“She’s not anything anymore,” Yanami states the simple fact.
The truth of that statement cuts through me like shards of broken bone.
“My mother was born on Isla Amantani, and that is a sentence I never thought I’d say out loud. The last hero the Guardians chose hid the stone after the war. It became a myth, and the people of Amantani know the myths more than any Inkan. She remembered the Samay Stone from childhood stories and begged the Guardians for it to save the empire. They gave it to her, and she brought it back to Amantani. She took me with her.”
“That’s when it happened. When…” My speech falters. I wish I could see more than just the parts of her face lit up by the fire. I want to see all of her. I want to look at the scar on her chest as I speak.
“Yes. The empire was close to collapse. She needed a miracle, and the Guardians gave her the ability to perform an unlimited amount. Now, she’s dead. The Guardians won’t speak to me, and this cursed stone is still inside of me.” Her words are desperate, but her tone is bored. She’s the princess from Lima again, but her mother is nowhere near. So why is she acting like frozen prey?
“Yanami, how can I take that thing out?” I ask, begging like a child.
“You can’t. It’s holding the last of my samay. I take it out, and the last of my samay leaves with it and…”
She trails off, and the unfinished statement hangs between us, frozen in time.
“You die,” I finish for her like a dutiful servant taking a whipping.
“My mother thought it all through. Put it inside me, and it stays a secret while having a built-in defense. Anyone who wants to take it will have to go through me fighting for my life. I was a fool, thinking her death meant any type of liberation. As long as this is in me, I’m still a part of her game, all of their games, the Guardians’…” the princess laughs again, a hollow and pained sound. “Yours.”
“Come here,” I whisper. I hope I sound as desperate as I feel. “Please, I just need to touch you. Just come here.”
I can’t offer her anything else. Not a denial of what she said. Not a promise that this will end. I’m the Guardians’ hero, but I’ve never felt more villainous.
“No,” she says. “I’m not taking orders from any of you now. I promised to get you to Isla del Sol, and I’m going to do my best, but that’s it. I’ve said all I need to say. Now I can be done with this.”
I see her lying down in the shadows. I call her name. Silence. I call it again.Yanami. I keep whispering it long past when I know she won’t respond, long past when my voice can make a sound. I whisper it in my thoughts, and it’s only when I’ve fallen asleep, deep into a dreamless slumber, that I think I hear my name whispered back.
Chapter 27
Ihave long forgotten what is on our llikllas when we emerge at a busy dock in Puno. We managed to take rural back roads all the way to the lake, but there is no avoiding the town when we need to get on a boat. We did our best to clean up, and that included putting on our llikllas to cover the matching blood stains the princess and I sported.
The llikllas that announce our upcoming engagement.
“You'd better keep a close eye on your girl there, miss. Pretty things like her go for a good price here,” an old man tells me in the lake town. It’s a disgusting statement, but he says it with such sincerity that I can’t find it in me to get angry. Not at him. He doesn’t leer at us or give any sense of coveting Yanami himself. He sounds tired instead. Disappointed. Like he wishes he didn’t have to say what he did.
The princess must have read him the same way because she stops and goes to talk to him.
We established on our walk here that the princess was free to talk, though she still needed to cover her hair. There’s no way the Aya Runa’s projections made it out of Inkan territory, so her face won’t be recognized. Only the rumors floating in with the refugees would have made it this far.
“Is there a lot of crime here, sir?” she asks, and the old man sighs as if carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.
“Didn’t use to be, no, but with refugees like you flooding in, people are taking advantage. A lot of folks here still harbor anger at your last Inka. They won’t be as friendly as I am to you lot.”
It’s a shock to hear the False King referred to as our last Inka. News of the assassination must not have reached this far yet. I look at the princess to see if she’s as shaken as I am, but her face doesn’t give away a hint of emotion.
“We appreciate your help, sir. You’ve been kinder than you ought to be with our history,” the princess says.
“I’m too old now to be bogged down by history. I’ve lived through too much of it,” he says.
The princess chuckles, and I feel the heat of jealousy surge inside of me.
“We’ll make sure to stay close together. We just have to make it to my family in Isla Amantani, and we’ll be okay,” the princess says.
“Isla Amantani? You’ve got a long way to go. But I wouldn’t worry too much. As long as you have some of that Inkan gold on you, then it will be easy for you to get on a boat there. They’re shuttling refugees all over the lake right now. A lot of people returning to their family homes just like you.”
A wave of anticipation flows through me. This is our last obstacle. We used our last bit of gold on the road for rations, but I’m not worried. We have a kid with us, and I can play desperate easily when I feel it at my core.
We say our goodbyes to the man. I’m holding Mare’s hand even harder now. I risk another look at the princess. She’s back to her indifference, though her lack of expression can’t hide the story that her clothes tell. We’re refugees. That much is obvious by our tattered clothes and wounds. We’re also due to get married.
