“You can,” Ghoa whispered in my ear. “I’ll help you.” Her fist crashed against my temple, and a blast of bitter cold tore through my skull—a cold so complete, my skin burned and my ears rang and each tooth froze in its socket. The chill spread outward like a sickness, hardening the blood in my veins and stilling all coherent thought. As the vortex of ice and agony entombed me, I saw the yellow flare of a torch and ash-covered hands. My final frozen breath reeked of burning flesh. Then everything dissolved into white.
When I jerked back into consciousness, I was on a hard metal cot covered in a scratchy blanket that smelled of alcohol. The pounding in my head was unbearable, my arm throbbed with every beat of my heart, and it felt like a blunted saber was sawing through my right leg.
What happened?
I tried to sit up, but my arm and leg howled at the movement, and the strap across my chest kept me pinned to the table.
Why am I strapped to the table?
Panic ripped from my lips in a scream. I thrashed against my bonds, but that only made bursts of light explode behind my eyelids.
“Lie still or you’ll tear your stitches.” Ghoa’s cool hands pressed me down, and her familiar scent of grass and steel washed over me. “Take a deep breath. You’re safe. I’m here.”
“What happened?” I gasped. “Were we attacked?”
There was a long moment of silence, and when I glanced up at Ghoa’s face, I noticed her tear-streaked cheeks and her puffy, bloodshot eyes. “There was anincident,”she said slowly. “I tried to stop you—”
“Stop me from doing what?” The last thing I remembered was leaning against the barricade, freezing my tail off.
“I didn’t want to hurt you,” Ghoa continued babbling, “but I didn’t know what else to do. You were on a rampage.”
“Arampage? What are you talking about?” I closed my eyes and clenched my teeth, but when I sifted through my memory, it was blank and white—like the grasslands after the first snowfall of winter. Panicked, I lifted my good hand over my face, searching for a lingering trace of starfire, but there was only cold, clammy flesh. “I don’t remember anything,” I said. My voice sounded shrill and high, and I trembled as if feverish.
Ghoa eased my arm back to my side and smoothed my hair away from my face. “You lost a lot of blood, and I had to hit you over the head—it was all I could do to bring you down. I’m sure your memories will resurface in time, but for now, consider it a blessing. You don’t want to remember.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
THE MEMORY DISSIPATES ANDI’M BACK IN THE SPIRE SALON, pinned beneath Ghoa, watching her dagger fly toward my chest.
To cut me down.
To silence me—like before.
But this time I’m ready.
I throw my weight to the side and Ghoa’s dagger slams into the floor instead of my chest.
“It was you!” I pant. “Youkilled the caravan of merchants at Nariin. Then you froze my memory and sowed your seeds of deception while I was blinded by pain and reeling from blood loss. And you ensured they stayed that way by implanting that skies-forsaken moonstone in my flesh. But I remember. I remembereverything.”
This stops her dead. Ghoa gapes at me, eyes wide as saucers and lips parted, her silence as damning as a confession.
Vindication pours through me like cool, spring rain, and I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. There may be a monster lurking inside of me—there may be something slightly monstrous hidden in all of us—but I have never lost control of it. I have never been a danger to the people.
Ghoa is. My beloved sister, the woman who raised me, the person who protected me from the cruel outside world. Except that cruel world was a fabrication. Somethingsheinvented to conceal her guilt.
“How could you let me take your fall?” I scuttle back until my shoulders bump against the glass wall.
“I’m afraid you’re mistaken, Enebish.” Ghoa dusts off her armor and schools her features. Her smile is so unnaturally calm, it makes me want to scream. She frees her dagger from the floor, replaces it in her belt, and tightens her ponytail. The peerless leader of the Kalima once more. As if the last five minutes never happened. “The bodies and wagons were consumed by flames, andmyKalima power does not reap such destruction.”
“But your hands can! Ash covered your arms to the elbow. Your hair was singed,” I babble, clinging to the images.
Ghoa’s smile is pitying. “You were half dead. Hallucinating or dreaming. You couldn’t remember such things.”
But I do. I close my eyes and see it all again. I feel the pain of her saber plunging into my flesh and the heat of the starfire rushing away from my palms. “How could you claim to love me, then ruin my life? How could you cut me down, then pretend to be my savior? Has everything you’ve ever said to me been a lie or manipulation?”
Ghoa’s expression hardens into steel and she switches tactics. “We were both on that mission. We were equally to blame. I did what was necessary to save us both. To protect the empire.”
“You can’t honestly believe that!” I gawk at Ghoa across the salon. I want to punch her. Kick her.Anythingto make her admit her guilt. “How does stripping me of my position and Kalima power andsanitybenefit the empire?”
