Page 134 of Dance of Stars and Ashes

His hand flung out again, narrowly missing her as fire singed the tip of her braid, and then, like the gutless weasel he was, he ran.

“Get back here, you coward!” she screamed.

“Zarya!”

She turned to find another flood of Kiraaye Ka spilling into the hallway. At least a dozen spotted Zarya and Aarav, and they came barreling down the hall. Zarya turned back towards Dhawan, but he’d disappeared.

“Run!” Aarav called, and they both pumped their arms and legs, skidding around corners, trying to lose the Kiraaye Ka, who stayed close on their heels. Zarya cried out and stumbled as a blade nicked her calf.

Aarav grabbed her by the arm, hauling her back up as they continued running.

“We can’t outrun them,” Aarav said. “Go and find Dhawan. I’ll deal with them.”

“You can’t do this alone!”

“I’ll distract them,” Aarav yelled as they hooked around another corner. “Go after Dhawan. I’ll take care of this.”

“Aarav, no.”

“Zarya, go. Let me do this for you. Find Dhawan and kill him, and then go and find your father and kill him, too. Let me protect you now as I should have been doing all these years.”

He cast a quick glance in her direction as he reached out and took her hand, squeezing it.

“I owe you that.”

Then, he shoved her down a hallway through a set of doors, slamming them behind her. She spun around and crashed against them as she heard the lock click.

“Aarav!” she screamed, pounding on the door. “Don’t do this!”

“Get out of here! Tell Lekha I love her!” he shouted through the wood before she heard his cry of rage and then the clash of steel against steel.

For several long seconds, she stared at the door, blinking furiously.

But she had to keep moving before the soldiers came through the barrier and before Aarav’s sacrifice had been in vain.

She pressed the tips of her fingers to her lips and floated a kiss towards the door—a final goodbye as a tear dripped off her chin.

“Goodbye, Aarav. Thank you.”

And then she turned around and ran.

THIRTY-EIGHT

The fire continued to burn in her limbs as she honed in on her desire to find Dhawan down the endless halls. She spotted a trail of blood, crimson footsteps smearing together, and smiled to herself. She searched, continuing around corners as the tracks grew closer together.

Given the amount of blood, he must have been quite badly injured. Zarya tried to conjure up the slightest ounce of sympathy and found none.

The footsteps led through a set of double doors that entered a large ballroom. Zarya eased herself around the one standing slightly ajar, catching sight of a giant map of Rahajhan hanging on the wall.

She squinted in the dim light that filtered through a round window cut into the ceiling. Pain gripped her heart as she entered, sending her to her knees. Dhawan was trying to bind her magic again, his power enclosing the star in her heart, trying to seal what Rabin had freed.

Rabin, who had given her back her magic so he could turn her over to the king of Andhera. It all made sense now. That’s why he had helped her and why he’d appeared out of thin air.

How could she have been so blind? Why had she trusted anything he’d said?

Zarya grunted as her ribs twisted on the verge of cracking, and just when she was sure she couldn’t take it anymore, that same mysterious force crested out like a shockwave, peeling away Dhawan’s magic and flinging it back at him. It sent him flying into the wall with a hard crack. He groaned, sliding to the floor.

Zarya struggled to her feet, barely able to stand, before she limped over.