Kintsugi

She is losing. Badly.

She has built a dehydration chamber to weaken his powers, sliced his wing to even the playing field, dragged him to a scorching desert to isolate him - and even with all that forethought, she is barely surviving their duel. The rage that’s propelled her so far sputters. With each blow that she's barely able to parry, the choking sensation of hopelessness gets stronger.

She thinks of her mother, unable to be resuscitated in spite of all her clever inventions. Her father, killed in an explosion notwithstanding the defenses she painstakingly built. Her brother, lost even with all her frenzied attempts at a cure. Her people, about to be conquered regardless of her newfound powers.

And even now, she is not enough.

She deflects another blow and somersaults backwards, but despite her enhanced speed she's a split second too slow to block the next attack. Namor races forward and stabs her, pinning her to a boulder like one of the River Tribe fisherman spearing his catch. For one long, delirious moment, between the space of two breaths, she thinks she feels the ghost of her mother's touch on her cheek. But then time speeds up again, crushing the illusion, and the world explodes in pain.

Griot blares the alarm. “Princess! Warning: suit compromised, warning…” Red lights flash inside her visor.

She releases the catch on the helmet, gasping for air and scratching at the spear. The suit is trying to seal her wound to prevent blood loss - something she designed after seeing N'Jadaka die. But unlike him, she won't be getting a merciful death.

“It could have been different, Princess,” Namor rasps into her ear. He backs up and looms over her. His skin is peeling and burnt, his eyes dark and wild. The sun is a blinding halo behind him, catching on the panther marks she gouged onto his cheek. A god of vengeance, bathed in blood and fire.

“Princess, we’re being cornered!” Okoye screams into her earpiece.

"Surrender," Namor demands. "And I will spare your people."

A clever girl who ate the forbidden fruit, with the temerity to not only to escape a god's kingdom, but also attack him head on. Bast must be roaring to smite her for hubris.

“I yield,” she whispers, and Wakanda falls.

…

Namor forces them to convene their council immediately, barely giving them time to collect their wounded and dead. As she limps into the throne room, she averts her gaze from the broken window, the water flooding the level below, the shattered floor where her mother took her last breath.

She will not break.

The Dora are held at the corners, heavily bandaged and disarmed. The tribal leaders and elders are herded by Talokanil warriors to the center. Two of them hold spears at each prisoners’ throats. Shuri has the questionable honor of having six of Namor’s best warriors, including Attuma and Namora, surround her with weapons, despite the fact she is still dizzy with blood loss, hands curled over her wounded stomach. She isn’t sure how long the patch job from the suit can hold before she needs her beads, but Namor has confiscated all of her technology.

She glances at a stony-faced Nakia clutching her son - one of many surprises Shuri had foolishly thought she could catch up on leisurely, afterwards. His face is scrunched as he sniffles quietly, a jagged knife held to his throat by a hulking warrior. Shuri breathes deeply, seeing red at the edges.

Namor likely had Queen Ramonda watched as she visited Nakia, and the boy discovered then - which would explain his presence in the room now, to threaten Nakia into submission. She wonders distantly how long Namor has been watching them, lurking out of sight. Years? Decades?

During the siege, Shuri had Nakia’s son and the rest of the children entrusted to a group of warriors including Myra, the faithful handmaiden of the royal family. But even clever, resourceful Myra was caught as she was smuggling the children out. If Shuri had held out, for even a little longer, perhaps they would have all had time to escape…

She will not break.

She blinks as Nakia catches her attention. The former War Dog stares at Shuri meaningfully, looks down at her son, and looks back at her. Nakia then blinks at her in a code Shuri once taught her a lifetime ago.

She has probably forgotten the code, there is no way Nakia is saying-

The boy also looks terribly familiar-

Oh Bast- that is her brother’s child. The heir to the throne. Her only successor as Black Panther.

Does Namor know? Her heart accelerates. Surely not - otherwise the boy would be dead by now.

She will not break-

Suddenly, Attuma pounds his spear against the floor three times, and she tears her eyes away from T’Challa’s son. The Talokanil stand to attention and uniformly turn to the entrance. Namor, flanked by two more warriors, glides into the throne room, a far cry from his weakened state in their last showdown. He is fully healed save for his heavily bandaged ankle. Good, she thinks spitefully, as the usurper takes her mother’s throne. She hopes his wing stays clipped.

“Council of Wakanda,” Namor calls. “Your people have fought well. But now you will yield to my rule.” He pauses and smiles coldly at Shuri. His teeth are sharp and pointed, like a shark’s. “If you attempt a counter-attack against Talokan, if I feel even a ripple in the waters… I will drown this entire country and every last man, woman, and child with it.”

She will not break.

Namor turns to address the larger audience. “I am not without mercy; take two weeks to bury your dead and rest. Mourn your sons and daughters. Get healers to see to your wounded.”

“Then what?” M’Baku demands. The warriors around him push his spears closer to his throat, but he plows on, heedless. “What happens to our people? You don’t seem like a king to leave us be. Will your kind rape and burn our fields? Drink our rivers dry and loot our homes? Force us to fight in cages and entertain you?”

“You mistake me for a colonizer,” Namor says smoothly, but there is an undercurrent of a predator that freezes everyone. “I am a benevolent and merciful god, and I can forgive. Just ask your princess,” he says, amusement suddenly seeping into his tone.

Shuri raises her eyes to him, and he stares back, smiling. She quickly lowers her gaze, not wanting her people to suffer her insubordination.

She will not break.

“After your mourning period, you will rebuild,” Namor continues. “My guards will help patrol your borders, keep your security.” Everyone hears, we are watching you. “But I have shown mercy several times, and your people have been ungrateful. Perhaps a lesson is in order.” He nods at a warrior, who drags Nakia forward roughly and pushes the woman to her knees. Her son cries out and runs to follow, but Myra pulls him back and shushes the boy gently.

She will not break- she will not-

“Take a look at your spy,” Namor hisses, pacing in front of her. “She killed two of my children, she stole my rightful prisoner, she incited this bloodshed!”

Riri is also dragged forward. She gasps in pain as she hits the floor. Namor’s eyes flash.

“And you have gone through so much pain, for this misguided foreigner, whose greed nearly ended us all!” He roars. The waters beyond the throne room rise and fall violently.

She will not-

“She is but a girl…” the Merchant Tribe Elder whispers, shaking.

Namor shrugs, indifferent. “Children can commit the greatest of crimes, and they will be tried by our law.” He looks remorseful, the snake. “Let this serve as an example. I will have these two executed at dawn, but the rest of your warriors will be-”

“Take my life instead!” Shuri screams, and every head in the room swivels to face her. “It is my fault - they are my people- make an example of me, only me, not them-”

“Shuri, no-” Nakia starts, but a warrior cuts her off with a chokehold.

Namor smiles grimly. “You offered yourself once to me, princess, in exchange for the foreigner,” he says. “I trusted your word then, before your spy so callously killed two of my children and incited this war. An eye for an eye, is that not how the surface world operates? Surely my children are entitled vengeance.”

“It was my mother that ordered Nakia to take me and Riri back,” Shuri says, the words feeling like ash in her mouth. “You had your revenge when you murdered her.”

Namor’s eyes are glacial. “And then you ambushed us, killing scores of my people.”

“Then punish me instead,” Shuri pleads. “I am the one at fault, I gave the order to attack.”

“It does not matter to me who gave the order. Your people struck the first blow, and lost to us twice. They will pay the price.”

“We do not need more orphans and funerals. Let us end this cycle of violence with me. Or are you truly so devoid of love,” she whispers, “ that you would rip a boy from his mother, when he has done no wrong? Or a girl’s life before she has had a chance to live?”

Namor narrows his eyes and studies her for a long while. Then he smiles. “What will you give me, in return?” he says, almost playful.

She swallows, fighting the urge to be sick. “Anything - anything in my power-”

He sighs. “You have no power. Not anymore.” He looks at her thoughtfully. Her heart beats faster, like a trapped bird. “Maybe there is some use for you. You did come close to besting me, after all.” His warriors shuffle uneasily at the careless sounding admission. “Perhaps I can once more be merciful. I did say I would make you queen.”

Shuri sucks in a breath. Surely - he has lost it-

“We will wed in two weeks’ time.”

She cannot break, because you cannot break something that is shattered beyond recognition.

…

Shuri moves on autopilot, helping her people clear debris, suction back the floodwaters, sweep the streets, carry the dead, build funeral pyres… She cannot bear to anyone in the eye and see what lies there.

Why didn’t you save us, you, our god given protector? What did we do to deserve this?

She runs out of tears on the third day. Okoye falls into step behind her, carefully patching up the dam alongside her. They don’t talk, but Okoye grasps her arm until a scowling Talokan warrior yanks them apart. Namor’s people are lurking everywhere, malicious blue demons as M’Baku calls them. They all have translators attached to their masks from Wakandan to Mayan. Her people cannot understand them, but they hear everything perfectly. Namor has been collecting information on them a long time, enough to crack their language, enough to know to keep Shuri from her lab and remove any technology from her people.

At the end of each day, she follows the rest of them into still-standing homes as they cram together in makeshift bedding. Namor had offered her, with glittering coal black eyes, a place in his quarters- a more luxurious and humiliating prison. She had refused, barely keeping her anger in check. She wasn’t allowed to utter consolations to her people, but at least she was able to use her panther strength to rebuild. She clasps the hands of the other women, shares grim nods with the men, and shushes the crying children. Her mind whirs, unable to sleep, as she despairs.

Nakia and M’Baku warned her about seeking vengeance. She did it anyway, and what did it leave her? Watching her people used as cannon fodder in a war they have tried to avoid for centuries. What would her family say? Would they cry with shame, that the carefully concealed Wakanda has finally been polluted, ripped apart, centuries of careful rule destroyed by a thoughtless girl?

Please… if you can hear me, father, mother brother… help me…

Before she knows it, the days blur and she is being dragged by Attuma to her palace chambers.

“For the wedding,” Attuma grins, nastily. “Brides must get ready, no?”

With a menacing laugh he pushes her into her room. A group of women are already there, held hostage by several warriors.

“Princess,” Myra says, gently leading her to a tub for bathing. She leaves the Shuri’s underclothes on, to preserve her modesty in front of the jeering guards, as she starts to carefully scrub her skin. To be thankful for mercies so small, Shuri thinks. The last few weeks they were forced to bathe communally in the rivers in front of the cruel guards that would constantly harass them.

She clears her throat, rough with disuse. “Thank you,” she rasps, as the other women help wash and cut her hair.

Myra suddenly taps against her skin and she startles in the bath, but Myra just keeps her eyes down. The guards glare at Shuri, but she closes her eyes and slides further into the bath.

Myra, like Nakia, remembers Shuri’s code.

Marital duties, Myra taps, and Shuri shuts her eyes in despair. She had nearly forgotten she was going to be raped. Do not struggle.

Is Myra mad? Shuri glares at her. Of course she would struggle.

Myra shrugs apologetically. Hurts more, she taps.

Shuri deflates. The woman is looking out for her, and her people. If Shuri doesn’t comply, the punishment will be carried out on them.

Use him.

Shuri frowns. How, she taps back.

Men are men, Myra taps cryptically.

Is her handmaiden suggesting… that Shuri seduce Namor? Her eyebrows nearly fly off her head. Surely not. For one thing, Shuri has the subtlety and bluntness of a rhino. There was a reason she had only ever been on one covert operation to extract Riri, after years of begging - and look how that had gone.

Secondly, Shuri had lived a sheltered life, mostly sequestered in the safety of her lab. Before the operation to extract Riri, she had set foot in the outside world perhaps for a grand total of three days, an impenetrable wall of Dora between her and any dangers. And now she was going into enemy territory with no protection at all.

Last, but most worryingly, Namor was far from naive. How could Shuri expect to deceive a god-king who had lived for centuries, and likely knew the matters of the flesh far better than she, a young woman who interacted with machinery more than people?

Men are men, Myra insists.

Shuri looks at her helplessly. Myra is classically beautiful - willowy, with eye-catching curves and high cheekbones and full lips. Many a Wakandan had vied for her hand, bumbling to impress her- something Myra and Shuri had found endlessly amusing. Even some of the Talokan guards glance the handmaiden appreciatively as she sashays past.

Shuri is lanky and boyish in comparison. Her strengths are her hands scarred by nights welding in the laboratory, her wits sharpened by years of study and experimentation. She is far from a femme fatale, with only a few fumbling sexual experiences she can barely recall. There was just no time. At first, all she wanted to do was be an inventor in charge of the Design Lab. Then her father had died, and after that her brother too passed, and then they were at war… And now she is getting a crash course in seduction, the day of her wedding, in Morse code, as her enemy’s guards peer at them like hawks.

Strongest is the prey that surprises, Myra insists. He will expect an attempt. But the serpent never expects a mongoose.

I’ll try, she taps hesitantly.

Myra squeezes her hand, then taps again. Pretend to be virgin. Men are jealous.

Shuri nods, almost imperceptibly. Then taps again, worried. Four months. Children.

Shuri’s contraceptive implant will last for four more months… after which Shuri is liable to get pregnant. She is unsure what effects the heart shaped herb will have on her, or if she and Namor’s DNA are even compatible. But he is half human, and she has ingested a similar plant to his own. There are hardly enough data points to make an assumption, and yet she has to assume the worst.

While Wakanda has always prized women to be equal to men in all aspects, Shuri has never hated her womanhood more than in this instance.

Wish I was a man.

Myra smiles, soft and sad. Men are stupid.

Shuri holds back a snort, then sobers. Not Serpent King. It is easier to sign than Namor’s true name, and for a second, he is just a myth.

“How much longer?” a guard asks, and her daydream is broken.

“Two more hours,” Myra says carefully. “The bride is to be fully cleansed of her life before, then clothed in the life of the new.” She pauses. “Is it different in Talokan?”

“The bride would fast for three days,” the guard starts. “Then drink from the sacred garden with K'uk'ulkan, before ascending to-”

“Eloy!” another guard snaps. Eloy falls back, chastened. The new guard glares at them. “You have one hour. Hurry, or else we will drag the princess as she is to the altar.”

The women move around in a flurry. Myra gives her a reassuring squeeze. They carefully towel her and drape a white dress with flawless jade and thread made of gold, sewn into the neck and hems, before draping an elaborate feathered headpiece on her head. She feels like a prized animal readied for slaughter. Myra grabs ceremonial Wakandan paint and quickly dabs white on Shuri’s face - slashes across her cheekbones, and one down her chin.

She blinks in surprise - the handmaiden has painted Shuri’s panther mark, not the mark of a wife.

Before she can ask about it, the guard that yelled at them pulls Myra back roughly. “What are you doing?” he snarls.

“Apologies,” Myra says, “it is customary for Wakandan brides-”

The guard backhands her and she goes sprawling on the floor. Shuri grabs the guard’s arm, ready to attack, but the cries from the other women stop her. She looks back. The guards are holding knives to their throats. She won’t be fast enough to save them all. Shuri lets go, breathing hard.

“An honest mistake,” Shuri grits out the lie. “It’s not her fault. No one told me-”

“Aapo,” Eloy calls uncertainly, “We don’t want to be late, they didn’t know. Let it go.”

“Fine,” Aapo says, eying her in disgust. “It’s your head on the line,” he gestures at Myra, who is struggling to get up. He nods at the warriors in the corner, who release the other women. They rush forward to help the handmaiden up. Shuri swallows hard. Myra’s beautiful face is bruising; her cheek will be a nasty mix of purple and blue soon. Her fingers twitch almost imperceptibly.

It’s ok, she taps, shaky.

No, Shuri thinks. It will never be ok again.

…