Ryzek watched his knife turn as he moved toward Eijeh.
“Then you must learn to see the future quickly,” Ryzek said. “Because I want you to find me the version of the future I need, and tell me what it is I must do to get to it. Why don’t we start with a version of the future in which Shotet, not Thuvhe, controls this planet—hmm?”
He nodded to Vas, who forced Eijeh to his knees. Ryzek caught the blade by its handle and touched the edge of it to Eijeh’s head, right under his ear. Eijeh whimpered.
“I can’t—” Eijeh said. “I don’t know how to summon visions, I don’t—”
And then Akos barreled into my brother from the side. He wasn’t big enough to topple Ryzek, but he had caught him off guard, and Ryzek stumbled. Akos pulled his elbow back to punch—stupid, I thought to myself—but Ryzek was too fast. He kicked up from the ground, hitting Akos in the stomach, then stood. He grabbed Akos by the hair, wrenching his head up, and sliced along Akos’s jawline, ear to chin. Akos screamed.
It was one of Ryzek’s preferred places for cutting people. When he decided to give a person a scar, he wanted it to be visible. Unavoidable.
“Please,” Eijeh said. “Please, I don’t know how to do what you ask, please don’t hurt him, don’t hurt me, please—”
Ryzek stared down at Akos, who was clutching his face, his neck streaked with blood.
“I do not know this Thuvhesit word, ‘please,’” Ryzek said.
Later that night I heard a scream echoing in the quiet hallways of Noavek manor. I knew it didn’t belong to Akos—he had been sent to our cousin Vakrez, “to grow thicker skin,” as Ryzek put it. Instead I recognized the scream as Eijeh’s voice raised in acknowledgment of pain, as my brother tried to pry the future from his head.
I dreamt of it for a long time thereafter.
CHAPTER 8: CYRA
I WOKE WITH A groan. Someone was knocking.
My bedroom looked like a guest room, no personal touches, all the clothes and beloved objects hidden in drawers or behind cabinet doors. This drafty house, with its polished wood floors and grand candelabras, held bad memories like too much dinner. Last night one of those memories—of Akos Kereseth’s blood trailing down his throat, two seasons earlier—had come into my dreams.
I didn’t want to take root in this place.
I sat up and dragged the heels of my hands over my cheeks to smear the tears away. To call it crying would have been inaccurate; it was more an involuntary oozing, brought on by particularly strong surges of pain, often while I slept. I raked my fingers through my hair and stumbled to the door, greeting Vas with a grunt.
“What?” I said, pacing away. Sometimes it helped to pace the room—it was soothing, like being rocked.
“I see I’ve found you in a good mood,” Vas said. “Were you sleeping? You do realize it’s well into the afternoon?”
“I don’t expect you to understand,” I said. After all, Vas didn’t feel pain. That meant he was the only person I had encountered since I had developed my currentgift who could touch me with bare hands, and he liked to make sure I remembered that. When you get older, he sometimes said to me when Ryzek couldn’t hear him, you may see value in my touch, little Cyra. And I always told him I would rather die alone. It was true.
That he couldn’t feel pain also meant he didn’t know about the gray space just beneath consciousness that made it more bearable.
“Ah,” Vas said. “Well, your presence has been requested in the dining room this evening for a meal with Ryzek’s closest supporters. Dress nicely.”
“I’m not really feeling up for a social engagement right now,” I said, teeth gritted. “Send my regrets.”
“I said ‘requested,’ but maybe I should have chosen my words more carefully,” Vas said. “‘Required’ was the word your brother used.”
I closed my eyes, stalling in my pacing for a moment. Whenever Ryzek demanded my attendance, it was to intimidate, even when he was dining with his own friends. There was a Shotet saying—a good soldier does not even dine with friends unarmed. And I armed him.
“I came prepared.” Vas held out a small brown bottle, corked with wax. It wasn’t labeled, but I knew what it was anyway: the only painkiller strong enough to make me fit for polite company. Or fit enough, anyway.
“How am I supposed to eat dinner while I’m on that stuff? I’ll throw up on the guests.” It might improve some of them.
“Don’t eat.” Vas shrugged. “But you can’t really function without it, can you?”
I snatched the bottle from his hand, and nudged the door closed with my heel.
I spent a good part of the afternoon crouched in the bathroom, under a stream of warm water, willing the tension from my muscles. It didn’t help.