Page 24 of Heart of the Desert

“I envy the way it seems easy between the two of you,” she said.

A bark of laughter so loud and abrupt that it startled the horses exploded out of me. “Easy? We must have different definitions of the word.”

Dhara looked at me quizzically. “The first time you arrived at Clan Otush’s encampment to fight the lava wyrm, you worked so seamlessly together, even though I know now you fought for separate causes.”

“Ah, yes, you missed the part of our story where we spent months trying to kill each other.” Even as I said it, an ache filled my chest—a visceral longing for those times, before Erix twitched and tossed his head as if trying to dispel a fly buzzing around his head. I knew he did it in response to the voices that constantly plagued him, and it was more difficult to swallow each time I witnessed it.

“Well, a true battle seems far preferable to dancing around underhandedly needling at each other. I prefer to face my adversaries head on with a blade in hand.” Dhara mused. Her gaze caught on Elion as she spoke, and I cocked my head.

“I don’t think he wants to be adversaries,” I said, knowing we were no longer talking about me and Erix.

Dhara pursed her lips. “Lords are supposed to be pictures of strength. The weak do not survive in the desert, and they certainly don’t stay lords. His trying to help me—protect me—at every turn, makes me look weak. It undermines the image I need to serve my people. To give them faith in a time of so much uncertainty.”

I chewed my tongue. Even after months as queen, the posturing of a leader didn’t come naturally to me. I had kept Erix at a distance in public to strengthen my rule, but it had ached like a knife to the chest.

“I denied my heart to be a better queen, and despite it… maybe even because of it, I failed.” My throat burned. “But maybe you have the right of it. You have been lord far longer than I managed to remain queen.”

Dhara looked pensive but clapped me on the shoulder. “I do not think your time for being a leader has passed. Survival is the highest law of the Ballan Desert, and it seems you have survived more than most. You’re still fighting, and you should know that the winner in most battles is determined by who can stay on their feet the longest.”

My eyes fell to Dhara’s leg, wound still visible and angry.

“Well then we better get you patched up if you are to be winning many battles soon,” I commented, before standing up to find some water and bandages, Dhara’s words heavy on my heart.

“We should spar.”

I glanced up at Aderyn from where I sat on my sleeping mat, cleaning my sword.

“Have the past weeks not been enough action for you?” I asked.

While nothing in the past fortnight had been as harrowing as the bone spider attacks, our trek across the sands had been far from easy. Predators were everywhere and hunting was difficult. I would have been tired even without the restless nights I had been suffering from. I woke often to find my sleeping mat empty as Erix rose and prowled through the darkness in agitation, leaving me cold with a soul-deep ache in my chest. My own nightmares roused me nearly as often—visions of Kelvadan crumbling from the mountainside or the desert falling into the sea. My stomach roiled, and I cringed.

In the present, Aderyn shrugged. “We’ve had plenty of practice fighting beasts and the elements, but when we reach our destination, we might have to face human foes.”

I grimaced. We still hadn’t been able to puzzle out why the desert had brought Aderyn and Elion the same way as us in their quest to find the enemy clans, but it seemed likely we would encounter Izumi and the other lords at some point.

“I wouldn’t mind testing my leg out before the next time my life is in danger,” Dhara chimed in. The deep wound on her thigh had healed to an angry red scar by now, and she had avoided using it too much until her skin knit back together.

I stood, picking up my saber. “All right, if you’re so desperate to hit something, I suppose it might as well be me.”

“Care to join us?” Aderyn asked Lord Elion, who sat on a boulder near the oasis we had found, persuading us to camp earlier than usual today.

He shook his head but smiled broadly and leaned back on his hands. “I wouldn’t want to miss the show.”

I wished for a moment that Erix could join us, and the tether in my belly twitched in response to my thought of him. He had stalked out on a hunt as soon as we had stopped for the day, refusing my offer to accompany him. The frenetic energy that poured down the bond and made me fidgety made me reconsider—perhaps taking up his sword against a friend right now would be counterproductive.

Dhara leaned from side to side with her hands braced on her hips and grimaced. “You two start while I limber up. My blood takes longer than I would like to get flowing these days.”

Aderyn and I approached an open patch of earth, and we each drew our sabers. We would have to pull our blows, as we didn’t have blunted weapons. I eyed her blade curiously.

“No sickle blades today?”

She shrugged. “I want a challenge.”

I scrunched my nose. “I’m not that out of practice.”

For a moment, it was almost like we were back in the training yard in Kelvadan, when violence had been looming on the horizon and not a constant companion. I could ignore the hollows under Aderyn’s eyes and the roiling of Erix’s angry magic in my gut and remember making my first friend during long days of sweat-soaked training.

“You presided in your throne room while I was still captain of the riders. I wouldn’t be so sure,” Aderyn taunted as we started to circle. I knew her well enough to predict that she wouldn’t strike first. As always, she would wait, baiting an enemy into an attack that would give her an opening.