The woman snorted. “Oh, Prince Sen’s going to have fun with you.” Then she dug her heels into the camel’s side and cantered away.
“Get back here!” I yelled. “Let me go!Hey!” But no one looked my way. Utterly ignored my orders and banging.
The last of my energy filtered away, and I slumped back in my cage.
But my fury didn’t abate. Jasim had beengood. Loyal. Compassionate when no one else thought me deserving of it. And because of that, he’d died. All that goodness, and for what? A grisly death in a trickster’s forest with no one to offer him a proper burial. Left to the insects and vultures to pick apart.
I squeezed my eyes shut against the onslaught of horrific images. That light feeling that had bloomed so freely just hours ago withered and died, rotted until not even a seed of it remained. If I weren’t caged, I would’ve torn through Sen’s forces with my teeth before going after the slave girl so I could drain every last drop of her blood.
No matter. I retreated into that quiet place inside myself that had allowed me to time my meals in Anwar’s cell down to the second. I could be patient if I had to be. And when Sen made the mistake of opening my cage, he’d find me waiting for him like a coiled cobra. When I struck, not a single person would be left to call the Dry Lands home.
SIXTY-FIVESAMIRA
The pain was bright, but my surroundings were pitch-black. I was in so much agony that I could do nothing more than gape in a silent scream. It stole my voice, my breath. I collapsed to my knees on a ground that was both rough and pillowy. Almost like clouds but slightly off.
Out of the abyss of unending torment came a silky, sultry voice. “Well, well, well.”
Every hair on my body stood straight up. I knew that voice. He’d only been a shadow before. An interloper in Zarqa’s fortune. But when I lifted my head, he was no longer a mere shadow.
Slitted orange eyes emerged from the darkness. Sensual lips curled on an expertly chiseled face that was at once human and feline, beautiful and deadly. Hair black as the Shroud hung around his face. Despite the dark, his golden skin held a vibrant sheen. Thick muscles strained against silver armor, ancient carvings pressed into the metal.
“Shaya,” I breathed. Terror blasted through me.
I dropped my head to the cushiony ground and lay myself prostrate, fighting the pain long enough to gasp out, “Forgive me, God of the Underworld.”
Shaya’s feet didn’t make a sound, but I knew he’d come closer when his voice sounded directly beside me. “Forgive you?” he repeated.
“Yes, I—I took power that was not mine to take. I don’t know why I— A moment of madness. I am so sorry. Please, take it back.”
He laughed, the sound like boulders tumbling down a mountain. “Do you really believe you could steal from me?”
My brows furrowed. But I could only manage another “Forgive me.”
He clucked his tongue. “Get your face off the floor, Samira.”
My head jerked up at my name. But of course Shaya knew who I was. He was the God of the Underworld. There was no deception possible with him.
“Stand up.”
Swallowing hard, I obeyed. My knees shook so terribly, I nearly fell right back down.
The god towered over me by at least a foot if not more. I’d seen his likeness all over Khada Palace and in the figurine in Rade’s room. And yet my mind struggled to process it here and now. Right in front of me.
He’d come to punish me, to send me to the Trench. Every worst fear I’d ever had, everything I’d spent my whole life working against, was about to—
“Honestly, Daughter, get a hold of yourself. Your fear reeks.”
I stared up at him, the world around me going quiet. “What… what did you call me?”
His slitted eyes gleamed. “You stole nothing from me, Samira Makara. The power was yours to take. Because you are my daughter.”
I hadn’t heard my surname in so long, I had forgotten it. But the moment he said it, it was like a bell ringing in my brain. That was my name. That wasmy name. Samira Makara. That was who I was.
But his daughter? That I most certainly was not.
“No. No, Amunet Khada is—”
“Amunet Khada is no one,” Shaya interrupted. “A contingency plan. No longer needed, now that I have you back.” He put a finger under my chin and tilted my head so that I was met with thefull force of those feline eyes. “They tried to hide you from me, my daughter. But I never gave up my search. Now here you are.”
