Page 86 of The Jasad Crown

Behind me, Kenzie and Medhat had risen, glancing at each other in mutual bewilderment. Efra sighed, clearly opposed to Namsa but resigned to her course of action.

I pushed out the question before it could curdle on my tongue. “I am going to Mahair. Will you come and fight with me?”

Namsa smiled, revealing three of her chipped teeth. “Even better.” She reached for my arm, and I held still this time. She squeezed my elbow once. “We will come and win for you.”

As soon as the decision settled, the campsite was cleared and our belongings gathered. Medhat and Kenzie crouched around a map of Hirun, with Medhat pointing out where our original path would need to divert into Mahair.

Lateef appeared beside me, clad in a heavy beige overcoat that would probably drown him in seconds if he fell off his crocodile.

We stared at the others in silence.

“His route to Orban is not far,” Lateef said. The wind picked up, and he folded his hands under his armpits. “He will have heard about Mahair. He will come for you.”

The veins pulsed.

“Yes.”

“If he captures you, we are lost.”

I smiled. “He won’t.”

Let Arin bring his strongest men. His best maps.

Let him come, and I would show him what it meant to hunt Essam’s favorite monster.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

SYLVIA

Itraced the faded words chiseled into the wall partitioning Mahair from Essam Woods.

May we lead the lives our ancestors were denied.

I was home.

Or at least, an impression of it.

At high noon, the streets should have bustled with activity. The ruckus of market preparations should have echoed all the way down to the raven-marked trees.

I glanced around, dread mounting the deeper we ventured into the empty village. Shutters had been drawn shut. The metal hooks outside the butcher’s shop swung in the breeze. I studied the ground beneath them. The dirt was still wet with the blood of whatever animal Nader had had strung up.

“Where is everyone?” Medhat whispered loudly. Kenzie slapped her hand over his mouth and shot me an apologetic glance.

I didn’t like this.

Even Rory’s apothecary had been bolted shut, the bell hanging limply from its wire above the door. Empty seed shells littered the stoop, and I fought the swell of nostalgia threatening to overtake me.

“Maybe the Omalian soldiers already came?” Kenzie asked.

The stab of fear was an instinctual reaction, but I didn’t allow it to pierce anything vital. I leveled a stern glance at Kenzie, reassessingher. A village pillaged by soldiers would not lie quiet and abandoned. It would be torn apart between the two opposing forces; homes broken, carriages stolen, horses slain. Bodies and blood, at the very least. Violence screamed in a million different voices—even its silence was loud.

I shook my head at Kenzie, once. I made a note to keep an eye on her during the fight.

“There are people nearby,” Efra said suddenly. Gold and silver churned in his eyes. “I can feel them. They’re nervous, unsure. Angry.”

A comforting combination. I scanned the dormant buildings ahead. We were in the center of the main square, and I had yet to spot any sign of life. Even the stray animals permanently wandering Mahair seemed to have vanished. “Where?”

Efra turned in a slow circle, head cocked. “Nearby.”

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