Page 8 of Thunder's Reckoning

“She’ll never be ready for what they want.” His voice sharpened, rare fury flashing through.

“You were fifteen when heofficiallytook you, Sable. She’s five, and he’s already promised her to an enforcer when she comes of age.”

The world tilted. I could almost hear Gabrial’s voice in my head, calm, patient, explaining in that infuriating way of his why this washonor, why I should be proud, why resistance was childish. My heart sagged under the weight.

“I can get you out,” Tallis said. “But we don’t have time. Gabrial leaves tomorrow for business. That’s our window.”

“What about Malik?” I forced the words through my throat. I wasn’t leaving without him.

“Both of them,” he said without hesitation. “I’ve planned for this. There’s a satchel ready, cash, a burner phone, keys to an old car outside the garden wall. You’ll have to push it down the road before starting it; it’s loud. I’ll clear the guards from that side.”

Now I understood the driving lessons in that old truck at the compound, Tallis’ voice in my ear when I was twelve, telling me to keep my hands steady even when the ground bucked. My hands shook now anyway. “Why would you help me?”

He hesitated, the curtain pulled tight in his grip. “I failed your mother. She died thinking I betrayed her. I won’t fail her twice.”

I kept my gaze on the same patch of garden, not daring to look. The years—bruises, prayers whispered to nothing—pressed into my bones.

“But he’ll kill you.”

A bitter smile laced his voice. “Then I’ll die doing something worthy of the ash in my blood.”

“What about the cameras?”

“They’ll go down tomorrow night, midnight. I’ll make a distraction. You’ll have a short window to gather the children and get out. Don’t waste it.”

“And the guards at our doors?”

“They like to… amuse themselves when Gabrial isn’t here. They won’t be a problem. Just promise me you’ll follow my instructions.”

“I will,” I said, breathless, my heart a pounding metronome counting down the seconds before we were caught.

The balcony door handle turned.

“Prophet requests you and Zara for luncheon,” Rhea’s voice came, crisp and formal. “He wants you both in white.”

Even her choice of words was a warning.Requestsmeant expects.Whitemeant possession.

“Of course,” I said, forcing the tremor from my voice.

The curtains swayed once—Tallis gone. Not like a man leaving, but like water closing over a stone, erasing the evidence it had ever been split apart.

***

UPSTAIRS, SISTER IDRISreleased Zara with a kiss that left a pale crescent of chalk on her cheek. She muttered at herself for the smudge, then wiped it away, as if even marks of affection needed erasing before they could be seen.

Zara ran the first half of the hall and walked the second, exactly as she’d been taught, before pressing her face into my stomach like five was still old enough to hide there.

“We need to change you into a white dress,” I said softly, framing it like a game. “For lunch.”

She wrinkled her nose. “The white’s scratchy.”

“I’ll put a slip underneath,” I promised, combing my fingers through her hair. “A soft one.”

“Father says I look like a lily when I wear white,” she said, and the wordlilycarried the faint, warm scent of the solarium. “And that it makes me beautiful.”

“You are,” I told her, and that one had no edges, no lies.

Malik waited at the nursery door, one hand braced against the frame like he needed it to stay upright. He gave me a small nod—more man than boy in that gesture—before glancing at his sister.