her,” he told her after she was done. “Walk there as if you can’t sleep and want company. Wait for me inside her quarters.”
About to step out, she turned back to him and smoothed out a wrinkle she’d made in his T-shirt when she pulled him inside. The instant she’d heard that scratch, she’d known. “Thank you for coming for me.”
Naasir’s smile was feral. “I’m going to find the Grimoire, so be ready to rut with me.”
That quickly, her fear at what they were about to attempt melted into flustered heat. “Keep your mind on escape.”
“I am. I’m looking forward to my reward.”
Coming from another man, those words might’ve made her uncomfortable, as if he was trying to put her in his debt. From Naasir, the statement was so honest, so open that she was only flattered, her blood hot. “I’ll see you soon.”
“Go.”
She stepped out of the room and, leaving the door open, began to stroll to Suyin’s suite. She knew she was being watched, but she didn’t look around, focusing her attention on the artwork on the walls.
Suyin was awake.
“I rarely sleep,” the other woman told her from her favorite sofa, an odd scent akin to seared flesh lingering in the air of the room.
Skin creeping at the realization that something horrible had occurred since they spoke just three hours earlier, Andromeda zeroed in on the new lines around Suyin’s mouth. She went to kneel by her friend, took Suyin’s slightly clammy hand in her own. “You’re in pain.”
A faint smile. “Xi came after you left. He believed my wing was regenerating too fast, so he ordered it be excised to the inner curve.”
Hands fisted and teeth gritted so hard a muscle jumped in her jaw, Andromeda checked the freshly cauterized wound. The pain had to be excruciating. Knowing there was nothing she could do about that now, she swallowed her rage and took in Suyin’s ethereal white gown. “Do you have a tunic and pants like mine?”
Suyin’s pain-dulled expression sharpened. “Yes, but if you’re planning an escape, don’t try to take me. I’ll only hold you back.” Bright, wet eyes. “My aunt won’t kill me—I’m family after all.”
Andromeda squeezed Suyin’s hand, the bones so fine, the skin delicate. “I won’t go without you.” She put steel in her tone. “So you must change because if you don’t, your dress will hamper your movements.”
Suyin’s lips trembled, but her words held a resolute strength. “I have only one wing, youngling.” She patted Andromeda’s cheek with her free hand. “I treasure your loyalty, but I won’t take advantage of it. I cannot fly, will be but a burden.”
“We won’t be flying,” Andromeda said, thinking of the wild creature she’d left in her room, the one who’d come into enemy territory for her. For her. “We’ll go as the tigers go.” It was the first image that came to mind when she thought of Naasir: a tiger, deadly and stealthy.
“Tigers?”
“You’ll see. Now change.”
Suyin didn’t argue any further, though her expression made it clear she thought this a foolish risk. Disappearing into another part of her suite, she returned dressed in dark blue leggings paired with a tunic in a slightly paler shade of blue. She touched her hand to the deep brown scarf with which she’d covered her hair. “I wore the darkest things I could find.”
Thunder rolled across the sky just then, right before rain began to fall outside in a hard beat. “The dogs can’t track in this,” Andromeda said with a teeth-baring smile. “We’re clearly meant to escape tonight.”
The words had barely left her mouth when Naasir slipped into the room. Eyes huge, Suyin’s hand lifted to her mouth as Naasir took her in and said, “You have one wing. Does it affect your balance?”
The blunt question made Suyin blink and blurt out an answer. “Yes. It’ll also drag me down should I need to run.”
Naasir’s eyes met Andromeda’s and she felt her entire body tense. Looking to Suyin, she knew Naasir’s silent solution was the right one, but it would brutalize the other woman when she deserved so much better.
Suyin’s next words proved she’d also worked out what needed to happen. “I’ll bleed too much or I’d already have cut off my remaining wing and tried to escape via the ground,” she said without any hint of self-pity. “The pain from excision is intense and will likely cause me to lose consciousness for an hour at least. The blood loss will render me weak for much longer.”