“Maia!” Cheeks flushed with excitement, the girl ran toward me, dangling one of my cloth birds by the fiery red thread I’d sewn into its wings to make it fly.
When she dropped the bird into my hand, I held it close. The thread, still warm with magic, tickled the base of my thumb.
“You look better,” she greeted me warmly. She cocked her head at Edan. “Was the Lord Enchanter able to help you?”
For the life of me, I could not remember her name. It teased the tip of my tongue, like silk that kept slipping out of my grasp. I frowned. “We were able to buy some time.”
Understanding flooded her kind eyes, and she grasped my hands, ignoring the feel of sharp nails and warped fingers under my gloves. “It’s me, Maia. Ammi. I’m your friend.”
“Ammi,” I repeated, hugging her. The name did sound familiar. Threads of an escape from the Autumn Palace and a journey across A’landi unspooled in my memory. This girl was important to me, but I couldn’t entirely place why.
Her shoulders relaxed, a smile widening across her full face. She swung a large bundle over her shoulder; she looked warmly dressed, with a quilted vest and a pair of thick woolen trousers.
“I brought extra clothes and supplies—compliments of Master Longhai. I left his shop a few days after you. Once I heard that you were off to fight the shansen, I knew I had to help. I might not be much good with a sword, but I’m handy with a knife and a good fire. Soldiers have to eat.”
“So they do.” I glanced at the hundreds of newly arrived men. “I’m afraid you’ll have your work cut out for you.”
I grabbed one of her bundles and motioned for her to follow me. “Come, I’ll introduce you to my family.”
* * *
• • •
Ammi quickly established herself as our head cook. Having women at the camp did miracles for the soldiers’ morale. Even Keton smiled more.
“A happy belly makes a happy man,” Ammi would say. I hoped the high morale would last. We were getting closer to the Spring Palace.
We had marched so long that the soles of Keton’s shoes had become worn, I noticed. He never complained, and I didn’t bring it up as I walked beside him, keeping him company as he pushed Baba in a supply wagon.
“You should stay in the Winter Palace,” I’d tried to convince my father. “It’ll be safer.”
“Where my children go, I go.”
“But—”
“I’m not staying behind,” Baba insisted.
So we brought him along. He mostly slept, still recovering from his time in the shansen’s captivity.
“What do you think will happen to the emperor’s concubines now that he’s dead?” Keton asked, trying to make lighthearted conversation with me.
“Emperor Khanujin did not have any concubines.”
My brother snorted. “Of course he did. All emperors do. I bet he kept the prettiest ones in the Spring Palace. The women in Jappor are famous for their beauty. That’s why they say the capital’s never been conquered, because the ladies will charm A’landi’s enemies into defeat.”
“Even if that story were true, I don’t think their charms will work on the shansen,” I said dryly.
Keton’s tone shifted, becoming darker. “Maybe not.” He fell silent for a moment, before he shook off whatever was bothering him. “You know, I wish battles could be fought with rice pots instead of swords. We’d certainly win if that were the case.”
My brother had never showed much interest in food before. “Why do you think that?”
“Ammi said Jappor is the capital of A’landi’s best food. Nothing like it in the North, she said. She’s quite the cook, your friend.”
I tilted my head in surprise. “You talked to Ammi?”
“A little. To thank her for her good work.” Keton stole a glance at Ammi, who was weaving her way through the army, passing out cups of tea and bamboo leaf–wrapped rice dumplings. Then my brother cleared his throat, and an unexpected blush tinged his cheeks. He immediately tried to change the topic. “Why isn’t the enchanter walking with us?”
I glanced at Edan, who’d kept half a dozen paces ahead during our entire march. My lips pursed, and I didn’t reply. Keton knew as well as I did the answer to that.
Baba was still wary of Edan; he thanked him politely when Edan came to help us pitch our tents or bring us food, but Baba never invited him to stay and eat with us.
Every time I tried to defend him, a dark look passed over Baba’s face. I closed my mouth, following Edan’s advice not to say anything—to give Baba more time. But deep down, I was afraid of the questions Baba would ask if we broached the subject of magic; I was afraid that he already knew what I had become.
My brother wore a sly look, one I had never learned how to read.
“Enchanter!” Keton called, waving Edan over. “Why don’t you walk with us?” My brother caught my startled expression. “Don’t worry, Maia. I’ll be nice. Edan! Join us.”
Edan blinked, looking momentarily stricken by the invitation. But he obliged.
“We were just talking about the Spring Palace,” said my brother. “Tell us about it. Are the women as beautiful as they say? Or do you prefer the women from the South?”
“Keton!” I elbowed my brother, horrified. “Have you been drinking?”
He laughed, and I hid a smile when I saw Edan’s expression. I’d never seen him look so tongue-tied.
“All right, all right—just tell us about the Spring Palace. Why is it so far north?”
“A’landi wasn’t always as large as it is now,” Edan replied. “When the first emperor ruled, the Spring Palace was his only residence, and he built it in the North so that the shansen’s armies could defend A’landi from invasion. As the empire expanded east and south, his descendants built three more palaces as a way to divide their time among the kingdom.
“Not until Emperor Tainujin’s time did people begin to worry the capital was too far north. Too close to the shansen’s territory, where the Northerners held more loyalty to him than to the emperor. Those worries would turn out to be prophetic.”
Keton said nothing, which Edan must have mistaken for disinterest, for the next thing he said was, “Maia tells me you fought in the Five Winters’ War.”
A shadow suddenly fell over Keton’s eyes. “I fought in the same regiment as my two brothers. They were far better soldiers than I was. Finlei told me he fought with you once. Said you felled a hundred men with a swoop of your arms.”
Edan’s face was unreadable. “That was a long time ago. A lifetime ago.”
The two men fell silent. I walked between them, until Keton mumbled an excuse to check on Baba.
“I shouldn’t have mentioned the war,” said Edan quietly, after Keton left. “That was a mistake.”
“You were nervous. You shouldn’t be—he likes you.”
“He wants to like me. Wanted.”
“Talk to him again,” I said. “It would mean much to me if you two became friends. He’s the only brother I have left. You are both my family.”
“Maia…” Edan’s voice trembled. “You talk as if you’re going to—”
“I’ll take over pulling the wagon,” I interrupted, not wanting to hear the end of what he was going to say. My heart might be numb, but it wasn’t dead yet, and I would spare him whatever pain I could.
“Try again,” I said. “Keton will appreciate your company.”
With a nod, Edan left and went to speak with my brother. I pulled Baba, alone, listening to the crunch of my shoes against the grass. Such a human sound, despite the curling of my claws with each step. My feet longed to fly, but I suppressed the urge and walked on.
A few minutes later, I heard my brother laughing.
“She did what?” Keton exclaimed. “I told her to keep to herself. No wonder you saw through h
er disguise.”
Though my ears yearned to hear what they were saying about me, I focused on the road ahead. My amulet thumped against my chest, and I thought of the three dresses I had sacrificed so much to make.
What little I had left of my tailoring gift wasn’t for sewing with needle and thread, it was for crafting a future, stitch by stitch, for the people I loved. That future would hold tight, even as I unraveled. It had to, or else the choice I had made—the choice that Master Tsring had told me was inevitable—would be for naught.
* * *
• • •
Two days later, we crossed into the Northern Plains. To the east was Jappor, and to the north were the forests and woodlands where Lady Sarnai had grown up.
Lord Xina drilled the soldiers, teaching them to fight as a unit while also testing their physical strength and stamina. Edan taught them what he knew about demons and ghosts.
“Ghosts cannot wield physical weapons; they are not fast like Gyiu’rak, and they are not clever. Their only means of attack is to lure you toward them. They will speak in voices that are dear to you. They will take on the faces of your loved ones, and they will know things that are buried deep within your heart. Do not fall for these traps. Do not touch the ghosts. If you do, you will become one of them, and your spirit will wander forever between the heavens and the underworld, until the demon you serve is vanquished.”
Meanwhile, I sat with the women, peeling a modest bounty of radishes and potatoes one of the farmers had brought.
The women stole glances at my eyes and my gloved hands, and whispered behind my back when they thought I couldn’t hear. It was easy to ignore until Baba came to help; then I quickly made an excuse to leave. I didn’t want him to see the looks they gave me, and I didn’t want to finally have to face his questions. I didn’t want to hurt him with the truth, not yet.
My presence stirred gossip in the camp, so I kept mostly to myself, except for when I joined Lady Sarnai’s nightly war council.
“Four hundred men,” Lord Xina said grimly. “Not nearly enough.”
I wanted to shout that it was more than we could have hoped for, but Lady Sarnai beat me to it.
“We’ve survived worse odds. The women could fight. Several of them have expressed a desire to.”
“They wouldn’t add much,” said Lord Xina. “You’d only be sending them to their deaths. Your father will have thousands of trained men.”
“This is not a war between armies. It is a war against my father. He commands his soldiers through fear, through his alliance with Gyiu’rak. Once he and the demon are defeated, the army will surrender. The challenge will be killing Gyiu’rak. Twisted though my father may be, he is still human—with a human’s weaknesses. He could have killed me at the Winter Palace, but he did not.” Her voice fell soft, but her tone was hard. “He remembers me.”
I drew a labored breath. If it weren’t for seeing Baba and Keton daily at the camp, I would not remember them either. Their faces would be lost to me, the sounds of their voices a familiar song I’d heard before but could not sing.
I’d lost Sendo’s stories and the sound of Mama’s laugh. And the words Finlei used to say when I lacked courage or faith in myself.
I tried not to panic, but the hollow ache inside me grew sharper with each new day.
Tonight, I decided. I would tell Edan what had been lurking in my mind for days.
I prayed he wouldn’t hate me for it.
* * *
• • •
When dusk fell, we built a village of tents in the middle of the plains. It had not snowed yet, though the grass beneath our boots crinkled from frost, and with each passing hour the chill of the wind bit deeper. There weren’t many women at the camp; we slept within a handful of tents near Lady Sarnai. Few noticed when I snuck out to visit Edan.
I kept a hand on his chest, taking in the slow steadiness of his heart. Not long ago, I used to worry about him becoming a hawk every evening, but now that felt like a distant memory. He didn’t shout out from his dreams anymore. Now that was me.
Sometimes, in the middle of the night, he would reach for my hand. How I wished it would always be so.
But staying Maia was a fight. Every second, every minute, every hour, I battled against myself to distinguish my thoughts from my demon’s. The blood of stars kept enough heart in me to sustain some inkling of who I was. But if I were to lose that dress…
“Was it like this for you?” I asked when Edan woke me from a nightmare. “Being away from your oath? When we were traveling, and you felt the tug of dawn and the pull of dusk?”
“It was different,” Edan replied. “The battle wasn’t against myself. I could feel my magic leaving me, but I knew that reuniting with my master would bring it back. For you, your magic is turning against you…and…”
“And there’s nothing I can do,” I finished for him bleakly. “It’s only a matter of time.”
I pursed my lips and stared at my nails. Thick, hard, and sharp. Even my knuckles had become gnarled, my skin growing scaly and parched.
“How did you end up a hawk?” I asked suddenly.
“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this anymore, Maia. You—”
“I want to know,” I said. “I’ve been thinking about what form I’ll take on. It’ll help me to know.”
He inhaled a deep breath. “Demons take on the form they had when they were enchanters, but not every demon began as an enchanter. Some demons have no spirit form, and others are powerful enough to take on any form they choose.
“I prayed for a creature with keen eyesight,” Edan confided. “Mine was getting poor from reading so much by moonlight. Soldiers didn’t have much use for candles.”
“So, a hawk?”
“Early on, when I discovered my talent for magic, one landed on my head.”
“On your head?” For a precious second, I forgot my troubles and chuckled.
Edan smiled. “I tried to shoo it away, but it followed me the rest of the week, screeching so loudly the other boys in my troop threw pebbles at it. I couldn’t understand what it was saying to me then, but I’ve always thought it could understand me. I never saw it again, yet I never forgot it. I wasn’t surprised when a hawk was what was chosen for me.”
I had no inkling of what would be chosen for me. No such creatures had come to me; in fact, all feared me at this point. But I did not say this to Edan.
I traced the lines on his palms. “These last few weeks have been hard for me. Not knowing whether you were safe, not knowing whether my country would go to war, not knowing whether I’d wake up the next morning as Maia, or as someone else.” I swallowed, wrapping Edan’s arms tighter around my shoulders. “But I know now I’m strong. Because I have someone to be strong for—Baba, Keton.”
“And me?”
“Especially you.”
My fingers crept up his chest to his neck, twirling a loose curl. But as soon as I wound it around my nail, I let go and stared at our hands, his on top of mine, the curve of his palm fitting perfectly over the back of my hand. His long fingers covering my sharp black claws.
“I want you to promise me something,” I said, trying to keep my voice as even as I could. “I’ve gotten better since finding you again and seeing my family. But it will not last. I can feel myself slipping a little more each day. If I should…become dangerous, you must stop me.”
“Maia…”
“When I do finally become a demon, Edan.” A lump hardened in my throat, making it painful to speak. “I want you to take the amulet. Take it away to the far corner of the earth and trap it in all the magic you can. Do what you have to do—bury it, throw it to the bottom of the ocean—just make sure I never find it again.”
“What good would that do?” Edan said gently. “You would spend all your hours searching for it. You are bound to the dres
ses inside—”
“One dress. I only have one dress left.” My throat felt raw, but I pressed on. “Please, Edan. I don’t want the demon me to have it…for her to abuse its power.”
For her to hurt anyone more than she already has.
“Demon magic cannot be contained that way, Maia.” Edan’s voice was grave. “Not even for you.”
Deep down, I had already known that. But I had hoped all the same. “Then end me. Promise me you will.”
I shook my head, preempting any protest.
He gave a numb nod. “If it comes to that, I will.”
Without another word, he left the tent. It took all my restraint not to follow him. I waited, sure he’d be back soon.
He did not come back.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Lady Sarnai saw my shadow outside her tent before I had a chance to announce myself.
“Don’t loiter, Tamarin. Come in.”
She was bundled in thick layers of fox fur, and she narrowed her eyes at how little clothing I wore. The wind seeped through my thin muslin sleeves, but I wasn’t cold.
Her tent was spartan, furnished with a cream-colored candle, a worn burgundy blanket, and two bronze pots—one for water, one for fire. Her bow lay on her bed, beside a quiver of freshly chiseled arrows.
“What is it?” Her tone was curt.
“I’ve come to ask a favor of you.” The words came out hoarse.
Lady Sarnai set down her sword, which she’d just begun sharpening. “You are in no position to ask favors.”
“I apologize, Your Highness. I’ll—”
She harrumphed. “Passive as ever. I don’t know how I ever took you for a man. What is it you want?”
My shoulders squared at her insult. “I asked Edan to kill me if ever I should lose control. But I don’t believe he will.”
Now she leaned forward, interested.
I took a deep breath. “I want you to complete the task if he fails.”
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