If it wasn’t a curse, then all this time, you could have spoken? Your brothers wouldn’t have died?
Of that, I wasn’t sure.She needed me afraid so I wouldn’t go home to Father or tell anyone who I was. She needed me to hate her so she could hide me from the Wolf.
I swallowed hard, finding my voice at last. “Where’s Takkan?”
As soon as I asked, I saw him lying against the gray piles of brushwood. There was no arrow in his armor.
He was uninjured.
I removed his gauntlets and wrapped my fingers around his. His hands were cold, and as I warmed them, I brushed his hair from his eyes and placed a soft kiss on his forehead.
“Takkan.”
His eyes opened, and a relief that mirrored my own flooded his face. He pulled me close, draping his cloak over my tattered robes. His heart beat against my ear, wild and anxious.
“I thought I was too late,” he said hoarsely. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“I could say the same.” I spoke haltingly, almost clumsily. My voice was rough from the smoke and from months without use, and my words sounded better in my mind than they did aloud. Funny how naturally I used to chatter on, my tongue moving faster than my thoughts. Now I was thinking hard, and I still sounded like a dolt.
I swallowed. “You almost got yourself killed, rushing into the fire like that.”
“I would do it again without hesitation,” Takkan replied. “To hear your voice. To finally see your eyes.”
He traced my cheek with his fingers, the same way I had traced his at the Winter Festival, and I stopped caring about how clumsy I sounded. I was alive, my part of the curse broken.
As I held his hand, pressing his fingers against my cheek, Kiki peeked nosily out of my hair.
“Is that a paper bird?” Takkan asked, blinking.
I nodded. “Her name is Kiki. I made her…with magic.”
Takkan didn’t look surprised. “And these—” He picked up the string of paper cranes strewn among the ashes. Their wings had scorch marks, and some had been so badly burned that they’d lost their beaks. “Can they fly, too?”
“No. Kiki’s special.”
“Like you?”
I didn’t get a chance to reply. The sentinels were drawing near, their heads lowered in apology. I couldn’t tell whether it was for me or for Takkan, whom they had all but betrayed—except for Pao.
I held out the charm Megari had given me. The ink had melted, and the fabric was charred, but I passed it to Pao. “Tell Megari I’m sorry I couldn’t say goodbye. I’ll miss her.”
He gave a solemn nod.
“Sorceress!” a voice spat from behind.
Hasege. He’d awoken and shoved aside the sentinels to charge at me. Takkan leapt to tackle him, but Hasege’s dagger flew out, the blade hurtling for my heart.
“Lina, watch out!” Takkan yelled.
The cloak I wore flared to life, its fabric sweeping over me like a shield. It spun Hasege’s dagger away, and the weapon fell into the snow with a thump.
“See, magic!” Hasege shouted. “What are you doing, tying me up! Have you lost your senses, Takkan? She’s a sorceress—”
“And that is the only reason I am not executing you here and now, Hasege,” said Takkan coldly. “Only because of Lina’s magic did she survive your treachery. You are exiled from Iro. From this day forward, you are no longer a sentinel, and no longer of the Bushian clan.”
He slammed Hasege’s head into the snow, muffling his protests. He and the other sentinels began tying up Hasege’s limbs and readying to take him away.
Ignorant brute,Kiki murmured from my sleeve.I’d pay good gold to see his face when you tell him who you reallyare.
