Page 11 of A Court of Truth and Thorns (Royal Scout #2)

KALI

T he soldiers who take hold of my arms are gentle—until I see the tent at the north side of camp, far enough away to muffle noise, and start to struggle against their grip.

Stupid and pointless, but I can’t help it.

My mouth is dry, my palms damp. My legs feel as if they could run for leagues if just given a chance.

The soldiers haul me inside, ignoring my attempts to bury my boots in the ground. Metal manacles close around my wrists with a deafening clank . A chain is measured from each of them to a stake driven into the rock floor.

Trace let them take me, and they did. The obsidian wall in my mind trembles. The world around me darkens as if fog has rolled over the sun.

“Prisoner secure,” a soldier reports to Lieutenant Copa.

“Very good.” Copa turns to me, his eyes smoldering.

“No one appreciates being deceived, Mistress Kalianna. Least of all the Everett army.” I sink to the ground.

A numbness spreads from my chest. I cling to the void for fear of losing what little control I have over myself.

Copa sighs and checks my chains and manacles.

Satisfied that all is in order, he leans out of the tent.

“The prisoner is secure, Your Highness. You may enter.”

Raza? I’ve only a moment to wonder what the broken girl wants with me before she enters in a flurry of skirts. The bandage covering her eye has shifted and the tail of a jagged red scar, running like a rat’s tail down her cheek, is startling against her sallow skin.

“Leave us,” Raza snaps at Copa. When he opens his mouth to protest, the princess rounds on him. “I thought you reported the prisoner secure, Lieutenant. Is she, or is she not?”

“She is.”

“Then I wish a private word.”

Copa brings his heels together in a salute. “My men and I will be just outside, then.”

“Fifteen paces away,” Raza counters. “When I say private , I do not mean I wish for the illusion thereof.” Copa stiffens.

I do too. “One more thing, Lieutenant.” Raza extends her hand.

“The wand, please. That wasn’t a suggestion.

” Copa’s face flushes, his eyes darting to me once before he unhooks a leather pouch from his belt and holds it out to the princess.

The moment the leather leaves his hold, he motions for the soldiers to follow him out. They do, all avoiding my gaze.

Very deliberately avoiding my gaze.

Raza squats in front of me, just out of my reach.

“I knew you’d be somewhere here, Lady Lianna.

Once I saw him, I knew,” she murmurs and unties the pouch, pulling out a wooden dowel with a crystal the size of a small walnut worked into a setting at one end.

It looks like a flower, except that the crystal is black and opaque. “Do you know what this is?” she asks.

“I presume it’s some breed of living crystal,” I say with an evenness trained into me over a dozen years. “Though I’ve never seen a black one before.”

She twists the flower between her fingers.

“It used to be a healing crystal. They are powerful little things. So much potent magic compressed into such a small gem. But this crystal is dead now, its walls but a shell that will neither give birth to additional magic nor refine what’s inside.

Do you know what unrefined magic feels like?

It is difficult to describe the effect. Here, let me show you.

” Swinging the wand forward suddenly, Raza jams the crystal against my skin.

I hit the wand away.

No. I try to hit it, but my muscles fail to obey.

My mind is just registering the shock of paralysis when the pain comes.

A sudden infernal burn that coats my nerves in searing oil.

I try to scream but the muscles to open my mouth and make the noise ignore me.

My body convulses, flailing in violent silence on the ground.

My lungs burn, desperate for air that won’t come.

My vision darkens. Raza pulls the wand away and steps back.

Breath. Sweet, wonderful, easy breath. I gulp air hungrily.

My heart pounds, sweat forming at my temples and running down my cheeks.

Raza squats to my level again, holding the wand out of reach.

“It’s called a stim crystal. The effect varies slightly based on the breed of living crystal it starts out as, but you comprehend the general idea.

I imagine you’ve not seen one before. In a country that kills off its whisperers, you’d have no one advancing the field. ”

“What do you want?” I rasp.

Raza’s face darkens. “I want to know what you did to my brother to make him choose your life over mine.”

“What?” The fog of shock hangs thick around me, but I try to make sense of Raza’s words.

“I was in the palace gardens when the Holy Guard attacked Delta. Three of my guards died within minutes.” She takes a breath.

Delicate fingers reach up to touch the bandage on her head, her uncovered eye losing focus.

“I waited for Rune. Searched for him. I was certain that only death would keep my brother from coming for me, from seeing me safe from rogue blades. But it wasn’t death, was it?

It was you. He chose to bring you to safety over me.

When I saw him today, I knew to look for you nearby. How right I was.”

I shake my head, humorless laughter bubbling inside my chest. If Raza bothered to watch her brother for more than two moments, she’d know that Trace is through with me.

The wand twitches in her fingers. A wave of fear rushes through me. “He didn’t choose me over you,” I say quickly. “There was no time to choose. It was happenstance. We happened to be in the same room when the coup started. That’s all.”

“It wasn’t happenstance,” Raza snaps back. “He left Delta to look for you, to bring you back. That is why you were in that same room of yours. And when the violence started, he saved you. Not me. I saw you all run, you know.”

I’d explain it if I could. If I understood any of it myself. But I don’t, so I gather the words I know to be true. “He loves you, Raza.”

“Not enough.” She stiffens. Her eye refocuses on me. With deliberate care, she reaches behind her head to untie her bandage.

My breath catches, bile rising high in my gullet. I swallow. Look away. Swallow again.

A deep, guttural growl escapes the girl. “It was a knife,” she says. “A knife thrown into my eye. Then dragged out.” Stars. I steady my breath as Raza covers her face again. Stars. “Say something, whore,” she demands of me. “What lies did you feed him to allow this? ”

“Your wounds are the fault of Bahir’s terror mongers, not Trace,” I rasp. “He couldn’t have stopped that knife.”

Her nostrils flare. “He could have healed my eye!”

“No.” I shake my head. “A knife to the eye would have—”

“He could have healed me!” Raza shouts, spittle flying from her mouth.

I pull back, heart beating fast. My hands come up with a loud clank of chains, palms out. “All right,” I breathe quickly. “You know better than I.”

She takes a breath, which I take as a positive sign. “Your companion is badly wounded,” Raza says, her tone sounding too normal for someone who’s so clearly crazed.

I choose my words as carefully as berries amidst thorns. “Her name is Jasmine. She has a fever.”

A hint of a smile. “She might die.”

Stars. “She might.”

Raza tilts her head. “So why has your loyal Trace not healed her?”

My heart beats hard, struggling to understand the direction of Raza’s thoughts. “His healing crystal is depleted,” I tell her.

She nods and I’m immediately glad I told the truth. She knew the answer before she asked. She leans in, bringing her face just outside the reach of my chains. “How did it get depleted? Not healing me, clearly. Who did Trace choose to save? You?” Her lip curls. “Did he heal you ?”

I stay silent, which seems less provocative than confirming the sin aloud.

Raza rocks back on her heels and, before I can scream, presses the wand into my neck.

Knowing what to expect does nothing to lessen the shock of convulsing muscles.

Through the haze of paralyzing pain, I see Raza adjust her hold on the stone, shoving the whole wand down the front of my shirt.

With no more need to hold on to the crystal, she stands and retreats to the other side of the tent to adjust her clothes.

My seizing muscles scream their agony, but it’s the burn in my lungs that sends waves of true panic through me. No air. I have no air. I am choking. I will die.

I strain to shift my body away. My muscles ignore me.

Across the tent, Raza’s back is to me. I’m going to die and she won’t even notice.

She will turn around, whenever that crazed brain of hers deems it right, and will stare at my dead body like a child frowning at a bug that splattered beneath her shoe.

My vision darkens, the world swaying around me.

I long for the calm stillness of the shadows.

Drowning must be like this. Unable to breathe, unable to scream, unable to fight.

Some who drown breathe in water before they perish.

I understand them now. A last chance to fill the lungs is so very tempting.

Tempting enough that I give in to it. Except it’s not water that enters. Nor air. It’s magic.