Page 163

My pulse lurched with alarm. “What will you do with her?”

“What we do with all murderers and insurgents,” Arun said smoothly. “The Hunter shall face execution.”

Mara choked out a panicked sound, and a similar, mind-emptying panic now hummed through me.

Erik has you right where he wants you. Don’t you want to stop him?

She could’ve been lying. But if she wasn’t . . .

“Wait—” I started forward, but a swarm of imperial guards converged on Mara, blocking my view.

“Wait?” Arun echoed. “For the Hunter to slaughter more innocents in our empire?”

“No,” Valeria said firmly, stepping closer to my side. “But if the Hunter has useful information, we should at least wait for Rheya to return from Banarrat.”

“If she returns,” Arun said, with enough meaning that we went rigid. He continued, his voice low, “We received news from the island a few hours ago. Just as the empress was reaching an agreement with the Banarrati commanders, a group of soldiers who’d been particularly loyal to General Holden sought to interfere.” He looked at Valeria with something like resentment as he said, “Her Imperial Majesty has been injured in combat.”

Valeria drew back, her alarm echoed in both me and Osana. But there was sorrow in Val’s eyes, too—a sorrow Arun didn’t seem to share as he turned away.

Instinct drove me to grab his arm, to try and hold him back.

It was a mistake.

I tensed as Arun’s attention narrowed on my hand, then drifted toward my Gallery brooch, which was still somehow attached after tonight’s chaos.

“Remember, Lady Alissa,” he said, his voice dangerously soft, “that your immunity protects you everywhere but here.” His gaze sharpened. “You should remember, too, that if we had known about the Hunter’s presence earlier, this massacre could have been avoided.”

I flinched, and Arun smirked at what the movement had betrayed. That we had known about Mara’s presence . . . and we’d said nothing.

A sickly guilt flooded me, and I knew from their expressions that Valeria and Osana shared the feeling; it rendered us silent as Mara was hauled off the ground.

“A true pity,” Arun said, glancing around the ruined settlement. Then he looked at Osana and smiled, faintly satisfied. “Do contact me if you wish to reinstate your apprenticeship, Miss Kimba. Your talents have been missed.”

Osana’s expression wavered between disgust and anger as he finally turned away.

The guards were marching past us when Mara thrust her legs up in a kick. Slamming her body into their armor, she ripped out of their hold.

Then she crashed into me.

I gasped as we tumbled down the slope together. My face hit the water, bubbles exploding up my nose. Mara grabbed my hair, and I thrashed, expecting her to hold me down. But she just yanked my head nearer to hers and hissed fervent words between her teeth.

Then they heaved her away and I was left spluttering, those words replaying in my mind:

Remember what Hunters do.

In my bathing chamber, Perla helped peel off my dress. She poured antiseptic fluid—one of Stian’s creations—into the lukewarm bathwater, and the greenish liquid marbled across the surface, filling the air with an alcoholic tang.

She left with the soft assurance that she would be just outside.

I lowered myself shakily into the tub, groaning as the sterilizing liquid crept up the red-hot burn on my thigh. Remembering Imogen and the others lost to the fire, I gritted my teeth against the agony. Once the pain subsided, I bathed carefully, until the soot created a murky film over the water, clinging to the sides of the tub.

Then I sat there for so long that my hair dried in a crunchy snarl and I began to shiver.

I didn’t recognize the skin wavering under the bathwater. It was how I imagined a warrior’s body: covered with old injuries and new. Yet it felt predestined somehow. As though I never would have escaped the violent collision of Hunter and Wielder blood inside me. And now my specter oozed out—a sorrowful liquid shimmer across the water.

There was movement outside. Perla must be getting concerned.

I forced myself to stand, my power running off my body with the water as a deeper cold engulfed me. I fastened a towel around my chest, then slowly lifted one foot out of the tub. Water sloshed out with me, soaking the tiles. I went to raise the other leg and swayed too far forward.