Page 92 of The Jasad Crown (The Scorched Throne #2)

CHAPTER SIXTY

ESSIYA

T he hours ticked past me as I sat in the center of the Aada. Different people took turns shouting, but they had given up directing their ire toward me. No amount of vitriol had coaxed a response. Throwing rocks at a wall loses its appeal quickly, so they had turned on one another.

In theory, I was listening to them. In theory, I looked blank and taciturn.

In reality, I strained to contain my magic as it howled inside me, slamming against my shoddily erected barriers. What no one in the Aada could see were the veins pulsing in bright silver and gold, an inferno of color burning out of me.

When I woke this morning and read the note in my hand, the veins had completed their conquest of my throat and crawled to my jaw. They throbbed over my body, straining to reach the rest of my face.

If I relaxed even an inch, my magic would slam through my control and slaughter everyone in the vicinity.

It would swallow me in the blaze, leaving a creature from the nightmares of the Awaleen crawling out of the ash.

A creature with no interest in fortresses or creation; a creature with the singular purpose of destruction.

The torn top half of the note fluttered at the center of the table, where it had passed between dozens of hands.

Take Sareekh il Ma’a to Jasad.

The second half of the note, tucked inside my tunic, had not been shared with the masses.

I will find you again, Suraira.

I stood abruptly, startling the quarreling groups into silence.

Unclenching my teeth took longer than I anticipated, the muscles in my jaw resistant to the sudden movement.

“We begin our leave for Jasad tomorrow. I will ask the Sareekh how many of us it can carry at a time and how long it anticipates the journey around Nizahl to take. We can send a small search party to ensure our landing location is free of soldiers.”

A wave of protest followed, but I cut it off with a raised hand.

“I have listened to your arguments, and none of them include an option that allows us to safely reach Jasad in time for Nuzret Kamel.

The Jasadis in other kingdoms have no choice but to risk the trade roads in order to reach our kingdom; we have the benefit of travel by sea.

Ignoring it without good reason is a recipe for death.

“I understand your doubt in my decision-making. I understand why you might hesitate to accept the suggestion of our sworn enemy. But in four days, Nuzret Kamel will lift the mist from Sirauk Bridge. Records show it lasts a mere hour or two. We cannot allow spite to govern us. We cannot miss our window of opportunity to raise the fortress.”

“Why would we listen to him after he betrayed you?” Efra shot to his feet. “He came into this mountain, learned all of our plans, played the part of reformed villain—and then escaped!”

Just as the disgruntled rumbling threatened to devolve into another hour of shouting, a quavering voice spoke up for the first time.

“He left behind the scepter,” Maia said. Doe-like brown eyes that were more suited to a poet than a lahwa flicked to the corner of the room, where Supreme Rawain’s scepter still rested. “If he had really betrayed us, wouldn’t he have taken it?”

“He must not have had time,” Efra snapped.

“If any of you come up with a better idea for reaching Jasad, you can find me at the cliffside.” I left the room swiftly, closing the door behind me. As soon as I turned the corner, I broke into a run.

“Do you think the rest of us do not wrestle with the darkness our power brings?” she cries out. “Do you think we don’t understand?”

I laugh. “What darkness do you wrestle?”

A third figure grips the teary-eyed woman’s arm, holding her back. “We are too late. Resign yourself to apathy, and atrocity will surely follow. You cannot wring sympathy out of stone.”

“You wound me,” I drawl. “Allow me to return the favor.”

Our magic ruptures.

Eight colors stripe the sky, mingling with the dusk.

When I blinked back to my body, I was outside, teetering on the edge of the cliff.

You remember.

I took a shaky step back from the edge and shook my head. None of it was real. It couldn’t be.

I see.

I took a deep breath, focusing on the unbroken horizon of blue stretching far beyond the Sareekh.

The sun shone through the hazy clouds, diamonds sparkling over the waves lapping around the Sareekh.

A beautiful panorama by any standards. How unfortunate the only person present for it could not be warmed by beauty.

“There are eight hundred of us in this mountain. How many trips would it take you to transport us to Jasad, and how long would it take?”

It will take twenty trips to transport eight hundred. Two revolutions of the sun to finish.

I ran through the calculations. Twenty trips, eight hundred people, two days. Each trip would take a few hours. A speck compared to our other options.

“The first set leaves tonight.”

I will be here.

“Thank you,” I said. “For everything.”

I found Maia and Namsa and asked them to assemble as many of the Jasadis to the cliffside as they could. “I would like them to see one last thing before we go.”

Twenty minutes later, I once again stood at the edge, half the Jasadis in the mountain milling before me. Maia and Namsa stood on either side of me, a silent support.

I faced the crowd. Power threaded through my voice, amplifying it across the mountainside.

“When many of us think of war, we imagine the battlefield. Swords singing through the air, horses galloping over burning terrain. War is known only for its physical violence.” I gazed out across the sea of Jasadis, anchoring myself in their attention.

“But there is a consequence of war worse than any sword. More violent than any bloodshed.”

I spread my fingers and dragged them across each of my eyes. Gold and silver threads followed my fingers, connected to the pulsing points at my temples. I twisted my hands, wrapping the threads around my wrists like gossamer bracelets.

“The first fatal consequence of war is our voice.”

The magic encircled my arms, looping around my neck and torso in steadily winding ropes.

“I spent my life frightened by the sound of my own name. I folded the parts of me the world did not want into as small a piece as I could manage, and I hoped time would take it away. Magic is not all we are, but it is all they were willing to see. Their fear tore us apart, and our fear destroyed what remained.”

The threads wove through my hair, rippling along my curls. The sky darkened as my kitmers circled overhead, their cries echoing between the silent mountains.

“Today, we turn their fear against them. We reclaim what was taken, and we do it loudly. We will not shrink. We will not hide. Hear me well, and hear me true: this will not be another Jasad War.”

My boots left the ground. The threads spun faster, twirling around me by the thousands. The light brightened, searing hotter than the sun. My magic howled, its joy pulsing in each thread around me. I was the heart of magic. The axis of power.

“This is our siege.”

I spread my arms wide. The threads expanded behind me, spinning together a golden shadow with me as the spindle.

I laughed, golden tears dripping from the corners of my eyes, as agony cleaved through my body. Enormous silver wings burst from the shadow. The cliffside shook as the Jasadis screamed.

Gleaming horns punctured the air as the kitmer raised its head, black eyes moving with mine.

Torso, legs, spine—the threads tightened around the kitmer until it tore away in a mighty flap of its wings.

The kitmer shrieked, the sound thundering across the horizon, and I knew they would hear it for miles.

The scream of a scorched land rising from the ashes.

My smaller kitmers rose to join it, a flurry of silver and gold wings blotting out the sun. I shielded my face as the wind scattered around them.

Efra stepped toward the cliffside, mesmerized. The kitmer I’d conjured at the Victor’s Ball, returned at last.

I inclined my head, and it wheeled over the surface of the sea, its wings spreading as it flew toward Essam. It would sear the sky gold and silver over the trade routes—protect them, remind the Jasadis enduring the journeys to our kingdom of what waited for them on the other side.

Home.

Pandemonium shook the mountain. Jubilation spread like wildfire. Groups of children escaped their parents to chase the cliffside, seeking another glance of the kitmer.

My fault, waiting so long to prove the potency of my magic to them. They should know who led them. They should know what kind of magic supported them.

“Essiya, are you all right?” Namsa crouched next to me, worry emanating from her.

“Certainly.” I lifted my head. Glowing and dry eyes met Namsa’s stunned ones.

“And you should refer to me as Malika.”