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“I think you should get your head on straight before tomorrow,” Reza said. He stood and adjusted the collar of his leathers. He walked out of the tent without another word and left Xerxes there, a statue of Per-Siana royalty, with no further instructions to navigate his way out of the turmoil in his mind.

No, Reza couldn’t be right—all the clues were there that Adassah was Ryn. Xerxes had seen it in her eyes. He’d even seen her face. He hadn’t made her into something she wasn’t.

But in his shadow of a heart, he wasn’t sure if he could believe what he saw after he was stung by the scorpion. He saw Ryn, he just didn’t know if it was while he was dreaming. When she took off her mask, he beheld her sun-bronzed cheeks and small nose, a scatter of new freckles and a set of lips he’d been driven to kiss twice before. But he always saw her in his dreams, and he wasn’t sure how to make her confess if she’d really been in the medicine tent yesterday. There were no other witnesses to confirm or deny if she’d really taken off her mask.

And she’d whispered such an outrageous thing.

“I might have even loved you. But you never loved me back.”

Those words had driven him out of bed in the morning and charging through the camp to find her. But could it have really just been a dream? She denied meeting him. Maybe… Maybe she really had no idea what Xerxes was talking about when he’d asked her in the feasting tent if what he’d heard and seen was a dream.

Xerxes glanced toward the bonfire again. That beastly instinct inside of him craved the chase, told him to go grab the maiden and remove her mask once and for all while his eyes were clear, his mind was sharp, his body was unaffected by medicines.

Divinities, was there a chance he’d actually made it all up? That Adassah wasn’t Ryn at all? Was Reza right that Xerxes had made a distraction for himself to avoid thinking of his terrible fate to come?

He released a heavy breath and stormed out into the night, making his way across camp to the strategy tent. He wasn’t sure whether to be angrier at Reza or himself. Some of the night torches remained unlit with everyone at the bonfire, and he stumbled over a step in the dark.

Everything was cold and empty in the strategy tent when Xerxes came in. He went to his desk and sat down in the chair he never used. He yanked the desk drawer open and there, right on top, was a report written clear in the Weylin tongue with her name on it:

FOR: GENERAL REZA

OFFICIAL FOLKE INVESTIGATION REPORT ON

ADASSAH CAHANA

Xerxes lit a candle, warming the space and sending shadows and light flickering over the desktop. He swallowed as he unfolded the parchment and held it by the light to read. His eyes only scanned a few lines—but that was enough. His chest expanded, the paper slipping from his fingers and falling to the desk where the rest of the report lay in clear view. But Xerxes could hardly bring himself to read the rest of it.

Adassah Cahana had never set foot in the Mother City in her life. Prison guards of the seventy-fifth province reported she’d spent three years in prison before the burn divisions were drafted into the war. Three.

Xerxes exhaled and squeezed his temples between his fingers and thumb.

Divinities have mercy.

What in the name of Boreas was going on?

She was supposed to be Ryn. It would have meant he wasn’t completely alone out here. It would have meant… It would have meant he could have peace of mind that Ryn was still alive and well.

His hand flew to his stomach and he moved away from the report, leaning back in his chair, staring into the darkness of the tent. If this report was true, that meant he’d fooled himself.

It would also mean Ryn was dead—and he couldn’t accept that. Because it would mean she might have been fighting for her life in the Mother City prison even before she was drafted. Maybe that was why he was so desperate to believe someone strong and untouchable like the Gold Maiden was the Ryn he wished he’d saved better.

He lifted the report again, eyeing the alphabet symbols. There was a line at the top of the page that looked to be written with slightly different strokes than the rest of the document. As if someone had tampered with it. It wasn’t like guards stood outside the strategy tent; anyone could have walked right in and made this story up, even a pack of sly criminals. He released a moan and tossed the paper back onto the desk.

Xerxes couldn’t decide if the idea of Burn Division Twelve trying to throw him off Ryn’s trail was cute or frustrating. Why couldn’t Adassah just admit who she was? Xerxes shook his head.

Divinities have mercy, he no longer knew what to think. Commander Adassah came over the sand hills like a glittering deity. She became what he’d needed her to be in his mind. His treatment. His distraction. Curse the Divinities, he’d actually convinced himself she was his maiden from the palace. And maybe she was. But maybe she wasn’t.

He tugged at his hair and leaned his elbows on the desk. A second later, he dropped his hands with a thud. For reasons he couldn’t guess, Commander Adassah wanted to fight alongside him in this war. And even though she might not be Ryn—she might just be a maiden he needed, not the one he wanted—he couldn’t refuse her help. He, and Per-Siana, needed Adassah Cahana.

Xerxes stood, the bitterness of the night air brushing his skin.

He had to accept the horrid truth that tomorrow he would meet the legendary War King he’d been avoiding since the beginning of the war. The man who had brought Xerxes out of his luxurious, isolated palace life into this desert. The one Xerxes had to convince if he wanted to stop Per-Siana from being turned to rubble and its people forced into slavery. And there was no place for any woman to distract him from that with so much on the line.

Reza was right. Xerxes had been distracted. And now there was no time left.

22

RYN