She stumbles but manages to stand, forcing me to do the same. I look over at Mare again and see him sitting and ripping fabric from the bottom of his tunic. He’s probably doing it to dress his wound just like I’ve taught him.
The princess huffs and rolls her shoulders back, falling into an immaculate posture fit for the Inka.
This is what I’m meant to save. The princess, the empire, and what it all represents to the Inka. Whatever calamity is meant to happen has started. There’s no denying that. We were arrogant to believe we had time to tour the provinces on the way to the Sun Staff, as if this were a show.Iwas arrogant to believe that, I know, but I still feel robbed of my moment. I only needed aweek for everyone in the empire to know my name, but I got this instead. No time, no debut, no Suyai by my side.
Bile rises in my throat again as I think of the last seconds before we disappeared, of Suyai’s wide, terrified eyes and desperate lunge for us, of her trust in me potentially broken. As I spit out the acid, I’m so angry at myself I can barely breathe, so disappointed it crushes my windpipe. I should’ve reached back. I should’ve tried harder, fought stronger, beenbetter.
But I shake my head and recoup, forcing myself out of a spiral I refuse to go down. What’s lost is lost, but glory is my fate, and that hasn’t changed. I need to get the Sun Staff and return to Suyai.
“You really have no idea where we are?” I ask the princess, her moment of vulnerability buried in my mind for later.
“I don’t need to repeat myself.” She sounds so much like her mother. The words are on the tip of my tongue, but Mare steps in before I can respond.
“Rei,” he says, over and over as he stumbles into my arms and holds tight. He’s limping. He has a blood-soaked, torn piece of tunic wrapped around his leg. That bird pecked at his flesh like he was a carcass up for the taking. “Rei, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I say, and the relief that floods through him is palpable. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
If anyone should be apologizing, it’s me. I’m the one who didn’t get us to Suyai in time, but I can’t think like that. Once I return with the Sun Staff, once I save them all, that won’t matter.
“I should’ve fought back. I know I can! I promise I can, but I got, I got–” he stutters and doesn’t finish his sentence.
“You’re a tough kid, Mare. You’ll get it next time,” I say, running my fingers through his curls. They’re identical to Suyai’s.
He wipes snot off his face and nods. That’s my boy.
“Why are we back home?” he asks.
I squint my eyes in confusion and copy his study of the sprawling landscape. I feel like a fool for asking the princess for answers when I could’ve just taken a look around.Home. Yes, that’s where we are. Not exactly, not in the warm house my aunts live in, but close. We’re high in the mountains, and there’s a town below us.
Ollantaytambo. It has to be it. I’d recognize stonework anywhere. We’re in the Sacred Valley, days away from the palace. Suyai, Mare, and I grew up a week’s walk from here, deeper in the mountain sierra but close enough to have visited towns in the Sacred Valley for their markets. Mare is too young to remember that, but he must recognize the landscape. To him, the mountains are home, no matter how long we’ve lived in Lima.
“Home?” The princess says, looking at us with suspicion.
My defenses flare at the look. There’s a growing desperation climbing up my throat, a gnashing mix of separation anxiety and fear of failure, that transforms into the need to fight.
“We’ve done nothing to warrant that glare,princess. You’re the one who brought us here.”
In the familiar territory of my homeland, the dynamic between the princess and me feels different. She feels human. It’s both thrilling and terrifying. A real human princess I can touch, a real human princess I can break if I’m not careful.
“I don’t know wherehereis,” she spits out every word.
“How is that possible?” Now that I know where we are, days away from Lima, I can’t believe she would have the power to take us so far without a point of reference. With that much unfocused power, she could have gotten us lost in the Ukhu Pacha.
Yet, a part of me trusts that would never happen, not with her strength. Envy is hot in my stomach. I swallow, and it cools. I try to look past the legend to see the girl. The girl is shaking.
“I wasn’t going to drown, not again. I didn’t know that was the last push I needed to get out of there but it was. I’ll be damned if I’m going back.” She’s shaking and backing away from me as she speaks. Her words make no sense, but she talks to me like I not only understand but am ready to fight her on it. I have nothing but the phantom image of a bruise on her cheek to give me context, a context that makes me want to fight for her not against her.
“Are you scared, Miss Princess?” Mare asks. The princess and I break eye contact to see him standing between us, staring at the princess head-on and waiting for an answer. It’s amazing, he’s half our height, yet his genuine tone and open demeanor make him the strongest of the three of us right now.
“You’re with me and Rei, and she’s the Guardians’ Hero,” he ends his sentence with a nod of his head, like that’s all that needs to be said, like fear is that easy to banish.
I am the hero, whether the princess or her mother accepts it. We need to begin the trek to Lake Titicaca and Isla del Sol, even if it’s not in the way we originally planned. Going back to Lima on foot would be days of going in the opposite direction of the lake and traveling through the Ukhu Pacha again would be worse. The strength of the mimicry necessary to cross that much terrain to Lima would alert every mimic there to our presence.
“No matter how we ended up here, we’re en route to the island,” I start, trying my best to sound controlled. “Mare is right. Whatever you’re scared of, I’m fated to protect you. The Guardians put me on this Earth for this reason alone. I wouldn’t fail you.”
I wouldn’t fail you, it comes out more like begging than reassurance.
She scoffs.
