Chapter 20

20

Quil

Sirsha, at least, appeared to have taken the revelation of Quil's title in stride, regarding him surmisingly while attempting to work herself free from her bonds. But as the prince edged toward her, R'zwana, initially rendered silent, finally found her tongue.

"We have no proof of your identity. Anyone could rattle off a ridiculous Martial name and say he's a prince."

"It's him, R'zwana," said the grizzled Jaduna who'd been guarding the door, peering at Quil. "I was part of the delegation to Antium eight years ago. I remember his face."

R'zwana could've lit the older man aflame with her glare. "Do not defy me, D'rudo."

"Seems like he's stating a fact," Sufiyan offered. "But you two can sort that out. We have a ship to catch, so if you could unbind her, we'll be on our way."

"You'll pardon her and let her go," the Raan-Ruku snapped. "After she has clearly flouted the very letter of the law by—"

Quil sighed as R'zwana rattled off a list of grievances. He'd been at court enough to know that if you let petty people argue, they'd never shut up. The Jaduna could probably turn Quil into a gourd with the snap of a finger. But Arelia was alone and the Kegari were crawling through the city like roaches. They needed to get out of here.

He was the crown prince of the bleeding Martial Empire. It was time these Jaduna realize it.

He recalled his aunt's flinty gaze when her council of advisers was being especially intractable, the way she'd tilt her head, and everyone suddenly thought thrice about crossing her.

Quil felt the change in his body, the iron in his spine, the press of his thumbs into his knuckles as his fists clenched. All of them sensed it, and R'zwana, still ranting, fell silent.

"Our two nations have a treaty." Quil silently thanked his droning pill of a tutor, who insisted on the prince memorizing said treaty. "Honor it. Or I'll be forced to draw my weapon. You'll call on your magic. And we'll have a diplomatic incident on our hands."

R'zwana's eyes were dark, like her sister's, but devoid of Sirsha's humor and warmth. What Quil saw instead was a festering insecurity that she worked hard to hide. Quil kept talking. Kept making her angrier.

"You hate your sister. That much is clear. But it's not my problem." Quil slowly let drop the blade in his sleeve, and drew closer to R'zwana, preying on her outrage, the way he'd seen his aunt do to others a hundred times. Until, in one swift motion, he had a dagger at her heart.

"Let her go. My patience grows thin."

A moment later, the young man named J'yan sliced through Sirsha's bonds, his knife flashing.

"I, too, am Raan-Ruku," J'yan said to R'zwana. "I don't relish telling the Raani that her daughter died in a knife fight with a Martial." He spat the last word like it was poison. Quil suspected that venom was because Quil had pronounced Sirsha his fiancée.

"She might be Jaduna-born," J'yan said. "But she's Jaduna no more. Let her go. We have a killer to hunt, and no time for foolishness."

A vein pulsed at R'zwana's temple. Then she smiled. The sudden shift was so unnerving that Quil grasped his dagger tighter.

"If they are engaged," she said, "then let him speak the words of fidelity. The Jaduna words, witnessed by the appropriate party."

"His Highness doesn't have time to wait for a member of the Jaduna clergy to show up," Sufiyan said, scorn dripping from every word. "He's a Martial prince, for skies' sake. His word is good."

R'zwana fixed her stare on Sirsha. "It's not his word that's the problem. Worry not. Any full-coined Jaduna can perform the ceremony with a few words."

"Enough." Sirsha's voice shook. "R'zwana, this is unnecessary—"

"I knew you were lying!" R'zwana grabbed Sirsha's arm and hauled her up. "Engaged! As if anyone would want to marry you ." Sirsha winced, and at the sight of her misery, Quil's temper snapped.

He didn't know why he found R'zwana's contempt for Sirsha so repugnant. Perhaps because he couldn't imagine treating Arelia or Sufiyan this way. Or because, despite Sirsha's dissembling, there was something oddly endearing about how terrible she was at it, and it made him want to protect her.

Whatever the case, he was in R'zwana's face before he realized what he was doing.

Sufiyan stepped close, voice low. "Probably shouldn't kill the Jaduna, Quil."

"What are the words?" he said to R'zwana, dead quiet. "I'll say them."

Sirsha stared at him in surprise and R'zwana took a step back. Quil's initial dislike of the woman burgeoned into something like loathing. She had no interest in treaties or laws or logic. She just wanted to kill her sister. At some point, she'd think of a reason to justify it. The longer they dragged this out, the more likely it was that she would conjure another loophole, and the longer they'd be stuck in bleeding Jibaut.

He didn't know much about Jaduna vows—his tutor had focused on treaties. A Martial troth took some undoing because families and assets were involved. But they were dissolvable, and Quil had never heard anything indicating that a Jaduna engagement was any different.

"Make it quick," Quil said. "As Sufiyan said, we have someplace to be."

"Very well." R'zwana's surprise was evident. "J'yan, the words of witnessing."

The other Raan-Ruku hesitated, and Sirsha's sister gave the man a look so blistering that Quil was surprised his skin didn't peel off. J'yan sighed.

"I, J'yan Deshma, of Kin Deshma, bear witness to this union."

R'zwana cleared her throat at D'rudo. He shook his head, but still spoke. "I, D'rudo Inashi, of Kin Inashi, bear witness to this union."

Sirsha's face went pale as R'zwana smiled nastily at her, drawing a dagger and offering it to Sirsha. "You know the words, sister," she said. "You've heard them often enough."

"I—I, Sirsha W-W-Westering, name Quil as my—"

"His full name," R'zwana hissed. "Don't forget the blood."

Sirsha grimaced and cut her hand. "…Zacharias Marcus Livius Aquillus Farrar as my Adah, half my soul. I give my heart unto his keeping, a gift with no compare."

R'zwana took the blade and handed it to Quil. "You memorized a treaty, so I imagine you can repeat that?"

He cut his palm with the knife. "I, Zacharias Marcus Livius Aquillus Farrar, name Sirsha Westering as my Adah, half my soul." It was just a few words. It wouldn't mean anything. He tried to look comfortingly at Sirsha but shifted his gaze at her obvious distress. "I give my heart unto her keeping, a gift with no compare."

R'zwana looked between them. "Hands," she said, and Sirsha sighed, offering hers to Quil.

As he took it, as their blood mingled, his body flashed icy cold, then overly warm, as if he had a fever.

"Witnessed," R'zwana sniffed.

J'yan and D'rudo echoed her. Sirsha released Quil. A moment later, the air shifted, as if a window had been opened though the room didn't have one. Quil's neck burned, and he glanced down, alarmed. He expected to see a wound or a dart poking out of his skin.

Instead, he found a thin silver chain glimmering around his throat, with a coin attached to it.

"What in the bleeding hells," he said, "is this?"

"That is the mark of a true Jaduna oath," R'zwana said.

"Excellent," Sufiyan said. "Let's go."

Before anyone could protest, Sufiyan bolted from the room, Quil following. The prince grabbed Sirsha's hand, realizing that it would be odd for him not to at least try to touch her, since they were supposed to be affianced.

"Move, move," Sufiyan muttered as they hurried down a long hallway and up a flight of stairs. "Before they change their minds."

They pushed out the compound doors and into the rainy night. A figure reared up in front of them, and Sufiyan had his bow nocked and aimed almost before she could lift her hands.

"It's me!" Arelia was soaked through, her expression offended as she took in the murderous look on Sufiyan's face. "The Kegari boarded the shabka. Just when I'd finally started making sense of the engine, too. Barely escaped them. Caught up with you in the market, but you went after Sirsha and I got stuck in the crush."

She held up a bag. "Got some supplies. Since you forgot that bit of the mission."

Arelia glanced down at Quil's hand, still entwined with Sirsha's. He dropped it quickly, expecting the Jaduna to disappear with nary a thank-you. But she only looked worriedly up the street. Voices sounded.

"We need to get out of sight." Sirsha nodded to an alley.

They ducked into it and emerged on another narrow lane, only to spot four Kegari soldiers. They were dragging someone with them. From the clothing, it looked to be a Martial. Quil couldn't understand the soldiers' Kegari speech, but one of them was rubbing his jaw and glaring at their prisoner; the Martial had put up a fight.

Quil reached for his scim— four soldiers, armor weak in the shoulder and neck —but Sirsha grabbed his arm. "You can't fight them all, Quil," she said. "Not if you want to get out of Jibaut alive."

She pulled him back too late; one of the Kegari looked up, shouting in excitement.

"Run—" Quil said, but a sudden wind swept down from the sky, viciously dragging Sufiyan and Quil back into the street they'd been trying to escape. Arelia, still behind them, dove into a hedge.

"What the hells— Quil!" Sufiyan clawed at a nearby wall, but lost purchase and skidded to the center of the road alongside Quil.

Quil's nerves screamed at him to run, but he couldn't move. He couldn't even speak. How is this possible? Another hellish Kegari invention? He tried to see where Sirsha had gone—but found he didn't need to because his necklace burned and he felt her, hidden a few yards away.

He had no time to dwell on it, because a figure appeared out of the darkness of the alleyway. Tall and hooded, with broad shoulders and gray-scaled armor. His features were almost entirely in shadow, but Quil could make out pale skin, a sharp jaw, and a sneering mouth.

"Quil Farrar," the man said, his Ankanese uninflected. "The Martial crown prince himself. Long have I wished to look upon you."

He wore no markings of rank, but the way his soldiers fell back, the way he walked told Quil that he wasn't some no-name officer. The air itself seemed to crackle around the man.

Quil strained against the wind, breaking free for a moment before a tendril of white metal unfurled from the figure's hand and wrapped around Quil's shoulders.

"Hold still," the man said. "Let me look at—"

A thin blade flew out of the dark and sank into the man's shoulder. He hissed, flinching as three more whipped past his head, impaling two of the soldiers behind him.

Sirsha's face appeared at the end of the lane, more daggers flying from her hands. "Move, I'm covering!"

The wind faltered, and Quil and Sufiyan bolted into the alley, Sirsha and Arelia on their heels. The Jaduna overtook them quickly, and they followed her as she cut through a garden, vaulted over a wall lined with glass shards, and raced through muddy, winding streets before stopping in a narrow space between two stables. Within, animals moved. Arelia wrinkled her nose at the tang of horse dung.

"There are more patrols than before," Sufiyan said after catching his breath. "Now they know we're here. And we don't have a ship."

Quil turned to Sirsha. "Thank you," he said. "Consider us even. Good luck with the hunt." He glanced at Sufiyan. "We of all people hope you succeed. Though—" His gaze dropped to the bracelet she'd stolen. "I'd like that back."

"You can't leave." She looked at him as if he'd suggested she stab herself in the eye. "We're Adah now—soul halves. It's a deeper bond than a simple engagement. Until our oath is established, we must stay close to one another, or it will feel like our bones are on fire."

"How close?" Quil asked, alarmed.

"In Jaduna lore, no farther than a cloud cat ranges to hunt ," Sirsha said. "Practically, that's a mile or two."

For a moment, he didn't understand. Then it sank in. Bleeding, burning skies. Why had he let Sufiyan talk him into saving Sirsha? And why, the one time he carried out a plan with no forethought, was this the result?

"You might have mentioned that the words of fidelity meant chaining myself to you—" Quil tried to pull the necklace off. It wouldn't break.

"R'zwana would have killed me on the spot! No Jaduna would get engaged without explaining the Adah oath. Besides, you knew our treaties backward and forward. I assumed you understood the oath, too."

"I—" Quil raked a hand through his rain-soaked hair, looking from a wide-eyed Arelia to Sufiyan, grimacing in sympathy. "You know who I am," he finally said to Sirsha. "I can't be saddled with—with—"

With a tracker who is far too intriguing to be good for me. He didn't say it, but from Sirsha's expression, it was clear she assumed the worst.

"I didn't ask to be rescued, mighty prince," she snarled. "Especially not by a fiancé . You saved my life but dragged me into yours in the process. I didn't want to say the words of fidelity. But it's done, so unless you want to enjoy the pain and suffering that comes with trying to outwit a Jaduna oath coin, you're stuck with me until we can find a Raani to break the link between us."

Relief swept through Quil. "It's not forever, then," he said. "We can break it."

"Yes." Sirsha rolled her eyes. "Eventually. And the longer we spend together, the farther apart we can get without causing ourselves any misery. For now, I'll come with you. Don't look so horrified. I'm good with a knife. I know the Southern Continent better than any of you. And I know someone who can help us get out of Jibaut. If we ever stop talking long enough to leave this alley."

As Quil studied her, his instinct tingled. The desire to use his magic, to understand her through her thoughts and memories, felt as powerful as the need to breathe when trapped underwater. He half lifted his hand, ready to touch her, to give in.

And then he remembered he'd be taking—stealing like a low criminal—and forced the magic to the back of his mind.

"You're hiding something," he said.

"I'm hiding many things, prince," she said. "Now that we're affianced, you'll learn all about them, I'm sure." Sirsha ran a finger down his chest, dark eyes fathomless as she looked up at him. Her pine-and-sky scent filled his senses and her gaze dropped to his lips.

For a moment, she was all he could see. Then she smiled and he remembered who he was dealing with.

"I hear another patrol coming." She shifted back to look at Sufiyan and Arelia. "You want to get out of here, right? Follow me."

Kade was not happy to see Sirsha. Perhaps because she had a knife to his throat. Or because Sirsha had punched him in the face about three seconds after breaking into his house—something Quil was sure he found as satisfying as she did.

Now, wild-eyed and panicked, Kade looked around the room as if for an escape. Quil took in the high windows, velvet settees, and intricately carved tables covered in rare books and scrolls. Pretty. But poorly designed for a quick exit, unless Kade wanted to defenestrate himself. Quil wasn't inclined to stop him if he tried.

"You're going to procure horses and supplies for me and my friends," Sirsha informed Kade. "You'll do it without making a fuss, or I'll hold your eyelids open as Reli here burns your life's work to cinders."

Kade released a short, panicked bark of laughter. "You wouldn't."

"I'd do worse," Sirsha said, "if I wasn't in such a hurry. Walk."

Kade stood, hands up. "Friends." He laughed. "I thought you said they were a pack of infernal Martials who probably wouldn't last the week."

Quil glanced at Sufiyan, who shrugged. The prince could tell Sirsha wanted to lie and deny it, as the infernal Martials were now essential to her survival. But, to her credit, she just lifted her chin.

"Horses, Kade." She tightened the knife against his neck. "Now."

Kade nodded and slunk ahead of them down the stairs, out a back gate and to a large stable. Sirsha whistled in appreciation as she took in the wealth of horseflesh. There were a dozen beasts here as fine as any mount a Mask might ride.

"You posh bastard," she said as Sufiyan and Arelia saddled the horses. "You don't need money. What the hells did my sister offer you that you'd betray a friend for it?"

"Get that away from me." Kade glared at her dagger. "I don't want you to trip and accidentally stab me."

"If I stab you, it won't be accidental."

She was trying to sound snide, but Quil could tell from the stiffness of her shoulders and the set of her jaw that Kade's betrayal had wounded her.

Which made Quil want to stick a knife in the pirate himself.

"Why betray me?" Sirsha asked Kade quietly, as if she'd forgotten Quil was a few feet away. "You know what my family did to me. I'd never have double-crossed you."

Kade looked down at his hands, ink-stained and scarred. "This…murderer," he said. "The one you're searching for. You don't know, Sirsha—you don't understand how—how awful she is."

Quil's gaze shot to Sirsha. She? The Jaduna hadn't shared that fact in all their days at sea.

"You've never taken an interest in my jobs before," Sirsha said. "Why now?"

"Because you're my friend," Kade said, and at Sirsha's scoff he sighed. "I don't want anything to happen to you."

"Is that why you sold me to my sister?" Sirsha said. "She was going to kill me, Kade. By drowning me and then leaving my body for the gulls' dinner. You'd have passed by your friend any time you went to the docks for the next three months!"

"You think you understand what you're dealing with. But you don't. You—" Kade went strangely pale then, the color of frozen milk. "I can't—" He turned away from her. Sirsha eased back, so surprised at his distress that she likely didn't see the point in threatening him. "I can't say more," he said. "Don't ask. Please—be careful."

"Ready," Sufiyan said. "Let's move."

Sirsha grabbed a length of rope from one of the hooks in the barn and tossed it to Quil. As he caught it, something occurred to him.

"You know this city," Quil said to Kade. "What do you know about the Kegari reserve forces?"

"Lose the ropes and I'll tell you."

Quil put his scim to Kade's stomach. "One more word that's not useful, and I'll gut you."

"They've got five thousand soldiers south of the city." Kade glanced down nervously at the scim. "Fifty Sails. They'll be doing sweeps, looking for you."

Quil nodded and dropped the rope, glancing back at Sirsha. "If he's tied up, they'll suspect we were here."

"Put them off our trail, Kade." Sirsha mounted her mare. "It's the least you can do."

Kade nodded. "I will. And I swear I won't tell your sister anything." His lips tightened. "She doesn't keep her promises anyway."

"What did she promise you?" Sirsha asked. "What did you need from her, Kade?"

"Sirsha." Quil glanced outside. They'd tarried too long. "It'll be dawn in an hour. If we want to get out of here without the Kegari seeing us, we need to leave."

Kade looked at Quil as if seeing him for the first time. "The Kegari are the least of your worries." He nodded to Sirsha. "Especially if you're with her."