It takes me all of nothing to reach her. Walls present no obstacle; neither do the armed guards patrolling every corridor and every doorway. Amma is in a far wing of the palace, asleep in a spacious room. Thank the stars she isn’t in a dank cell somewhere. But her hair is matted, and her jowly cheeks are no longer upturned and rosy with laughter, but sunken and sallow.
“What have they done to you, my sweet Amma?” An ethereal hand forms out of my stardust magic to gently brush the hair from her face. She murmurs restlessly in her sleep. I can’t bear to leave her, so I hum a lullaby that my mother used to sing to me.
Her eyes fly open... and land directly on me. “Suraya.”
My starlit lips whisper her name. “Amma?”
“Itisyou.” She reaches a bruised arm upward, her fingers passing through me, a hand caught in between beams of magical light.
“Can you see me?” I whisper softly as if it’s a trick and she’ll disappear any second.
“So bright,” she says, squinting up at me. “Shimmers of wings and vibrant tail feathers.Akasha.Your magic is a beautiful firebird, just like my sister used to say.”
“Are you well? Did they hurt you?”
“No.”
“How is this possible?” I whisper.
“Nasrin was like you,” she says, “with akasha rich in her blood. She was a gifted healer. I don’t remember her aura being as strong asyours or so bright. I was not blessed with similar abilities, but I could sense hers. We were bound by blood.”
“She was a Starkeeper?”
She nods. “One who was not awakened. It was not her time.”
I remember what the crone had said to me the first time I’d met her—the fates will wait until they are called.
“Why didn’t she tell me?” I press my marked hands forward even though they are not fully visible. “I was marked as she was. She knew what I could become.”
“She and Hassan wanted to protect you.” She pauses, pain breaking across her face. “They came for you once, when you were two. Morvarid wanted to invoke the dark ritual, to bind you to her son.”
“The queen did?” I ask, startled.
“She was—is—a death magi,” Amma says. “The only reason they were not taken unawares was because a friend in the palace warned them.”
Phantom goose bumps break out over my spirit flesh. Adeathmagi. I knew she was rotten to the core. But then my eyes narrow. “A friend? Who was it?”
“The queen’s sister, Nihira. She was Elonian, from the House of Fomalhaut. She knew of her sister’s obsession.”
Roshan’s mother.The artist behind the painting my mama so loved. I wonder if Roshan knows that our mothers were friends. It seems we have always been connected, even before we met, before we were born, as though we were always meant to protect each other, joined as we were by our mothers’ love.
“Nihira was the one who alerted your parents and helped them flee the palace and Kaldari. She and Nasrin put the protection runes on you so you would not be found. Your mother tied that magic to her own life essence.” She swallows, sorrow filling her eyes. “She gave every ounce of her soul’s healing power to cover you.”
My heart clenches. “So I killed her?”
“No, love. She did what any mother would for her child. She protected you to her last breath with a smile on her face.”
Mama...
“Hassan and I swore to safeguard you to the end. We meant to tell you so many times, but the years passed, and it seemed like the queen had forgotten or given up. We were foolish to believe such a thing.”
“She hasn’t forgotten,” I hiss through my teeth, emotions raging through me.
“She hid her past well. The Order of the Magi was disbanded because of dissension in their own ranks. The death magi wanted to resurrect Fero to bring back magic and power to Oryndhr. The queen was biding her time until they found you and King Zarek was dead.”
“I believe she murdered him,” I muse aloud, “under the cover of the Dahaka attack.”
“I suspect the same.”
