There’s no time to wallow, however, as we come up to the next set of targets. Doing the same will be a hundred times harder on Razulek up in the sky. I keep calm and concentrate on making a clean slate with each new shot. I miss some and I hit others. By the time we come back to a stop at the training grounds, I’m breathless and high from adrenaline.
“You did well,” Karânî says, “for your first time on that horse. Six out of ten targets.”
“Not bad,” Zahre congratulates me as she dismounts. “You eliminated six enemies. Pretend that your magic is nearing depletion. Let’s see how good you are with a dagger.”
Considering I’ve come close to being depleted twice—once with Roshan when he’d nearly died and then when I’d healed Razulek—I nod. Although my power feels like a bottomless well lately, both Ani and Darrius insist that akasha has to be replenished, especially if a magi uses too much. I need to be better at identifying when I’m nearing that point.
I pull my dagger from my sheath and meet Zahre in the ring. Some of the king’s men gather to watch, and I feel my nerves take hold at the attention. “Don’t focus on them,” Zahre says. “Eyes on me.”
She attacks first with a quick swipe toward my torso that I dodge. I suspect that was merely a test of my reflexes, because the next one comes much faster. I spin out of the way, going for my own offense with a lunge and a thrust. She dodges me easily and then parries with a swift shuffle and spin combination that has me misjudging where her body will go. My balance wavers. I take precious seconds to reacquaint myself, time I’m well aware she could have used for a fatal strike.
Zahre moves like a dancer, similarities in her footwork, fluidity, and dexterity. I wonder if she’d looked so graceful when she danced with Darrius. The brief loss of focus costs me as a punch catches me in the stomach, and I gasp when her blade whines across my chest plate and nicks my arm.
“Shit!”
She lifts her brows. “You were distracted.”
“I was thinking about how well you move,” I say. “Like dancing.”
Zahre slows down her footwork. “You have a good eye. Most fighters watch the feet and the hips to determine movement, so my style of fighting confuses them. My hips sway this way, and you automatically think that’s where I’m going, but my center of gravity is a misdirection.” She shakes her head with a smirk. “What you should watch are the knees.”
I mimic her steps and feel like a fool when a wolf whistle from one of our spectators cuts through the air. A storm of shadows bears down out of nowhere and tosses the man into a pond, and I feel a bolt of possessiveness seething down the bond. I roll my eyes when Darrius materializes at the far end of the ring and the crowd instantly dissipates.
Jealous much?
He scowls.I should cut out their eyes and feed them to Indira for even looking at you.
You’re so violent, my king.
Pleasure rumbles down the bond.Call me that again.
I turn and wink at him, being intentionally perverse.Violent.
“The king is here,” Zahre remarks, interrupting our silent exchange. “Do you want to give him a demonstration?”
I balk. “Now?”
She grins a bit maniacally and waves over Karânî, who also enters the ring, her short sword in hand.
Bronze earth magic lights Karânî’s blade while frost shines over Zahre’s dagger. With excitement filling me, I glance down at the runes near the hilt of my dagger and call for my starlight. It whooshes down the steel in a glimmer of iridescence. I let my magic fill me and then fly into motion.
I lunge and parry, slice and thrust, catching my blade to each of theirs in showers of sparks and magic. I dodge the magical attacks, leaping out of the way when a fissure forms in the ground and attempts to swallow me, and evading a stream of ice that shoots from Zahre’s direction. I respond with strikes of my own, coils of glowing starlight whipping out in multiple directions. Toying with them, I yank my foes off their feet and snatch their weapons. I push them off-balance and singe their clothing. Before, without magic, I was at a disadvantage, because Zahre is undoubtedly the better warrior with a blade, but with my magic, I am invincible.
I believe that right until I look down and see the hilt protruding from my chest just before I feel the pain.
Fuck, this is going to ruin my day.
Darrius’s roar fills the air as he runs toward me, his shadows disarming everyone within striking range. I frown down at the curious lack of blood, but realize dully that the flesh around the blade is frozen. Shadow magic takes a screaming Zahre to the ground in vicious fury, a hairsbreadth away from ripping the bones from her body.
“Dare, no! It’s not her blade.” His attack stops, and she limps to retrieve her fallen dagger. I wheeze as my magic dulls the searing edge of the pain, pushing the blade out and healing the wound. “Someone else threw this.”
Zahre’s voice trembles as she kneels at my side, her nearly identical dagger visible in her palms. “That’s my father’s blade.”
“Masišta,” the king seethes, waving a hand at the dozen guards who have come running at his shout. “Find him! Get that snake and bring him to me.” He glares at Zahre. “If you had anything to do with this, you will pay in blood.”
“I didn’t, Your Majesty.” She taps the center of her brow. “You may look, I have nothing to hide from either of you.”
I watch her carefully, sending out a tendril of my magic—and my nascent psionic abilities—into her mind. If she feels the intrusion, she gives no sign. It’s surprisingly easy to sift through her thoughts, and nothing I see points to treachery. Everything she has said she has meant, which warms me considerably.
