Night Spinner (Night Spinner #1) - Addie Thorley Page 0,54

my breath.

“That’s right,” I sneer. “I’m just a keeper of birds. A mindless minion to be used and discarded at your convenience.”

“You can’t possibly think that! I’m risking everything to help you.”

“Only because it helps you.”

Ghoa rears back as if I slapped her. Her brown eyes glisten in the early-morning light, and her hand slowly comes to rest over her heart, as if I’m breaking it. But I refuse to grovel and scrape—like I always have before. Not if Serik’s life is at risk.

“You claim to have coordinated a relief effort for the shepherds,” I forge on, letting the damning words spin from my lips like a battle-ax, “but I’ve yet to see a single grain of rice from the empire. And you claim Temujin is the source of Ashkar’s troubles, but from where I stand, he seems to be the only one helping.”

Frost crystalizes through Ghoa’s lashes. Thick veins of ice plow into the ground where her fingers clench the dirt. “He’s gotten to you. What have you seen? I don’t know what lies Temujin’s peddling, but I promise nothing he’s doing is helpful.”

“Is Serik bound for Gazar in two days’ time?” I demand.

Whatever Ghoa was going to say dies on her lips and she stares at me. The chill of her body laps my skin like flames. “Did Temujin tell you that?”

“Is it true?”

She wets her lips, and my heart hammers faster with every second that passes, because she shouldn’t have to think about this.

“This has nothing to do with Serik,” she finally says. “What do you know of Temujin? It’s your duty to report everything you’ve learned.”

I scramble back, out of the lean-to. Away from Ghoa. Because Temujin was right.

Bleeding skies, he was right.

“How could you allow this?” I shout. “Serik is your family!”

Orbai dives from the tree with an ear-piercing screech and thumps down on my arm, her talons tense, her wings outstretched.

I reach up and stroke her chest as Ghoa emerges from the lean-to. She takes her time, adjusting the knife in her boot and brushing the leaves and snow from her breeches. “You are overreacting,” she says in a low, firm voice. “If you would stop hollering long enough to allow me to explain—”

“How can you explain sentencing your own cousin to Gazar?”

“It’s only for a short time. The abba is at his wits’ end. Serik still refuses to say his penances, he’s outright blasphemous during services, and they caught him squirreling away food in his robes, as if he were planning another escape. The abba thinks a few weeks in Gazar will give him some perspective—and, quite frankly, I agree.”

“You know that no one is sentenced to Gazar for ‘a few weeks.’”

Ghoa takes a step closer. “How about this: If you tell me what you know of Temujin, I will lessen Serik’s sentence. Suggest an alternative form of punishment.”

I shake my head. “You weren’t even going to tell me he was in prison. Why would I believe you’d follow through on this offer?”

“Because I’m your sister!” Ghoa erupts. “How could you honestly choose a deserter over me, after everything I’ve done for you? I have never doubted you. I didn’t walk away when the rest of the world washed their hands of you. Doesn’t than mean something to you? Don’t I mean something to you?”

My tongue pulses with all of the words I could say to prove my love and gratitude, but Ghoa’s claims don’t match her expression. Her jaw is set and her shoulders are rigid. Her fingertips fidget at her hip—where that flap of worn leather would be if she were wearing her armor. But it’s the glint in her eyes that chills me most—an eerie, detached resolve that reminds me of the hellish days following the death of Chinua, the former commander of the Kalima warriors. Ghoa had worn tracks into the floor of our tent from pacing and murmuring to herself. Not out of grief for our fallen leader, but obsessing over who would take his place. She was willing to do anything to claim the title, and when her turn came to prove her merit, she ordered longer and more dangerous missions into Zemya. She doubled each watch and quickened every march. Pushing, pushing, pushing to prove her proficiency.

Despite these monumental efforts, the king addressed his next correspondence to me.

Only because he’s worried you’re overextending yourself, I’d assured Ghoa. Though, secretly, I’d been delighted to see my name embossed in gold. Secretly, I’d been pressing my night spinning