While most had honeymoons directly following their weddings, Larkyra and her now husband, Darius Mekenna, the newly anointed duke of Lachlan, had been too busy rebuilding and revitalizing his once-cursed homeland to celebrate. Now, with his people and territory beginning to thrive once more, he and Larkyra were set to go on a holiday to one of their southern estates.
It was only natural they took Larkyra out for a hen night before she left. Still, Niya hadn’t thought it would end this early.
“We’ll all go,” said Arabessa.
“No,” protested Niya. “Let’s have another drink. Macabris is just around the corner.”
“I wish we could, but—”
“But nothing. You’re not even in your cups, little bird! We have both failed miserably if you’re not stumbling home tonight.”
“Darling, I cannot be sporting a headache and nausea in the morning. Darius’s and my carriage ride is long, and it will grow even longer if I’m forcing us to stop every few turns to empty my stomach.”
“When did you become so boring?” grumbled Niya.
“You mean responsible?”
“Same thing.”
“You know,” said Arabessa, “you and I have to be up early as well, for Father has invited the Lox family to breakfast.”
“By the Obasi Sea,” groaned Niya. “Talk about boring. And whatever happened to luncheons? Breakfast is entirely too early to receive guests. What will the neighbors think?”
“I’m sure Father would rather they gossip about our odd hours of entertainment than our . . . other oddities.”
“You mean like how odd looking his eldest daughter is?” challenged Niya.
“More like how his second child can’t sit still for more than a single grain fall in public.”
“It is not my fault Father’s guests are always so dull. I have to move around in fear of falling asleep from boredom.”
“While listening to your gripes is always riveting,” said Larkyra, fishing a portal token from the pocket of her skirts, “I suggest you save a few for conversation tomorrow.”
With the tip of her blade, Larkyra pricked her finger, letting a drop of crimson hit the center of the gold coin. Bringing it close to her lips, she whispered a secret—one that Niya, despite her best efforts, always failed to hear. The token flashed as Larkyra flicked it into the air. Before it fell to the cobblestones, a glowing doorway shot up from its center, revealing another city’s dark alley stretching out on the other side.
There were a handful of ways to get to and from the Thief Kingdom, but surely the simplest was with a portal token. The problem lay in acquiring the right one, for portal tokens were sparse, with only the most powerful able to create them. Luckily, the Mousai had a direct connection to a creature capable of making the coins with a snap of their fingers. Of course, Niya knew, convincing them to do the snapping was the hard part.
Without another word, Larkyra hiked up her skirts and slipped through the portal’s door, quickly followed by Arabessa.
Niya paused at the glowing entrance, a heaviness weighing on her chest. Nights like these, with them all out together free to play, were growing sparse now with Larkyra settled down with Darius. If she had known their evening was to end so soon, she would have . . . well, Niya didn’t know what she would have done differently. Except perhaps teased Larkyra more.
“You coming?” asked her youngest sister, standing close to Arabessa on the other side of the portal door.
Shaking off her nostalgia, Niya stepped through, immediately becoming enveloped in the new city’s dry heat. While the Thief Kingdom smelled of wet dirt, fires, and incense, here fresh jasmine floated through the air. And beyond their narrow alley, the sun was rising.
Niya breathed in the city of her birth: Jabari. The jewel of Aadilor, it was called, for it housed the most diverse trade in the southern lands. Its richly built buildings on the northern peak gathered like a shining diamond toward the sun.
Behind Niya, the way back to the Thief Kingdom snapped shut as Larkyra returned the portal token to her pocket.
In its absence, the alley somehow now felt . . . less.
“Ready, sisters?” asked Arabessa, prompting them to remove their masks.
Niya waved a hand over her face, a mist of her orange magic seeping from her palm. Release, she silently instructed. There was a tingling of her disguise unsticking before it dropped into her fingers.
Niya rubbed her eyes. Her masks always felt more natural in place then off.
Yet here, in Jabari, their disguises were of a different nature.
In Jabari they were the daughters of Dolion Bassette, the Count of Raveet of the second house. An esteemed family who, to any casual observer, held no gifts or connection to a deplorable city cloaked deep inside a mountain. And for good reason. While this city held many splendors, magic was not one of them. Here citizens eyed such powers with distrust, ostracizing those with magic from the community. Niya could not blame them. Aadilor’s history was fraught with the gifted taking advantage of the giftless. Best if each kind stuck to their own lands.
But secrets needed places to hide, and for creatures as powerful as Niya and her sisters were, it was best to hide in plain sight.
Tucking her mask into the reticule looped around her waist, Niya followed her sisters out of the alley.
The wide streets of Jabari’s upper ring were quiet, aristocrats having no need to wake before sunrise. The sisters turned onto a street lined with large marble homes, their wrought iron gates holding back pristine green lawns where morning lilies and roses readied to bloom.
Despite the peaceful hour, Niya couldn’t shake a cool touch along her neck as they turned a corner. A sensation detectable through her gifts. She glanced over her shoulder but saw only empty road.
She waited to feel the energy again, a sign that someone might be mirroring their steps, but none came.
It was probably a rat, she thought as she hurried to catch up with her sisters, the moment quickly forgotten.
What Niya did not take into account, however, as she entered the gate to her own home, was that sometimes the magic tingling of being followed was instead the basic human instinct of being watched.
CHAPTER TWO
Hot tea splashed across Niya’s hand as she filled her cup until it overflowed, arousing her from the belief she had just entered the Fade from boredom.
“Really, my flame, the Loxes were not as dull as all that,” her father, Dolion Bassette, said from his usual spot on their veranda, where he lounged like a lion beneath the soft morning sun, his white cheeks growing rosy.
“You’re right, they were far worse,” grumbled Niya. If it hadn’t been for their lighter prepared breakfast, she was convinced the Loxes’ visit would have yawned into lunch.
“The younger daughter, Miss Priscilla, was not so awful,” said Zimri as he leaned into his chair.
“You would say such a thing,” replied Arabessa. “She all but spoon-fed you your food, the poor lovesick child.”
“I cannot help how my charms affect those around me.”
“Is that what you call them? Charms? I always thought they were better described as annoyances.”
Zimri cut Arabessa a look, staving off whatever retort he wished to speak.