Viktorija Adelyte Kazlauskas

Chapter Nine

Viktorija stood on the branch, while scanning the area below it. Taking a deep breath, she jumped onto the next one. A skill she hadn’t perfected, since at times she’ll miss and fall onto the whatever was below her target.

“It’s getting easier,” Viktorija whispered to herself a second after she landed. Not only that, but since they had come back; the team had only been given D-rank missions and that gave her time to read over everything she had stolen. Making sure to write copies for Azuloas and Aldona, Viktorija would send them over to her cousins once a week.

She had even started completing missions by herself again; she needed to eat and even than she would have to wait for one traveling market to do so. Viktorija was on patrol duty at the moment; the Tournament was on at the moment, so anyone who was willing to do patrol duty was sent to keep an eye on things.

In fact, thinking about sending letters to her cousins. Ameenah had sent her a letter since she ran into Zaire and Tanishia, turned out those two were what Ameenah had needed to give them an edge that Tau didn’t see coming.

Screams pulled her out of her thoughts this, when she went towards the sound and she saw that a bandit was horribly burnt. This was her playground and she barely enough time to avoid a beam of lava that would have cut her in half.

“Losrusern Village,” Viktorija muttered to herself as she spotted four people, a male with brown hair and dark blues eyes catching her eye. Standing up, she jumped from the branch and glared at them and her hand went near the seal that would send a message back to the village’s gate.

“Kamuzu, we can’t kill this one,” a man told the blue eyed male, he was the teacher. He was wearing a normal Sinzia uniform. White fabric tied loosely around his head, tied in a style that would keep sand out of his hair.

“Losrusern Village, it’s been awhile since any of you were seen around here,” Viktorija blankly told them. “So, you’re either here for a mission or the Tournament.”

“We’re here for the Tournament,” the teacher told her, putting his hand on Kamuzu’s shoulder and Viktorija just kept him in the corner of her eye. The Lava bloodline wasn’t something to be taken lightly; the lava or the poisonous gas would kill you. “You’re from Nestanha.”

“I’m on patrol,” Viktorija bluntly told them, she looked at the burnt male and then back towards them. “Why did you kill this man?”

“He was a bandit,” the female student told her, when Viktorija looked at her. She sighed and pointed towards a dagger that was imbedded into the wood. “He attacked us.”

“And that was all I needed to know,” Viktorija told them. “My replacement should arrive soon, I’m guessing the Ombre cachée know your arriving.”

“We’ve arrived early,” the teacher told her.

“You’re like me,” Kamuzu told her, his eyes were blank.

“If you mean the seal, then yes,” Viktorija told him as she removed the bracelet around her left wrist and showed them the small snake. Kamuzu’s teammate just looked between them with large eyes and thin mouths. “Aldona and Azuloas are the same. So’s Tau, but I haven’t met him, I hear he’s quite bloodthirsty.”

“You mean you’re a Sin?” the other male teammate asked her.

“Yes, I’m the holder of the Snake of Envy.” Viktorija only looked at the team with a bored expression on her face. She just wondered if he would have as much of a problem with that fact as her village had. But she was guessed from Kamuzu; that was highly likely. “Do you have a problem with that? I can tell you neither Kamuzu nor I choose to have this done to us.”

“I’m Kanika,” Kanika told her while elbowing her younger brother in the ribs, both knew that Kamuzu didn’t chose to the holder of the Lion of Pride. “And this moron is my baby brother; Kosey.”

Viktorija just looked at them, she was slightly amused. Kosey meant Lion and Kamuzu meant medical, it was almost as if Kosey was meant to the holder for the Lion of Pride and not Kamuzu, something was off about the whole thing.

“Do you have a name that starts with K?” she asked the teacher.

“Bakari,” he replied.

“Well; if you have any problem with me being the holder of Snake of Envy; keep it to yourself as I don’t care what you think,” Viktorija told them as her replacement showed up, the man nodding at her before he moved along. “I get enough from my own team; that was my replacement, so I can show you lot a shortcut back to the village. If you’re willing to follow Sin, I mean.”

“What’s that?” Kosey asked as Hyacintha flew through the trees and wrapped herself around Viktorija’s torso.

“A dragon,” Viktorija told him.

“Torija,” Azuloas greeted as he appeared next to her, putting his arm out for Hyacintha to climb up and Aldona wasn’t that far behind him. Hyacintha didn’t move and now Viktorija was glad that she had sown metal plates on her second layer, so Ismay didn’t see them and ask her about them.

No one knew about them, but they had been useful in stopping Etienne’s sword from hitting her flash the few times they did spar.

“You’re here for the Tournament as well?” Viktorija asked them.

“We are; Montgomery, Jakoba and Launce are waiting with Justus,” Azuloas admitted. “Hyacintha just wanted to see her favourite girl.”

“Your name is Torija?” Kosey asked her.

“Only Aldona and Azuloas can call me that,” Viktorija told them, crossing her arms as Aldona and Azuloas glared at them. She could tell that there was history there, something happened that Viktorija wasn’t aware of. “Torija is a nickname; my name is Viktorija.”

“I heard something about a short cut?” Azuloas asked her.

“Your team can join, my replacement arrived a bit ago; so, I’ll be heading towards the village anyway,” Viktorija told him. “And I want to meet this Jakoba, recovered fangirl.”

“And Jakoba would like to meet our cousin,” Aldona told her, before nodding her head and heading back to where Viktorija guessed her team was waiting. Azuloas standing next to her as they waited for Aldona to return with two males and a female behind her. The adult was Justus, the female must be Jakoba, which meant the other males were Launce and Montgomery.

“Follow me then,” Viktorija told them as she made her way back towards the village on foot; it wasn’t like her shortcut was a village secret. In fact, she was pretty sure she was one of the few that had found it.

And she knew that by the fact that the path was slightly overgrown. White flowers growing along the edges, it was peaceful, and she doubted that either team would need to use this shortcut often.

--

Kamuzu just looked at Viktorija as she led them through the forest, ignoring the two that walked next to her; dragons around their waists. Her eyes were like his, barely hiding a murderous rage, even if hers seemed to be more controlled. Aldona and Azuloas didn’t have any type of murderous rage in their eyes; which confused him.

They were like him and Viktorija, so why were they so cheerful? Both had haunted eyes, so they knew what it was like to be hated. Yet, it didn’t seem like they resented their village, didn’t want any of them dead.

Kosey didn’t know what to think of Viktorija’s words; sure, she was like Kamuzu. She was a holder of a Sin, she could turn around and kill them without blinking, he had seen his baby brother do it more than once. Kanika just rolled her eyes, Viktorija was the only one from her village; so, she didn’t know what Bakari was worried about.

“Ahndray, Emilio,” Viktorija greeted as she walked towards the front gate, signing her patrol finished. Xavierra had told her their names before they had a chance to, knowing that it would annoy them that they didn’t get to do it themselves. “Is there anything for the Ombre cachée? I have two teams that need to sign in for the Tournament and you know that Xavierra would kill me if I didn’t help her two favourite boy toys.”

“You’re like eleven -”

“Ahndray, seriously, I’m fifteen,” Viktorija told him before he could finish his sentence, Aldona laughing into her hand as Azuloas just grinned at them.

“Fifteen! How do you know about that!” Emilio finished his boyfriend’s sentence. “You look eight kiddo.”

“Ahndray, Emilio, seriously? Xavierra,” Viktorija told him.

“I want to meet this woman,” Aldona whispered next to her. Jakoba looked pained as she stared at the front gate, Launce just looked at her before talking to Justus.

“And she’d want her little sister to know her trade,” Ahndray dryly stated.

“Pretty much,” Viktorija stated.

“How long?” Emilio and Azuloas asked her.

“A few years.” Viktorija just looked at Azuloas with a raised eyebrow. Ahndray just picked up a card with a storage seal on it, before handing it over; daily reports that would most likely not get read for another month.

Viktorija always admired the blonde-haired woman, even when she was treated poorly for something out of her control. Xavierra never let the village’s words get to her or lower her self-worth.

“When I’m older, apart from the odd obsession with snakes,” Viktorija told them, sealing the card into her bracelet and put her hands behind her back. “I want to be like her.”

“Now we have to meet her,” Aldona muttered.

“That’s just what this village needed,” Emilio told her patting the top of her head, while Aldona and Azuloas just looked at each other; whispering something that she couldn’t hear. “A miniature Xavierra running around.”

“Whatever lets you sleep at night, cause we both know Xavierra won’t,” Viktorija told them turning around to look at the two teams, all of them signing into the visitor’s book. “I can show you to the Ombre cachée’s office, then he will most likely want me to show you to your hotels.”

“Torija, we were going to ask you to that anyway,” Aldona told her, elbowing Montgomery as he looked at the gate slightly dazed. A pain expression on his face, Viktorija had a feeling that there was a story behind that. “This place is a maze.”

“And to think, we thought Sashan was bad,” Jakoba joked as she walked over to Aldona. “Aldona and Azuloas are the only ones to work that maze out.”

“The benefits of running away from mobs,” Viktorija joked.

“Never come to Losrusern then,” Kosey told them.

“Major Wars will do that to any village,” Justus told them, Bakari nodding his head. “And being randomly attacked between them, doesn’t help. A lot of rebuilding happens during these times.”

“Explains the random buildings,” Viktorija commented, before shaking her head and started going towards the Ombre cachée office. “Come this way, it shouldn’t take long. You’re some of the first teams to arrive.”