Chapter Twenty

I’m still sobbing when Datu Payan, the head Healer, presses his hand against my shoulder. He bends over my friends. One after another, they gasp, then sputter. Their eyes fly open, and color returns as if a frost melted. This really was a test?

What the Freezing Hells? I wipe tears and snot from my face. How dare the Baylan play with our emotions like this! With every passing day, I feel more and more certain that whatever crime my mother committed must have been justified. These are not tests but torture. My shoulders heave, and I scream aloud in frustration.

Payan looks away, apologetic. “I am sorry that you needed to believe that death was close at hand. When we are done here, eat and rest. You will feel better shortly.” Everything about him appears guileless. His voice is soft and soothing, and his wide-set eyes assert innocence. If I ran to him raving that the moon was a dragon’s egg, I wonder if he might agree just to soothe me and I would find my convictions firm. I wish I could trust him, but I don’t.

Worse yet, I hate myself for not acting quickly. If this were real, my friends would be dead, and it would be my fault. I don’t know who I am more mad at: Payan, the Sundo, or myself.

Virian shifts and sighs. Her head still rests in the crook of Dayen’s neck, and his chin still nestles upon her hair. When she looks up at him and he looks back, I see something different in the exchange.

“The ruler of Tigang must make difficult decisions,” he says. “We had to know how you might react in the face of death. You may think we Healers only fix broken bones and maladies, but never forget that if Tigang goes to war, we spend the breaths of our lives to save all the people that we can. Though we have had peace for centuries, we must also be ready in times of war. Peace does not last forever.”

His words ring like a distant warning, but I am too much of a mess to focus. Virian and Dayen are alive, I remind myself, but it doesn’t ease my guilt. I worry that if I close my eyes I might open them and a different reality might take us all.

“Today we tested your ability to think quickly under pressure and how well you could cooperate with others.”

My anger switches into anxiety. I know we are not automatically disqualified from the Sundo for failing a test, but I don’t know how low or high my score must be now. I can’t afford to be disqualified. I still haven’t figured out a way to get my mother out of the dungeons.

“Virian Saniran, you failed this test. You three were given a single orasyon to save someone. You could have copied it out and saved the both of you. Do you not always carry writing implements and paper?” Payan’s eyes drift to the pouch on her waist.

Virian sits up straight and stutters. “But I could hardly move! How could I have copied it out?”

“You could have given your tools to Kuran Jal.” Payan shakes his head and turns to Dayen. “Dayen Kam, you chose to sacrifice your chance at winning for someone you thought more worthy. Noble, but you did not think of a solution that would save you both, either. Lives are precious, and we must do what we can to save as many as we can.”

My heart pounds, because only one judgment must come next, and I already know the outcome.

“Kuran Jal, your indecision condemned both your friends to death.”

I make a shallow bow. I should have acted faster and kept my head. I deserve their scorn, not forgiveness.

“You have all failed this test, but none of you are disqualified, so your fate is not yet decided. But to succeed, you must do spectacularly from now on,” he warns. “Remember, sometimes there is no right choice, but you must make one anyway,” he says in a gentle tone before dismissing us.

When he is away, I throw my arms around both Virian and Dayen. “I’m so sorry,” I say over and over and crush them tightly against me. “I thought Reshar was going to disappear us…”

“Kuran.” Virian pushes me back with a gasp. “You’re heavier than you look. And why on earth would Reshar do that?”

Because he’s mean, difficult, selfish, and clearly up to something secret. I don’t have proof, only a feeling.

“At least now we know she likes us both equally,” Dayen teases but quickly disentangles himself from my arms, even though I did not touch his skin. “I’m starving.”

“First of all, we stink. Second of all, Reshar is a crusty old goat, but I don’t think he’s evil,” Virian says.

“What if he has something to do with the missing candidates?” I ask.

“Do you have any evidence?” Virian asks, and I shake my head no.

“Are you both hungry?” Dayen interrupts us.

“You’re always starving, Dayen.” Virian wrinkles her nose.

I don’t know how they can make light when they might have just died. But I was the one that watched it happen, and I don’t know if I could ever watch something like that again. I might be tempted to leave the Sundo first. I shake my head and walk back the thought because I cannot afford to fail.

“First of all, let’s grab some food.” I stand slowly. “Second of all, there’s a place I know…”

It’s not my fault, I tell myself, but my heart refuses to agree.

Virian tugs my hand and spins me around to face her. Her posture reminds me of Omu’s statue, ready to command or pass judgment.

“Next time, you better choose,” she says. “We don’t always get to keep it all.” Her expression softens, and I wonder what she’s already lost and what’s brought her here, but she turns into herself and the quiet.

…

I lead my friends into the Autumn Palace with fresh towels and new clothes draped over our arms. I want to make amends, but I also want to soak away every ache in my body, wash away the guilt stained onto my soul—or at least try.

When Virian steps into the baths, she whistles with delight, and the sound bounces happily in its recesses, multiplying. Soft light tints us all an otherworldly shade, and I half wonder if we’ve already died and are ghosts.

Dayen turns the tap on the large basin and hoots in victory when hot, milky spring water hisses into the empty pool.

I dip my toe in, but there’s a knock at the door. My heart leaps ahead of me.

I stick my head out to find Teloh standing outside the entrance, hands in his pockets. He wants me gone, but I’m too tired to be angry. I step outside the baths and leave the door a little ajar.

I realize now why his gaze is so unsettling. It’s not his eyes’ strange blue-black color but how intently he stares, as if nothing else in the world exists but me.

So, I stare at his feet.

My mother always told me that you can’t control what you feel but you can control what you do about it. I’m not in control now, and I don’t know if I want to be. I don’t understand what my heart keeps trying to tell me, only that everything is a jumbled mess that gets worse when he’s around, because he makes me want to hope for something more.

“Were we lovers or enemies in our past lives?” My voice sounds flatter and calmer than I expect because I already know the answer.

I brace for him to tell me why I am so repulsive, that I deserve to be cursed, that I could never be worthy of ruling Tigang—something I don’t even truly desire. I want him to give me a reason to despise him and end the torture of his presence. I lift my eyes upward, afraid to move or make it worse.

“Nothing so simple as either.” For a moment, the mess of emotions I feel is mirrored on his face, but the ghosts in my chest remain strangely silent. “At first, I was afraid that you might remember. Now, I am afraid that you are in danger. If something were to happen to you, I could not forgive myself.” He looks up at the ceiling, his jaw clenched tight. “The others were given a different Healing test. I thought the poison was real, too, but I couldn’t do anything.”

I curse him to the Freezing Hells, heart thudding. I still want to hate him. This is not the answer I was looking for.

“I don’t understand anything anymore,” I say.

“It’s called change, Narra.” He smiles, and how it warms me, so free and full of life in that instant that it could power a thousand spells. But I am no hero. I am afraid of everything, including myself.

It would take one heartbeat to close the gap between us, and yet, it feels an impossible distance.

“Kuran!” Virian’s sudden appearance makes me jump. She holds a towel primly around her chest. “And you. What are you doing here? Has Arisa actually let you off her leash?”

“I have no quarrel with you candidates,” Teloh says, and his stance shifts, ready to move.

“Well then the water’s ready, and it’s glorious.” Virian tuts and glides back through the door as elegantly as if she wore a gown. Not for the first time, I wonder about her life before the Sundo.

“Are you coming?” she shouts, and I hear her splash into the pool with a shout.

It takes me a moment to realize that she’s inviting the both of us.

Teloh raises an eyebrow, and to my surprise, he removes his boots and walks into the baths ahead of me. He slides into the pool, clothes and all, hardly making a ripple. I watch them there, waiting for me.

Nothing can stay the same forever.

I suck in a breath and follow, unsure where this path goes. It feels like driving a cart up a mountain road on a moonless night, and any bump in the road might send us careening over the edge.

The boys turn their backs so that I can leave my towel at the tiled edge and slip into the pool. It is as glorious as I dreamed. I close my eyes as hot water laps against my skin. I almost purr, and Virian is humming as she smiles up at the ceiling. I catch her slip her hand under the surface to meet Dayen’s.

Teloh sees the gesture, and our eyes meet for a moment. It’s as tentative as a handshake, and I am the one who looks away.

None of us talk, but this moment is ours, thoughts to ourselves, in the amber light.

…

Teloh drips in his clothes, back turned, as he waits for us to get changed. It feels like I’ve started a truce between us. I boldly trace his jaw with my eyes when I’m clothed. I wonder if his skin feels how I think it will; if it is rough, or if it is soft; if to touch it might awaken the sleeping thing inside me.

“No one can curse me more than I have already been cursed,” Teloh says, watching my hands balled at my sides. I hesitate when he takes my right hand and turns over my wrist, but he gently uncurls my fingers one by one, so that my palm is bathed in light. When I do not protest, he lifts it to his lips, and my skin burns where his lips touch me, as if I am on fire.

All I can hear is my heart in my ears—he’s kissed me like this before in my dreams. It’s a gesture as old as Arawan. I forget the pain of my dislocated finger and my scars. My lives crash together. Past and present dance in a circle that leaves me dizzy in the center of it all.

“Whatever I did in my past life to hurt you, I’m sorry.” I struggle for my mouth to make sense, but I know that I’ve erred once the words escape my lips. His expression closes as he gently pulls away. I touched upon a scar that is still healing or might never heal.

“Do not say that unless you know what you’re sorry for.” There is danger in his tone, and he is gone before I can say another word. And I don’t hate him; I hate myself.

Dayen is staring open mouthed, with big eyes. Virian is covering her mouth to stop from giggling. I wish this was as simple as the flirtation it looks like. I let out a long sigh.

“Well, now.” Dayen slaps me on the back and whistles. “You have good taste, Kuran.”

“So, you like them dangerous?” I ask. “He’s Arisa’s personal assassin.”

Dayen chokes on a cough and his cheeks turn embarrassingly red, but Virian chews her lip thoughtfully.

“Can we trust him, Kuran?” she asks.

“No,” I say.

I dare not imagine how Arisa might use him against us.