And there were small bits of gold everywhere she looked. In the handle of the brush she had used to tame her hair. Carved into the wooden beams of her bed. On the table next to it in the shape of a narrow circle. She absentmindedly rubbed the golden circlet around her wrist. The one on the table was similar, and clearly meant for her to wear, but she had felt the chill of the achilla at the center before she had even touched it and decided against it.
And then she waited, and while she did, she allowed her thoughts to wander.
The tapestry came to mind, the colors bright and burned into her mind. The way the golden threads connected them all, and how Yuri’s hands had been devoured by them. The blood that ran beneath her feet was her fault, according to Kasik’s version of the story. She and the other Ikara had created chaos and devastation and then were hunted down like animals for it.
But she remembered Mika’s version, which had told a different story. One where the Ikara were retribution and salvation.
Kasik was right—perhaps her attaywasmonstrous—but it was the gods and the men in power who had forced her hand, who had pushed her toward inevitable destruction. A mutation in the fabric of who she was and could have been.
Had she been left alone, she would have been, at that very moment, in the fields with Sacha and Lali, harvesting their portion of the chani owed to the emperor. But they had come, and they had collected, and Nina no longer felt responsible for the consequences of their actions.
Nor her own. Whatever choices she made were forced by the hands of their greed and misguided faith. Even Kasik’s, even if his touch had been gentle and warm and naively wanted. Nina was aching for comfort, for sympathy. To stop feeling so overwhelmingly alone, but the only things she allowed herself to feel were grudging acceptance and bleak understanding.
Nina was but one person in the face of their power and cunning, Ikara or not. Her plan to kill the emperor was foolhardy and brash and enormous, and she would most likely die before succeeding. She only hoped that once she was dead, the gods and their pawns would finally forget her, and leave her family alone.
When a knock came at the door, Nina was ready. She had steeled herself against seeing Kasik again with the reminder that even if he had apologized, it didn’t mean she had forgiven him. There was so much he had hidden from her. Whether it was intentional was none of her business. He was a distraction from her grand plan—the only thing that mattered now.
Killing Emperor Maicu would not happen that night. It was their first time meeting, and it was meant to occur at an intimate dinner with his most trusted friends. She assumed Kunay Atik would be there, andKasik. She would be forced to sit at the same table as the men who pulled the strings of her fate.
When she finally opened the door, Kasik lowered his hand and raised his gaze to trail over her. She remembered the way his dark eyes had been alight as he watched her dance underneath the stars in the Tuta Kulla, how his throat had bobbed noticeably when she stepped closer. How she had felt unencumbered and foolishly brave with his eyes upon her.
He took her in the same way now. As if she had been conjured from his wildest and most desperate dreams.
Nina tore her eyes away and went to step past him, but he stopped her with a gentle hand around her wrist. “Your feet,” he said, his voice both near and distant, the pulse in his neck fluttering quickly.
Cheeks blazing, she glanced down to see her bare toes peeking out from the hem of her dress. She had forgotten her slippers. The feel of Kasik’s fingers cradling her wrist lingered even after she slipped on her shoes and followed him out the door, through hallways that had begun to look familiar.
Until, suddenly, they weren’t.
The light was different in this part of the kancha. It struck the walls in a way that made them look as if they were on fire, but when she grazed her fingers across the length of one, she found it cool to the touch.
“Gold,” Kasik said from in front of her.
Nina looked at him, and then the wall. “Gold?” she repeated.
“Brushed gold,” he clarified, as if anticipating her next question.
She turned back to the wall. It wasn’t shiny like the empress’s jewelry or the stitching on her hem, rather a dull, deep yellow that seemed to soak in the light and burn from within. She couldn’t help but press a hand to it, marveling at the sheer beauty and the time it must have taken to craft this.
It was such a different world here compared to her home near the sea, where their existence was simple and everything was crafted in a way that served a specific purpose. There was beauty in the simplicity, and she respected it, but she couldn’t help consider how she might not have ever gotten to see the golden buildings of Amaru if she hadn’t been brought there.
Even if it was against her will.
Not for the first time, she thought about just how far out of her depth she was, in all ways. How much easier it might be to accept her fate, marry the emperor, and live her life in luxury. This didn’t have to be a fight that she fought. Murdering the emperor wasn’t the only solution. In fact, it was possible it was theworstoption, and the farther away she was from Shayim and her people, the more absurd it seemed.
Nina was not a savior, but she was afraid to find out who she would become without her anger, without her resolve, without her hopes and plans for her own future.
The long hallway came to a sudden end at a set of tall double doors, a large torch on either side washing the stone walls in a burnt-orange glow. Behind her, the spaces between the torches crawled with whispering darkness, yet she was tempted to slink toward it and away from what lay beyond and made her heart skitter with apprehension.
“It’s just dinner,” Kasik whispered. She wasn’t sure who he was encouraging, but she inhaled deeply and straightened her shoulders all the same.
They stood side by side, much like they had when observing that tapestry. On the other side of those doors was a different kind of story unfolding, one that she was determined to narrate.
“I’m ready,” she whispered back. Kasik’s hand rested upon the latch for two heartbeats and then he pushed the doors open with a flourish.
The soft murmur of conversation filling the room just seconds earlier disappeared, and all attention turned toward Nina.
In the center of the small room sat a wooden table, where people dressed in varying shades of red turned to her. The torchlight cast them in shifting shadows so that all she could see were glowing eyes set within unfamiliar faces. Even through the eerie dimness, she could recognize one figure.
