Page 69 of The Jasad Crown

What I had seen was impossible. It wasme, but not me. The face reflected in the creek belonged to a stranger, but the things she had done had felt so real. The way that poor girl had been dissected, left open like an animal pelt to dry in the sun… I couldn’t have done that, not in my very worst moments. I could be brutal, and I could be cruel, but I was artless about it. My rage took the shape of a rabid brute force, too focused on simply making impact to notice or care how it reached its destination. The detached, musing sort of savagery I’d felt in the vision was beyond my capacity.

At least, I thought it was.

Your mind is a maze of mirrors, reflecting only the memories you choose to save.

My nails dug into my elbows, and I shoved my mounting alarm deep into the recesses of my chest. My magic was strange—it had always been strange, even before the cuffs. The visions, the figures I had seen at the waterfall? None of it meant anything. None of it was possible.

Efra was still rattling off objections to the kitmers, my magic, and everything about my general existence. The impulse to kill him had passed, but that did not mean Efra had not burst through the limits of my patience.

The pulse of magic came smoother this time. I flicked my wrist, and four of the kitmers dove toward Efra. Garbled shrieks rippedthrough the air as the kitmers’ claws grabbed Efra’s limbs and they took flight. I waved cheerfully as they carried him off the side of the cliff.

“Well.” Namsa joined me by the edge, watching the kitmers weave and bob over the sea, Efra held beneath them like a particularly unwieldy log. The best kind of sunset view, in my opinion.

“I tried my best,” I said stiffly. If she planned to deliver a soliloquy about my failures, I wouldn’t order her tossed around the surface of Suhna Sea like Efra, but I would not stay to listen. “That is all I can do. It is all I can offer. I will keep trying, but I don’t understand my magic yet. It may take time.”

A light touch to my elbow sent shock waves up my arm, and I barely remembered not to flinch. My aversion to touch may have abated, but unexpected contact still rattled me.

Stricken brown eyes studied me. “We have done this all wrong, haven’t we? We ask you to lead, then treat you like a criminal. We demand your magic, then hold you in judgment over it. It is no wonder you possess such a low opinion of us. Awaleen below, you might have found more mercy from the Nizahl Commander himself.”

Stupefied, I could only blink.

“You are twenty and one, Essiya,” Namsa offered gently. “What you know of Jasad is a mere impression, yet you have been consigned to carry its burden since the moment of your birth. The rest of us—the point of having anus—should make it easier. Duty is a weight we should carry between us, not a weapon we use to crush each other.” She pushed a lock of hair behind her ear, dropping her gaze to the ground. “I should have done more to smooth the way for you, but…”

I wrapped my arms around myself, battling an unexpected surge of emotion. “Dawoud.”

“Holding you in judgment for his death was small and weak of me. You loved him as dearly as I.” The hand on my elbow traveled to my shoulder. “I am so sorry we failed you, Essiya.”

Braced as I was for admonishment, the kindness left me wrong-footed and unbearably raw. I tried to return us to familiar ground. “I failed you, too. Far more frequently.”

She squeezed my shoulder once before releasing me. The warm imprint of her hand lingered. “I will agree to forgive myself, if you agree to do the same.”

In the distance, Efra screamed as one of the kitmers dropped his leg, briefly submerging the limb into the sea.

I moved my jaw from side to side, trying to round out the words I wanted to say. As comfortable as I was around Namsa, I was still her Malika. I was someone she expected to exude inner strength and steadiness.

Loneliness had become a rope around my neck, and the noose tightened each time I put on the mask of Malika. No matter how comfortable I became around the Urabi, they were not Sefa and Marek. They were not Rory, Fairel, Raya.

They were not Arin.

I exhaled slowly, already guilty at the thought. Despite the chasm of secrets between myself and the Nizahl Heir, he’d inspired a rare honesty out of me. Around him, I could be sullen and quiet, vicious and loud, careful and cunning. Any mask I wore crumbled beneath his scrutiny, so what was the point of trying to hide myself?

“I am resentful,” I said, and those werenotthe words I’d so carefully crafted in my head. They poured free before I could dam the river. “I resent my crown. I resent you for asking me to storm the Omal palace knowing Queen Hanan will reject me. I resent myself for missing my old life.”

“It is perfectly natural—”

“I resent you for asking me to burn alive for Jasad.”

Stupefied silence replaced whatever platitude Namsa had been ready to offer.

“We are at war. If—when—Queen Hanan refuses to reinstateme to the line of inheritance, we will have played our last hand. You will ask me to raise the fortress, to give Jasad its only fighting chance. We both know what will happen when I raise the fortress, Namsa. What happened to Qayida Hend is legend for a reason.”

Maia’s shout reached us from the door. “Mawlati! Are you coming?”

The harsh set of Namsa’s features softened. Guilt, maybe, or pity. “We don’t know what will happen, Essiya. Qayida Hend became a legend for burning, but I truly believe you will not meet her fate.”

I turned away from Efra and the swooping kitmers, gazing dully at the silhouettes of the mountains, their jagged peaks tearing through the star-strewn sky. “Oh?”

“You, Essiya of Jasad, will not be known for burning.” A shiver went through me at the force of Namsa’s conviction. “You will always be known for surviving.”

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