et her up, damn you.” The Commandant’s orders cut through the
fog of my brain, startling me from sle ep. “I didn’t pay two
hundred marks so she could sle ep all day.”
My mind is like tar, my body racked with dull pain, but I’m aware
enough to know that if I don’t rise from this pallet, I really am dead. As I
grab a cloak, Izzi pushes the curtain to my room aside.
“You’re awake.” She’s obviously relieved. “Commandant’s on the
warpath.”
“What . . . what day is it?” I shiver — it’s cold — far colder than is normal
for summer. I have a sudden fear that I’ve been unconscious for weeks, that
the Trials are over, that Darin is dead.
“Marcus attacked you last night,” Izzi says. “Aspirant Aquilla — ” Her
eye is wide, and I know then that I didn’t dream the Aspirant’s presence —
or the fact that she healed me. Magic. I find myself smiling at the thought.
Darin would laugh, but there’s no other explanation. And, after all, if ghuls
and jinn walk our world, then why not forces of good too? Why not a girl
who can heal with a song?
“Can you stand?” Izzi says. “It’s past noon. I took care of your morning
chores and I’d do the others, but the Commandant’s quite insistent that you
— ”
“Past noon?” The smile drops from my face. “Skies — Izzi, I had a
meeting with the Resistance two hours ago. I have to tell them about the
tunnel. Keenan might still be waiting — ”
“Laia, the Commandant sealed up the tunnel.”
No. No. That tunnel is the only thing that stands between Darin and
death.
“She questioned Marcus last night after Veturius brought you in,” Izzi
says miserably. “He must have told her about the tunnel, because when I
went by it this morning, the legionnaires were bricking it closed.”
“Did she question you?”
Izzi nods. “And Cook too. Marcus told the Commandant that you and I
were spying on him, but I, well . . . ” She fidgets and looks over her
shoulder. “I lied.”
“You . . . you lied? For me?” Skies, when the Commandant finds out,
she’ll kill Izzi.
No, Laia, I tell myself. Izzi won’t die, because you’ll find a way to get
her out of here before it comes to that.
“What did you say to her?” I ask.
“Told her that Cook sent us to get crowleaf from the storage room by the
barracks and that Marcus waylaid us on the wa y back.”
“And she believed you? Over a Mask?”
Izzi shrugs. “I’ve never lied to her before,” she says. “And Cook backed
up my story — said she was having horrible back pain and that crowleaf was
the only thing that would help. Marcus called me a liar, but then the
Commandant sent for Zak, and he admitted there was a chance that he’d left
the tunnel entrance open and that we just happened to pass by. Commandant
let me go after that.” Izzi looks at me worriedly. “Laia, what are you going
to tell Mazen?”
I shake my head. I have no idea.
»»»
ook sends me into the city with a stack of letters for the courier
without so much as a mention of the beating I took.
“Be quick about it,” the old woman says when I appear in the kitchen to
resume my duties. “There’s a nasty storm c oming, and I need you and
Kitchen - Girl to board up the windows before they’re blown out.”
The city is strangely quiet, its cobbled lanes emptier than usual, its spires
shrouded in unseasonable fog. The smells of bread and beast, smoke and
steel are dulled, as if the mist has weakened their potency.
Conscious of my freshly healed limbs, I move gingerly. But even after a
half hour of walking, all that remains of the beating I took are ugly bruises
and a dull soreness. I head first to the couriers’ office in E xecution Square,
hoping that the Resistance is still waiting for me. The rebels don’t
disappoint. Within seconds of entering the square, I smell cedarwood.
Moments later, Keenan materializes out of the fog.
“This way.” He says nothing of my injuries, and I’m stung by his lack of
concern. Just as I’m willing myself not to care, he takes my hand as if it’s
the most natural thing in the world and leads me to the back room of a
cramped, abandoned shoe shop.
Keenan sets a spark to a lamp hanging on the wall, and as the light
flares, he turns and looks me full in the face. The aloofness drops. For a
second, he’s unveiled, and I know with lightning certainty that behind that
coolness he feels something for me. His eyes are almost black as he takes in
every bruise.
“Who did this?” he asks.
“An Aspirant. It’s why I missed the meeting. I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing?” He is incredulous. “Look at you — look
what they’ve done to you. Skies. If your father was alive and knew I let this
happen — ”
“You didn’t let it happ en.” I put a hand on his arm, surprised at the
tautness of his body, like a wolf raring for a fight. “It’s no one’s fault but the
Mask who did it. And I’m better now.”
“You don’t have to be brave, Laia.” His words are spoken with a quiet
fierceness, and I suddenly feel shy of him. He raises his hand, slowly
tracing my eyes, my lips, the curve of my neck with the tip of his finger.
“I’ve been thinking about you for days.” He puts his warm hand against
my face, and I want so much to lean into it. “Hoping I’d see you in the
square wearing a gray scarf so this can all be over. So that you can get your
brother back. And after, we could . . . you and I could . . . ”
He trails off. My breath comes in short, shallow bursts, and my skin
tingles in wild impatience. He moves closer, drawing up my gaze, pinning
me with his eyes. Oh skies, he’s going to kiss me . . . .
Then, bizarrely, he st eps away from me. His eyes are guarded again, his
face empty of any emotion but a sort of professional detachment. My skin
burns in embarrassment at the rejection. A second later, I understand.
“There she is,” a gruff voice sounds from the door, and Mazen enters the
room. I look to Keenan, but he appears almost bored, and I’m shaken at
how his eyes can go c old as quickly as a candle being blown out.
He’s a fighter, a practical voice chides me. He knows what’s important.
As should you. Focus on Darin.
“We missed you this morning, Laia.” Mazen takes in my injuries. “Now
I see why. Well, girl. Do you have what I want? Do you have an entrance?”
“I have something.” The lie takes me by surprise, as does the
smoothness with which I tell it. “But I need more time.” Surprise flashes
across Mazen’s face for a brief, naked second. Is it my lie that’s caught him
off guar d? My request for more time? Neither, my instinct tells me.
Something else. I fidget as I remember what Cook said days ago. You ask
him where, exactly, your brother is in Central Prison. What cell?
I muster my courage. “I . . . have a question for you. You know where
Darin is, right? Which prison? Which cell?”
“Of course I know where he is. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be spending all my
time and energy figuring out how to free him, now would I?”
“But . . . well, Central is so heavily guarded. How will you — ”
“Do you have a way into Blackcliff or not?”
“Why do you need one?” I burst out. He’s not answering my questions,
and some stubborn part of me wants to shake the answers loose from him.
“How will a secret entrance to Blackcliff help you free my brother from the
most fortified prison in the south?”
Mazen’s gaze hardens from wariness to something close to anger.
“Darin’s not in Central,” he says. “Before the Moon Festival, the Martials
moved him to the death cells in Bekkar Prison. Bekkar provides backup
guard to Blackcliff. So when we launch a surprise attack on Blackcliff with
half of our forces, the soldiers will pour out of Bekkar to Blackcliff, leaving
the prison open for our other forces to take.”
“Oh.” I fall silent. Bekkar is a small prison in the Illustrian Quarter, not
too far from Blackcliff, but that’s all I know about it. Mazen’s plan makes
sense now. Perfect sense. I feel like an idiot.
“I didn’t mention anything to you, or anyone else” — he looks pointedly
at Keenan — “because the more people who know ab out a plan, the more
likely it is to be compromised. So, for the last time: Do you have something
for me?”
“There’s a tunnel.” Buy time. Say anything. “But I have to figure out
where it lets out.”
“That’s not enough,” Mazen says. “If you have nothing, then this
mission is a failure — ”
“Sir.” The door pounds open, and Sana tumbles in. She looks as if she
hasn’t sl ept in days, and she doesn’t share the smug smiles of the two men
behind her. When she sees me, she does a double take. “Laia — your face.”
Her eyes drop to my scar. “What happened — ”
“Sana,” Mazen barks. “R eport.”
Sana snaps her attention to the Resistance leader. “It’s time,” she says.
“If we’re going to do it, then we need to leave. Now.”
Time for what? I look at Mazen, thinking he’ll tell them to wait a
moment, that he’ll finish with me. But instead he limps to the door as if I’ve
ceased to exist.
Sana and Keenan exchange a glance, and Sana shakes her head, as if in
warning. Keenan ignores her. “Mazen,” he says. “What about Laia?”
Mazen stops to consider me, the annoyance on his face ill - concealed.
“You need more time,” he says. “You have it. Get me something by
midnight, day after tomorrow. Then we’ll get your brother out, and this
whole thing will be over.”
He walks out, engaged in low conversation with his men, snapping at
Sana to follow. The older woman gives Keenan an unreadable look before
hurrying out.
“I don’t understand,” I say. “A minute ago, he said we were done.”
“Something’s not right.” Keenan stares hard at the door. “And I need to
find out what it is.”
“Will he ke ep his promise, Keenan? To free Darin?”
“Sana’s faction’s been pushing him. They think he should have broken
Darin out already. They won’t let him back away from this. But . . . ” He
shakes his head. “I have to go. Be safe, Laia.”
Outside, the fog is so heavy that I have to put my hands in front of me to
ke ep from running into anything. It’s the middle of the afternoon, but the
sky grows darker by the second. A thick bank of clouds roils above Serra as
if gathering strength for an assault.
As I head back to Blackcliff, I try to make sense of what just happened. I
want to believe that I can trust Mazen, that he’ll hold to his end of the
bargain. But something is off. I’ve struggled for days to eke out extra time
from him. It makes no sense for him to suddenly give it away so easily.
And something else sets my nerves on edge. It’s how quickly Mazen
forgot about me when Sana showed up. And it’s how, when he promised to
save my brother, he didn’t quite look me in the eyes.