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ryin

The top of the wall is wide enough for three men to stand shoulder to shoulder, with only one of them at any great risk of falling off. I’m already standing at the edge about as far as I can get when two Nimali soldiers march by, one brushing against me and nearly pushing me over. My teeth grind and I swallow the shout that wants to fight its way past my lips. My eyes burn with the need to push back at them, but I press the feeling down, hard, and channel that energy into my mission.

Other than the assholes surrounding me, I don’t mind duty at the wall. On a clear day, from here I can almost see my home in the Greenlands, a place I haven’t set foot in for over three years. Of course, now it’s nearing sunset and the fog that descends around the city is too dense for me to see much of anything. I peer out into the murky gloom to the south, into No Man’s Land, but can barely see the base of the wall thirty feet down.

Up here, surrounded by my enemy, forced to pretend subservience to them, I refocus on my true duty: monitoring the movements of the Nimali soldiers. I commit to memory those who are stationed here so I can bring the information back to the others and add it to the communal database of knowledge my fellow Fai are building. I take note of who trains and how hard, who slacks, who notices, and a dozen other things that will help us one day gain our freedom.

Until a screech rends the air and ice rolls down my spine.

“Revokers!” someone shouts from the ground. The Nimali on the wall snap to attention, readying themselves for a potential battle. My daimon would love to be let out to fight—it hasn’t had so much as a skirmish for three years—but it will have to wait a bit longer. That doesn’t mean I don’t call to it, keeping the spirit that shares my body within easy reach inside me. If the growling and snarling rising from No Man’s Land are any indication, a fierce fight is going on down there, obscured by the fog.

On top of the wall, silence reigns as the soldiers wait for word. We all stare toward the ground, anticipation a dark cloud suspended over us as sharp eyes scan the gloom for either a member of the scouting team that went out an hour ago or a Revoker, red eyes flashing and fangs covered in gristle and blood.

The first person who runs into view is tall and familiar and very much Nimali. His armor is blood spattered, but he appears uninjured. Others sigh audibly in relief, but my jaw tightens. Prince Shad. I wouldn’t have minded if he’d been grievously injured. My daimon silently chastises me for the unkindness, but I can’t help it. There are only two Nimali men who could have killed Dove, and he’s one of them. Until I’m certain it wasn’t him, I have to act like it was.

A bear and a lion are close behind him—part of the prince’s honor guard. The bear’s gait is hampered by a pronounced limp, though she still eats up the ground with long strides. Then my focus returns to the prince. He’s carrying something—someone—over his shoulder like a sack of beans. His bounding steps cross the distance easily, and then he’s at the rope ladder a soldier threw down. He climbs it with one arm while holding what I can see now is an injured woman.

Blood pours down her back from gashes that I’m sure were made by a Revoker’s claws. Her clothing is odd. A short, loose dress, oddly patterned and flimsy—I’ve never seen anything like it before, not on a Nimali or a Fai. Why anyone would go into No Man’s Land without battle armor is a mystery, but the woman is also barefoot. Begrudging respect bubbles up from my chest for the way the prince is able to negotiate the climb with that much dead weight, carried awkwardly. He could have shifted into his other form and flown up, but his own claws might have further injured her. And he is definitely treating her like something special.

The reason becomes clear when he finally gets to the top and one of the soldiers reaches out to help him with his burden. Prince Shad shakes his head and gently lays the woman down on her side, revealing her face.

I’m too far away to see at first, but when the soldiers in front of me gasp and immediately kneel, I get a glimpse. Princess Celena lies there, bloodied and battered. Her rich, chestnut skin is ashen, taking on an almost gray pallor. I’m frozen in place for a moment viewing her small form, her strange, tattered clothing, the odd way she’s braided her hair.

Then I’m shoved hard from behind, stumbling forward through the kneeling men and women.

“Where is the healer?” Prince Shad roars, but I’m already there, crouching down beside the princess. My daimon joins me seconds later, eager to fill me with its essence and lend me its healing power.

Celena’s back is ravaged, the wounds already bubbling with the poison from the Revoker’s talons. They look fresh, so it’s not too late to heal them if I’m quick about it. I hold out my hands and close my eyes, letting my daimon fully take over. Its energy flows through me, using my physical body as a conduit for its power.

Through my daimon, I sense the damage, the torn flesh and the toxins that have already entered her bloodstream. The healing energy pulls the poison out, a sticky black substance that leaks onto the stone of the wall. The flesh, layers of muscle and skin, is knit back together until there isn’t so much as a scar left. I silently thank my daimon and it retreats. Then I open my eyes.

Prince Shad is staring down at his sister. When the blue light of my power retreats, his dark eyes flick up to mine.

“I removed the poison,” I tell him.

“All of it?” I nod. His lips flatten into a grim line. “We’re taking her back to the Citadel. Come with me; the king will want to be sure.”

My muscles grow rigid before I nod again. An audience with the king is the last thing I’m interested in, but of course, I can’t disobey a direct order from the prince, or any Nimali, really. I might grind my teeth into dust before I’m free of these people.

The princess stirs, rolling over from her side to her newly healed back. The breaths of the half-dozen soldiers gathered around us catch as she blinks her eyes open. She meets my gaze and her brow lowers. She gasps for air and her face clears before breaking out into a joyous expression.

I’ve been in the presence of the princess many times before. I’ve healed her and been the subject of her scrutiny, but I’ve never felt the breath leave my body when she looked at me. I’ve never seen her lit from within with pure happiness.

Her smile as she sits up is a beam of sunlight in the darkness. “Victor?”

I swallow, unable to answer, but disappointment crashes into me—which makes no sense. “My name is Ryin, Your Grace.”

She tilts her head as her gaze roams over my face and body, then returns to my eyes. Her joy dims somewhat. “Victor,” she repeats, more uncertain. “Are we really in heaven?” Her voice is different, brighter, even in her doubt.

Behind her, Prince Shad frowns deeply, troubled by her confusion. He clasps her shoulder and she turns around, noticing the others for the first time. Her mouth drops open with shock. She must still be processing everything she’s gone through. The trauma. The injury. And healing can take something out of a person. She’ll need rest.

“Celena,” Shad says.

She scrunches up her face. “Who?” She looks around again then down at herself. Then she seems to notice that she’s on top of a thirty-foot wall.

She was already sitting in the middle of the platform, but still she scrambles closer to me, brushing against my legs. I slide out of the way—it’s forbidden for a Fai to touch a Nimali. The princess is too discombobulated to even notice.

“Wh-Where am I?”

“You’re back home,” Prince Shad says slowly. “In Aurum. We found you outside the wall just as Revokers attacked.”

No light of recognition for him or his words shines in her eyes. Shad looks at me with worry in his gaze. “Did you sense something amiss when you healed her?”

Celena’s head snaps toward me, her eyes peering intensely.

“No, Your Grace. But I would not be able to sense a missing soul.”

“Soul?” she screeches, curling into a ball and wrapping her arms around her legs.

Shad sighs and runs a hand over his face. “You’ve been missing for two weeks, Celena. And it seems in that time, you have lost your memory soul.”

Celena’s eyes widen and her head darts all around in jerky movements as she takes in everything. When she looks back at me, it’s like she’s expecting me to contradict the prince’s words, or…Or like she’s turning to me for comfort.

I can’t gainsay the prince, nor would I, as his assessment is correct. She appears to have no knowledge of herself, her stepbrother, or anything else she should know. I didn’t see any trauma to her head that would explain missing memories, and if they are missing completely, then that could only be explained by the loss of the soul that controls memory.

But when she looks at me like this, dark eyes rounded and fearful and seeking solace? From me? For the first time, I feel sorry for a Nimali. The emotion is brief and I shove it away the way I suppress the anger and rage, because just like them, it will do me no good. I must squash any sympathy for my enemy, for not a single one of them would show anything similar for me. I am not here to reassure her or ease her path, not after what her people, her own father, have done to me and mine.

I tear my gaze away from hers and lower it, faking deference. A hiss escapes her lips. Shock? Dismay? It doesn’t matter. The princess needs nothing from me but what I have already provided. I saved her life, and it’s more than she deserves.

And if her eyes haunt me, the sadness brimming in them gutting when I catch another involuntary glimpse, I ignore that as well. I must.

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