Yet it felt like a place from her past rather than her future.
She remembered running from one tree to another as a child, skipping across their branches like she was flying, the moss under her feet and the sky in her large curls, looking down on the boat-filled waterways that glistened like jewels. She would close her eyes and listen to the song of the forest, the music of its branches and how the tune changed with her mood.
Now all she could think about was Creije, falling victim to Ashwood.
That was the city she had fallen in love in.
The city she’d met her best friend in.
The city in which they’d started this quest.
And they were primed to lose it.
“You’re my constant,” Saxony said.
She pressed her forehead to Karam’s, placing her hand to feel the steady drumbeat of her warrior’s heart.
“Coming back here hasn’t felt much like home at all these past few days, except for when I’m with you. With you everything makes sense.”
“Yes,” Karam said. Her breath tickled Saxony’s lips. “I am really quite amazing.”
Saxony scoffed, but she didn’t argue. She simply closed her eyes and inhaled the sound of Karam’s half laugh, memorizing the melody of it before she finally pressed her lips to hers and let the rest of the world fall away.
4
Tavia
THE FOREST WAS LIKE a fancy cell. If cells had birds that woke you up before sunrise.
Not that Tavia hated it. The Uncharted Forest was beautiful, but she couldn’t get comfortable. Tavia was used to shadowed streets and a cautious moon, with bright-eyed tourists and endless possibilities of magic and mayhem.
There was none of that here.
Not to mention that they had been in the Rishiyat camp for over a week and the only real progress made in their war against Dante Ashwood, Kingpin of all that was unholy and bastard-like, was that they hadn’t gotten themselves killed.
Yet.
The forest was pretty, but it didn’t seem to be helping them. As it was, their army had a grand total of eighty Crafters, including the sixty they had rescued from the Kingpin’s island. Some followed Saxony’s amja, some followed Asees, but most of them just looked like they wanted to go home. Wherever home was.
They weren’t in good shape, even with the forty buskers Tavia had wrangled into staying on their side without Wesley to lead them. And if Wesley were here, then he’d probably tell her—when. When Wesley got here—he’d tell her what a piss-poor job she was doing at managing everything while he was away.
“You don’t have the authority for this, busker.”
Casim, underboss of Rishiya, stared down at Tavia like she was a fly he quite fancied swatting. A specter of his face, tired but youthful, hovered over the open fire like a cloud. His mouth was stern, eyes faded and just as wicked as Tavia had always pictured them.
It had taken her days to secure this meeting, and robbing Casim’s buskers—arrogant little gits like Nolan included— hadn’t exactly helped to put her in the underboss’s good graces. Still, it had gotten his attention, and after a few delg bats and a lot of wishful thinking, Casim had agreed to meet. Or, more precisely, sent her a charm that melted into the open flames and then sprouted his uppity little face from the embers.
“I have the authority,” Tavia said. “The buskers in this rebellion follow me now.”
“And you want me to send more buskers to your cause,” Casim said. “Risking my own neck in the process.”
“It’s not like Ashwood is going to let you keep your neck once his power trip comes to an end. He’s preaching Crafters as the new, superior race. You think just because we use magic, we’ll be any better off than the regular folks he’s going to exterminate or enslave?” Tavia almost laughed. “We’ll either be next, or be regulated to his guard dogs, watching over the prisons and jumping when he tells us how high.”
Casim’s entire face twitched at that.
Like any underboss, he was not the sort of person who liked taking orders. Underbosses were charged with ruling entire cities, with the Kingpin trusting them to keep the trades going, and usually Ashwood’s only concern was how much magic they sold, or what charms they should push. Tavia could see that the thought of Ashwood breathing down his neck and imposing his every whim on Casim’s city was not his idea of a bright future.
“You think he controls you now?” Tavia asked, pressing the nerve. “Just wait and see what happens if he wins.”
“And you think us teaming up will save it all?”
“I think that you can convince the other underbosses to join forces and that might just save us all.”
“Doubtful,” Casim said. “When it comes to the Kingpin, they’re all a bunch of damn chickenshits.”
Tavia kept her chin high, and her stare hardened. “You can convince them. There are nine underbosses in this realm and I know for a fact that each of them values what you have to say.”
Which was a lie. Technically, Casim was part of the inner circle. Part of the four underbosses who thought themselves superior enough to dictate to the other five—Casim, Stelios, Ilaria. And Wesley. Casim was by no means the most powerful or the most respected, but, with Wesley gone, he was the best she was going to get. She doubted the others would even give her the time of day.
Casim was the easiest link to pull from the chain.
“What do you know of the other underbosses?” he asked. “You’re just one in a sea of replaceable buskers that Wesley took under his wing.”
Tavia shook her head.
He didn’t know how wrong he was.
Wesley had kept Tavia versed on every other underboss in the realm. Just in case, he’d said to her. You never know when they’ll crawl from their shadows.
Tavia knew their wants and their ways. She knew their limits and their lies. She knew each and every one of the underbosses by name and she knew that all of them would turn against Dante Ashwood for a better offer. If crooks could be trusted to do one thing, then it was to not be at all trustworthy.
“Are you saying that you’re not powerful enough to convince the others to help?” Tavia asked. “Maybe I should be talking to Ilaria or Stelios instead.”
She would have done it in the first place, except that Casim was not only their closest ally, being underboss of the city they were hiding in, but he was also one of the most scared when it came to Wesley’s name.
Casim’s snarl grew.
“Watch yourself, busker. Don’t think that just because you were under Wesley’s protection before that it affords you any mercy now that the Kingpin has him.”
Tavia wondered if someone’s teeth could break from gritting them so hard, because if so, then hers were fit to bursting. Just the mention of Wesley’s absence set her off-kilter and brought her hand to his bone gun, which was nestled in her belt loop, where she always kept it these days.
It gave her the smallest of comforts, but it was all she had left of him.
“Wesley is where he needs to be for the moment,” Tavia said, the bluff heavy on her lips. “And you’re a fool to threaten me. Wesley named me the best busker in all of Creije.”
“But he’s not there with you,” Casim said, sounding uncertain. He craned his neck, searching the shadows with grim reluctance, as if Wesley might just appear around the corner.