“Thanks to you,” I answered. With a single finger, I gently turned her chin so she had to look at me. Her large brown eyes glistened.
“I frightened a man twice my size with that little knife. He had hurt a small child, and I threatened to cut off his nose. You took a stand, Natiya. It helped me to take one too.”
She looked back at the river. “My stand didn’t go well.”
“Neither did mine. That will never stop me from taking them. Once we fear to take a stand, tyranny will have won.”
“Then why do I feel that we’ve lost everything?”
I pulled in a slow, shaky breath, feeling the price she had paid. “There are more battles to be fought, Natiya. This isn’t the end.”
Tears trickled down her cheeks. “It is for Dihara.”
A sickening twinge wrenched my chest. This was Natiya’s reality—and mine. Were any losses worth the gains? I struggled with the same doubts I saw in her eyes. Dihara had sent me here to speak to her, but really, what did I have to offer? I was still trying to find my own way.
“Once, when I was feeling despair over bad fortune, Dihara told me we’re all part of a greater story—one that transcends even our own tears. You’re part of that greater story now too, Natiya. You listened to the truth speaking within you. It may not seem like it right now, but you’re stronger today than you were yesterday. Tomorrow, you’ll be even stronger.”
She turned to look at me, the same defiance in her face as the day I’d left her in the vagabond camp. “I want to go with you,” she said.
My stomach gripped. I wasn’t prepared for this. I saw the hunger in her eyes, but I also saw Aster. It filled me with fear and renewed grief. I wouldn’t let this part of the story be hers.
“Not yet, Natiya. You’re too young—”
“I’m thirteen now! And a woman—the same as you!”
My blood rushed and my thoughts tumbled like a thousand tiny stones in a swollen river. “Cha liev oan barrie,” I said. “Your time will come. I promise. For now, your family still needs you. Be strong for them.”
She stared at me and finally nodded, but I was certain she remained unconvinced, and my own shortcomings seemed evident again.
A fishing line tugged, and she jumped up, giving it a sharp jerk to snag the hook deep in the fish’s mouth.
* * *
I sat on the watchtower wall looking out at the rolling plain. An orange ball of fire settled into the earth, the rippling line of the horizon slowly swallowing it up as if it were nothing, as if all the sun’s timeless power were merely warm frosted confection. Gone in a single bite.
All that was left in its wake was an orange glow that lit the edges of spiked ruins in the distance. Rafe said legend claimed the ruins were what remained of a great stronghold that once held all the wealth of the Ancients. Now the works of the demigods were little more than scars on a landscape—reminders that even the great, with all their wealth and knowledge, can fall.
Somewhere beyond all that, on an unseeable horizon, was Morrighan and all the people who lived there, going about their lives, unaware. My brothers. Pauline. Berdi. Gwyneth. And more patrols like Walther’s who would meet their deaths, as unaware as I had once been.
I want to go with you.
Where I was going was no place for Natiya. It was hardly a place for me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
RAFE
“May I have a turn?”
I wiped the sweat dripping from my face with my sleeve. I knew a crowd was watching my sparring exercises with other soldiers, but I hadn’t known Lia was among them. I turned, following the sound of her voice. She hopped down from the paddock rail and walked toward me. I waved off the soldier who was poised to spar with me next.
I had seen her use a sword in our escape from the Sanctum, but that was in surprise attacks, and I didn’t know how well she really knew how to spar. It wouldn’t hurt for her to expand her skills.
“All right,” I answered.
“I could use the practice,” she said as she approached. “I had training with my brothers, but they emphasized dirty fighting.”
“There’s no other kind when you’re fighting for your life. First thing, let’s find a sword that’s suited for you.”