Page 73 of Her Radiant Curse

“My ears deceive—did you say you can pay?”

“We need a boat,” says Hokzuh, skipping over her. “And something to heal my wings. Channari needs to reach Tai’yanan to save her sister.”

“I know why she’s here.” Nakri lifts Hokzuh’s moonstone off his neck and holds it up to her eyes. “Are you sure you want to give this up so close to dusk, hmm?” She tilts her head. “I won’t make it easy for you to steal it back.”

Hokzuh’s shoulders tense, and I have no idea what they’re talking about. “I didn’t offer the stone.”

“And I didn’t say I wanted it. I’ve no use for a tenth eye, especially one as large as that. The gold chain, then?” Nakri inhales. “It smells of rich blood.”

“The king of Shenlani was wearing it when Channari killed him.”

“Ah, so I’m in the presence of a kingslayer.”

“Does that mean you’ll help us?”

“Her,” Nakri says. “I’ll help her.” She meets his glare, and the two are locked in what feels like an hours-long contest of wills. The crocodiles sink back under the boardwalk, their yellow-green eyes floating above the water.

“A boat and a potion,” she says at last, “and I have sight to bestow upon the girl. Dragon and snake will wait outside.”

Hokzuh’s jaw tenses, but he nods. So does Ukar.

For someone who looks a thousand years old, the witch is fast. She hobbles for the last bungalow, already halfway there when I realize I’m supposed to follow.

Her house stands out from the rest; it sits on crooked bamboo legs, with a pointed thatch as hairy as an old man’s beard. Crocodiles are packed densely around it, and their wary eyes follow me.

And the smell! I can’t help wrinkling my nose.

Nakri tosses the gold chain into a cooking pot, then offers me a bowl of water that stinks of fish, but I’m too thirsty to mind. I finish it in a single gulp, then set the bowl down.

“I’m not Angma’s daughter,” I say again.

“And I’m not the Nine-Eyed Witch. But we don’t get to pick the names they call us, do we?”

“What is your point?”

“I’ve heard the tales they tell about your sister. You don’t even exist in them.” She wipes her chin, tosses her bowl behind her. “In a hundred years, you might as well never have existed.”

“I would be glad to be forgotten.”

Nakri rests her chin on the jagged head of her cane. “A girl who hunts her nightmares yet cowers from her dreams. But that will change. You’re quite different from how we saw you, Channari.”

“We?”

The beads around her neck move in unison, until all seven pupils face me. Nine pupils, including the witch’s own. We.

“What sight did you want to share with me?” I ask, as respectfully as I can.

“ ‘One sister must fall for the other to rise,’ ” Nakri replies. “Do you remember those words?”

The Serpent King’s prophecy sends a shiver dancing down my spine. I haven’t heard it in years, and I don’t appreciate the reminder. “Yes.”

“The Serpent King wouldn’t give his life for just anyone.” Nakri’s eyes roll from side to side, the various beads sending me furtive looks in turn. “We’ve been puzzling for years why he’d sacrifice so much to protect you. And why he told you that you would need Hokzuh.”

“He foresaw that Hokzuh would help me.”

“Help you?” Nakri repeats. “Do you truly think Hokzuh would help you…if he knew the true source of your sister’s light?”

All of me goes rigid. She knows.

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