The hum started deep in Roa’s belly. Like lightning, it buzzed and crackled and sparked.
The hum was bright and alive within Essie, too, like a fire fusing them together.
“I hate him,” Roa said bitterly.
But even as she said it, tears pricked her eyes.
Oh, Roa.Essie’s voice seemed suddenly fainter.I wish I could fix this.
“I hate him for using her....”
The hum reverberated in Roa’s ears now. Rattled in her bones, making her temperature rise. Roa shook her head, clenching her teeth against the deafening roar of it.
“I hate him for making me into a fool....”
Essie’s eyes shone more fiercely than usual as she circled Roa, carving through the air, swooping around and around her sister. Just for a moment, Roa thought she felt her sister’s soul flicker.
“I hate him most of all for what he did to you.” Her fists were clenched. The air between them was white-hot and her next words came out like a sob. “I hate him for shattering us!”
The hum exploded, searing them both. As it did, a resounding crash rang out as the windows in the hallway burst.
The heat that had been rising between them vanished.
A cold emptiness rushed in.
Roa stared at the white bird before her. Those silver eyes stared back, but they seemed startled. Frightened. Confused.
Essie?
Her sister’s silence pierced her.
Roa reached across their bond, only to lose it. She reached again, but her sister’s spirit was like water slipping through her fingers. The hum—so bright and strong moments before—waslike the heartbeat of a wounded, dying creature. Still there, but ever so faint.
It terrified her.
She watched the white bird swoop out through the broken window and up into the pomegranate sky. Roa followed it to the window. The sun was gone, but its light glowed just above the desert’s horizon.
“Essie!”
But no answer came.
Before
The very first summer Dax came to stay in the scrublands, their mother made Roa and Essie take him everywhere. Essie wasn’t allowed to go to the cliffs unless Dax went, too. Roa wasn’t allowed to play gods and monsters unless it was Dax she played against.
Roa, who hated cliff jumping, never went to the cliffs. And Essie, who hated board games, wandered off with Lirabel, leaving Roa stranded with the king’s son for entire afternoons.
They knew what their mother was doing. She was interfering, and they didn’t appreciate it.
So the sisters made a pact. They would not be friends with the disruptive visitor from Firgaard. They would shun him on principle.
It was easy at first. The king’s son had never played gods and monsters before. He was a boring opponent and it annoyed Roa. Eventually, if she beat him enough times, he would stop wanting to play her.
Or so she thought.
But the more ruthless she was on the board, the more eager he was to learn. The more she beat him, the more he begged to play again.
His unyielding enthusiasm made her soften, just a little. Sometimes, when he stared for long stretches of silence at the checkered stone board, thinking hard, she gave in. Helping him see things he couldn’t. Telling him how to predict her moves. Giving him the knowledge her father had once given her, when she first learned to play.
