to start thinking of a plan to get Wesley some help before it’s too late.”
“So this is less about Creije and more about your boyfriend,” Saxony said.
Tavia’s eyes narrowed.
It was about all the people the alliance could save. She didn’t contact Casim just for Wesley; she did it because every night all she could picture were the innocents in her city, injected with the Loj over and over until Ashwood had sunk his claws in deep enough to leave marks that would never fade.
She pictured her mother, whispering at shadows as the magic slowly ate away her mind.
Can you see them now, ciolo? she always whispered. My ghosts.
“Saxony,” Karam said, stepping in between them like she could sense a battle on the horizon. “Perhaps we should talk about this another time. You two are both—”
“You might not like Wesley,” Tavia interrupted. “But you should know that having him as an enemy would be a mistake.”
“I can handle Wesley,” Saxony said.
“You’ll handle him? He’s on our side.”
“Speaking of our side, if we’re all on the same team, then why are you going behind my back?”
Tavia all but scoffed. “Weird how much that hurts, isn’t it?”
Saxony’s jaw clenched and the air between them grew thick with the rising sun.
“You both must take a breath and remember our mission,” Karam said. “We cannot tear ourselves apart when our foes are waiting to do just that.”
Tavia looked to Karam. She wasn’t sure when the warrior had become the peacemaker, tying Tavia to her old friend in an awful, obligatory way that she still couldn’t get used to.
“We need to come together to find a solution to this war,” Karam said. “Tavia is right in saying that Wesley is an asset and that the underboss of Rishiya can provide us with more soldiers.”
“I know that,” Saxony said. “But we need Crafters to win this war and we can’t do it without my amja’s help. I just need time to convince her. And once I do, we can fight the Kingpin and save Zekia and—”
“So Zekia is worth saving, but not Wesley,” Tavia said. “She can be redeemed, but anyone you don’t care about can go straight to the fire-gates?”
Saxony’s eyes tensed and Tavia didn’t miss the flicker of hurt that crossed her friend’s face. “That isn’t what I said.”
The wind breezed warmer on Tavia’s cheeks and she knew that the change in the air wasn’t just from the sun anymore, but from Saxony’s magic. Her Crafter powers were like a wildfire, buried skin-deep, ready to rise at any moment.
“What you say and do are two different things,” Tavia said. “Who’s to say which side of your personality we can trust today?”
Saxony didn’t say anything in response, and whether that was because there was nothing she could say, or because she knew Tavia wouldn’t listen anyway, it didn’t matter. Saxony turned without another word and headed back into the camp in the space of a few blinks, leaving Tavia alone with Karam.
“You need to stop punishing her,” Karam said. “We are not enemies here.”
Tavia wasn’t so sure.
She could forgive a lot of things, but Saxony’s actions had nearly gotten them killed at the train station when they tried to escape Creije. Her family had attacked them in Granka, and Saxony’s letters had led the Kingpin straight to Asees and Arjun’s Kin. And then there was that whole matter of Saxony’s little sister kidnapping Wesley from right under their noses.
It wasn’t enough that Ashwood had murdered Tavia’s mother with magical experiments, but now he’d taken the one person she had left who—
Tavia swallowed.
It’s okay, ciolo, her mother’s voice whispered.
Tavia had thought that as an orphan she knew what it was to be alone, but she was wrong. In the span of no time at all, she had lost her underboss, her home, and her best friend. Wesley had always been there for her to rely on, even if she never wanted it, and Saxony had always been a source of light and friendship in a city she took for granted.
Now both were gone.
Now everything seemed wrong.
“Keep acting like this and you will push everyone away,” Karam continued.
“There are more important things than Saxony’s feelings or my popularity,” Tavia said. “If we don’t stop Ashwood from destroying Creije, he’ll trample the other eight cities too, and then spread the Loj elixir across Uskhanya. And after our realm is gone, he won’t stop there. Maybe he’ll go for your realm next.”
“So you team up with any crook you can?”
“Casim