“How does it work?”
She met her gaze. “Would you like me to demonstrate, gamemaster?”
Jaya eyed her gloves, then the shape of her arms, then the sharp slope of her jaw and found, disconcertingly, that she was beautiful. She looked away quickly. Visha did too, although Jaya felt the prick of her stare on the back of her neck, and she felt herself go hot all over again.
Samson finally sat at the head of the panel, and Chandi sat beside her, the bridge between their side of the table and the Black Scales.
“Gamemaster,” he called. “How many of your…sand creaturescan you conjure?”
“They’re notcreatures. They’re called the Sandsworn,” Jaya said, indignant. “And I don’tconjurethem like some sort of wizard. It is a science. I create them using magnetic black sands and signals sent via my metal lotuses—”
“I don’t care how they work,” Samson cut in. “I want to know how many you can create.”
Jaya had half a mind to tell him about the sanctity of the gameplay process, but Akaros cast her a sidelong glance, and she bit back her retort.
“I can bring five hundred Sandsworn. That should be more than enough to distract the Jantari overseers aboveground while you attack through the tunnels.”
Though Samson did not wince, she saw his shoulders stiffen like a fighter who sensed danger in the field but could not find where.
He’s traumatized, Akaros had told her.Even in training, he hated small spaces. He almost blew another kid’s head off because he panicked during a recon.
“The tunnels—” Samson began.
“You led the assault in Magar and took back the city from an even stronger Jantari force. Surely, this is nothing you can’t handle.” Jaya met his gaze then, waiting, because she knew as well as he that he would not admit to his fear, not in front of his men, and certainly not in front of the Arohassin.
Samson’s mouth tightened. When he spoke, there was an acidity in his voice, as if he was now realizing how terribly he had underestimated her.
“You’re right. Nothing I can’t handle.”
Chandi looked to him in alarm. “General, you don’t need to be on the front lines for this one. It might be wiser if you stayed back—”
“Noted, Commander,” Samson said, his voice like the sound of cold meat slapping on a butcher’s block.
Chandi stiffened. She looked to her fellow men, but no one else dared to speak. Jaya plucked up the metal lotus and held it out to Samson.
“I’ll need you to carry this with you during the attack.”
“Absolutely not,” Samson growled.
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of a little flower, Sam,” Akaros said.
“And let a sand creature jump me in the tunnels? How do I know this isn’t some part of your ulterior motive to harm me or my men?”
“If I wanted to harm you with the Sandsworn, I would have done so already,” Jaya said flatly.
She activated the lotus, and it began to rise. The sound of rushing sand whispered through the room as black kernels slowly spilled out of its closed petals.
“This will protect you. You can mold any form, whether it’s a shield”—she waved her arm, and the sand solidified into a shield the length of her arm—“screen”—it lengthened into a tall screen—“or sword.”
The sand formed an urumi,hisurumi to be exact. The twin blades dark and long instead of silver. The urumi slowly unspooled, the tongues tasting the air as if to strike. She heard the others gasp. Visha grinned, and Akaros and Chandi looked to Samson, but the Butcher was not watching the blade. He was watching her.
Too much water. Men of blue are made of greed, she thought involuntarily as she met his gaze. Then she chided herself for giving in to such superstitions.
Her Butcher—she was already thinking of him asherfighter—observed her with a coiled alertness that made her palms itch for her stylus. She sketched the field.Tiered stepwells, four sides, two fighters across a faulty bridge that cascades minute by minute into the quicksand below. He will be armed with an urumi.
Slowly, Samson placed his hands on the table. “Can I wield my Agni through it?”
Jaya hesitated. “I haven’t experimented, but you are welcome to try—”
