From the stories they’d shared, it seemed they’d been able to stay formless for years on end—and not end up an exhausted mess once they returned to the earth.
A problem for another time.
Staying as still as possible, Dara checked to make sure his weapons had come through and then straightened up.
He breathed a sigh of relief. Irtemiz.
The young archer was asleep on a straw mat, her breath rising and falling in the beams of moonlight that streamed in from a barred window near the ceiling. A skin of water rested at her side, and if she was disheveled—her black hair knotted and wild, her clothes threadbare—she’d at least been treated for her injuries. Her left arm and leg rested in splints, her body mottled with old bruises. Her right ankle was shackled, an iron chain leading to a pipe that ran vertically through the room.
Dara’s heart sank. The shackle he could deal with. How to silently escape a guarded room with a badly injured woman was another story.
He carefully crept forward, lowering himself to her ear. “Irtemiz,” he whispered.
Her eyes shot open, but she was too well trained to shout. Her gaze darted to his.
There was no relief. “You shouldn’t be here, Afshin,” she said, her voice barely audible. “They’re expecting you. They mean to kill you.”
“A lot of people have already failed at that,” he said, trying for a reassuring smile. He nodded at her leg. “Can you walk?”
Despair grew in her face. “No. I can’t even put weight on it. A wave smashed me into the remains of the Citadel. Their doctor says it’s shattered.” Her voice trembled. “My arm too. I’ll probably never hold a bow again. I’m useless, but you’re not. You need to get out of here.”
“You’re not useless,” Dara said fiercely. “And I don’t intend to leave you, so you might as well help me.” He gestured to the room. “Are there any other ways out of here?”
“I don’t know. They blindfold me whenever I’m moved and only speak in human languages. They had a Daeva man, a patient, here to translate, but I haven’t seen him in days.”
Dara took all that in, considering his options. He’d planned on flying out, but there were two of them now, and his magic was still recovering. Could he really burst through these doors, navigate back through the maze of corridors, and take to the air without getting them killed?
He glanced again at the window. It was small … but perhaps not too small. Quietly pulling over a wooden stool, he climbed up to examine it. The bars were metal and new, their welding still gleaming. The construction looked flimsy—maybe the bars would keep Irtemiz in, but not Dara. Beyond the window, the midnight sky beckoned. It would be a tight fit, but it was better than going through the door.
Dara climbed back down. “I’m going to need to change to my other form,” he warned. “I’ll help you through the window, but it might hurt.”
She still looked uncertain but gave a shaky nod.
He released his mortal guise, fire sweeping over his limbs. The relief was immediate. Not all his magic returned right away, but Dara could already breathe more easily. With a flick of his hand, Irtemiz’s mat floated up from the ground.
“Wait one moment.” He climbed back up on the stool and then grabbed the bars with his scorching hands. He popped the entire metal frame out of the window with little effort and then looked for a spot to set it down.
Weak-blooded fools. Had their builders proper magic, they would have had stone mages shape the window bars out of the bricks itself and had blacksmiths temper them with fiery hands. Kaveh had called the hospital a vanity project with shafit labor; small wonder they had resorted to inferior human techniques.
Movement drew Dara’s eye. A skinny length of cord that must have been held in place by the frame jerked swiftly out of sight. Odd.
He’d only just stepped back when there was an explosion outside the window.
Dara stumbled, shielding his eyes against the sudden flare of light, the stool tilting and falling with his movement, depositing him ungracefully on the ground. There was the acrid aroma of gunpowder.
Ah. The trap.
Another blast and a metal ball the size of his fist shot through the window he’d been hoping to fly through, smashing into the opposite wall and raining dust over his head. Irtemiz yelped, ducking beneath her uninjured arm.
The door to the room burst open.