face. Wrap my arms around him. Find a compromise that suits us both. It will kill me to watch him walk away again.
“Enebish? Where are you going?” Inkar tries to catch my arm, but I wiggle free.
“Go on without me. I need to—”
Serik darts around the corner and I barrel after him, leaving my half-formed explanation hanging in the air.
He races around one corner, then another, and I beg my stinging leg to move faster. It’s all I can do to keep sight of his cloak as he slips through another intersection and down a darkened street. Bright fiddle music trills from a shabby inn halfway down the block, and he scurries toward it. Dozens of signs plaster the windows, advertising fiddle duels and low-stakes games of nik. I smile as Serik’s shadow slips inside. It’s exactly the sort of place he’d hide out.
Inkar and the boys are chasing me. Gaining on me. Their footsteps pound the cobbles and they bark my name in hushed, angry voices. I’m being reckless. I know that. But I keep running anyway. I don’t even stop to consider how all thoughts of Temujin vanished the moment I saw Serik. I know only that the most primal, pulsing part of me insists I reach him. Now.
My bad leg gives out on the final step and I crash face-first through the inn’s double doors. Temujin bursts in on my heels, cursing and panting. “What are you doing?” He leans over to help me up, but we both freeze because the common room is empty. And dark. Lit only by a pale shaft of moonlight streaming through the window.
I had expected a roaring hearth fire and tables filled with rowdy gamblers. Perhaps a cluster of fiddlers sawing away in the corner. But a mouse nibbling the leg of a chair is the only sign of life.
Unease creeps down my spine as I gape around the room. The inn clearly isn’t abandoned. The bar is freshly oiled and the benches are free of dust. The yeasty smell of ale hangs thick in the air. It’s decidedly closed, though strangely, the high-pitched strings play on—a phantom tune drifting down from the upper floors.
Chanar and Inkar jog up and lean against the door frame. “Have you lost your mind?” Chanar wheezes at me.
“Keep an eye on the street.” Temujin sends them out with a wave of his arm. “Make sure we haven’t been followed. And you—” He turns back to me, but I’m already picking my way through the tables and chairs.
“Serik!” I whisper-shout. He has to be here. I saw him slip inside. This must be some sort of safe house. “It’s me!”
“Keep your voice down,” Temujin growls. “He’s gone. I know that’s hard to accept, but you can’t go chasing every passerby who bears the slightest resemblance. It’s dangerous.” He takes my arm and tugs me toward the door.
“But—” I cast around in desperation.
“Let him go,” Temujin says again. “He’s with the First Gods now.” His voice is gentle, but his grip is uncomfortably tight. He pulls me back another step. We’re nearly to the door when fabric rustles behind us.
“Show yourself!” Temujin’s voice is a vicious snarl, and he pulls a hidden dagger from his belt.
Slowly, a hooded figure steps away from the far wall. Blood thunders in my ears as they inch forward, one excruciating step after another, until the dim patch of moonlight finally illuminates the golden hem of their cloak.
I sag against the nearest table. “Serik! Why didn’t you answer before?”
“How is he alive?” Temujin demands.
Serik continues forward without speaking, gliding between the tables like a ghost.
“Serik?” My voice is a faint, rattling whisper and I take an instinctive step back.
The door slams shut behind us.
“Trap!” Temujin shouts as I shriek and stumble into a stool.
Out on the street, Chanar and Inkar throw themselves against the door, but the iron bolt clangs into place, locking them out.
And sealing us in.
Shadows shimmer to life along the walls. Tall, hulking shadows that smell of leather oil and creak ever so slightly.
Lamellar armor.
Cold sweat drips between my shoulder blades as the warriors edge toward us. Slow and deliberate, like spiders stalking their prey. One familiar face after the next, until the whole of the Kalima surrounds us.
Serik enters the circle last, clapping slowly.
Temujin’s breath comes in bursts and he turns to gape at me. “Did you help him escape and burn the supply shack? I knew he would betray us!”
“Serik wouldn’t betray me.”
“Then who, pray tell, is