My father finds me a while later. Without saying a word he collapses to the ground as well. Before I can process anything, he lurches forward and clutches me in a hug.
I have experience with loss. I know the pain, the torture, the ache. But when my mother died I was only four, too young for grief to rip through me in the same way. As I grew up, her death slowly sank its claws into me.
But this. This is branding. My world is crumbling before my eyes and I can’t do anything to stop it.
Gods, this is what my father dealt with, has dealt with for years. One look into his eyes and I can tell the pain is ripping him open anew. I have only one other memory of him crying.
I take a shuddering breath. I don’t know if I can live through today, let alone the hollow moments that will fill the rest of my life. I will never talk with her again. Never touch her. Never put pen to paper knowing she will read my words.
Bang!The ground roars.This is because of me.I created a storm from all the white magic I smashed into the clouds. Or worse, the gods are responding to my rampage and they have decided to yell back, to shake all of Wickery in answer.
Bang! Bang!again. Explosions and the sound of thunder pound the air.
I search the sky for the source of the noise and find it instantly. A dark-gray cloud spews from the mountains to the west, toward Naupure.
The earth shakes and my father and I shake with it.
Bang!
I stand to get a clearer view of the clouds and where they’re coming from. No, this isn’t because of me at all. It’s Mount Gandhak. Mount Gandhak is erupting.
“Come on, Jatin,” my father orders. We run back inside, down the hallway. The group huddling around the medical room peers toward us for answers. More people have gathered, including an older female guard who stands next to Riya and wears the sun crest of Belwar.
“What is it?” Riya and Kalyan both ask, and then glance at each other.
“Mount Gandhak is erupting,” I say as my father barrels into the medical room. I follow close behind. The blood and herbs on the floor perfume the air with an iron tang. At first, I can’t look at Adraa, but when I do, my eyes stick. She looks peaceful. Her hair lays like a spiderweb, loose, tangled, and ribbonless. I choke back a sob.
My father steps forward. “Mount Gandhak is erupting. I don’t know how much time we have. I’m going to need your help for this. Maharani Belwar, I don’t think we can do this without you.”
“Erupting? It hasn’t erupted in centuries. It’s a dormant volcano,” the head guard says.
“Not anymore,” my father says grimly.
Maharaja Belwar looks between the one small arched window and us. The sky has already turned to deep red in the past five minutes. “I’ll help, of course, but—”
“I can’t leave her!” Maharani Belwar shrieks. “If I leave her now…” At her cry it dawns on me. He is asking her to abandon Adraa. My father would take away the little hope we have left for Adraa’s life?
“Maharani Belwar has to stay with Adraa. She’s the only one that could possibly—”
“She’s gone, Jatin, and we don’t have time,” my father says, his voice nearly breaking.
A small body pushes forward and everyone looks. Prisha slowly pulls Maharani Belwar’s hands off Adraa’s body. “Mom, go. I will save her.”
“Prisha, you— It’s too difficult and you need to evacuate.”
“Sansria!”Prisha shouts, and a blaze of light-pink smoke consumes her mother’s darker pink. It swarms and then dives into Adraa’s mouth. “I can do it, and I won’t leave.”
“I’ll help too,” a young woman dressed in a healer’s uniform whispers as she steps forward.
“As will I. Tell me what you need, Prisha,” Riya says, rolling up her sleeves.
The female guard, who I think is Riya’s mother, based on their similar features, pulls at Riya’s arm, holding her back. “You’ll be needed on the ground, helping with evacuation.”
“No, Mother. This is my duty, to protect her no matter what,” Riya says.
“But she’s—”
Riya jerks her arm free. “She didn’t give up on Dad. I will not give up on her. Ever.”
