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I feint letting the scim fall, and in the instant that Eleiba’s gaze drops to it, I punch her square in the face. She drops like a stone.
“In.” I point the scim at Nikla’s throat. Already, soldiers thunder down the hall toward us. “Now, princess.”
She bares her teeth but backs into the chamber. I bar the door and ignore the shouts getting closer.
I flip my scim around and hand it to the princess. “A token of goodwill. As I said, I just want to talk.”
Nikla takes the weapon with the swiftness of someone practiced with a blade—and puts the point to my throat. Distantly, alarm bells clang. Her guards will be breaking down the door soon enough.
“Well, girl,” she says. “What could the Blood Shrike of a pretender possibly have to say to me?”
“I know Keris is here for an alliance, but you can’t trust her,” I say. “She betrayed an entire city of her own civilians to become Empress. Tens of thousands left to the mercies of the Karkauns because of her lust for power.”
“I was not born yesterday. I’d be a fool to trust your empress.”
My vision goes red at that word. “She isnot,” I hiss, “my empress. She is a snake, and allying with her is a grave error.”
“Keris is offering me a treaty that would end the jinn attacks on Mariner villages,” Nikla says. “Can you do the same?”
“I—” I need a moment to think. Just a moment. But the blade makes it hard to breathe, let alone come up with a solution to Nikla’s problem. Everytrick I learned in rhetoric class flees my mind. I wish, suddenly, for Elias. He could sweet-talk a stone into giving him water.
“It’s Keris’s men who are carrying out those raids,” I say. “She’s allied with the jinn. We could fight them together.”
“You and what army?” Nikla laughs and lowers the scim. Not because she’s tired. But because she’s no longer afraid. “Do you even have enough food to get your people through the winter? You’re a fool, Blood Shrike. I can’t fight Keris and her supernatural allies. I can only make a deal. I suggest you do the same.”
“I’d die first.”
“Then you’ll die.” Nikla’s guards bang on the door, shouting her name. “In a few seconds, at the hands of my soldiers. Or later, at the hands of your empress.”
She’s not my empress!“Keris is evil,” I say. “But I know her. I can defeat her. I just need—”
The door splinters. Nikla observes me pensively. My words won’t convince her. But perhaps threats—
At that moment, a shrill scream punctures the air. It is so deafening that I cringe and cover my ears, hardly noticing as Nikla drops the scim and does the same. The banging on the door stops as cries sound from outside it. With a great crash, the windows of the chamber shatter and glass plunges to the floor. Still, the scream continues.
My skin prickles, and deep within my body, my healing magic stirs, restless as a pup in a thunderstorm.
Laia. Something is wrong. I can feel it.
As quick as it began, the screaming stops. Nikla straightens, her body trembling.
“What—”
The door bursts open and her guards—including Eleiba—pour in.
“Keris will betray you before the end.” I dart past the princess, swiping up the scim. “If you survive it, if you need a true ally, get word to me in Delphinium. I’ll be waiting.”
With that, I offer her a low bow. Then I race for the shattered window and fling myself out.
VII:Laia
I am not alone. I know it even in unconsciousness. Even in this strange blue space where I have no body.
I am not alone, but the presence with me is not outside me. It isinme.
There is something—or someone—inside my mind.
I have always been here, a voice says.I have just been waiting.
