Page 38 of The Moon’s Fury (Moon & Sands #2)

A bead of sweat rolled down her back as she hurried through the familiar cobblestone streets. Tan buildings with glass displays stretched around her, shops selling books and parchment and quills.

Burhani tugged her shawl farther over her head. She was probably being overly cautious. It was unlikely anyone would recognize her.

Not after all these years.

Despite herself, her footsteps slowed as she passed the street where she used to live with her mother.

Her feet moved of their own accord until she stood before the large building, its face bedecked with colorful clothes drying on balconies and large windows that reflected bright sunlight into her eyes.

Because it was the sunlight that was causing her to blink rapidly. Just the fucking sunlight.

The home she’d shared with Mama was on the third floor. Burhani stared at the balcony, as though her mother might open the door and step out into the open air if she waited long enough.

The balcony did open, and she gasped.

But it was an unfamiliar woman that emerged, laying out her children’s clean, wet clothes over the black railing, as Mama had once done.

Before the illness killed her.

Before Ebrahim uprooted her from her home and education and her life and dragged her to Alzahra.

Burhani pulled her shawl across her face and stalked back to the main street. There was no time to feel sorry for herself.

Fucking Layna.

This was all her fault.

It wasn’t enough that she was a crown princess, raised in an opulent palace, showered with riches.

It wasn’t enough that she had wanted for nothing her entire life.

It wasn’t enough that Layna had a loyal sister, a healthy mother, and two fathers.

She had to be the fucking Daughter of the Moon, too.

Burning rage, fueled by hatred, coursed through Burhani’s veins. Fucking Layna who had blasted Ebrahim with light and knocked the elderly man to the ground.

The man who had raised Layna instead of his own daughter.

Mama never told him about you , her conscious whispered, and it was becoming harder and harder to ignore the reasonable words.

In her heart, she knew Ebrahim was a good man. He’d spent the last few years in Alzahra trying to make up for lost time, to help her build a home there. He’d encouraged Layna and Soraya to befriend her, and they had tried several times in the beginning.

She couldn’t deny that.

They probably would have succeeded if she hadn’t seen the way Ebrahim regarded them both, Layna especially, with familiar, paternal affection.

Why had he loved them, but never thought to search for her?

Her hatred was irrational, and her scholar’s mind knew it.

But a vengeful heart was deaf to reason.

Layna, and her uncontrollable power, was why she was in this mess. After she had nearly killed Ebrahim that night, Burhani had no choice but to seek out the elders.

Layna needed to be stopped.

Her lips twisted into a sneer beneath her shawl, footsteps sure against the familiar cobblestones, a path she’d walked a thousand times over.

The two sisters thought they were so clever with their hidden texts and tomes. Her eyes rolled of their own accord. Soraya spent plenty of time in the library, nose always buried in some botany or herbology text.

Brutish Layna, however, preferred the training grounds. So when the crown princess suddenly began spending more and more time there, she knew there were secrets to uncover.

She’d found the hidden library easily, and had greedily read as many scrolls as she could manage in one sitting. Her sharp mind was hungry for knowledge, and the hidden library held it in droves.

It’s where she learned of the elders, the prophecy, and the Medjai. It’s how she knew exactly who she needed to inform about Layna and her volatile powers.

Except the selfish bitch had fled in the night, taking her sister and mother with her.

The Medjai had installed Ebrahim as a puppet ruler, and she could see the noose tightening around his neck each day.

Her feelings about Ebrahim were complex, but she did love him, in her own way. He was a good man—the Medjai’s schemes and commands chafed at him.

There was little more he could take of the injustices the Medjai doled out—what he’d begrudgingly accepted was only out of fear for her safety.

Which is how she now found herself in Thessan, her footsteps leading her back to the Grand Libraries she’d left behind.

She kept her head down as she walked through the towering main doors.

The first floor of the magnificent building was open to the general public.

Her feet glided across the polished marble, past rows and rows and rows of bookshelves.

It was a labyrinth to most, but one she knew more intimately than the lines on her palm.

She knew which column to duck behind, which turns to follow to reach the restricted section reserved only for Scholars. She rounded a corner and—

A hand gripped her arm. “You can’t be back here, sahiba .”

The voice was deep.

Familiar.

Sometimes, she still heard it in her dreams.

Slowly, she turned and dropped her hood.

The man’s grip loosened, then fell away completely. She gazed at his handsome face—he hadn’t changed at all. The years that passed between them had chiseled his features, and he was even more breathtaking than she remembered.

“Hani,” he breathed, and she lost another piece of her heart.

“Hello, Thanh. You look well.” Her voice was surprisingly even, though her heart was attempting to batter through her ribcage.

“I—so do you. How have you been?” His blond hair had grown out since she last saw him—when she had said goodbye—the wavy ends reaching past his shoulders. Wide blue eyes scanned her, and she wondered what he saw.

Did he still see his first love?

Or the woman who left him and his heart in pieces?

“It’s been difficult,” she admitted, biting her lower lip. “But I’ll make it through. I always do.”

Thanh rubbed the back of his neck. “I heard about the unrest in Alzahra. About your father, he’s—”

“How have the years treated you?” Burhani cut in.

She did not want to talk about her father or Alzahra. Her fingers twitched at her sides, desperate to reach for him.

“Um, good. I suppose,” he said, eyes darting to the floor. He tugged at his robe’s billowing sleeve, a nervous tic he hadn’t outgrown. “I’m engaged. To Sandas.”

He may as well have carved open her chest and tore out what remained of her broken, shattered heart.

Sandas. Of course, he’d have fallen into her willing arms.

Thanh cleared his throat, waiting for her to speak.

“Oh, that’s wonderful.” Her voice sounded hollow even to her own ears.

Thanh’s blue eyes shone with remorse. He opened his mouth, then thought better of it. Finally, he asked quietly, “What are you doing here, Hani?”

“I need to get into the restricted archives. Can you take me?”

He looked uncertain, glancing around the deserted hallway.

“I can’t do that, Hani. You’re not—you’re not a Scholar anymore.” He winced even as he spoke the words, as if they pained him more than her.

“Please. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t important. It’s a matter of life and death.”

She didn’t tell him whose life and whose death.

He considered it for another minute.

“All right.”

He led her through the narrow passageways until they reached a hidden door, concealed behind a bookshelf. It opened to shadowed, familiar stairs, and together they descended.

She’d followed him down here countless times before, hands clasped tightly in the dark. Back then, her body had craved him more than her mind craved knowledge, and she’d paid no mind to the ancient scrolls, tucked away from the world.

They reached the bottom, and Thanh handed her the torch.

“You have ten minutes.”

She nodded. She’d done more in less.

Now, her father’s life depended on it.