was an incident that occurred in all of a heartbeat. But for Yisa, it changed everything.
She'd known of the casualties of her countrymen. She read the reports. She memorized the numbers as her father negotiated them away. But to see it happen felt like watching her brother's funeral all over again. She could hear her great grandfather's voice in her head. And something snapped. Not even she could remember the slow, deliberate path she took, walking through moving traffic and across the street. Her mind was shut off, and her eyes were trained forward, her vision seeing red.
Yisa didn't stop until she pulled the Taimiev heirloom off her side, took the sheathed short-sword in hand, and broke the soldier's jaw with a swing of the hilt. Standing over the fallen man, she breathed in unmitigated rage as rifle barrels trained on her, the shocked, wounded soldier's unit replying to force with force. She stared them down.
It took the desperate, screaming shouts of her security force, realizing what had happened, to make the soldiers drop their weapons. She was a noble. A Taimiev. They cannot touch her. And they didn't.
Angrily snapping for medical help for the elderly man, Yisa realized what she was really meant for. It wasn't to lead her family. It was to lead much greater things.
The anger that woke in her that day could not be helped, ignored, forgotten, or stopped. Not that she wanted it to. For the very first time, she knew who she was. And what she would become.
Her father did not see it, too busy taking frequent trips and seeing to the health of his wife his son. He trusted Yisa passably enough to function adequately on her own, of course with the help of his political allies and business advisers. She continued to work tirelessly, putting on her airs and the face they demanded of her, while in any spare moment she could, focused on her real goal. She began to allow herself to see the real state of her home and her people, far away from her family's money and political ties. The war was over, but the fighting was not. It was a time of Russian occupation. It was also a time of Chechen insurgency, its militants battling and dying to have their freedom. Her blood wanted her to ally to one side, but she knew that she could not. This was not about joining a war.
This was about stopping it. This was about making peace. This was about change. This was about healing.
Foregoing the fighting, she turned all eyes towards war relief. Meeting in secret with underground efforts going on, she determined to become their private benefactor. Yisa knew her family had so much money that they surely would not miss some of it disappearing. She knew how to perform the accounting so to hide millions of rubles in daily transactions, and she also knew how to oversee the use of the money -- her father had taught her well.
Yisa funneled it out, putting it towards equipping her devastated country with food, aid, and other necessary supplies, even stressing to press the supplies out to villages still hurting under Russian occupation. Sometimes there would be setbacks, with either Russian troops stopping or Chechen militants capitalizing upon what she sent out, but she was determined. She was also wholly anonymous. Only a couple people even knew she was involved, and knew as well that if compromised, her family could put a stop to it.
Life remained clandestine up and past her eighteenth birthday. Yisa felt like she was leading two lives simultaneously. One half of the day, she was her father's pupil and her family's placeholder. The other half she was a self-proclaimed healer of the land. And it was not easy to reconcile those two people. Most of the time she was manic and sleepless, sometimes plagued by insomnia that would last for days. Other times she felt bitter and frustrated, all her secrecy making her feel alone and disconnected from everything, even her own family. But she would not question her crusade, and dared not quit on it. Despite all her stresses and anxiety, Yisa had never felt so satisfied.
Up until the day she received an update from her sources in Chechnya's underground network. There were reports of present violence in a small town partially occupied by a particular unit of the Russian Ground Forces. Their platoon number struck her as eerily familiar. But she ultimately dismissed it.
To the shock of two of her most trusted contacts in the Chechen underground, Yisa announced she'll be going there herself. She'll take the supplies there directly and see to the well-being of the people. She would also see to speaking with the unit in question.
Free of security, she stole out of her father's estate, and with her supplies made the journey out. She'd seen photographs. She'd watched videotapes. But neither could come close to seeing it with her own eyes. As she saw the destruction intensified, the demolished, gaping houses, the bullet holes in walls, and the unmarked graves, Yisa hated herself for having lived in a mansion while all this was happening.
Arriving to the town in question, Yisa made stops to households and apartment buildings, most of them vacated, many with doors locked and refusing to open, and the rest entreating the same warning from anyone left behind. Get out. Leave. Take us with you. Take my baby. Help me. Their eyes were dead and pleading. Her focus changed with the more she heard. Yisa could do more than distribute supplies. She could amass evidence to stop it. She began to do so until the inevitable occurred and watchful troops stopped her car. They demanded identification, and Yisa yielded her own, used to all sorts of people equally deferring to her name and status. This soldier just looked surprised. He shared some private words with his comrades. Then he took her under arrest.
Yisa was escorted to a run-down hotel that served as the platoon's outpost, her demeanour complaint but stern. When one soldier tried to remove the short-sword heirloom from her person, she backhanded him across the face. For an instant, the embarrassed soldier looked like he was going to put her through a wall, but his officer called him off, amused. He reminded them all that they were dealing with a dignitary's daughter. Or something else entirely -- when they found her cameras and evidence in question. She'd hidden the drives and was unwilling to give them up.
They tortured her a little. It was nothing Yisa couldn't take. Her great grandfather put her through worse. She held her tongue and let it only make her angrier. It seemed as if these troops were wary of her, afraid to hurt her or do permanent damage, afraid of the consequences that would befall an unwise action. The Taimiev family was one of Moscow's best allies in Chechnya, though her influence did not extend out to these men as well as she hoped. The fact was they were emaciated. They seemed no better than the civilians of the town. Away from food, clean water, and medical supplies, they looked and acted like they hadn't seen fresh supplies in weeks. After bingeing on hers, they had to decide what to do with their captive. The officer made his decision. It was a risky decision. They'd ransom her. They'd appeal to her father and get enough money to get the hell out of Russia entirely.
Not everyone shared his decision. The smarter ones attested that she had evidence on the lot of them. She'll bring it to light. They won't go to prison over this.
But the superior officer got enough support to keep his way. Hunger does a lot for changing men's minds. And Yisa, trying desperately to keep her wits about her, tried not to imagine the look on her father's face when he heard the news. Blindfolded and handcuffed, she was forced out onto a blind march deep into the wilderness circuiting the town, knowing that only because she could smell the trees. In the ensuing days, she remained held outside a small, undetected outpost, dealing with the cold, dead nights outside and the reality of her danger. She was fed nothing and given little water. She also soldiered through endless threats on her life and her honour, knowing she had to remain strong, cold, and logical.
She could feel the hatred rolling off the Russian soldiers. Yisa wasn't sure what it was about her they despised more. Because she was Chechen and Muslim? Because she was rich? Because of both of those reasons? But her wealth had its advantage; they didn't hurt or dishonour her, and the fact that she remained untouched meant that her family line held some weight. They may have been scared of reprisal. Or maybe they were just too tired and hungry to hurt her. She didn't think about them too much. She worried about her own life.
She especially worried about it when gunfire suddenly exploded around her. Where they left her bound on the dirt, she ducked down and huddled, feeling her heart in her throat. It stopped. The bodies of her captors hit the ground around her. Then all went silent. She listened for sound, and hearing none, rubbed her temple and cheek against the earth until she pushed away her blindfold, her eyes immediately seared by the dawning light. Yisa was blinking in disbelief when she felt herself grabbed.
It was a disaster. Her father refused to pay in whole what they asked. The whole platoon turned on each other, unable to decide what to do, what decision to make, or how to fix this. The officer who ordered her ransom got shot in the head by one of his subordinates. The rest of them fled. But he was the smart one. He came back for her. He wanted to kill her in the first place. Destroy the evidence. Hide the body. Hide it for long enough. Enough time for him to get out. He had the perfect spot.
At gunpoint, Yisa had to continue her march. By now, she was starving, dehydrated, and exhausted beyond wits. He kicked her a few times, and watched her fall. He spit down on her. Asked her how it felt to be worthless, worthless like he was. To live and feel the way he always has. Did she like it?
Yisa didn't respond. She had no sense in her head left to do so. All she could think about was that she was going to die. Is this how her brother had felt? How lonely it feels to know you're going to die all alone...
He marched her down the forest path and at a specific marker. It opened into a deep, expansive, dug hole punched into the earth, hitting Yisa with the sweet smell of freshly-turned soil and something else. Rot.
It was a mass grave. Bodies shot, stripped naked, and half-incinerated. Bodies of Chechen civilians. Missing townspeople. Men. Women. Children. Their bare legs stuck in a hundred different directions. Empty eyes stared up at her.
Yisa's eyes glazed over with rage.
The soldier said that he'd tell her a joke before he killed her and pushed her corpse into the grave. There's an American family that reminded him of hers. Did she ever hear of the Kennedys? Same bad luck that happens to all rich bastards. They all seem to keep dying. She'll be the second Taimiev he watched die. And who says wars are fought by the poor?
She swung a look back on him. And Yisa found she couldn't breathe. Her staring eyes read the unit on his uniform's shoulder. Of course it was familiar. Why didn't she realize? They were the subordinates of the dishonoured Daniil Rumyantsev, the officer suspected of mass-murder and her brother's death. His men escaped any formal charges, and it appeared they were back on active duty. And the first mass-killing wasn't enough.
They murdered again. They murdered innocent people -- her people. They murdered her brother. They were the men who took him away.
Fury shot like poison through her veins. She couldn't speak. She couldn't think. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't see.
The only sensation in Yisa's heart was a single desire. She wanted to... she wanted to...
...slaughter.
A voice suddenly pushed into her mind, feeling like it had been injected into her head by needles. It sounded like three voices in one. One was a woman's. The second spoke backwards. And the third just laughed.
It told her:
"THOU art thee.
I am ME.
You have been the White Queen.
So shall I be.
Can we hear when SHE is near?
When yesterday shall arrive, you will already know. Once you remember tomorrow, then we both must go."
Yisa wasn't sure what it was. It looked like a woman but she knew it wasn't human. It was all white, white as can be, her skin anemic and her hair silver, framed in a magnificent white dress. She had a crown but no face, her back standing toward the both of them but with her arms bent forward. And the woman, the thing, doubled over like a marionette and erupted into blades.
And Yisa watched her cleave into the man. First she halved his weapon, and then lopped the hand off at the wrist. He screamed in shock and pain, and unable to conceive of what was happening, simply tried to flee the creature. It did not let him go. It cut into him. Again. And again.
Still handcuffed, still frozen there, Yisa bore witness to it all, her eyes dim and glassy. She couldn't look away. She didn't want to look away. She liked it. The blood. The terror. It fed her in ways she'd never realize. She wanted more. She wanted to break him. She wanted to spread him across the ground. It made her anger go away. The pleasure was intoxicating. The best she'd ever felt. Like she was finally complete. She wanted to kill him. She was going to kill him.
Kill him. Kill everything. Kill it all. KILL--
--what?
Yisa came too, realizing she was staring, realizing her mouth was pulled into a demented grin against the spray of blood. What was happening? Shaking her head and shuddering backward, the crowned woman in white disappeared the instant the girl sobered. It faded like it'd never existed at all. And in its wake was her would-be killer, crippled, disfigured, bleeding out, but gasping the little wet gasps of someone still alive.
Terrified, she ran.
And that was how they found her, another set of troops dispatched to try to surround the platoon and potentially see to her release. They find Yisa, suffering from dehydration and exposure, her hands still cuffed, and her face bloodless with fear. The only words she had to say where pleas to help a dying man in the brush.
He didn't die. The rest of the platoon were subsequently caught and held, all of them held under the charges of kidnapping and attempted murder. More were added when the Taimiev heiress announced the hiding spot of her camera drives and took them back to the mass grave. Russia balked against an international outcry, politicians trying to navigate some way to minimize the crimes, but Yisa was ready for diplomacy. She threatened to circulate the evidence to whoever asked for it. And despite her father's angry orders, she testified at the trial and saw to every one of her captors receiving life sentences.
It was obvious that Yisa returned from her ransom a changed woman. She'd lost the rest of her softness. She'd grown fierce, almost tyrannical with her convictions. No longer did she believe it was her place to sit behind desks and hide in family estates. No longer could she commit to inaction while people died. And now did did not care to hide any of her plans from her father: she was no longer allied to their family. She was allied to the world.
Perhaps she was even above it. Not even she could explain that -- whatever it was -- that appeared the day she was nearly murdered. Yisa considered many options. Was it Allah? An angel of Allah? A prophet? A spirit? A monster? It called itself the White Queen. It said it was her. Whatever it was, she could neither dismiss nor deny it. It meant she had a destiny. It meant she was a leader. She was a crusader.
She confessed the same to her father. Thinking her half-crazy, he simply tried to threaten the resolve out of her. Then he tried to whip it out. Yisa remained steadfast. Even her father knew he'd seen her expression before -- his dead son looked the exact same way. Defiant to the last end. And that end would be arriving soon, because she was going to get herself killed.
Eventually a compromise had to be reached. Her father contended she'd leave Chechnya and return to France with her mother and siblings. She'd live a happier life there. She'd be safer. And if she disagreed, he would cut her off. Even Yisa knew her goals would be difficult without money to fund them--
It was either a stroke of luck or fate or something else entirely, a name she'd sent an inquest out to her underground contacts came back with a hit. She'd asked after a name as soon as she returned from her ransom. And now it told her that Daniil Rumyantsev was supposedly in Japan. She'd indicted every one of his collaborators. Should she turn her sights on him? Her blood burned for it, but even she feared: what if her crusade was nothing more than a plot of revenge? She had to transcend revenge. As much as she loved her brother, she knew he had to remain the catalyst and not the destination.
What was worse is how much she wanted to kill for him. Kill for herself. It scared Yisa to wonder if perhaps that thing she summoned, the woman who tried to murder in her name... if it was part of her soul? She wanted to murder that man so badly. And not stop with him. Murder everyone. Everyone who had wronged her. Everyone who had thought to oppose her. Everyone and everything.
The thoughts would consume her day in and day out. One of her father's aides would give her a disgusted look and she'd feel the bloodthirst rising against her throat. She'd see more news photos of insurgency casualties and they would captivate into insensibility. One afternoon, she'd accidentally cut her finger while polishing her heirloom short-sword and watched the bead of blood swim down her finger a little too closely, and much too intensely.
Each time she'd sober out of the reverie all to hate and fear herself all the more. What did that mean? Was she really a monster inside? But she wanted to make change in the world. She had to. It was her purpose. But her principles would inevitably lead her to take arms against her enemies. How could she not give in to her soul?
One night, Yisa swore an oath to herself. No matter what would happen, no matter what her principles would instruct her to do and where to go, she would never take a life. She would have to find a way around murder. There would be no exceptions. Because if she made that mistake... she feared there would be no going back.
With that vow sworn, she felt ready to make a compromise with her father. She wouldn't return to France, because it was no longer her life. There was no way she could ever return to the child she was with the life she had. But neither would she stay in Chechnya. She'd lived briefly in Tokyo before in her youth, and proposed returning to Japan for school. She found an engaging pre-law program at Sumaru University.
And thus she was shipped off, her father relieved to set her somewhere safe and far away. Surely that would soothe her. Surely that would keep her alive long enough to ensure his son could be of age to take her place. Surely she wouldn't find trouble in a place like that.
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