Muna doesn’t need to know any of this, especially not when I haven’t convinced the princess to stay in Cusco with me yet.
“Does that mean you’ll help us?” I ask, though I don’t really mean it as a question.
His chuckle dies in his throat as he presses his lips together in that same restrained way his aunt Tula did. It must run in the family.
He doesn’t want to help. That’s what he says in the whirlwind of the next few hours, but he knows he doesn’t have much of a choice. He trusts what I’m saying is true to an extent, and he’s a soldier in the Inka’s army. In the end, what he personally wants doesn’t matter when an oath is involved.
When he shows us to our rooms that night, promising to continue this tomorrow so he has time to calm his heart, I have the excuse of duty to justify shaking my head no to his offer to sleep in his room. But it’s not about duty. It’s that I want things with a force that keeps my heart beating, and he’s never been one of them. When the princess requests that I stay in her room, I go easily. Because I want things with a force that stops my bones from breaking beneath gravity. I want things with a force that could make our Mountain Gods bow.
At night, in the dark, the princess’s whisper reaches me. Mare is fast asleep between us, and her voice is so hushed it’s almost drowned out by his breathing.
“What if I just give you the ability to use mimicry?” she jokes, something so out of character I have to force myself to keep my laughter under wraps.
“That’s not possible, but even if it were…” I stop to think, something Suyai is constantly reminding me to do. My next words are as sure as our fate. “It has to be you who does it. It has to be you and me.”
The princess’s gasp is barely audible. I think that’s it. I’ll save our conversation about Cusco for tomorrow, when it’s easier to lie on the grass and argue all we want. My eyes start to close, fluttering like butterflies as I try to keep them open even though I can’t see anything in the pitch black.
“If I go, we leave Mare behind,” the princess whispers, but the words are as loud as an explosion. I want to cover Mare’s ears and ensure he doesn’t hear a single word.
“No,” I say, because there’s no other answer. “I won’t abandon him. He’s strong enough to join us.” The words hurt something deep within me, something still raw from my own abandonment around Mare’s age, but I don’t want to delve into those feelings tonight.
Something in the princess breaks.
“I’m going to trust you,” the princess suddenly whispers, and my eyes widen, desperate to catch a single glimpse of her face to see if they match her words. But nothing, I can’t beat the dark. “I’m going to trust you to keep him and me safe… I’ll stop in Cusco for Intiraymi, but I’m not getting involved. I’m leaving that night, with or without you.”
I don’t respond. I don’t trust myself to open my mouth and say something that ruins everything. It hits me that if I open my mouth, I might be tempted to kiss her. I wouldn’t do it, not now. But the need is there, at the edge, one breath away from consuming me.
Tonight I am not satiated, but I am calm.
Because I’m the Guardians’ Her,o and someone finally sees that and accepts it. I’m the Guardians’ Her,o and I’m keeping the princess safe.
I’m the Guardians’ Hero, I whisper to myself and fall asleep.
The princessand Muna are going to figure out disguises this morning. How we came to that conclusion is a mystery to me, but I know better than to question it. The princess is taking my promise seriously, and her icy demeanor is melting around him.
It helps that he stopped touching me after I told him no last night.
It makes sense. The princess has more of a head for strategy than I do, and she figured out a way to get us to Cusco. We’re going to go as devout citizens from the countryside, making the voyage to Cusco to leave an offering for Intiraymi. This means we’ll need disguises and, of course, an offering.
So the princess and Muna are going to work on our clothes and backstory. I’m going to… Well.
“There’s a Muki in the mines,” Muna tells us, after a country breakfast of quinoa pancakes.
“Muki?” the princess asks, free to talk now that we know he’s forcing himself not to look too closely at anything involving us. He has to know by now, of course, he does, but he’s doing a good job at pretending.
When I hear about the Muki creature, I already know where this is going. It fills me with dreadful excitement. I’ve been itching for a real fight more than I thought. We’re back at the table next to the fountain. It’s the most private area that’s not one of our rooms. There’s no one else inside the grounds except Muna’s aunt and us, but we all feel the need for privacy anyway.
“Rei?” he asks, and I realize I’m too in my head and missed a portion of the conversation. “Care to calm your girl down?”
I look at the princess and see her roll her eyes.
“I don’t need to be calmed down. I need to know why you’re trying to send my cha– my companion into a mine infested with these muki creatures.”
“Mukis don’t infest. They’re solitary creatures. There’s only ever one in a mine at a time,” I respond without thinking.
“Solitary creatures with horns and a penchant for human flesh, apparently,” she shouts.
I look at Muna and glare. “Why would you tell her that?”
