“Yes, well. That tends to happen when you’re torn in two. But at least you didn’t drown. You’re welcome for that.”
I squinted in the direction of the voice, my exhaustion and pain making me snap. “Thanks.”
“As I said,” the woman sniped. “You’re welcome.”
She was younger than me, but not by much. Thirty years old if I had to guess, and small—slimmer than Aliyah but a good head shorter, but with skin the colour of snow and hair only a few shades darker. An oval face currently contained so much annoyance I was genuinely impressed, and the longer I stared at her, the flatter her expression grew. It was her eyes that made me startle, that made mestare.Bright, shocking blue, with a core of crackling white.
I blinked. Blinked again. Registered the emptiness in my chest, the lightness of my body, the quiet in my head. And I blinked again.
“Great, you’ve been rendered into an imbecile,” she huffed, climbing to her feet, her body covered in muck and very little clothes. The moment I realised her clothing consisted of scraps of magic, rather than fabric, I tore my stare away.
“Could you put some clothes on? If my wife gets the wrong idea, she’ll kill us both.”
“Of course,” the woman simpered. “Let me just hop over to the sprawling medina on the banks ofthis nightmare river!”
“Alright,” I sighed. “Fair point. But don’t blame me when Ameirah murders you.”
I saw her shrug from the corner of my eye. “Do you have a name?”
“Elinour.”
She seemed to startle at her own name, and jumped on the muddy riverbank. The river that was silver from edge to edge, not pitch black, not corrupted. “Elinour!Elinour.I can finally say my name.” She grabbed my hand and shook it vigorously. “It’s nice to meet you, Varidian, I’mElinour.”
“I’d gathered that,” I drawled, rubbing a pounding headache between my brows. “You’re the lightning soul.”
“Not anymore.” When I shot her an alarmed look, she was grinning. “Look, I have fingers!” She wiggled them in my face. “I don’t know how, but when you purged all that magic into the river, it pulled me out too, and now look!”
“Fingers,” I observed drolly, searching the river ahead of us for purple hair and a flash of black fire, for Nabil’s air magic shuddering across the water. “Is all my lightning gone?” I mused, struggling to fit this truth into my head, to accept it. The lightning soul was gone. Was a woman, flesh and blood. And sarcasm.
“Mylightning,” she corrected, heavy on the sass. “And no, it’s not gone. But it is all mine, now.” She gave me a beaming smile when I met her gaze in shock. “There might be a bolt or two that remains, likely all your life, but the storm of it came out with me.”
I felt inside me, but everything was too painful to tell what remained. My own control magic was still there, thriving and expanding, as if it had been shoved aside all this time and—
“Varidian!” Elinour shrieked, flinging her hands up and scattering lightning across the mud.
I had to jump to avoid the blinding white spark that swept dangerously close to me, so close it would have burned my damn toes off. When I landed, I was already moving, swinging around with my hand on the hilt of Dusk-Breaker, miraculously still sheathed at my back even after hours or days in the river.
I was ready to challenge Xiu in battle, ready for winged soldiers or wyverns, but I drew up at the sight of a familiar gentry. A thrill went through me, rippling my stomach with violent butterflies, and I grinned, from edge to edge of my face.
“Hello, Kaazhim,” I greeted, sizing up the tall, sharp-featured man. He didn’t have a sword in his hand—as a high gentry, he preferred getting others to do his dirty work, and the swordacross his back was just for show. But milky white magic did gather in his hand.
I gripped a fistful of magic, my power rising eagerly, excited to finally strike an opponent it could seize. And I drove a spear of control magic into the flesh of Kaazhim’s brain before he could anticipate the move. He was so focused on the sword in my hand and the lightning that darted across the mud, erratic as Elinour struggled to work her new body, that he didn’t even shield against the true attack.
“I’m going to enjoy this,” I told him, and watched the blood drain from his face when I said, “Put that magic away and draw the sword from your back.”
In an instant, the milky power extinguished in his palm and he pulled free the elaborate jewelled sword from his back. He wasn’t even dressed for battle; he wore the same embroidered djellaba he’d wear to council meetings, not a single attempt at armouring his body. I scoffed, shaking my head.
“Anyone would think you came here to die, Kaazhim.”
His teeth bared, hatred jerking him forward a step—until Elinor shrieked and threw her hands at him, lightning burning a hole in his sleeve. “I came here to kill you as a gift to my queen.”
“Interesting. Did you forget about my control magic?” I tilted my head, watching him freeze when I commanded, “Don’t move.”
“If you’re going to kill him, can you hurry up?” Elinour stage-whispered. “We’re wasting time.”
Any time spent terrorising the fucker who tortured my wife wasn’t wasted, but Ameirah might need me right now. So I gave Kaazhim one last smile—one of victory and satisfaction at his pain, his death. And I swung Dusk-Breaker, cleaving his head from his neck.
The memory of Kamila’s head bitten off by the wyvern filled every space in my head, but I pushed it away and promised I would honour her, that she’d never be forgotten.
