Page 172 of A Sea of Fate and Starfire

“What—” I rasped, the lining of my mouth and lips peeling as the ash ate away at my skin.

But I knew what.

I knew by the hateful emptiness in her eyes. The way she neither winced nor cried at her skin as it curled, blackened and disintegrating in her palm. Above her head, a murder of dark wings blotted out the stars.

Shield weed seared through my flesh, flames across my face and neck.

“Where are you?” I asked her, calmly, though my mouth had been set to fire. “The real you. Release Selena.”

She moved toward me, long skirt swishing over her hips, and angled her open hand before her mouth as though preparing to blow a kiss. Ash had collected along the lifelines of her palm, damp at the edges. I wonder how long she’d been forced to hold it. Hours?

Days?

“I thought you might come sooner, Maren,” she said, her voice like silk. Something wet splashed quietly over my nose; a wet kiss from the dark sky. “We’ve been waiting.”

“It was a real crow then.” My fists curled. “I stabbed a real bird.”

She stole another step in my direction. Without my water-call, I was forced to back away, sliding through leaves and ferns, branches scratching along my back. “One of my birds, fed a sleeping draught of koren valeriany. I needed you out in the open, separated from the others.”

“Well, here I am.” My friends dropped from view as the trees grew dense around me, the island jungle thick and lush and sparkling with danger. I reached for my hip and remembered I’d left my knife among the crow’s bones. “I should be no threat to you now. Let Selena go and face me.”

She smiled, beautifully serene. Cruel. “Were you happy to stab the heart of your once master? Did it heal the hate in your heart?”

The world ceased to let me evade her further. Smooth stone pressed into my back, the white rocks I’d once climbed and lounged on. My arms spread across them, calmly searching for escape. “I hold no hate in my heart.”

Selena laughed coldly. “Of course you do. Hate is an heirloom for you and I, passed through generations. It lives in your blood only because it runs in mine. Your anger is my anger, your wrath is my wrath. When your rage spikes and your fury reigns, it is a relic of me within you.”

Ice trickled down my spine, a bucket of cold water poured over my head. “What do you want, Thaan?” I asked. “If you’re going to kill me, the time is now.”

Selena shook her head. She stood taller than me, but her eyes and cheeks were sunken, her throat hollow, strength drained from her flesh by the days here. “Simple girl. I told you when we met, I wouldn’t throw your life away. I need you. And you need me.”

The hair along the back of my neck rose as I stared at her, knowing where this line of speech was headed. “You won’t frighten me into vowing anything to you again.” I let her step closer. Close enough to touch me.

“Once more, I find your lack of wisdom personally disappointing.” Selena leaned inches from my face. “Give them to me.”

The weight in my pocket seemed to double, that pulse I’d felt in the Parian tunnels threading against my thigh. “Give what to you?”

Leihani—where are you?

Selena’s mouth curled from her teeth, her nostrils flaring. Her skirt stretched tight over her waistband as she leered, the undeniable shape of a knife hidden within. “Give me my stones.”

In the trees—

She shoved forward, grappling, scratching at my skin and dress, feeling for the stones. I cried at the singe of her hand, angry tears biting through my lashes as I struck back, blindly punching, slapping. Her touch was a flame, an iron rod left in the fire, branding every inch of skin I owned.

No, I thought I heard her weep, please. But I could barely see through the pain, my knees trembling to hold me straight.

I felt her hand find them, curling around them through the byssus silk. Delving into my pocket, drawing the small weight of them out.

The world had lost shape and depth, the taste of smoke and metal swimming over my palate. Strands of light fell like jewels through Selena’s shadow before something dark fell across her, forcing her away. A golden hand reached through the leaves, pulling me to my feet first, then lifting me off them.

My vision focused enough to find my mother and father struggling with Selena in the grass.

“She took the stones,” I said, breathless, blinking Kye’s radiant skin into view.

He swore under his breath, spinning on his heel.

A sound like splitting stone, dark air and heat bursting across my skin.