That night, I paced. Barefoot on the cold stone, hair freed from my braid, in the same dirty clothes I’d trained in. I traveled up and down the halls, losing myself in the complicated maze of tunnels winding through the complex. The blue light inside the walls followed me, so reminiscent of the gold streaks in Jasad’s fortress that I bit my lip. Every now and then, I would spot one of the guards from the corner of my eye. They were keeping watch from a distance. I was grateful for the space.
My first year in Mahair, I’d skulked around the village every night until sunrise. Memorizing escape routes, finding the corners to duck into when Nizahl soldiers passed. The perimeters of the village had seemed enormous. I had spent ten years comfortable in the opulence and majesty of Usr Jasad, followed by half a decade living in a hollowed-out tree infused with Hanim’s magic to fit exactly two cots and stacks of scrolls.
“Go back to your room. Now.” Vaun’s voice gave him away before he turned the corner.
I was too exhausted to handle Vaun. The other guards left me alone. Why couldn’t he? “You first.”
His lips curled back, and he stepped toe-to-toe with me. I ignored the urge to antagonize him further and ground out, “I can’t sleep. Walking calms me down.”
“I did not ask for your worthless opinion. Return to your room. If you leave again, I will drag you before His Highness myself.”
Loathing trickled over my lethargy. I hated every Nizahl soldier, but Vaun—Vaun represented a type I despised above all else. The kind of soldier who thrilled in the ounces of power the colors on his uniform lent him. The kind for whom inflicting misery was not a byproduct of necessity, but the purpose. Vaun was a soldier who would learn about merchants selling Jasadi bones and give the offenders a wink.
I glanced at my cuffs. The silver shifted, tightening around my wrists. My magic was upset. Why? Why now and not during breakfast, when Vaun called me a dog’s whore?
“I was not given orders from your Commander to remain in my room at all times,” I said. I didn’t flinch from his pungent breath or cower to his sad attempts to raise himself taller than me. “And I certainly do not take orders from you.”
Wes appeared behind Vaun. The older guard rubbed his eyes and yawned. “Vaun, enough. Jeru and Ren are maintaining watch. We were not ordered to confine her.”
Vaun didn’t budge. Ah—now I understood. I turned my chin and met Wes’s exasperated gaze. “He is baiting me. He wants me to attack him so he has an excuse to drag me before the Heir.”
The furrow on Wes’s brow deepened. He reached for Vaun’s arm. Before he could make contact, Vaun settled a hand on my waist.
I tensed harder than if he had spit in my face. I pushed his hand off.
“Don’t touch me,” I hissed.
Keep your calm, Essiya, Hanim cautioned. He is goading you.
The next hand was on my arm. I tried to shove past him, but he clasped my elbow. His other hand went to my stomach, right above my navel. Any measure of composure sizzled to nothing.
Hanim tossed a rag. “Press it over the wound and stop crying. You shouldn’t have let it catch you.”
I turned my face into my hair. She hated the sight of my tears. I almost never cried anymore, but the pain—this pain eclipsed any I had known before it. My blood poured over my hands, soaking the rag in seconds.
Hanim crouched next to me and pried my hands away from my stomach. A sharp inhale whistled through her teeth. “Dania’s rusted axe, Essiya, what did you do?”
“I w-wanted to let it get c-close enough,” I moaned. Hot tears slid over my temples and into my hair. “I cut its head off. Like you said.”
I faded in and out of consciousness as Hanim loomed over me, working to wrap my torso in strips of linen and rabbit hide. A bubble of happiness rose above my agony. She cared. She didn’t want me to hurt.
A sting on my cheek pulled my eyes open. Hanim slapped me again. “You do not get to die,” she snapped. Her eyes were pitiless. “Death is not for those with debts to repay.”
“Sylvia! Sylvia, stop!”
I became aware of arms winding around my chest, holding me back. Vaun was on the ground, clutching his bleeding nose. I shoved Wes away. My back hit the wall.
“I told him not to touch me.” I sounded delirious even to my own ears. “I told him.”
Vaun surged to his feet and knotted a fist in my hair. He yanked hard, knocking me to the ground. “She will be taken to His Highness.”
Wes watched Vaun maneuver my kicking form down the corridor with no small amount of disbelief. He didn’t follow.
Vaun dragged me down the hall with both hands in my hair. The stone scraped and tore at me, and he moved too fast for me to try standing. I kept my hands in my hair, trying to minimize the pressure against my scalp. Each time I resisted, he yanked harder, and my eyes watered.
He released one hand to shove open a door. I was tossed onto a thick blue rug.
“My liege, I apologize for interrupting you so late in the evening. I discovered the Jasadi exploring the tunnels and behaving evasively. When I questioned her, she turned violent. She clearly has intentions to cause you harm.”
I used the wall to hoist myself to my feet. Seated in an armchair by the window, very much looking like he’d planned to retire for the night, was the Nizahl Heir. Without looking up, he closed the text on his lap and set it to the side.
“He is lying,” I said, but it emerged tired and without any fire. What did it matter? He would not take the word of a Jasadi over his own guardsman.
Arin ignored me. “Did she express these intentions to you?”
Vaun shifted. “No, of course not, but—”
“Was she wielding a weapon when you apprehended her?”
Vaun and I were equally baffled. “She means you ill, sire!”
“I am certain she does.” He tapped the arm of the couch. The sight of Arin’s bare hand was startling. “Many do. Arresting them all would be a lofty task indeed.”
“She—”
“She is not easily provoked,” Arin said. “Aside from her fits and failures of humor, the Jasadi is not prone to rabid reactionism.”
I frowned. Failures of humor?
“He put his hand on my waist.” I stared straight at Vaun, not bothering to hide my vindictive satisfaction. He had dragged me to the Heir only to have his own legitimacy questioned. “When I told him not to touch me, he put a hand on my stomach.” I spoke the last part through clenched teeth, resisting the instinct to wrap my arms around my middle. “I am a weapon for the Heir, and you will treat me with the dignity you afford a sword, if not a person. You are not meant to wield me.”
Arin’s gaze slid to Vaun and hardened. Though his voice didn’t change, a frigid chill swept through the room. “You put your hands on her.”
Vaun dropped his chin, which I imagined to be the Nizahl version of wringing one’s hands. “I had no other option, my liege. She would not return to her room.”
I wanted to lunge at him, tear his sinew with my teeth and stomp his chest into a feast for the dogs. “I am here because I chose it, not because you have trapped me, you pus-ridden swine b—”