“It’s Makai.” He took her hand and gripped it tightly. “Will you help me? Please?”
Izabel only hesitated for a second. She couldn’t leave him alone in the market. “Of course.”
Her beast rumbled unhappily, uncoiling in her belly as it sent a ripple of sapphire scales sliding up her neck. They both wanted to be safely locked in at home, but Izzy knew the market well, and she had plenty of friends here. Plus, Luka had trusted Dashiell enough to send him as her protector, so she was secure enough for now.
As soon as we find Makai’s mum, we’re going home.
Izzy nodded her agreement as the boy tugged her forward, with Dashiell right behind them.
“What does your mum look like?” Izzy asked.
The boy blinked at her. “Like me,” he replied, as if it should be obvious.
Izzy scanned the crowds of shoppers as they threaded through the stalls and barrows, but didn’t see any other black-and-silver curls or worried amber eyes. No one seemed to be searching for a missing child. Everyone was busy haggling, picking up produce, checking the quality of fabric, eating and drinking, or simply browsing.
They came to the bargain side of the market without finding anyone for Makai. These barrows were piled with dusty second—or third—hand clothes and linens, while the food carts were loaded with flatbreads and steamed dumplings. They walked past an older woman, her wrinkled face pulled into a grimace as she stirred a huge pot of bone broth, the air full of the mingling scent of fat and onions.
The streets narrowed, growing ever gloomier, and they began to pass stores with dark interiors, their windows made of rippled green glass, dusty with embedded impurities. These shops sold tallow lanterns, woven-grass mats, sacks of grain, and leaf-wrapped bundles of dried fish and salted meat. Then they were past even those and nearing the streets of Naos.
Makai fidgeted and bit his cheeks, looking increasingly agitated as they walked. They exited the market not far from the dockyard, and Izzy stopped. They’d gone far enough with no luck. Makai tugged her forward, trying to drag her toward a gloomy alleyway, but Izzy dug in her heels. She definitely wasn’t going that way, no matter how sad he looked.
She squeezed his hand and gave him a reassuring smile, despite her unease. “We’ve looked the length of the market. It would be best if you came home with me. You can have some sweet tea and a honey-seed cake while we find your mum.” Once they were back, Dashiell could go out and look properly. Someone must know where she could be found.
Makai’s eyes filled with tears, and he pulled his hand back to wipe them away with his palms. He took a step away from her, and then another, his mouth opening and closing as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t find the words. His distress at losing his mum seemed to have suddenly overtaken him.
She took a step toward him, ready to take his hand and guide him back to the side of the market she knew well. But before she could, she felt the sharp sting of a slim blade at her back, a little to the side of her spine… right over her kidney.
Izzy dropped her hand to the knife in her belt and started to spin, ready to fight, to scream, but Dashiell’s low snarl stopped her. “I wouldn’t if I were you. I have a needle blade between your ribs. One quick thrust and you’ll be on your knees, bleeding inside your guts. You’ll be dead before anyone can be bothered to care.”
Her beast roared in furious outrage as a shimmering wave of scales erupted from her toes to her hairline. But the knife was too slender and too viciously sharp for her leathery scales.
Dashiell slid the blade a thumb’s width deeper into her flesh, deep enough to spread a fiery burn through her back and side, and to leave her beast howling. Izzy had no doubt he would killher and leave her body in the market. She tried to control her ragged breathing. “What are you doing?”
“I saw you leaving the clinic,” Dashiell said, “and I followed you to the Burnished Hall. You had the look of someone moving on. The opportunity was too good to waste.”
“What do you want from me?” she whispered.
“I want what I should have always had. Comfort. Money. Power. Why should you have those things and not me?”
“I don’t have those things,” Izzy insisted. “Maybe there’s some gold in the shop, but I spend most of it on the clinic I help with in Naos. If you come with me, I’ll give you everything I have.”
Dashiell chuckled unkindly. “I know exactly how little money that shop makes. Benja was my friend.”
Izzy twisted to look into his cold green eyes. “Benja? The apothecary?”
Dashiell ignored her. “Nothing you have is worth anything. But you can help me get something that actually does have some value, a product that will ensure I never have to work again.”
God of Chaos. There was only one product that could possibly earn that kind of wealth. Izzy shook her head. “Firebreather is a scourge. I won’t help you spread your drug any further than you already have.”
This time he laughed outright. “I’m not talking about Firebreather.”
Icy dread spiraled through her. “What are you talking about?” Izzy asked.
“Something even rarer… and more lucrative.”
Gods of fire. What does he mean?
“People have seen us together,” Izzy said desperately as the blade tip embedded in her back burned. “Makai knows you’re with me.” She met the boy’s frightened eyes. “Run to the castleand ask for Luka. Tell him what happened. I promise you, you’ll be looked after. Ipromise.”
