“I will not hunt you. Every village in every kingdom will hail you as the Alcalah’s Victor and offer you home and hearth. You will be assigned a retinue of guards for the rest of your days, offered more wealth than you can spend in ten lifetimes.” The lilt in his Nizahlan accent lengthened as he spoke. “I offer you a new life.”
I scarcely dared to believe it. I would never need to vacate this identity. Sylvia’s fame as the Alcalah’s Victor guaranteed Essiya’s ultimate erasure. After all, it would be unthinkable that the Champion riding beneath Nizahl’s banner was also the dead Heir to the kingdom Nizahl brutally razed from the earth. That wealth and liberty could outweigh such a loyalty.
Whose blood could run so cold?
“You must be truly desperate to catch them,” I said, “if you are willing to offer me this.”
The endless possibilities streamed before me. I could return to Mahair with enough money to buy the shop from Rory and a home of my own. Feed Raya’s wards and take care of Fairel. I could purchase a horse—a stable of them—and take Marek to the places he dreamed of visiting. Chase adventures with Sefa.
I could visit Jasad.
There is no Jasad, Hanim said harshly. Why would you go visit the Scorched Lands?
It was a slap of cold reality. Hanim had taken great pleasure in telling me of the war between Jasad and Nizahl. When the tide of war turned in Nizahl’s favor, Hanim would draw frantic runes at our feet. Dirt would twirl in the air and coalesce into moving images of the war. A hundred miles away, we watched flames char the palace’s grand pillars. Children torn screaming from their beds as hoofbeats thundered into wilayah after wilayah.
“How can I trust your word?” I asked. “You have but to gesture in my direction after the trials are complete, and a dozen of your company will be upon me.”
“Are you suggesting I would order our Champion executed after she has earned Nizahl victory?” he asked. “That I would dishonor my kingdom by revealing our Champion as a Jasadi and admitting I allowed an abomination to stand in Nizahl’s name?”
He raised a shoulder. “Anything is possible, I suppose.”
Arin lifted a golden ribbon from the pillow. It must have fallen from my hair while I slept. He slid the strip of gold between his fingers. “Allow me to spare you further strain and answer your next question. What keeps you from escaping? No supervision is flawless. You might very well decide to forgo the nuisance of the ordeal and simply vanish.”
This time, it was he who closed the distance between us. He lifted his arms and paused. He was giving me an opportunity to steel myself against the instinct to flinch away.
Irritation at his contradictory behavior simmered. Arin would hand-feed me to wolves without a second of regret, yet he would not breach the boundaries of my body.
Gathering the long ropes of my hair in his gloves, he said, “The decision is yours, suraira. I will not be your warden. However, Sayali and Caleb may have a more vested interest in your participation.” He deftly twined my curls together. The silk ribbon trailed across the back of my newly freed neck.
Suraira?
I couldn’t focus with him so close. My muscles were tense, braced for attack. “I have never met a Sayali or Caleb,” I managed.
He chuckled softly. “My apologies. You know them by other names.” He finished tying my hair. A velvety press of leather on my chin guided my gaze up to his. More frustrating than even the twisted maneuverings of Arin’s mind was his Awaleen-forsaken beauty. Trying to ignore it from this close was like glaring at the sun and pretending not to smell your eyes burning. I cataloged each facet of him as one studies the sharpness and shape of their executioner’s scythe. The strong contours of his jaw, the elegant line of his throat. I wanted to rip the pretty illusion apart and reveal the beast I’d seen in the war room.
“The Citadel’s High Counselor has searched long for his stepdaughter and her blond lover after they left him for dead and emptied his coffers. Should their location be made known to him, I imagine they would be hung for their crimes. Maiming and robbing a High Counselor is punishable by nothing less. They wouldn’t even need to factor in her lover’s defection from the army.”
My eyes narrowed. I genuinely did not have an inkling what he was talking about. I wouldn’t associate with any Nizahlans, let alone fugitives. I opened my mouth—and went utterly still.
If you are hoping to light a fire of fear in me, you are too late… Before it ever came to a tribunal, I would promptly follow you into death.
My nails dug into my palms. “Sefa.”
Her blond “lover” could be none other than Marek. Hadn’t I questioned their history? Wondered after Marek’s specific knowledge of Nizahl’s customs? To be fair, not even the farthest limits of my imagination could have conjured the possibility of Sefa as the stepdaughter of the Supreme’s High Counselor.
“You would hinge their lives on my compliance?”
Like a stone against the surface of still water, the brutal efficiency of his plan rippled through me. If I left, he would haul Sefa and Marek to Nizahl to account for their crimes. Crimes I doubted had any basis in truth. Sefa wept at the sight of limping stray dogs and taught the girls in our keep how to braid their hair. She wouldn’t brutalize and rob her family. Marek… Marek might, but not without a reason.
If the High Counselor was anything like the Supreme, he would chain their carcasses on the Citadel’s gates. Their flesh would be a feast for the carrion-eaters.
A mirage standing by the river, a bare hand extended for mine. An impossible decision. And just as I was trapped then, I was wholly cornered now.
“Hundreds of lives hinge on your compliance,” Arin replied. “They are two of many. Yours is counted in the number. If you do not triumph in the Alcalah, the protection you are granted as a Champion will disappear. Felix is a prideful man. There will be no safety for you anywhere in Omal. If any patrol captures you in another kingdom, Felix will have the right as your true Heir to drag you to stand trial in his courts.” He didn’t need to finish. We both knew Felix would never suffer me to live long enough to stand trial after I lodged a knife in his leg and humiliated him.
There was more. There had to be. One doubt circled stubbornly to the forefront. “Why me?”
He withdrew, releasing me from his strange thrall. A beat of silence passed, and I gritted my teeth. Another instance of information he deemed privileged to himself only. He preferred to spin me where he aimed, ground me in half-truths and suspicion.
“You were fate’s choice, not mine. While I hunt the Jasadis who have slaughtered a legion of innocents from Orban to Lukub, they hunt you.”
After Arin left, the guards blindfolded and led me from the room. I strained my ears for the babble of the river or the rumble of carriages, any marker of our location. The crunch of leaves underfoot did not leave plenty for me to work with. Fresh air replaced the foul odor of decay, and I wondered who would be left with the miserable task of burying the deteriorated soldier.
“Will we be much longer?” I complained. Walking blind at the mercy of Nizahl guards wrought havoc on my nerves.