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“Why didn’t you come see me?” Neera asked.

Jasmine swallowed, the answer tucked in her tongue, ready to be released.

“Zavian was very protective of you.”

“But he would have allowed you come.”

“I know, but only on his terms. I wanted to be sure he was okay with me seeing you without worrying”, Jasmine gave a crowning smile. “And besides, I am here now. That’s all that matters, and you should have a maid up here! To help with your dressing and room.”

Neera’s gaze zeroed on her as she reached behind her to zip up the dress. Jasmine stared at what would be considered a tattered horror that Neera donned. The neckline was plunging, and the slit at the side of her leg revealed her pale skin and the sheer material at the midriff exposed the skin there.

“You like it?” Neera asked.

No, Jasmine hated it. She looked like the girls at the dock who slept with different men a night for peanuts, only richer, and prettier.

.....

“It’s…good, nice actually”, Jasmine complimented her. “But black is for funerals and witches, you know that, yes?”

“Well, I am no witch, so a funeral it is then”, Neera said.

If that was an attempt at humor, Jasmine didn’t like it.

“A funeral?” Jasmine asked, and a nod was all she got in response.

The discomfort pricked Jasmine’s skin like hundreds of needles. She searched inside her head for a viable excuse, and before she had the time to rack one up, Neera locked her arm with hers as she guided them down to the dining hall.

The array of meals spread across the table was lavish. Neera matched Jasmine’s choices of food—red caviar with smoked salmon and potatoes, and the maids went about serving them.

“This is a feast, and won’t the King be joining us?” Jasmine asked one of the guards. At least Zavian would be a buffer between her and Neera.

“He is away”, Neera answered her. “You should know, you are his wife.”

The comment stung Jasmine. “That wasn’t very pleasant, Neera.”

“Oh, forgive me”, Neera clapped her hands together. “They shouldn’t have heard that. Everyone, leave the room.”

The maids and the guards exchanged glances, and when the Queen said nothing to dispute Neera’s orders, they filed out of the room one after the other. Jasmine had the guards outside the dining halls, anything was off, she would call them in a second.

“Privacy”, Neera scooped a spoonful of caviar into her mouth, smacking it and nodding in satisfaction. Jasmine followed suit and kept her eyes on Neera as she took a potato into her mouth.

“Do you know what it’s like to be dead, Jasmine?” Neera asked.

Jasmine’s eyes widened at the first name reference. Neera continued to smack on the caviar, completely unladylike to the shy Neera who would hesitate through bites of her meal, as if deciding whether to go on or quit.

“I haven’t been dead before”, Jasmine said.

“I have”, Neera drank a full cup of water in large gulps like a thirsty camel. She reached over to the jug and poured another for herself. “It isn’t a great experience, to be honest. It is like you are walking in this darkness, and you don’t even know which direction to head. It’s scary.”

Jasmine squirmed, her appetite dissipating.

“And then, you just know things, things you never knew when you were alive”, Neera squinted her eyes ahead, as if in thought. “You can suddenly see everything, maybe because you weren’t supposed to come back, but it all becomes clear”, Neera lifted the glass cup to her mouth, her eyes pinned on a sweating Jasmine, “clear like glass.”

“I am glad you are well, Neera, I really am”, Jasmine took the napkin and wiped at her mouth. “But I am afraid I have to retire to my chambers.”

“But I am not done yet”, Neera said.

“Perhaps another time?”

Neera said nothing as Jasmine drank water, and somewhere down her throat, the water clogged, sending her into a fit of coughs that burned at her chest. She reached for some more water, but the glass clattered on the floor and shattered, the burning becoming even more intense.

That was when Jasmine saw the smoke coming out of her mouth.

“Neera, help! Please!” Jasmine begged, a scream lodged somewhere in her throat as an invisible fire consumed her.

“I just wanted to understand why you’d have those maids kill me. But then, jealousy was enough of a reason, wasn’t it?”

“Neera please!” Jasmine begged, her hands clung to her throat as she wondered what kind of poison Neera had used on her. There were only a few poisons on the surface of the earth that could kill demons.

“But then, no one expected me to come back to life now, did they?”

“Neera”, Jasmine reached to Neera but ended up falling on the ground instead. She writhed and could see the flames now blurring her vision, and the pain consuming her entire body.

Neera inspected a piece of potato before she put it in her mouth. “The food isn’t quite that good, is it?” She looked to Jasmine, beautiful skin blackening, the fire eating her up. “Oh well, pity you can’t remember the taste at this point.”

Jasmine gave a shriek, but it was low, quiet, born out of her pain. She begged within her as the fire gutted her insides, eating her alive. She could feel her eyes sizzle in her skull as her vision disappeared, and her throat was long gone. Now she didn’t even beg to live, she begged for death, the mercy of it.

Death didn’t find her until the fire licked and gutted every part of her, consuming her weak beating heart last. Neera finished the last of the caviar, and to Jasmine’s burnt-up remains, she smiled.

“You see, I told you there was going to be a funeral.”