IT HAD BEEN almost two weeks since the last combat round, and Sajda still didn’t know what to do about Javan.
He was surviving, a fact that shouldn’t have made her feel anything one way or the other, but which somehow made her glad. He’d kept to the rules she’d outlined for him—eating in his cell with her or Tarek, staying close to the other prisoners on the fifteenth level during chore and arena practice hours since Hashim and the rest of level five had a different schedule, and staying in plain view of the doorway during rec hour so she could keep an eye on him from the hallway in case Hashim decided to pick a fight while all the prisoners were in a room together. Occasionally she was able to get him out of his cell between his sparring hour and the bell that heralded the prisoners’ recreation time, but she’d had to invent excuses that wouldn’t raise anyone’s suspicions and get back to the warden. She’d told the guards that Javan had been given extra cleaning duties, and to make her story sound legitimate, she’d included several others from the fifteenth level as well. They’d scrubbed the arena until it glowed, polished the seats, and wiped the walls; and when they were finished, she had them start over again. Anything to keep an eye on Javan during the hours when Hashim might be able to bribe a guard to let him leave his cell.
He’d had to mingle with the other prisoners during recreation time—it would be hard to make allies otherwise, and he desperately needed those for his next stint in the arena—but Sajda had remained vigilant just outside the recreation room with the guards, her expression daring Hashim to give her a reason to punish him. Hashim had glared right back, and Sajda’s magic stung her veins at the memory.
He wouldn’t take her interference much longer. Either he’d confront her directly, or he’d do his best to kill Javan in the next combat round.
Worry chased her thoughts during the day and kept her up at night. Her bargain with Javan was a sword held over their heads by a fraying thread. One wrong move, and he could die. One mistake, and the warden could get suspicious and decide to expose Sajda. She couldn’t even coach him on the beasts he would face in the next round, because for the first time in the tournament’s history, she had no idea which creatures would go into the arena. It was supposed to be a combat round against beasts of the air, but the warden had canceled her shipment from Llorenyae and simply told Sajda she should order plenty of sand.
Instead, Sajda had coached Javan on which prisoners might make potential allies and had tried to hold up her end of the bargain by sparring with him during his arena practice. She thought it strange that he insisted on making it into a game where a simple touch counted as a point, and no one was supposed to use their full strength, but there was no accounting for the ways of aristocrats.
She’d done what she could, but she had the terrible feeling that disaster was careening toward them. She ought to walk away. Protect herself. Focus on surviving.
But he was kind, even when she wasn’t. He made her laugh. He listened to her as though her words mattered. He treated her as if she was something far better than a slave, and every time he smiled at her, something warm swirled through her veins like a new kind of magic.
It was strangely exhilarating until this morning when she woke before dawn and realized that the odd, fluttery feeling in the pit of her stomach wasn’t hunger.
At least not hunger for food.
Somehow, he’d become someone she wanted to be with each day, and it was terrifying. She wanted to back away. Cut him off at the knees before he had the chance to do the same to her. Before the thread holding the sword over their heads snapped.
But even as she considered what she would say to leave him friendless in Maqbara once again, something dark and aching opened up within her, and the words refused to pass her lips.
What was she going to do when he found out what she really was? When he turned on her and saw the monster instead of the girl?
The only good elf was a dead elf.
Maybe it was better to just show him the truth herself. At least then, he’d be walking away because she’d given him a push.
“Where are you?” Javan asked beside her, and she jumped.
“I’m standing right here in the middle of the arena with a scrub brush and bucket, just like you,” she snapped. “The warden won’t be happy if you and the other prisoners don’t get your work done before the next bell.”
“We’ll get it done. I meant where are you up here.” He tapped lightly on the side of her head.
“Do that again, and I’ll give myself ten points for every touch I get this afternoon during sparring practice.”
He gave her an exasperated look. “You can’t arbitrarily change the rules just because you’re in a bad mood.”
“I can do as I please. I did what I pleased for eleven years before you showed up, and I’ll keep doing as I please long after you’re gone.” She’d forgotten to borrow the cold composure of the stone wall outside her bedroom this morning, and everything inside her felt like a rope fraying under the strain of something far too heavy to lift.
He went still, which meant she’d just revealed too much of herself to him. She was looking back through her words to find the problem when he said quietly, “Have I done something wrong?”
“You made me be friends with you.” She glared at him as she set her bucket of soapy water by her feet.
“I didn’t make you do anything.” He set his bucket down too. “Nobody ever makes you do anything.”
She ran her fingers lightly over the runes in her cuffs and looked away.
Seconds later his hand brushed lightly across her wrist, lingering on the cuff, one finger resting on the web of scars that peeked out from beneath the iron. “Why do you wear these if they bother you?”
She moved her hand away. “Who says they bother me?”
“Sajda.” His voice was gentle.
She met his eyes defiantly. “What?”
“Are we truly friends?”
“I don’t know how this happened. I blame you.”
“I can live with that,” he said. “And you don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to tell me. But one day, I hope you trust me enough to tell me why you wear those bracelets if you don’t like—”
“Cuffs.”
The word slipped out before she thought to stop it, and one look at the slowly gathering thundercloud on his face had her wishing she could take it back.
“Cuffs.” His voice was deadly quiet.
“It’s nothing. We should scrub the floor.”
“It’s everything.” He waited until she looked into his eyes, so dark and right now so full of fury. “Isn’t it?”
She clenched her jaw and willed herself to be a star—distant and untouchable. The thundercloud on his face became a storm.
“The warden did this to you, didn’t she? Put iron cuffs on you so that every time you lift your hands you remember that she sees you as her slave.” His voice had a lethal edge to it now.
“She doesn’t just see me as a slave. I am a slave. Bought and paid for.” She was a star. A galaxy. A vast, unknowable space so very far from here.
“She may have paid coin for you, but she doesn’t own you. You’ve seen to that. I’ve never met someone with more confidence and courage than you.” He held her gaze with his, but he didn’t really know her. He hadn’t seen the truth.
The warden hadn’t just bought a slave. She’d bought a monster. And monsters didn’t get to keep mothers or homes or friends.
“I’m going to check on the weapons. The warden ordered me to see what needs to be sharpened before the next combat round. You can scrub the floor. And when you’re done with that, go offer a sneak peek at the weapons’ placement schematic to the four competitors you wanted to build an alliance with. Hashim and his friends will be stuck cleaning the ovens in the kitchen for at least another hour, so you’ll be safe.” She was already backing away, her fingers itching to touch her cuffs as her magic spun through her like chaos, wild and wounded.
“Sajda—”
She left him in the middle of the arena, surrounded by buckets, guards, and the other prisoners from level fifteen.
He wasn’t supposed to hear the things she wasn’t saying. No one was. With him, she couldn’t hide behind the ice she borrowed from the stars. The spaces between her words left her secrets bare to him.
Friendship was terrifying.
She was a fool for falling into its trap.
Magic churned through her, nipping at her skin. It streaked through her veins with a familiar pain, hunting for a target, but there wasn’t one.
She’d allowed this. Dropped her defenses because he’d protected Tarek. Because he’d saved the life of a stranger in the arena at the expense of his own victory. Because he’d said he was a prince, but he treated her like his equal.
Because when he smiled with that hint of challenge in his eyes, something wild and bright woke within her.
The cuffs burned against her skin as her magic thrummed with every heartbeat.
And still she didn’t know what she was supposed to do about Javan.
“Well, look at that. I’ve been hoping to catch you alone.”
Sajda whipped around to find Dabir standing behind her, blocking her return from the corridor that led beneath the seating platforms to the small weapons closet.
“That’s a very foolish wish.” Her voice shook as the magic within her hurled itself against her skin, begging for its freedom. “You’re supposed to be cleaning the ovens.”
“Hashim thought one of us should go see what you do with your pet all day.”
“You’ll be beaten once the guards find you.”
He shrugged. “I’ve been beaten plenty since I came here. Once more doesn’t matter. Especially now that I can tell Hashim you’re using the new boy as a maid during the mornings and a punching bag in the afternoon.” His smile made her skin crawl. “And I can tell him he was right about you.”
“So you skipped roll call yesterday afternoon to watch level fifteen’s arena practice, and you think that means you know something about me?”
“I’d heard the rumors—how you’re too fast and too strong to be just a slave girl who feeds the beasts—but until I saw you sparring yesterday, I thought the rumors were just Hashim making an excuse for not subduing you yet the way he’d like to.”
Her breathing came hard and fast as she stared him down.
He stepped closer, and she held her ground, even though everything about him made her want to back away. “Now I think he’s still making excuses, but I can see why he’d want to overpower all of that speed and strength. Hashim thinks we’re just going to leave you for him, but . . .” He shrugged as if to say oh well, I got here first.
Fury and fear twined within her until she could no longer tell the two apart. Her magic buzzed beneath her skin, a hornets’ nest ready for blood.
His blood.
He thought he’d seen the limits of her power while she was sparring with Javan, but he hadn’t seen anything yet. Raising her fists, she said, “I’ll give you one chance to walk away.”
He laughed. “You’re a good fighter, I saw that for myself, but I’ve got you by several handspans. It’s been a long time since I had to subdue a girl to get a taste of her and there’s nowhere for you to run.”
Her smile was vicious. “No, Dabir. There’s nowhere for you to run.”
He frowned, but she was already moving. She took three running steps forward and slammed her fists into his face. He flew backward and crashed against the rough stone wall of the corridor. Blood poured from his nose, and her magic whispered and begged and screamed until she fell to her knees beside him, cupped her hands beneath his chin, and let his blood pool in her hand.
She’d never held another person’s blood in her hands before. Distantly, she knew she should be frightened or disgusted or worried about the way her magic was scraping at her palms like a rabid animal. But instead, she was fascinated. It was like his blood was the key to a side of her magic she hadn’t known existed.
He groaned and tried to slide away from her, but she wasn’t watching him. She was staring at the tiny crimson lake in the center of her palm. Her magic surged, a painful itch that spread along her arm and exploded into her palm with agonizing brilliance.
The blood spun in lazy circles, and images floated into Sajda’s mind.
His past.
His intentions.
His fears.
She bared her teeth as she slowly raised her head to lock eyes with him, his darkest nightmares playing across her mind, one after the other.
Dark, small spaces.
A woman with short hair and a loud voice.
Falling into a lake and sucking water into his lungs.
Snakes.
Magic was an implacable force that owned her, rushing through her veins until all she could hear was its intoxicating thrum of power.
He’d wanted to overpower her.
He’d overpowered other girls before her. Left them broken and bleeding when he was finished. She could see their terrified faces in his mind.
“What are you doing?” His words were slurred, blood leaking from the back of his head where he’d hit the wall.
She held his gaze as she leaned down to the little lake of blood in her palm and began whispering. The nightmare took shape in her thoughts, fused with her magic, and became words that fell from her lips with the power of a lightning strike.
The runes on her cuffs blazed red, but she ignored the pain and let the words rush out, conjuring the images in his mind with every breath.
He saw snakes rising from the stone floor, black and glistening. They coiled and writhed and slithered toward him, while the stone gave birth to more. He shoved himself as close to the wall as he could, and still they came. Golden eyes unblinking. Fangs extended. They rushed across the floor, crawled over his boots, and slid over his skin.
He screamed as her words took a different shape and the walls closed in, skylights turning to hard slabs of black stone. The snakes were churning now, a writhing mass of scaly black, as the room shrank to nothing more than a box.
He wailed, a long, broken sound that startled Sajda out of the story she was weaving. She closed her mouth, letting the rest of the words, the images, dissipate into nothing.
Dabir clawed at his body, searching for snakes that weren’t there, and screamed for someone to turn on the lights.
Horror swept over Sajda.
What had she done?
The magic that had borrowed a shield of calm from the stone wall each day to protect her suddenly felt like a weapon that had used her. Controlled her.
Turned her into a monster.
She scrambled to her feet and turned to find Hashim standing at the end of the corridor watching her with curiosity burning in his eyes. Without looking at him again, she swept past and took the stairs to her room two at a time.
But no matter how fast she ran, she imagined she could still hear the echo of Dabir’s screams as he fought with the nightmare she’d given him.