Of Dreams and Rust - Sarah Fine Page 0,87

the sky from three distant points within the canyon, and from one just to the east.

“I’m ready,” I say, because he does not seem aware of anything but the view.

He tears his eyes from the horizon. “Would you consider staying here?” he asks quietly.

“What?” I clutch the strap of my pack. “Why?”

He jumps from the outcropping and lands on the trail next to me, scooping his pack from a boulder. “When this is over, you can find the soldiers. Tell them you were held prisoner. Tell them who you are. They will get you back to the Ring.”

“Melik?” My throat is so tight that it comes out as a squeak.

He grasps my shoulders. His eyes are red rimmed and bloodshot, shining with fear. “Wen, the machines will be here in a few hours at most.”

I crane my neck to peer at the smoke. “How can you tell?”

“The distance between the smoke puffs, and their number. There are nineteen headed this way, and they are past the point of the battle yesterday.” He swallows hard. “Which means my men destroyed one of the twenty—and are probably dead. And we have no reinforcements. I sent word with Commander Kudret yesterday, but even if the general decided to send anyone, they would not arrive until tomorrow.”

I cover his hands with mine. They are cold and sweating. “What are you going to do?”

He looks toward the east. “I will fight until I am dead, Wen, but we cannot stop them all. And even if I survived this attack, the soldiers would execute me on sight.” He bows his head and closes his eyes as my hands slide into his hair. “But I have to do what I can. Maybe if I could—”

“And you would leave me behind?” I ask, choking on the idea of losing him now. He talks like it is a certainty.

“I want you to live through this!” he shouts, his voice breaking.

My fingers pull tight in his rust-colored locks. “But you can’t make me stay here while you go,” I whisper, standing on my tiptoes and drawing his face to mine. “Not now. I can help. You know I can.”

Our kiss is desperate with grief and terror. “I cannot watch you die,” he breathes against my mouth.

“And I cannot sit here and do nothing. You would never accept such a thing. How can you ask me to?” I step back and put my hand over my heart, then turn my palm to him. “You cannot keep me from this fight.”

He stares at my hand outstretched, and then he takes it in his own. “Then we will go together.”

He tugs me down the trail, and I jog after him. I savor every slide of his palm against mine, every time he steadies me with his hand on my waist, every exhaled breath. I stare at his broad back, his shoulders, his booted feet as he nimbly weaves through the passes and descends toward the village.

When I was young, I sat at my father’s desk and played with an hourglass he kept there. I would turn the thing over and listen to the quiet hiss of sand as it tumbled down. As the bottom filled, the sand stopped falling in a steady torrent, and it became possible to spot individual grains. I feel like that now, examining each second separately, trying to memorize and hold it in my mind.

As we reach the lower part of the trail, Melik turns to me. “Find my mother. Tell her what is happening.” His thumb strokes over the back of my hand. “See if the two of you can load the wounded onto a cart and head south. Warn the other villages on the Line.”

“Focus on what you need to do,” I say to him, wishing my voice weren’t shaking, wishing we weren’t down to a few grains of sand, a few seconds before we reach our good-bye.

He pulls me to him and flattens his palm between my breasts. “Mican tisamokye,” he whispers. “You carry my heart.” He kisses the top of my head and lets go of my hand. His face is lit with a ghostly smile. “So no matter what happens to the rest of me, it is up to you to take care of that.”

He pivots on his heel and sprints toward the village, leaving me to scramble in his wake. The lanes are filled with scared Noor, pointing up at the smoke that signals the beginning of the end. As I run toward