Rage still burned through me as I walked alone into the square. Bodies were smashed into every available space. Sunken eyes watched me warily as I approached, wondering if I was going to shove myself in front of them or steal the ration coins they clutched in their hands.
“Water,” voices rasped, holding buckets in the air.
“Stay back,” a voice called. “Form a line.”
It was like everyone had scuttled out like scorpions, hoping to be the first to the well after the storm. In this crowd, it’d be nearly impossible for the Desert Boys to make a quick entrance and exit. But Cion had said the crowd would part for them, and if they didn’t, the boys were good at ducking under arms and through small gaps.
I couldn’t see Cion and the Desert Boys on the other side of the square waiting for my signal, but I knew they were there. The plan was to wait until after my father spoke and left the area, hopefully taking guards with him.
I still hadn’t decided if I was going to let my father leave that square alive. If anyone deserved to be thrown into the arena with two tigers behind the doors, it was him. But today, I felt more powerful than those tigers and had already passed judgment on him. So I ignored the protests of the crowd as I shouldered myself closer to the front. I wanted a good view. If my father was going to torture these people, I wanted to be close enough to stop him. I wanted to be close enough to kill him.
I waited with the crush of bodies. The whole mass swayed and shifted as some tried to push to the front while others gave up and moved backward. Elbows caught me in my ribs and side. Feet stomped on my exposed toes. It was a constant battle just to stay on my feet with the sun beating down from overhead and the people crushing me from all sides.
Sweat slid down my collarbone, but I didn’t take off my cloak.
Finally, a tall figure pushed through the crowd, and people parted for him and the trail of guards at his heels.
The crowd stilled. Wind passed through, dragging the edges of tunics and tendrils of loose hair to the side. Everyone’s eyes stayed forward.
My heart beat twice as fast, begging me to release the energy building like a sandstorm in my chest.
I wasn’t sure what I was expecting when I saw my father again, but his face hadn’t melted into a grotesque imitation of the snarl Rodric often wore. He was still the man I’d grown up with. A man who did cruel things. A man who’d murdered my mother out of his own fear of weakness. A fear he’d instilled so deep in me.
You could tell by his gait he didn’t consider himself like these people. He walked with his shoulders thrown back as if the pounding sun didn’t beat against him. He heaved himself onto the edge of the well. It was the same well I’d fallen into not days before.
He shook back his hair. The crown atop his head gleamed as he surveyed the crowd. The key he used to draw back the tigers’ chains was in full view and weighed heavily around his neck. No one here would know what the key was for. But I did, and it was a stark reminder of what the Desert Boys would face if they got caught.
Everyone went silent.
Instinctively, my hand went to my sword hilt.
My father had taken up the same exact position, a constant reminder of both his skill and power. I released my grip and clenched my hands into fists instead, refusing to mimic him, to do anything like him ever again.
“My people,” he began, “as you’ve heard, water rations have been cut to half a bucket a day.”
Shouts went up from the crowd.
He waited for them to quiet before he continued. “You have only the Desert Boys to blame for this. They nearly drained this well.” He gestured to his feet. “There’s barely enough left for anyone.”
“Lies,” someone called out from the crowd.
My father straightened. “Bring him.” My father motioned to two soldiers.
The man tried to fight back. A woman clung to him, pleading with the soldiers not to take him, but they wrestled him forward and made him kneel before the king. I tried to push ahead, to get closer. But the crowd had closed ranks, as though by blending together it would be harder to pick out individuals.
My father beckoned the man to rise. “Take a look for yourself. Tell me if you see any water in here.”
The man stood, casting wary glances at the crowd behind him. He took tentative steps closer to the well and peered in.
“Tell them what you see,” my father said.
The man turned back to the crowd. “There’s . . . there’s nothing! No water as far down as the eye can see.”
My father held up his arms as if that proved his point.
The crowd let out a roar. They threw their fists into the air and cried for water despite what the man said. My father ignored them, and with a flick of his wrist he sent the man back to the crowd.
It took me a moment to wonder why he hadn’t killed the man outright for calling him a liar. But it was because he was playing his role of the fair king. The good king. The one they needed. Oh, he’d deal out justice, but it was in the form of the arena. So it was never him punishing the people. It was the tigers. It was their own choices.
He could play the benevolent king when he needed to, like now, when he wanted to turn everyone against the Desert Boys. Because there was no way the Desert Boys had emptied that much of the well. I’d been there not days before. The water had been so high it hadn’t taken me long at all to climb out.
Even if Yeri had been at the well where I’d caused the riot, my actions could have lessened the supply, but they wouldn’t have depleted this well. Nothing would’ve. Not that fast. Not even the drought.
The one and only time the wells had gone dry was at the very start of the drought, before I was even born. But all the records said the water levels had decreased slowly, that there had been a noticeable decline over several weeks as the wells refilled less and less each night.
The only ways the wells would drop that drastically would be if the drought had reached a terrifying new level or if Cion was right about there being water controls.
My father didn’t look worried about there not being enough water. He wasn’t telling people to conserve and prepare in case the wells went dry. In fact, the more I thought about it, he was never worried about us having enough water in the palace.
No, he’d once again blamed the lack of water on the Desert Boys. Because he wanted the people to turn against them. But in order to do that, he needed to ensure the water levels would be low enough to be convincing—low enough to control these people.
Which meant Cion had to be right about the controls. About everything.
Rage blinded me as I started to elbow through the crowd. This was going to end here.
But I stopped when I heard my name.
“The Desert Boys haven’t just taken our water,” my father continued. “They’ve also taken Princess Kateri.”
A gasp went up from the crowd.
“If you see her, alert the guards immediately. And know this . . .” He paused and eyed the crowd.
I was far enough back it would be hard to see me. Still, I ducked my head when my father’s eyes passed over me—though I had nothing to worry about. His eyes held no recognition. I was one of them now, part of the masses, covered in dirt with lips chapped by thirst.
It was obvious now why he always insisted we wear white. He gleamed like a beacon atop the well amongst the seas of muted browns and tans around him.
Untouchable.
“If it’s discovered that any of you are concealing her or helping them,” he finally continued, “my captain of the guard will deal with you.”
He threw back his shoulders. “Rest assured my captain of the guard and his men are doing all they can to recover her. She will be found. And if you’re the one to find her and bring her to us, you will be rewarded.”
With a crook of his finger, my father motioned for a soldier to come forward. The man carried a carved box roughly the length of his forearm. My father threw open the lid. Thick golden ration coins gleamed in the sunlight as the soldier held it above his head for all to see. There had to be at least a hundred coins in there. Maybe two hundred.
Murmurs traveled through the crowd. People stood on tiptoes to get a better look.
My father motioned again, and the soldier snapped the lid back into place.
“But if she is not returned, things will only get worse. So think about what is best for our people, for your families.” He looked down on us all once more. Then he leapt off the well and pushed through the crowd in my direction.
People pressed tighter against one another to make a pathway. I somehow ended up on the edge of the crowd. I swallowed, all moisture gone from my throat.
My father sauntered right toward me, unaware of my presence. Unaware of the suffering around him. Of the suffering inside me. The suffering he’d been causing for years by controlling the water levels and letting us all think there was a drought when he could’ve ended it.
My hand went to my sword.
But just as I was about to pull it, a small hand covered mine. I looked down to see Dimic.
He shook his head. His dark eyes stared intensely at mine, refusing to look away. “If you die,” Dimic said, “we all die.”
I stared at him, puzzled by his words.
“You’re our hope. You’re the only one who can fix this, the only one who wants to help us and has the power to do it. Don’t throw it all away for revenge.”
Somehow I got the sense those last few words weren’t his, that they’d been spoken to him sometime in the past. And not only just to him, but to countless Desert Boys just like him.
They were counting on me now.
I eyed my father and his contingent of soldiers. Could I take them all on? Or would they strike me down before I could even reach my father, before I could even make a difference?
I let go of my hilt.
Dimic nodded, assuring me I’d done the right thing. “We’ll wait on your signal,” he said.
“Should we even raid? How do we know there’s any water left?”
Dimic gestured to the crowd. “He wouldn’t leave them with nothing. Otherwise, they’d turn against him altogether. There’s always some water. It’ll just take longer.”
I nodded as he disappeared back into the crowd. I hoped he was right and that this wasn’t a lost cause.
I ducked my head as my father swept past, his soldiers trailing behind him.
He didn’t even eye me as he went by. Not that I should’ve expected it. Even I’d never really taken the time to look at the people on the streets. To see the way their shallow cheeks sunk or notice how many of their lips bled from lack of water.
I swallowed down the fire inside me, storing it away.
As soon as my father was gone, people spread out to fill the aisle he’d used. I let them push past me, fighting to get closer to the well.
Somewhere a guard shouted again to form a line. I scanned above the crowd. It didn’t look like any of the soldiers stationed around the well had gone with my father like Cion had hoped. I prayed he was right that his boys could take on fifteen guards. Well, hopefully less than that after I played my part.
All I had to do was get them to chase me. Cion had drawn out a map that I’d tried to memorize, of the best route that would lead them far enough away while still allowing me to circle back and meet them at the gate.
My father’s announcement had complicated that. If I went up there and announced myself hoping the guards would follow me, I’d have a mob on my hands. These people didn’t know I was working with the Desert Boys. They’d turn on me as soon as they saw me. Two hundred ration coins would change their lives forever.
My palms grew sweaty as I debated what I should do. I scanned the crowd around me. I was walled in on all sides. I couldn’t see Cion or any of the boys. Why hadn’t I thought to mention it to Dimic?
The only thing I could think to do was weave my way out of the crowd and regroup, because they’d never get any water if there was a mob fighting to turn me in.
I turned and pushed back through the mass. People were just as unwilling to part for someone attempting to leave as they were for someone trying to cut in front of them.
I squeezed between pressed bodies while fighting to keep my gaze downward. Elbows rammed into my ribs. Buckets whacked my thighs. Someone careened into my side. I bumped into a man on my left. People were starting to shove each other.
The crowd shifted. Individuals crashed into me. I stumbled into a woman on my right.
I looked up to apologize, but the words froze on my tongue as a breeze ruffled my hair. My hood was puddled around my neck. The woman’s eyes went wide. They stared directly at the golden cuff around my neck before going to the sword belted over my gladiator gear.
“It’s you,” she whispered.
“Please,” I begged, trying to back away but getting nowhere.
“It’s Princess Kateri,” she squealed. “I found her.” Her arm shot out and wrapped around mine.
I jerked out of her grip. But when I turned, a man grabbed me. I tried to run, but bodies pressed in around me. The man’s arms snaked out and coiled around my neck, pulling me into a headlock. My golden neck cuff crushed into my windpipe, cutting off my air supply.
He strong-armed me toward the soldiers.
I let out a strangled cry and kicked at his knees while digging my fingers into his forearms. He responded by tightening his hold around my throat. I gasped for breath.
I squirmed and kicked, trying to tangle my feet with his to bring us both down. He wrenched my head back, squeezing even more. The air in my lungs burned hotter and hotter. The crowd hazed out of focus.
I clawed and pulled at his grip until my arms felt too sluggish to move.
The man shouldered and elbowed his way through. Hands reached out from every direction as though they thought just touching me would somehow entitle them to the reward. Hairs were ripped from my head. My cloak tore. Someone spit in my face.
Worse were the insults they lobbed at me: Snake. Palace rat. Murderer. Eventually their voices all ran together, a cacophony of noise that reverberated over and over in my mind with the sound of my rising heartbeat, which slowly drowned out everything.
We burst into the circle the guards were maintaining around the well.
The soldier who’d been on the well rushed over carrying his spear.
The man dropped me at his feet. “There’s the princess. Now I want my reward.”
I lay there, struggling for breath. I wanted nothing more than to get the golden cuff off my neck, to feel cool air over my skin. But I couldn’t even bring my fingers up to undo the clasps.
“Shackle her,” the soldier said.
I was rolled over and a knee pinned me to the ground. My hands were ripped forward and chained in front of me. Two soldiers yanked me to my feet, propping me up between them. They must’ve been fed a different story by Rodric than the one my father had spouted in the square if they knew I wasn’t going to go easily.
“Move out,” the soldier called. “Take her up to the palace.”
“What about the well?” one of the soldiers holding me asked hesitantly.
“We’re about to get promoted,” the first soldier replied. “I don’t care what happens to the well as long as we get her through this crowd and up to the palace.”
“Where’s my reward?” the man said, stepping forward.
The soldier studied the man for a moment. “Of course.” Then he took his spear and rammed it into the man’s stomach.
I cried out, watching while the man’s wide eyes instantly turned to glass.
The soldier ripped the spear away and faced the crowd as the man collapsed in front of him, blood mingling with the sand. “Does anyone else want to claim the reward for Princess Kateri?”
The square had gone eerily quiet.
“I didn’t think so.” He turned back to his men. “Let’s go.”
The two soldiers dragged me in the direction I’d come from, which at least took them away from Cion’s assigned location. Maybe he’d seen I’d been captured and made a run for it.
Then again, I was drawing all the soldiers away from the well. I’d failed at everything else, but maybe I’d done just enough and he’d risk the raid after all. If there was even water to be had.
But that meant I had to figure out how to get away on my own before we reached the palace, because every step we took was another second gone, another move closer to Rodric.
I took a steadying breath to drown out the pulsing in my head.
From what I could see, there were roughly fifteen soldiers around me. They hadn’t thought to take my sword away, and they’d shackled my hands in front of me. If I could break free from one soldier, I could draw my sword. I wasn’t sure how well I could yield it with my hands bound, and fifteen was a lot to take on at once. But if they wanted me alive, they might be reluctant to fight too hard. That would have to be my advantage.
I scanned the crowd up ahead looking for a break, for the right moment to try my luck. It wouldn’t do any good to escape only to have the crowd converge on me again.
The soldiers in front shoved people out of the way with their spears, while the rest of the men closed ranks around me, keeping me from view, from grabbing distance. They didn’t want anyone taking their prize.
Up ahead, I thought I saw a break in the crowd. I was just about to trip the soldier on my right when a familiar voice sounded.
“Why aren’t you guarding the well?” Rodric barked at the guards.
If getting caught wasn’t part of the plan, running into Rodric surely hadn’t been part of any preparations. I tried to go for the soldier’s leg. He buckled slightly, but he didn’t go down or loosen his grip.
At the sound of commotion, Rodric pushed through the contingent of soldiers, the head soldier quickly at his heels.
A cruel smile spread across Rodric’s lips. He crossed his arms across his chest.
“I knew she wouldn’t last long outside the palace,” Rodric said. “Even the famed Achran Flower dries up without water after too long.”
I spit in his face.
He wiped it away with a swipe of his hand and leered forward. “I wondered how you survived out there all alone. Now I see it’s because you’re just like a yellow-spotted sand snake, attacking everything and hiding away in holes to stay alive.”
“I survived,” I replied, “because sand runs in my veins.”
His hand squeezed around the cuff encircling my neck, making the edges dig into my skin. He brought his face up against mine. His acrid breath pounded against my face.
“Do you remember those cuts I gave you?” He squeezed harder for effect.
I tried to gasp. My shackles clanked as I brought my hands up to his, trying to pry it away.
He laughed. “I will do that to every inch of your body after you’ve given me a son or two. And I’ll make sure you’re still alive when I throw you into the desert. Then you’ll really know what it’s like to have sand in your veins.” Sweat trickled down his forehead. “Only someone who comes from the desert, like I did, can rule this city.”
As he squeezed, the veins in my throat felt like they were tangling around my airway. I dug my fingernails into his hand. He didn’t notice. And he didn’t loosen his grip.
The already hot air in my lungs felt like it was burning through my insides layer by layer.
He was actually going to kill me. He didn’t care about the arena.
But then a voice cried out, “It’s a raid!”
His grip loosened immediately as his eyes darted over my head. “No,” he whispered. His eyes flew back to me, suddenly piecing it all together. “You’re with them.” He let out a cry of rage and flung me toward the soldiers. “Get her back to the palace.”
I threw a glance over my shoulder. Cion was perched atop the well handing a filled bucket to a line of boys. The bucket was passed down the line, and the boy at the end grabbed it, snapped on a makeshift lid, and disappeared into the crowd so that the line got shorter.
Rodric and several soldiers raced toward the well.
The closest guard hauled me away from the square. I elbowed him and kicked the one on his left, which afforded me room to draw my sword.
The shackles awkwardly pulled against my wrists.
The circle of guards around me spread out. These men knew what I was capable of. Or at least they thought they did.
But after seeing those children and the Desert Boys gaunt with thirst, after watching Yeri take his last breath, after learning what my father had done to my mother and sister, to these people, fire was raging within me. Not fire. Heat. The very life of the desert itself. I let it loose on the guards. I struck out at the closest one, catching him in the leg. I didn’t wait to see him go down. I twirled and met the attack of another, driving him backward until another guard came at me. I parried his attack and landed a kick to his chest. My world became a blur of metal and blood.
When the final guard went down at my feet, my chest was heaving.
At least I didn’t have to worry about the crowd. They’d scattered as soon as Rodric pulled his sword. I could hear him shouting curses at Cion somewhere amongst the chaos of Desert Boys fighting guards.
Dimic appeared by my side. “Time to go.” He grabbed my wrist and produced a piece of metal. He shoved it into the shackle keyhole. After a moment, it popped open, sending the chains clattering to the ground.
“Thanks,” I said, shocked at how quickly he’d removed them.
“I’m the best lock picker out of all the boys,” he bragged.
“I’m just glad you came for me at all,” I said, rubbing my wrists.
Dimic gave me a sidelong look. “You’re one of us. We always help each other.”
We headed back toward the well where the fighting was the thickest.
Cion had Rodric pinned against the well. But more guards were pouring into the square. One headed straight for Cion.
“Cion!” I cried. He turned just in time to fend off a blow, but it also meant that he’d had to release his hold on Rodric, who used his bulk to smash into Cion’s shoulder, sending him spiraling to the ground.
Without thinking, I rushed toward him. I stopped the arc of Rodric’s blade before it could connect with Cion’s neck. “Your fight is with me,” I said. I pulled my blade back, drawing Rodric’s attention with it.
“It would have been with you, if you hadn’t run away,” Rodric said. “I’m surprised you survived at all under the Desert Boys’ water rationing system. I thought you would’ve dried up by now.”
While he spoke, Cion struggled to his feet behind him. Dimic had appeared at his brother’s side and deflected the attacks of the closest guards.
“You’re going to regret coming here today,” Rodric continued. He advanced toward me. I watched his wrists for any movement that might betray his next move. His arm twitched, and I brought up my sword to fend off a blow that didn’t come.
Rodric’s eyes went wide, his mouth gaping open.
Behind him, I saw Cion slice a small dagger across Rodric’s side. Drops of blood stained the sand. It wasn’t a deep wound. No worse than the one I’d gotten in the arena.
Rodric roared and swung his blade in a circle hoping to catch either Cion or me.
“Go,” Cion shouted, using Rodric’s unbalanced movement to knock him aside. Dimic ran for the other end of the empty square, but I couldn’t leave Cion behind.
“Come on,” Dimic shouted, frantically motioning with his hand while casting glances at the line of guards. “He can take care of himself.”
As if to prove Dimic’s point, when Rodric lunged for Cion, he sidestepped and let Rodric crash into the guards.
I didn’t wait to see what Rodric would do next.
I ran.
Cion caught up quickly. He led us through a maze of streets before pausing at a squat building with an old barrel outside. He leapt on top of the barrel and hoisted himself onto the roof. Dimic climbed next. Cion held his hand down to me, and just like during my initiation test, I took it and hauled myself up.
We jumped across rooftops and flew over alleyways.
When we reached the last house, I didn’t turn back to look at the palace. I plunged off the edge with all the other boys and ran past the crumbling gates and out into the desert.