Just come, I begged, adding to myself, Come and don’t hate me.
At last, Kirah stumbled from the murky passage into the clearing. “Where?” she panted.
I pointed at Dayo and said, “Please.”
The color drained from Kirah’s face. “Am have mercy,” she wailed. “An assassin infiltrated the keep? How? Why didn’t the Ray protect him?”
“Stay close to me,” Sanjeet snapped. He reached for Kirah, casting a searing glance my way. I nodded, keeping my distance. Kirah wasn’t mine anymore—demons didn’t have best friends.
Kirah coaxed Dayo’s head onto her lap, muttering prayers. Her hands trembled as they clutched the tassels of her prayer scarf. Sanjeet found Dayo’s shirt and bunched the fabric into a tourniquet.
“On three,” Sanjeet said curtly, and Kirah looked sick but nodded. He counted and pulled out the knife. As Dayo’s blood soaked the tourniquet, Kirah raised her veiled head to the moon and sang.
Blessid chants resonated in the throat, packed with power to cross miles of desert sand. Kirah’s song soared into the night, so strident I could see the notes winding around the stars. She sang lullabies to slow the rush of blood, high-pitched trills to scare away infection, basket-weaving rhymes to knit the flesh together. But her last and longest chant was a mother’s plea to a restless daughter: a song to keep a soul in its body.
No rubies for my baby’s head, no satin for her feet
No castles can I offer her, no princes dark and tall
But wandering girl, come find your bed,
sheets pressed with purple flowers
For castles have no camel’s milk; my kiss is baby’s crown.
Kirah crooned the song over and over, her homesickness pouring into each note until blue tinged the predawn sky. Sanjeet pressed his hands on Dayo’s side, repeatedly searching for weaknesses and telling Kirah where to direct her healing song. At long last, they sagged with exhaustion.
“The organs are intact again,” Sanjeet said. “Still weak, but getting stronger. He needs rest, lots of it. But you pulled him out of danger, Kirah.” He clapped her shoulder, his eyes glistening. “Thank you.”
“We’ll have to carry him back to the keep,” she said hoarsely. “We have to be careful, but between the three of us—”
“She will not touch him,” snapped Sanjeet.
“Why not?” Kirah blinked, still disoriented from hours of chanting. She glanced at me, then up at the tree. “What happened here? Tar, were you having a dalliance with Dayo? But I thought you liked …” She trailed off, noticing the tension between me and Sanjeet. “Great Am. Jeet … did you stab Dayo because … because you were jealous?”
“Jealous?” Sanjeet barked a laugh, and the sound pierced my stomach like a spear. “What for? The love of a monster?”
“Tell me what’s going on right now,” Kirah demanded. “Don’t make me call the others—”
“I tried to kill Dayo,” I said.
For the first time, Kirah noticed Sanjeet’s dry, clean hands and my shaking, bloody ones. She took in the tears and mucus streaking my face. “You didn’t,” she said. “You couldn’t.”
I said nothing.
“You’re scaring me, Tar. This isn’t funny. Am’s Story, say something—”
“You should tie me up.” I held out my wrists. “The cellar beneath the keep kitchens has a lock; put me there. Tell the others I’m sick. That I need to be quarantined. When it’s properly morning, I’ll have a guard smuggle me to the nearest lodestone port. I’ll go … somewhere far. A place I can never hurt him again.”
Kirah’s face contorted with horror.
“I’m half-ehru, Kirah.” The words came out as mangled as Enitawa’s branches. “Mother had three wishes; she gave one to me. I had to obey. I’ve resisted all this time, but she found me and I had to give in …” I shook my head. I sounded like a madwoman. But I had to make her understand. I couldn’t lose her, not Kirah.
And as for Sanjeet—
The phantom of his lips brushed against mine. How could that same mouth call me monster?
“I can explain,” I said, stretching out my hands again. “Please. Let me show you.”
Both of them were still. Sanjeet’s jaw hardened, and he placed a protective arm around Kirah.
“If we touch you, you could steal our memories,” he said. “Like you used to steal mine in the Children’s Palace.”
For a moment I floated above my body, watching the scene from above. The Crown Prince of Aritsar, barely breathing. Sanjeet and Kirah huddled together, shielding Dayo from the demon. The girl sniveling and stammering excuses. Even now, she was pretending to love them. Pretending to be sorry, to