Page 129 of Daughter of No Worlds

I wanted to seize upon this moment of silence, but I wasn’t even sure what I would say.

A knock on the door interrupted my thoughts before I could clarify them, and Nura entered. “You look worlds better,” she observed, then turned to Max. He barely looked at her.

“So,” she said. “You came back after all.”

“So it would appear,” he said tightly.

Then her eyes fell on the bottles lining the desk and her eyebrows rose. “How did you manage to get these?” She paused at the last one and shot him a look. “Is this what I think it is?”

“You’re the mind-reader, not me.”

“Did youleave Arato get this? Even Zeryth and I typically can’t get our hands on this stuff.”

He shrugged. “I have my connections.” Then he tucked his hands into his pockets and straightened, flicking his gaze to me. “I have a few things I need to do. You’ll be alright for an hour or so?”

Words that I could not untangle still coiled in my chest. So many things that I had wanted to say to him.

But I swallowed them back, and simply nodded. He gazed at me for just a split second longer before he turned around and slipped out the door.

* * *

Nura satbeside me for a while, examining me, taking my pulse and checking my breathing. At her mere touch, a revulsion rose in me. When I looked at her, I saw flashes of memories that weren’t mine. Most vividly, the image of her blood-stained face, palm raising to my temple, in a betrayal that would wreck Max’s life and destroy the city of Sarlazai.

Perhaps she noticed me flinching away from her touch, because she gave me a long, quiet look, one that balanced on the edge of an unspoken question.

“Has it begun speaking to you?”

The memory of that voice slithered through me. “Yes,” I said.

“Good. I think you’ve pushed through the worst of it, then. And you should be able to begin harnessing it soon.”

Harnessing it. Is that what she told herself she was doing in Sarlazai that day?

“Whatisit?” I whispered.

“That’s not an easy question to answer. The best we can tell, it is essentially raw magic — raw magic that draws from a deeper level than that harnessed by human Wielders, deeper even than that drawn upon by the Syrizen, or the Fey.”

“But it… speaks.”

“It is sentient,” Nura said, lightly. “Yes.”

“So whatisit? Or was it?”

“No one knows. It was secured by Zeryth’s predecessor, Azre. Somewhere past Besrith.” She was quiet for a moment, her gaze slipping further away. “He died before anyone could find out exactly where. But it is very powerful.”

Memories flashed through my mind. Memories of fire and blood and destruction, and above all, devastation. Memories of Max’s family, and their dead, horrified faces.

“It showed me memories,” I said. My gaze met hers, and I knew we both understood which ones.

Nura’s throat bobbed. Her only hint of emotion. “It is a terrifying creature in many ways,” she said. “But it is also incredibly powerful, and even in the horrible things it does, it saves many lives.”

“It showed me what you did in Sarlazai.” My fingers clenched, and Nura’s eyes flicked away from me, suddenly preoccupied with the notes on her lap.

“I did what my position and my rank bound me to do.”

“Youforcedhim.” My words came through clenched teeth. The betrayal that Max had felt that day still ached in my chest. I knew what that was — to feel like your body is not your own. And his memories of the city’s destruction mingled with my own half-remembered images of the capital of Nyzerene burning. “Andso manydied.”

Her gaze shot to me, sharp as the edge of a blade. “I did what I had to do, and I will carry that weight to my grave. Thousands and thousands more would have died if the war had continued. It would have gone on for years. And I saw it, then — an opportunity.”

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