The soldier scuffles with the twelve-year-old. I step away from the slow-moving catapult and pull my khanda. “Leave them be.”

The soldier turns on me, and his eyes bulge. I recognize him as well. He and I were in the military encampment together in Iresh. He forgets the boy and draws his sword on me.

“General Manas!” he calls.

Manas has strolled around the bend in the road, out of sight. No other soldiers are near. I can scarcely hear my quick breaths over the woman’s wailing.

The soldier shouts louder. “General! Cap—”

“Afternoon, soldier,” Natesa purrs, pulling off her turban. Her dark-brown hair falls around her dirt-smudged face.

The soldier is so stunned by the sight of a woman—and a beautiful one at that—he does not see Yatin throw his haladie until it is too late. The blade sinks deep into the soldier’s chest, and he collapses before the family. The woman abruptly stops crying and picks up her young child. I shuffle forward to examine the fallen soldier. He is dead, or will be soon.

Yatin speaks from near the wagon. “Rohan, stay here and redirect all sound. Warn us when the general is coming. Natesa, put your turban back on.”

Rohan kicks up a subtle wind, concentrating on Manas’s whereabouts. One would not detect the mood in the skies unless already suspicious. Natesa quickly ties on her turban. Yatin strides past her to the family’s hut. Adrenaline takes over, overriding my shock, and I help him lug the body inside.

Yatin retrieves his haladie and kicks dirt over the trail of blood on the ground. “Hide and don’t come out until the army is gone,” he tells the woman, who nods avidly. “Don’t speak of this, and you’ll be left alone.”

She ushers her children inside, closes their door partway, then pauses. “Thank you, Yatin. Your sisters and mother will be overjoyed to know you’re well.”

I startle at his given name. She shuts the door, and Yatin and I hustle back to the wagon, into Rohan’s winds. Two minutes, maybe three, have passed since Manas rode off. Natesa’s turban again covers her hair. We lead the horses onward, and the next wagon comes around the bend. Rohan weakens his gusts, and we march on.

My heart beats two times faster than my feet.

“He’s coming,” says Rohan.

Manas rides nearer to us. At my prompt, Natesa tucks a loose strand of her hair down the collar of her jacket. Manas’s horse canters past our wagon and slows. He looks back at the woman’s door.

He remembers he left a soldier there.

Farther up the line, a commander calls for the general. Manas circles his mount and rides onward into the troops ahead. I release a quick breath, my heart flailing against my rib cage, and pray that no one pursues the disappearance of one soldier in this vast army.

Once we are clear of the village, I address Yatin. “Who was that woman?”

“A friend of my mother’s. We can trust her.”

We are not near Yatin’s village; that was his village. “Where is your family’s home?”

“Not far from here.”

His sadness hushes me. Though this is the closest he has been to his family in many moons, he cannot stop to visit them. Had I been paying better attention, I would have suggested he and Natesa meet his mother and sisters and rejoin us later. If Natesa had not distracted the guard long enough for Yatin to throw his haladie, we would be finished.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “You did the right thing.”

Yatin slides an indirect glance at Natesa. “I’d do it again.”

As would I, and that worries me. I once told Kali that sometimes the only solution for peace is war. But we are not here to fight these men or change their minds about their leader. We have come for Brac and Opal. And the sooner we find them, the sooner we can run far away from the demon rajah and his army.

17

KALINDA

I meet Indah and Pons in the temple courtyard. Night is falling, and with it, the clear sky leaves an opening for the cold winds pushing in from the north. Much of the snow has melted away, and ice forms on the puddles that remain. Ashwin arrived ahead of me. From his hard-set jaw, he is still simmering over our encounter in the Claiming chamber.

Pons hands Ashwin his machete and says, “The rebels are waiting near the lake. They wish to meet you and the kindred alone. I cannot tell how many there are. At least one of them is a Galer. I received her request to meet you but nothing since.”

The rebel Galer must be redirecting the sounds of their movements to conceal their numbers, an uncomfortable beginning to our diplomatic engagement. I draw my dagger. “I’ll throw up a flame if we need you.”

Indah nods. Her powers will not be of much use to us in this cold, but she is still an adept healer.

Why am I thinking of needing a healer?

Because someone gets hurt every time we interact with the rebels.

Not this time. Tonight, we broker peace.

Ashwin and I exit through the gate. We turn away from our wing flyer by the road, into the chilly wind, and pass through the alpine forest. A figure waits outside the tree line, in front of the frozen lake. Even from a distance, I recognize Anjali, the warlord’s Galer daughter. She wears black robes with a red belt cinched at her waist. Her ebony hair is tied back in a long, thick braid. Anjali was one of the rajah’s top four favored women in his court, but she secretly worked for her father as a palace informant. Her winds swirl predatorily around her, a convex slithering of currents. We stop a fair distance away, and Anjali lulls her gusts. I sense within myself for my powers. My inner light is faint but accessible.

“Kindred. Your Majesty.” Anjali bows, her welcoming discordant with her smirk.

“We were expecting the warlord,” remarks Ashwin. Our exhalations shimmer in the air like silver plumes.

“My father is preoccupied with matters in Vanhi. As you’re aware, the demon rajah’s army is marching there.” Anjali’s intense dark eyes strike a balance against her oval chin, and her subtle curves are offset by a slim waist. “Our informants brought us disturbing news. Would you like to hear?”

“Tell us the message your father sent you to deliver,” I reply, annoyed at her meandering discourse. Like a sidewinder snake, Anjali waits until her opponents are distracted by her indirect weaving and then strikes.

“The demon rajah is growing his powers.”

“He doesn’t need to grow his powers,” I say. “He never tires.”

“The longer he is out of the Void, the weaker he becomes . . . unless he feeds off bhuta soul-fire.” Anjali wrinkles her nose. “You know that disgusting thing you Burners do? Parching? Udug does the same, only he parches his victim’s whole soul.”

The rebels have also learned the Voider’s name, but Ashwin does not disclose if her knowledge about the Udug upholds his own findings.

“Creatures of the evernight thrive in the dark,” Anjali explains. “They’re the strongest in the shadows. Through feeding off bhuta soul-fire, Udug is expanding the powers he brought into our realm. By the time he reaches Vanhi, he will be more powerful than the demon you battled. He will be unstoppable.”

Ice radiates in my gut, stemming from the cold-fire strangling my inner light. Udug’s powers work the same way on me as they do the rest of the world.

“The Lestarian Navy is on its way,” says Ashwin, calm and focused. “With the rebels also on our side, we’ll have sufficient bhutas to defeat Udug.”

She wags her finger at him. “You unleashed the Voider, yet you need bhutas to vanquish him?”

“I don’t share my father’s hatred. An alliance with the rebels will ensure a place for bhuta Virtue Guards in the empire’s future.”

“An alliance is one answer,” Anjali admits. “But we have another.”

Ashwin boosts his chin. “And what’s that?”

“For you to die.” Anjali’s smirk widens at his flinch. “Udug is tied to you through your heart’s wish. If your heart stops beating . . .” She makes a poof motion. “He returns to the Void.”

My powers hum just below my skin. “Your theory is unfounded.”

“We won’t know until we try. Your Majesty?” Anjali leers at his title. “You unleashed Udug. Do you have the courage to send him back?”

I step in front of Ashwin. “The prince won’t forfeit his life.”

“My father told me you’d say that, which is why for every hour the prince lives, one of the palace prisoners will die in his place. The warlord will start with your favorites. Your rani friends, Parisa and Eshana. Or maybe your servant, Asha. No, it will be Shyla, the one with the baby. She has a little girl, I believe.”

Anjali’s threat wrings me breathless. I raise my dagger to slice away her sneer, and she summons a wall of wind between us, halting my opening to strike her. Satisfied that I cannot touch her, she twirls a chakram—a circular throwing blade—around her wrist and switches her gaze to Ashwin.

“Decide quickly, Prince. My father will kill a rani every hour starting at sunup unless he hears that you’re dead.”

All warmth drains from Ashwin’s pallor. He opens his mouth, his dry lips sticking together. “Are you certain this will stop Udug?”

I slice my blade in front of him. “You cannot consider this. Hastin is trying to frighten you into conceding your throne, and the only way to do that is through your death.”

Anjali laughs lightly. “Oh, let the prince die. It’s his right.”

“Quiet,” I snap. “Ashwin, we cannot believe anything she says. Hastin has the palace and he’s afraid you’ll win it back. This must be a trick.”

“But if it isn’t . . . ?” he asks.

“Then we’ll find another way.”

“Your friends will be killed,” he whispers, holding the machete at his side. “My father’s wives—my family—will die.”

My throat aches, thinking of the ranis and Asha, my servant. Hastin could kill them no matter what Ashwin does or does not do. They are innocents, bystanders in this race for power. But they are more than prisoners. Every one of them is a sister warrior by heart and deed. As such, they would relinquish their lives to protect their families and their homeland’s future.