The room they thrust me into straddled Mahair’s border, pungent from the odor of nearby livestock. The door slammed shut, leaving me alone with my whipping panic.
“No, no, no,” I repeated, pacing the length of the room. The Nizahl Heir could not name me Champion, not after he saw my magic. He knew. He had the evidence he sought against me. The Commander would never knowingly assign the honor of Champion to a Jasadi. It must have been a tactic to delay Felix. Hunting me had taken more than two whole days’ worth of effort—it seemed fair he would want to kill me himself.
I needed to get out of here. Where in the tomb-damned earth had they taken me? Dozens of maps covered the walls of the room, names and dates scrawled on their surfaces by the same hand. A single straight-backed chair was tucked near a table barely wide enough to support a cup of tea. A glass cabinet stretched along the left wall.
I yanked at the cabinet’s handles. The locks held fast. Behind the glass sat replicas of the Awaleen’s most famed possessions, some of which I recognized, some I was glad not to. The tree branch Dania swung into the heart of a new mother. An axe forged to resemble Dania’s, rusted with blood. The sight of a ragged doll hewn from animal hide repulsed me a step backward. The doll leaned at a forward angle, childlike eyes drawn onto its rigid flesh. I didn’t remember the doll in any of the Awaleen’s stories.
I studied the cracked lines of its skin and pursed my lips, distracted by a vague recollection from Hanim’s lessons. The doll wore Orban’s flag from the ancient Battle of Zinish. Lukub had won by using magic, which Nizahl had expressly forbidden in times of war. The magic Lukub’s captain drew upon to defeat the Orbanians during the Battle of Zinish was too awful to recall, an evil that consumed the land like a mighty pestilence. Some of the Orbanian soldiers had been torn apart, their bodies warped and condensed into—
—into small, humanlike dolls.
I tore my gaze away, pressing two fingers to my lips to fight a surge of bile. No wonder the battle ended the way it did. Nizahl, who rarely muddied their boots in territorial feuding, had marched through Lukub. Only the clever and quick politics of the then-Sultana kept Nizahl from tearing Lukub apart. The Battle of Zinish had led to a peace accord between Nizahl and Lukub. One each subsequent Supreme and Sultana upheld.
Of course, the Battle of Zinish took place when magic was forbidden only as a weapon of war. Peace was an option for them. Peace, which my magic had permanently forsaken by hurling a dagger at the Omal Heir.
If I could repeat this evening, I would never leave Rory’s side. We would bundle up whatever we had not sold at the booth and go back to the shop. Maybe we could have heated enough water for two mint teas in the back room and laughed at the children tripping over one another in the street.
I would not be in this room of war relics, standing in the ashes of my second life.
Escape was the only option. Even if Arin condescended to listen to an explanation, his mercy would not extend beyond staying my execution until after a trial.
I paced the room. If Arin maintained his pattern of dismissing his guards, he would be the only obstacle between me and freedom. His guards would patrol the perimeter, and even if they spotted me running, they would not give chase. They had pledged to protect their Commander, and they would go straight to him. Once they realized I’d slain him, well, I would need to run very far and very fast indeed.
I glanced down at my torn and bloodstained clothing. Sefa still had my cloak. The dagger I kept in my boot had found a new home in Felix’s leg. I would vanish without taking so much as a sesame-seed candy with me.
Tears pricked my eyes. I felt utterly, achingly alone.
I pulled at the handles of the cabinets again. I hurled my body against the glass, but the thick surface didn’t bend. If the cabinet could withstand the passing centuries, my paltry efforts would not break it.
The doll’s eyes seemed to follow me. Mocking my failure.
I knew what I needed to do, but it would hurt. Was it too much to hope for a bloodless solution, just once? By Sirauk’s cursed depths, I had not come this far to be foiled by a pane of glass. My magic lay dormant, unaffected by my efforts. I could not fathom how it had escaped my cuffs, and I did not have time to waste hoping for two impossibilities in the same night.
I grabbed the slit on the bottom right of my tunic and yanked down. I tore the amount needed to completely wrap my elbow and lower arm.
Sweat beaded at my forehead. I closed my free hand around my other wrist and raised my cushioned elbow to shoulder level. “No broken bones,” I ordered. Life with Hanim had made for some strange habits, including speaking to my body as though it could hear me.
I swung my elbow into the glass as hard as I could. Pain exploded into my arm, reverberating through me until I tasted it behind my teeth. Using my grip on my wrapped arm to angle my right side forward, I hurled my body weight behind my elbow at every hit. If I stopped now, I wouldn’t start again. The agony radiating in my arm wrestled with the reality of confronting the Nizahl Heir without a weapon, and I swung until blood soaked the tunic strips.
A crack formed in the glass. Small, barely consequential compared to the sheer size of the weapons cabinet. I drew my arm back, choking down a whimper, and slammed my elbow into the fissure. The bottom half of the glass shattered. I turned my head as shards rained onto the ground, covering my face with my bloodied arm. Bloodied, but not broken.
I shoved my arm through the pane, reaching for the rusted axe behind the Lukubi doll. My nails scraped the handle, my fingers struggling to close on it. Had I mangled my elbow to miss the Awaleen-forsaken axe by mere inches?
Footfalls sounded outside. A low murmuring rumbled at the door. I craned for the axe, but I would need to break more of the glass to reach it.
I swore and grabbed the first weapon I could fit through the jagged edges. A short blade, half the length of my battered forearm, sharp despite its years. Not as good as an axe by half.
Twin footsteps grew loud, then faded in the distance. The two guardsmen assigned to my door departing on their Commander’s orders. I tucked the blade into the waist of my pants. The handle burrowed into the small of my back.
He was here.
I peeled the wet strips of fabric from my arm and flicked them aside. I had played his game from the moment he stood over me at the river. The boring, unassuming village ward. A girl either na?ve enough to perform burial rites on a fallen Jasadi or clever enough to hide her magic for five years. Until my magic reacted, I was simply Sylvia.
My magic tore the illusion of Sylvia to pieces and rebuilt her to represent one word only: Jasadi.
I straightened my shoulders. The chase had ended, and the Nizahl Heir was merely another monster at my heels.
The door opened.
CHAPTER EIGHT