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“I’ve seen that ship before,” he growled above her.

Her eyes widened, reading the lines of a massive galley as she would a familiar face.

“So have I.”

Purple sails, a double deck of oars, two masts. Big enough to rival any trade galley or even a warship. She flew a flag of Siscaria, a golden torch on purple. But Sorasa knew better.

This ship sailed under no flag.

And neither did her captain.

19

The Cost of Empire

Erida

The palace burned as her hand burned, chewed from the inside out. Red-hot and blinding. Erida could not mourn. She could not even watch as the Amhara and the Elder leapt through the windows, their fate known only to the gods.

She could barely think around the pain, her world narrowed to the blade through her palm, the dagger skewered through her own flesh. Hot flames licked at the walls, demons at the corners of her eyes. Sweat poured over her skin, soaking through her nightgown, as blood poured over the wood of the little table, gushing from the open wound.

“This will hurt,” a voice said in her ear, one familiar hand pressing her head to his chest.

His other fist closed around the hilt of the dagger. She flinched, already screaming against him.

Steel seared on bone, nerve, muscle, and skin.

Erida’s vision went white.

Her knees buckled and she expected the thud of her body on the floor. It never came. Taristan caught her deftly, one arm around her back,the other looped under her bent knees. She dangled, weightless and helpless in his arms.

“You must stem the bleeding,” he rasped above her, his own focus on getting out of their bedchamber alive.

Erida wanted to vomit. Instead, she forced down a breath of smoky air, choking as she gasped. With her good hand, she wrapped the loose fabric of her nightgown around her wounded palm, hissing in agony. Every inch of movement sent a lightning bolt of pain shooting through her hand and up her arm.

Only her anger kept her awake. It coursed through her with the pain, the two entwined like lovers.

She squinted through the smoky room, her once magnificent chamber reduced to embers. Their bed went up in flames, the intricately carved framing crumbling apart. Fire licked along the lacquered wood, consuming every beautiful thing. The curtains edged in Madrentine lace, the rare mirrors, the Rhashiran carpets. Crystal candlesticks. Fine clothing. Feather pillows. Cut flowers in jeweled vases. Priceless books, their pages gone to ashes.

On the floor, the bronze dagger lay where Taristan had thrown it. She committed it to memory, her bloodshot, weeping eyes tracing the curve of the edge, the black leather of the hilt.

Amhara, she knew, as she knew the look of the woman who held the blade.

Tattooed, agile, smart. It was she who first saved Corayne so many months ago, when the Corblood girl was in Erida’s grasp. The Amhara woman stole victory then, and she stole it again now.

Smoke still spiraled in the wake of her enemies, stirred up by Domacridhan and the Amhara’s escape. Part of her hoped they were broken atthe base of the palace tower, their bodies destroyed by the fall. The rest of her knew the Amhara would not give her life so foolishly.

As Taristan ran from the room, fighting his way past fire and collapsing floorboards, Erida cursed to her god, the taste of blood welling up in her mouth. But even What Waits did not answer, his whispers gone in her hour of need.

She should have killed me, Erida thought, teeth clenched against every agonizing step forward.That is the blessing from What Waits. I am still alive, to fight and to win.

She pressed closer into Taristan, her free arm thrown around his neck. His skin burned against hers, blazing like the flames. She was literally in Taristan’s hands, at the mercy of his strength and his bravery. Somehow, she found that easy to trust. It felt second nature, like breathing.

The salon was worse than the bedchamber, the tapestries charring off the walls as beams fell overhead, kicking up embers like fireflies. Between slitted eyes, she caught sight of the bodies on the floor. Erida did not grieve the loss of her Lionguard knights. It was their duty to die for her.

Pain and rage drummed back and forth, ruling one heartbeat and then the next. Her hand pulsed, blood welling between her fingers. Try as she might, she could not curl her hand, her fingers barely responding.

It was too much to bear.