“No.” His tone held the same wary dread Vina’s had.
“I am what you think I am?” The desperation in my voice made my question sound like a plea. Everything I knew had been whisked away. Unmoored, I tried to anchor myself to the only truth I thought I knew: I was an ashinwa. Vina’s words replayed in my head along with Jamillah’s gentle concern when she said, “I should have found you.”
“Yes.” He drew out the word as if there was more he wanted to say. “We should go,” he added. He linked his fingers with mine. They felt so warm. The firmness of his grip wasn’t enough. I was floundering. I’d abandoned every self-regulating technique I knew: Vagus reset—screw your exhalation. Mindful walking—I was on autopilot and my feet could have been replaced with hooves and I’d be none the wiser. Gratitude—it was hard to be grateful for anything in the weeds of despair.
I needed to get it together. Cirrian’s hold on my hand was firmer when I stopped for a moment. I shored up the resolve I needed to gather my emotions to sort through later. Probably with a bottle of wine and comfort food.
Cirrian’s hand slipped from mine and gently pressed into my back, guiding me from the building and past the guards with purpose.
“Cirrian,” Lyzeil said as we moved past him quickly. I was acutely aware of the intensity of the guards’ stares, although I wasn’t sure who was the recipient of their interest: me or Cirrian.
Cirrian’s pace continued. He pulled me closer, wrapping his arms around me in preparation to return home, when the sound of beating wings came from the sky. A moment later, we were surrounded by twenty winged guards.
They separated to create an opening for three people to enter in a single file. A tall, lean woman with golden-brown skin and molten brown eyes. Her grimace, softened by full lips and docile eyes, showed her determination and dissatisfaction.
A fitted black jacket made of reinforced fabric and leather moved with her body without softening its lines. Soft leather lined the tapered wrists of the sleeves. The neck rose snugly at the throat, precisely framing it. My eyes snagged on the narrow sheath seam that housed an easily retrieved slim blade. The diagonal harness strap crossed from shoulder to ribcage looked decorative until I saw that it was a retention strap securing blades to them for easy retrieval. The bold embossed insignia had meaning. I speculated rank, but the varying colors meant something else. I just had no idea what.
Matte black pants similar to the ones Cirrian wore were cut lean through the thigh with a strap. Knee-length boots completed the uniform. Whereas Cirrian’s seemed ornamental, her steeled-toed footwear without any visible lacing was to give her an advantage during a fight.
The slow breaths I took did nothing to temper the growing apprehension from the new arrivals. While Cirrian’s attire spoke of dark menace, their determined advance held an air of authority and readiness for violence.
Cirrian stood taller, his expression quickly moving from annoyance to defiance that he leveled at the duo behind her that included Larkin, who looked as if he was there under duress and returned Cirrian’s annoyed look. But his irritation was clearly directed at Cirrian and not the situation.
The guards surrounded us, thrusting me out of the way before I could make sense of what was going on. The woman’s invocation came quickly with a blast of magic, torrential and strong. Cirrian grimaced as the black smoke around him narrowed out, wound around him, dissipated, and then he wasshackled, his arms and legs in runed chains. His mouth moved ardently in what I assumed was a counterspell that failed. Buckling to his knees, he toppled over from there. He was still, his eyes closed, his breathing even and soft.
Where I’d expected to see accusation or even rank cruelty from the woman who’d forced Cirrian into submission, there was something else that I couldn’t quite place. Sorrow. Wistful regret.
It was missing when it was turned on me. “And you?” she said, pinning me with a wrathful glare diametric to her honeyed voice. “You seem to be the reason behind all this chaos. I need to know why.”
She didn’t give me an opportunity to answer. The cloud of magic swept over me, my vision grew hazy and heavy, my mind clouded, and then darkness.
27
Opening my eyes to low, warm light and a room stifled with magical energy in a low, unsettling vibration, I looked down at my body. I was still in my t-shirt and jeans, the duster placed at the end of the bed.
“You’re awake.” With an icy expression, the woman who had spelled me looked down as I lay on the cloudlike bed. The only comfort in a bedroom with décor that should have been cozy and inviting but felt cold and inhospitable. Perhaps it was the company.
“Sayier, give her space. It can’t be comforting to awake with you standing over her like that.”
Her companion was an albino woman about the same height. Her pale blue eyes offered a kindness absent in Sayier. The angular lines of her face formed a diamond. Full, wide lips spread in a smile that didn’t quite meet her eyes and seemed to provide a consolatory offering to contrast Sayier’s. It exposed a solitary dimple that was a little too low. Shoulder-length thick coiled hair was pulled back with something that sparkled along the edges. It drew my focus. The corners of her top lip lifted, and she pulled her hair back enough for me to see a string of glittering turquoise stones that I suspected were real.
“Nahela,” Sayier called to her companion, whose eyes rolled away from her.
Withdrawn cautiousness was the only response I could offer to her act of kindness. I hated being pulled into cynicism, but if they were using a good cop/bad cop tactic, I wouldn’t fall for it. I wouldn’t trust her any more than Sayier, who’d spelled me and locked me in what I believed was a beautifully decorated prison.
Sayier moved from the bed, and I slowly eased off it. Taking in the room, my eyes landed on a large window. Seeing my interest but reluctance to move toward it, Nahela turned with a flick of her wrist. The lights dimmed and the midnight-blue curtain pulled back, revealing a wall of glass. Warm, buttery sunlight spilled in with a breathtaking view. The room was eerily silent; even the light sounds of my steps were swallowed into the quiet.
My fingers touched the cool pane, expecting to feel some sort of magical barrier, but there was only glass. Perfectly ordinary glass. Too ordinary. Mountains rose in layers. The sun cast a bright white light over the snow-dusted peaks. Richly verdant pines crowded the slopes, lined in a way that felt intentional rather than naturally wild. So dense it would make navigation through them nearly impossible. Mist clung to the valleys in slow, deliberate drifts. Too precise. Looking for pathways down the mountainside, I spotted a few, narrow and winding, but they appeared to vanish behind ridges at the site of dense trees. There weren’t any signs of roads, villages, smoke from hearths, or any signs of movement or life.
Beautifully isolated. Caged.
Turning back to Sayier and Nahela, I said, “It’s beautiful.”
Their placid smiles tightened. Nahela inched closer, taking in the view, her features softening as if she was trying to look at it through my eyes. Her expression was unreadable.
“It’s peaceful,” she said.
“And confining,” I added.
