I chase away the thought before it can haunt me again. Thinking of what could’ve been won’t help me convince Roën to say yes.
“Zïtsōl, charming as I may be, you don’t want men like me or Harun by your side. You definitely don’t want to be in our debt.”
“If Amari doesn’t make her claim to the throne, someone else will seize control.”
“That sounds like her problem.” Roën shrugs. “Why do you care?”
“Because…” The right words slip to the tip of my tongue. Because she’s what’s best for this kingdom. She’s the only one who can call off the military’s maji hunt.
But staring at Roën, I don’t want to lie.
Somehow, it feels like lying to myself.
“I thought things would be better.” I shake my head. “Magic was supposed to make things better.”
Speaking the truth aloud makes me feel like I might break. The truth makes my heart ache.
“Baba’s death, the tîtáns, the hunted maji,” I sigh. “All these people fleeing their homes. It hasn’t even been a moon since the ritual and it feels like magic’s destroyed the entire kingdom. Everything’s worse than it was before.” I wring out the rag, wishing I could turn back time. “Now that it’s here, I don’t want it. I wish I’d never wanted it at all.”
I exhale a shuddering breath and move to wipe away more blood, but Roën grabs my wrist, forcing me to look at him. His touch makes my skin hum. This is the first time since that night on the warship that we’ve truly been alone. Back then, we stood beneath the yellow moon, sharing nightmares and scars.
The way Roën looks at me now makes my skin crawl, but it also makes me want to draw close. It’s like his stormy eyes pierce through my shell, seeing me for the mess I truly am.
“If you don’t want magic anymore, what do you want?”
His question makes me pause. All I want is the people I’ve lost. But the more I think, the more I remember Mama’s embrace. The warmth of death’s escape.
“I want to be free,” I whisper. “I want to be done.”
“Then be done.” He pulls me in close, studying me as if I’m a knot to be unraveled. “Why ask for my help when you can cut your losses and call this the end?”
“Because if Amari’s not sitting on that throne, it was all for nothing. My father will have died for nothing. And if that happens…” My stomach clenches at the thought. “If that happens, I’ll never be free. Not with that kind of guilt.”
Roën stares at me and I can see the objections rising to his tongue. But he seems to hold them between his teeth as I cup his chin, wiping away more blood.
He looks down and I see the tally marks that run up his arm, the worst of all his scars. He once told me that his torturers carved a new line every time they killed a member of his crew before his eyes; twenty-three tally marks for twenty-three lives. Deep down, I think those scars are the reason Roën left his homeland. The reason he understands me better than anyone else.
“I don’t give second chances, Zïtsōl. This would be your third.”
“You can trust me.” I stick out my hand. “I promise on Baba’s life. Help us finish this and you’ll collect in gold.”
Roën shakes his head, but relief rushes through me when he puts his hand in mine.
“Alright,” he says. “We’ll leave tonight.”
CHAPTER FOUR
AMARI
THE NEXT MORNING, my voice echoes in the cramped captain’s quarters. As the warship nears Zaria’s shores, I struggle to write the speech that will convince the people of Orïsha to back my claim to the throne.
“My name is Amari Olúborí,” I declare. “Daughter of King Saran. Sister to the late crown prince.”
I stand in front of the cracked mirror, attempting to feel the power embedded in those words. No matter how many times I speak them, they don’t feel right.
Nothing does.
I pull the black dashiki over my head and toss it onto the growing pile of clothes on my bed. After weeks of living with what I could carry on my back, the excess gathered by Roën’s men feels foreign.
It brings me back to mornings in the palace; to biting my tongue while servants forced me into gown after gown under Mother’s orders. She was never satisfied with anything I wore. In her amber eyes, I always looked too dark. Too large.
I reach for a gold-tinted gele on the floor. Mother was always fond of the color. I nestle the gele along my temples and Mother’s voice rings through my ears.
That’s not fit to wipe a leopanaire’s ass.
My throat dries and I set the headdress down. For so long I wanted to shut her out. Now I don’t have a choice.
Focus, Amari.
I pick up a navy tunic, squeezing the silk to keep the tears in. What right do I have to grieve when the sins of my family have caused this kingdom so much pain?
I slide the tunic over my skin and return to the mirror. There’s no time to cry.
I have to atone for those sins today.
“I stand before you to declare that the divisions of the past are over,” I shout. “The time to unify is now. Together, we will be…”
My voice trails as I shift my stance, inspecting my fragmented reflection. A new scar spills onto my shoulder, crackling like lightning against my oak-brown skin. Over the years, I’ve grown used to hiding the scar my brother left across my back. This is the first time I’ve had to hide Father’s.
Something about the mark feels alive. It’s as if his hatred still courses through my skin. I wish I could erase it. I almost wish I could erase him—
“Skies!” My fingers flash with the blue light of my ashê and I wince at the burn. I attempt to suppress the navy glow that shimmers around my hand, but the room spins as my new magic swells.
Midnight-blue tendrils shoot from my fingertips like sparks from a flint. My palms sting as my skin splits. My scars rip open at the seams. I gasp at the pain.
“Somebody help!” I shout as I stumble into the mirror. Crimson smears across my reflection. The agony is so great I can’t breathe. Blood trickles down my chest as I fall to my knees. I wheeze though I want to scream—
“Amari!”
Tzain’s voice is like shattered glass. His presence frees me from my mental cage. The pain fades ache by grueling ache.
I blink to find myself on the tarnished floor, half-dressed with my silk tunic clenched in my hand. The blood that smeared across the mirror is nowhere to be found.
My scars remain closed.
Tzain covers me with a shawl before taking me into his arms. I brace myself against his chest as my muscles turn heavy, winded from the burst of magic.
“That’s the second time this week,” he says.
Actually, it’s the fourth. But I bite back the truth when I see the concern in his gaze. Tzain doesn’t need to know it’s getting worse. No one does.
I still don’t know how to feel about these new gifts. What it means to be a Connector; to be a tîtán. The maji had their powers restored after the ritual, but tîtáns like me have never had magic until now.
From what I can tell, the tîtáns come from the nobility: royals unaware of their maji ancestry. What would Father say if he knew his own children carried the blood of those he hated most? The very people he regarded as maggots?