MY NERVES JANGLED LIKE A CHOIR OF MIDWINTER bells.
In a small hollow just a few paces below me, Ina sat on a rock beside the stream, plaiting her dark hair while the water eddied around her pale ankles. She finished the braid and began to coil it at the nape of her neck, weaving in a thin strip of leather to tie it in place. As another gust kicked up, she turned into the wind so that I saw her in profile—the perfect straight nose, the sharp angle of her jawline. Over the past few weeks, her scar had tightened to a red line arching across her cheek like a bloody crescent moon. It only made her beauty more fierce, the blue of her eyes more intense, the dark of her hair and lashes more striking.
A day might never come when the sight of her didn’t steal my breath.
“Ina,” I said. Her name came out suffused with longing.
Her head whipped around with serpentine speed.
“Asra!” She dried her legs hastily, slipping her feet into worn woolen socks and then her boots. One of the toes was beginning to come unstitched. She clambered over to where I stood, until the soft curves of her body arched within a hand’s breadth of me. The wind whirled around us, our cloaks tangling with one another before we even touched.
I opened my arms and she stepped into them without hesitation. Relief flooded through me. The scent of spring hovered around her—cool mountain water and the verdant green of the soaproot shoots she’d used to wash her hair and bathe. My fear and worries slipped away as she melted into me like the softness of day turning to night, of darkness shifting back to dawn. The warmth of her against me brought back every moment we’d shared together with nothing between us at all. After all my fear, she was still my Ina, still the girl I knew, familiar in my arms. She would listen to reason. She had to.
“I’m glad you’re here,” she murmured. The hum of her words against my neck sent goose bumps racing down both my arms.
“Do you mean that?” I asked. Hope fluttered in my chest, fragile as a newly hatched butterfly. One minute she wanted me. The next she didn’t. It had to be the trauma of everything that had passed since we left home—or perhaps the dragon, who might have felt differently about me than she did.
She released the embrace but kept hold of my hand as we scooted back around to the more sheltered side of the cluster of rocks, crouching low to hide from the worst of the wind.
“How did you find me?” She sounded nervous, not like the bold creature who had left an entire caravan of bandits nothing more than bloody smears on the road.
I cast an anxious glance toward the cliff. We were still within sight of it. “The people who live in the forest saw you.”
“I’m glad you’re safe.” She ran her fingers over the ribbon of my courting bracelet, a small smile playing over her mouth. I wanted to kiss her.
“Not quite yet,” I said. “I promised the Tamers I’d get you to leave their forest. They’re worried about you upsetting the natural order. If I fail, they’ll kill me.”
Ina snorted. “They have no chance of killing you with me by your side. Besides, I don’t plan to stay. It’s hard to hunt as a dragon in these woods. Too many obstacles. We’re mountain creatures, after all. But I’m so tired . . . I needed to rest. I still can’t take dragon form for more than a few hours at a time—less if I’m flying for long periods. It should be at least a little easier by now.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. Guilt swirled through me. It had to be because she hadn’t manifested traditionally. Even though I’d been the cause of it, I didn’t know how to help her now.
“Oh, Asra.” Ina rested her head on my shoulder. “You shouldn’t have come after me. What if your death ends up on my hands, too?”
“I’m not dead, and it wouldn’t be on your hands anyway,” I said firmly. “This was my choice.”
“I don’t want to kill anyone else,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.
“I know you don’t.” I squeezed her hand. Finally she was coming to her senses.
“Just the one. Just him.” Her head snapped back up and her eyes took on a hint of wildness, the flash of the dragon within. “I would have flown straight to Corovja and killed him days ago if my manifest was settled, but it’s taking time. Too much time.”
I took a deep breath. So much for sensibleness. I had to talk her out of this before she got hurt wreaking vengeance on someone who hadn’t earned it.
“Ina . . . there has to be another answer. The boar king didn’t personally destroy our village. It could be moons before your manifest settles. You could take that time to find a way to protect others who are at risk of bandit attacks. Or figure out what future you want for yourself,” I said. If I could just get her to slow down and think, surely she’d realize that the best course of action was to make a fresh start.
“But you and I could get revenge for what the king did to our home. We could stop him from doing it to anyone else ever again.” She gestured widely to acknowledge the whole kingdom.
“But if you kill him, you’d be queen,” I said. Had her determination for vengeance turned into a hunger for more power? Her justifications didn’t add up.
She shrugged, but her eyes glimmered in a way that told me it wasn’t the first time the idea had crossed her mind. “That can be decided after he’s dead.”
“Please don’t do this. It’s too dangerous. He’s already got the Nightswifts plotting something against him. We don’t need to get tangled up in that.” My fear grew the longer we argued. She wasn’t being reasonable.
Ina tilted her head. “Nightswifts?”
“Assassins who used to work for the king. I ran into some of them when I was looking for you in Valenko. Listen, I don’t want harm to come to any other village, but you need to rest. Let’s find somewhere to go that’s safe and quiet where we can talk about this more,” I said.
“If you don’t want any other villages to be harmed, then don’t let it happen. Help me kill him.” The venom in her voice made me shiver.
What had happened in Amalska was inextricably tied up with the king and the crown for her, and I had let that happen. The time had come to tell her the truth. Whatever she decided to do from here, she had to do it with full knowledge of the role I had played in the fall of Amalska. I shoved down my desire for one more night beside her, one night to be comforted by her closeness before I had to risk letting her go.
I had always wanted impossible things.
This time, I could not allow myself to have them.
“Ina, I have to tell you something.” My heart was already breaking.
“That you love me?” she said, her eyes suddenly playful. Her moods had always been mercurial, but now they seemed to change with the swiftness of the spring weather.
“I do,” I said, but I couldn’t force a smile. “That’s where this all began. You know I am more than mortal.”
She nodded.
“There is more than that—more than what I do with the herbs and potions. I have a gift, one I was told never to share.” I hesitated, terrified to reveal the darkest part of myself to someone for the first time.
“You can tell me anything. You know that,” she said, her voice encouraging.
For just a moment I let myself get lost in the cool blue of her eyes, but I couldn’t stop now.
“I can shape the future by writing it in my blood.” Speaking the secret aloud felt like letting part of my soul go.
“You mean you could write the death of the king if you chose?” She gripped my arm, her eyes glittering.
“No. Gods, no.” Even if it wouldn’t be treason, the thought made my stomach churn. I could hardly believe she’d suggested it. How could she so quickly turn to killing as the answer, and how could she want me to bloody my hands, too?
“But why not?” A spark of anger lit in her eyes.
“Using my gift ages me before my time. And if I’m not specific enough about what the future should be . . . things don’t go the way I expect. People get hurt. People die.” Images of burned bodies flashed through my mind. I swallowed hard as bile rose in my throat.