Page 97 of A Kingdom of Sand and Ice (Kingdom of Gods #2)

Then she turned, her eyes slithering towards Alina. A wicked smile curled across her lips.

‘And once we tell them the farahi murdered their leader…’ She shrugged, tilting her head. ‘Well. Everything will change.’

No.

No, they couldn’t.

They couldn’t hurt Hessa.

Alina had already lost everything. Her family, her kingdom, and, for a time, even the will to live.

But then came Hessa: radiant, stubborn, impossibly strong.

With her smiles that chased away the shadows, with her words that stitched broken pieces back together, with her faith in Alina when no one else had believed. They could not take her, too.

If the world took Hessa from her…

There would be nothing left.

Alina’s soul would wither into dust, hollowed out by grief.

‘Please, don’t.’ The words slipped from her in a trembling whisper as tears traced silent paths down her cheeks, dripping onto the floor like rain from a dying storm. Her head hung in despair, her body slumped in defeat. This couldn’t be happening. She would not allow it.

Her body convulsed as she fought against the Dunayans restraining her, her breath ragged with fury. A fist slammed into her stomach, knocking the air from her lungs.

‘I’ll do anything!’ she gasped.

‘Amira, it is okay,’ Hessa said through gritted teeth, her voice unshaken. ‘They wouldn’t dare kill a princess.’

Saren snorted.

‘I will always be with you, amira.’ Hessa smiled, a gentle, devastating thing amidst the chaos, ignoring the hands gripping her and the blade that hovered near. Her attention never once left Alina’s. ‘Remember that. Always with you.’

Without a word, Saren forced Hessa to lie flat on the ground, pressing her boot to the back of the desert princess’s head, grinding it slowly downward.

‘No! Don’t give up, fight!’ Alina cried, her entire body surging with resistance. Her teeth clenched as she thrashed against the iron grip of her captors, her shoulders threatening to wrench from their sockets with the effort.

‘I’ll wait for you in that place we spoke of,’ Hessa whispered, her voice soft and unwavering, her eyes locked with Alina’s, refusing to rise towards the heel pressing against her skull. ‘I’ll be celebrating with my sister. But I’ll wait for you, amira.’

‘No, don’t you dare!’

Alina screamed, the sound raw and broken, as the terrible truth shimmered in those white eyes: there would be no escape.

Even if they managed to claw their way from this room, there would be others, more waiting outside.

Saren had planned this well. And Hessa… Hessa could never survive the betrayal of her Dunayans. No matter how much she loved Alina.

‘Please… don’t.’ Alina’s voice cracked, raw and pleading, as she looked to Saren, desperation blazing in her eyes, silently offering everything she had, everything she was, if only it might spare Hessa.

‘Yaa da ma sahraa, amira,’ Hessa whispered just seconds before Saren drove the dagger into her back.

Then her neck.

Then her skull.

Alina screamed.

The sound tore from her throat like a wounded animal, primal and full of agony. Her eyes widened in horror, her vision swimming as the world collapsed. The hands that had held her back suddenly released her, and she collapsed to the floor, crawling, gasping, towards the crumpled figure she loved.

Tears fell like blades, sharp and unrelenting, carving a path of devastation down her cheeks as she gathered Hessa into her lap. Alina cradled her gently, brushing tangled strands of hair away from Hessa’s brow as if such a tender act might undo what had been done.

The world receded. Walls, whispers, all of it fading into a silence that pulsed with grief. She didn’t care if the others were still there. Let them kill her. Let them end it. Nothing mattered now.

She rocked slowly, her tears baptising Hessa’s still, blood-matted hair.

‘Farahi,’ Saren said at last, her voice distant, almost bored, as she motioned for the others to leave the room.

Alina did not lift her head. She wept, her grief boundless.

‘You should run now, farahi,’ Saren continued. ‘The others will soon be alerted. They’ll find their leader, slaughtered by your hand, or so they’ll be told. If you’re still here when they arrive…’

‘Leave me alone!’ Alina roared, the sound hoarse and burning.

Saren only shrugged, stepping lightly towards the door as if what had happened were of no consequence.

‘Hagan sends his regards,’ she said.

Alina froze. Even her heartbeat seemed to falter, suspended in the silence that followed. She turned, dazed, to confront Saren, to demand an answer, but the Dunayan was gone. Vanished like smoke through the cracks.

A voice—no, a scream—rose in her mind, urging her to run. Leave. Save yourself.

But she couldn’t. She wouldn’t. She could not leave Hessa behind, not butchered and broken on the floor like discarded meat. That was not the ending Hessa deserved.

Run, amira. Run.

The voice came again, so familiar, so heartbreakingly clear.

Hessa’s voice. It drowned out everything else: the room, the footsteps in the distance, even Alina’s own grief.

It was all-consuming. And yet, Alina stayed, rooted in place as agony swelled inside her like a rising tide.

Her body screamed with pain, but still she didn’t move.

Her fingers, trembling, continued to comb through Hessa’s hair as she wept deep, broken sobs that scraped against her ribs.

Something sharp brushed against her trembling fingers, and Alina reached into Hessa’s hidden pocket, searching blindly for the mystery it concealed. Her breath caught as her hand closed around a necklace. Delicate, yet heavy with meaning, crafted from white stone and desert sand.

She remembered now: the moment Hessa had been handed something in secret, the way she had tucked it swiftly away, her movements cautious, protective.

She hadn’t wanted Alina to see it. And now, here it was.

A sand-stone necklace, rare as starlight in this land.

A treasure not given lightly, but gifted to a beloved.

A silent declaration. A vow. A proposal, not of grandeur, but of devotion.

Alina’s heart splintered as she held Hessa close, understanding at last what the girl had intended. Hessa had been waiting, to ask her to be hers, not just in the quiet of stolen glances, but wholly, body and soul.

And now, she would never have the chance.

Hands shaking, Alina lifted the necklace and clasped it around her throat, the white stone falling with reverent weight against her skin. It nestled there as if it had always belonged.

‘I accept, Hessa,’ she whispered into the silence. ‘I will be yours. Always.’

Please, amira. Go.

Alina shook her head, lips pressed into a silent refusal. Let them come. Let them kill her. She had nothing left with which to fight. No blade, no strength, no will. What more could the world take from her? She had lost everything. Everyone.

And all of it… because of him .

Hagan sends his regards.

Her head snapped towards the door Saren had vanished through, rage beginning to claw its way up through the numbness. How had Saren known Hagan’s name? What connection lay hidden in the shadows between them? Was the warlock behind this too, behind Hessa’s death?

A new fire lit within her, a fury so pure it scorched her sorrow.

She would not let him slip into the darkness unscathed.

No, she would find him. She would burn the flesh from his bones and watch the screams tear themselves from his throat.

She would make him feel every loss he had carved into her heart.

And she would not stop until there was nothing left of him but ash.

With aching care, Alina laid Hessa gently onto the ground, her fingers lingering in the silken tangle of her hair.

She stood over her love’s still body, wavering.

Could she truly do it? Could she walk away now, fight on, when the one person who had made the world bearable, who had stitched light into the torn fabric of her soul, was gone?

The silence clung to her like grief, thick and heavy.

Alina was alone. Utterly, wretchedly alone.

From somewhere beyond the room, voices rose, shouts and screams that bounced off the stone walls like ghosts. The sound grew nearer, a warning. A choice.

If she stayed, she would die.

And death… death didn’t seem so terrible. To slip into the dark and find Hessa waiting, smiling. To see her parents again. To hold Ash once more, even if just for a moment in whatever came after.

But deep down, Alina knew they would not welcome her if she surrendered. Not like this. They would never forgive her for letting go.

No. She had to rise.

To find Hagan. To make him pay for every shattered life, every stolen joy. For her kingdom. For her family. For Hessa.

And now, there was Saren.

Saren, who would bleed for her betrayal. Who had earned her place on Alina’s list of vengeance.

One by one, she would end them.

‘Qa yaar qamh valva sahraa,’ she whispered, her voice trembling as she pressed a final kiss to Hessa’s brow. May your grain return to the desert.

Alina paid no mind to the blood soaking the floor, nor to the crimson now staining her hands and robes like war paint. The screams grew louder, closer, sharp echoes of the chaos that still pulsed through the city’s bones. But she heard none of it.

Her fury had swallowed all sound.

Rage burnt through her veins with every breath she took, rage at the unspoken bond between Saren and Hagan, rage that the warlock still found ways to torment her, even from afar. Rage that the woman she loved had been taken, stolen like everything else she had once held dear.

They would burn for this.

Every one of them.

No one saw the lone girl as she fled through the winding streets of Madari, blood-slick and silent as a shadow. Nor did they witness her slip into the open desert, swallowed whole by its endless sands, until even she began to forget she had ever existed at all.