Bodies crushed against the guards, forcing my protectors to squash against me. Hands spread their fingers wide before raking toward my head. I’d dodge one direction and then be pulled back the other. My head arched back. Strands ripped from my scalp. Somewhere a child chanted he’d gotten a ribbon.
Another child grabbed the fabric of my dress. “Water,” he begged, his voice hoarse. He wore no shoes or shirt, and I could see the outlines of his ribs running down his chest.
The guard ahead of me rammed the wooden end of his spear into the child, sending him spiraling backward into the throng of the crowd. “Move back,” I yelled, hoping to keep the child from being trampled.
I turned my head to follow the path the boy’s body took into the enveloping crowd. That’s when something round and hard smashed against my temple. I staggered into Sievers.
He caught me before the crowd swallowed me. “You’re bleeding,” he said.
Jolts of pain shot through my head. My vision blurred. I saw four guards in front of me instead of two. I couldn’t concentrate on moving my feet forward while the ache in my head spread.
I became aware that Sievers’s arm was around my shoulder, pressing my head into the crook of his arm, protecting me from the rocks still being thrown while also guiding me through the gauntlet. “Get her to the East Well,” he shouted to the other soldiers. “There will be more guards there.”
He pushed me forward. Rocks glanced off his armor with more force and frequency. Their constant clink was what I imagined falling rain would sound like.
As we pressed on, my vision cleared and the tops of buildings appeared around us. The crowd thinned on the narrow streets. We burst into the East Square, where a line snaked away from the well. Six guards stood around it, monitoring how many buckets each family took by collecting their ration coins in turn.
The guards responded as they saw our approach, clearing a path. As soon as we got to the well, Sievers rested me on the ground nearby while the other guards held the crowd back.
He inspected the wound on the side of my head. “It’s not as bad as I thought,” he said. “Head wounds always bleed more than anything else.” He lowered the bucket into the well and hoisted up fresh water. He gave me an apologetic smile before tearing a strip from my dress to use as a washcloth, then bathed the wound.
He wrung the cloth into the bucket and stared at the bloody water for a few moments before throwing it out.
“Just because you get extra buckets for being a soldier doesn’t mean the rest of us do,” someone called from the crowd. “Stop wasting our water and get back to your palace.”
Sievers lowered the bucket back into the well, shaking his head. He and I both would’ve saved the water if we could’ve in this drought, but it’d been too bloody to salvage.
A shadow fell across me.
“These people would have killed to have the water you just threw out,” a voice said.
I squinted against the intense sunrays to make out the figure as I scrambled to my feet.
A man about my age stood on the ledge of the well, leaning against the wooden frame. He wore thin pants and a woven shirt that had seen better days. He lifted his head, shaking long, unkempt strands away from his face. “But water doesn’t mean the same thing to someone who’s never gone without it.”
Sievers pointed his spear at the man. “Back away from Princess Kateri.”
The man scoffed, and a sly smile spread across his face. His eyes examined my dirty face and torn garment. “You’d think they’d take better care of the famed Achran Flower. Maybe they’ve been overwatering you.”
I studied him as well. The untamed hair. The confidence to approach the well. A Desert Boy. He had to be.
“If anyone’s overwatered here, it’s all you Desert Boys. But I’ll be putting an end to that.” My hand went for the sword hilt that wasn’t there.
He yanked the bucket up from the well and poured water into a container held by a small boy I hadn’t noticed. “I’m not just any Desert Boy,” he said. “I’m their leader. But you can call me Cion.”
I didn’t breathe. I didn’t think. I reacted. I grabbed the sword from Sievers belt and leapt forward. My vision swirled, and the well hazed in and out of focus.
“The cactus’s spines come out,” Cion said. He drew his own sword. It was a blade unlike any I’d ever seen. Instead of one shaft of straight metal, this one had two that forked away from the hilt like a snake’s tongue.
Maybe that’s what had started those annoying rumors.
“Keep pulling water,” he shouted over his shoulder to the boy. Then he leapt up, somersaulting through the air above my head and landing in front of me. He again flicked his long hair out of his eyes with annoying confidence.
Sievers and another guard tried to leap between us, but I shoved them away. There was no way I was giving up a chance to face Cion in the flesh. I grinned. Bringing in Cion was exactly what I needed to make amends with my father.
“I didn’t think you existed,” I said, jabbing my sword toward his throat.
He easily sidestepped the blow. “That’s why I decided to put in an appearance, keep you on your toes. Maybe if I’d done that sooner, you wouldn’t have been so slow in the arena today.”
I cried out as I lunged for him. He ducked out of the way, giving me a clear view of haggard boys taking up arms against the soldiers while another line of smaller boys pulled bucket after bucket from the well and passed it down the line and out of sight. Without the added weight of armor, the Desert Boys easily outpaced their opponents.
One boy without shoes was knocked to the ground, but before the guard he was fighting could deliver his next blow, another boy slid through the guard’s legs and blocked it, giving his friend time to get back on his feet. Behind them, boys were climbing onto the buildings and vaulting off—landing behind two soldiers to retrieve lost weapons and gain the advantage.
Another boy cried out as a blade cut into his arm, and I thought maybe it was a sign we could turn the tide back in our favor. But more boys materialized out of the crowd, some to carry away the injured boy and others to take up the fight where he’d left off. They had the timing and precision of thieves in the way they’d slide in and out.
I pulled my gaze back to Cion. We circled each other. “You’re a plague,” I spat, “stealing water from these people.” I aimed my sword at his midsection. He deflected the blow, refusing to make any attack of his own.
“I doubt you know anything about the plague,” he said. He hopped onto the edge of the stone well to avoid my blow aimed at his knees. “You were locked away in the palace while it destroyed everyone out here. Maybe”—he flicked his sword so quickly toward me it was a blur in the sunlight—“you should have used that time to practice harder.” His sword connected with mine, ripping it away from my hand.
It spiraled toward Sievers, who was fighting off a Desert Boy with curly hair.
Instinctively, I took a step back to avoid the sword now pointed at my chest, but I refused to drop my gaze. I stared dead into the dark eyes of the legendary leader of the Desert Boys.
He smirked. “Too bad I can’t fight in the arena,” he said, lowering his sword and smugly crossing his arms across his chest. “Otherwise, you’d be engaged to me now, and I’d give Achra a leader who actually cares about its people.” He still stood on the edge of the well, leaning against its support beam.
I lunged for him. He expected the move, leaping off the well as I sped toward where his knees had been. I’d been hoping to knock him into the water, where he’d be trapped. But the instant his feet left the stone wall, I realized my mistake.
I ricocheted off the far side of the well, unable to get a hand on the edge. Cool air rushed around me until I splashed into the water below. When I surfaced, I punched my fists into the water and screamed.
My dress clung to my legs, making it hard to kick, but I’d spent time in the oasis waters learning to swim because my father had wanted me to be a master of all aspects of the desert. And if I stretched out my arms to either side, I could touch the walls and keep myself afloat. Moss squished between my fingers, and droplet ants crawled over my hand, their transparent abdomens heavy with water to take back to their colony.
A head popped into the circle of light at the top of the well, and a rope twirled down. “Try not to contaminate all the water with your royal stench while you’re down there,” Cion called. “People still need that to drink.”
“If you’re so concerned about what they drink,” I screamed, my voice echoing hollowly up the walls, “then stop stealing it all for yourself!”
I grabbed the rope and began to climb. The rough threads of the rope dug into my skin. My skirt tangled around my legs, and I gave up using my feet and pulled myself up purely with my arms.
By the time I’d ascended high enough to grip the edge of the well, my palms were bleeding, and the Desert Boys were gone. The only signs they’d been there were a few overturned carts and the groaning guards scattered across the square.
Sievers rushed over as soon as he saw me clinging to the edge of the well. He hoisted me over the edge, and I landed in a heap. Sand clung to my wet skin, chafing against me, but it was nothing compared to the intense heat filling my stomach and surging through my body. No one should have been able to wrestle my sword from me.
Flashbacks to the day Rodric wounded me raced through my mind. I could already feel the hatred rising in my body.
“Are you all right?” Sievers asked. He had a cut running down his cheek.
I ignored him, searching for some hint of where the Desert Boys had gone. Slowly, people were repopulating the square. I shook Sievers away and raced toward a woman with a basket hoisted on her shoulders. “Did you see where they went?”
She shook her head, refusing to look at me.
I asked the woman next to her, and the man next to her. They all refused to answer, instead looking down into the sand.
“Didn’t anyone see where they went?” I raged, returning to the center of the square. “Are you all so afraid of them that you’d rather have your daily water rations taken down to nothing?” I spun in circles searching for answers. I exhaled thick bursts of hot air through my flared nostrils. I must have looked like some sort of desert monster. A mixture of blood and sand covered my sopping dress. My hair hung in limp tendrils. I ran my fingers through it. The sun had dried it slightly, but clumps of sand had taken up residence.
I shook my head.
Sievers put his hand on my shoulder. “You’ll find no answers here,” he said.
I let him lead me back to the palace, but I stared down every person we passed, daring them to challenge me or say anything about my appearance, to give me an excuse to release the anger throbbing in my heart.
In fact, I was so focused on looking for someone to fight that I nearly clobbered Latia when she ran into me.
“Latia?”
She cast her eyes around the scene, obviously disturbed by what she saw. The note she’d been drawing earlier trembled in her hands, and her face was pale when she met my gaze. “I heard the soldiers call out that you’d been injured by the crowd. I came to help.” She lifted her hand up toward my scalp.
“I’m fine.” I shook her away and kept walking, fuming all the way back to the palace.
Though when the shadow of the palace fell over my body, a chill crawled across my skin. My heart was no longer throbbing with anger but with emptiness and regret.
And fear.
The only thing worse than letting the Desert Boys get away was having to face my father afterward.