“W
hat do you want?” Max demanded.
Nura gave him an icy smile. “May I come in?” “If I say no, are you just going to wander in anyway?
Because that seems to be how these things go around here.”
“Yes, probably.”
“You’re that determined to lecture me?”
A low laugh unfurled from her breath. “Don’t be so self-important, Max. I’m not here to see you.”
I tried not to look surprised. They both turned to me — Nura with her mouth twisted into a little unreadable smirk, and Max with a hard glint in his eye that echoed of nervousness.
“Why?” he barked.
“Let me in and you’ll find out.” Max hesitated, then stepped aside.
Nura strode across the room and slid into the chair near me. She was wearing a variation of the same uniform she donned every time I saw her — the long, white jacket buttoned all the way up to her throat, moon insignias on her lapel and across her back. I was once again struck by how graceful and deliberate her movements were, as if every muscle worked in perfect unison, even in the tiny expressions of her face. She was actually quite beautiful. As
she moved to sit down, her white braids fell over one shoulder, rippling light from the windows across her face in a momentary softness. Then she settled and that glimmer was replaced once again with steel.
“Is your training going well?” she asked.
“Very well.” I would have given her that reply regardless, but I couldn’t help but glance at Max as I answered — pleased I didn’t have to lie.
“Good. I’ve come because the Orders request your help.”
I blinked, refusing to allow myself to look surprised even though a wild hope leapt to my skin. This had to be good… didn’t it?
“For what?”
“Lord Savoi’s son in Tairn is refusing to abdicate power, even though his family has been removed from leadership. It’s merely a tantrum. But we need bodies to march upon the city gates and scare him out of his hideout, and I would like for you to join. It will not turn to bloodshed. He simply needs to be scared.”
“The Guard doesn’t have enough people to do this as is?” Max cut in. “One Fragmented girl will make all the difference?”
“One Fragmented girl and one ill-tempered, moderately famous Solarie, if you’re cooperative.”
She said the word “cooperative” so drily that it cracked and scattered across the floor.
“But again, you’re too self-important,” she went on. “We’re sending letters to many people in the area, since the Guard is preoccupied in Vernaya.”
“The war hasn’t even started yet and you’re already overtaxed?” Max needled. “And what happened to the Orders being politically neutral? Or have you given up that farce now that one of your own is driving this mess?”
But I let Max’s ranting fall into the background, watching Nura, thinking.
I would take any opportunity presented to me. I couldn’t afford not to. But I didn’t give up anything for free.
“I will go,” I said.
Max, who had been mid-complaint, snapped his mouth shut.
“I thought you would seize the opportunity,” Nura said, looking pleased.
“I will go,” I repeated, “if Zeryth Aldris will bring my friend back to Ara with him when he leaves Threll.”
I spoke smoothly, confidently, even though I felt just like I had when I was a little girl demanding my freedom from Esmaris with my fifty sad silver pieces. I’m sure my presence at this city was nothing of value to them. But if it was, they wouldn’t get it without giving me something in return. Not when there were so many things I still needed.
I carefully avoided Max’s gaze, though I could feel it searing a charred hole in the center of my forehead — stark contrast to Nura’s, glassy ice that glistened with faint sheen of amusement.
“Members of the Orders need to follow directives without the luxury of conditions,” she said.
“Firstly, that does not seem to be true.” I gestured to Max. “Secondly, you made very clear that I am not member of the Orders. Not yet.”
Nura’s eyes betrayed silent laughter. “Oh, Max. She really has learned a lot from you, hasn’t she?” Then, to me, “Everyone in this room knows that you need us more than we need you. And yet, if I understand you correctly, you’re asking me to inconvenience one of our most important members on one of our most important missions for you?”
“You ask for my help, so I ask for yours.” I leaned forward. Max’s words still pounded in my ears. I would never leave him there. Well, I wouldn’t either. Never. “And this is not for me. This is for decency. You already denied thousands of people help. You said it was too much. Now I
ask for one person. Is that still too much? Or are the Orders less powerful than they say to be?”
Silence. I half expected Nura to look angry, but she didn’t. Instead, she peered at me with one shallow wrinkle of thought between her eyebrows, a faint smirk tightening one corner of her mouth.
“Fine. Give me a name and we’ll see what Zeryth can do.”
My heart lifted.
“And in return,” Nura went on, “I expect to see you tomorrow at the gates of Tairn. Is this a deal?”
I did not hesitate. “Yes.”
Max stood there in rare, conspicuous silence.
“Your friend is lucky to have you.” Nura crossed her arms, tilted her chin thoughtfully. “Be careful, though, Tisaanah. It’s easy to manipulate people who want one thing more than anything else.”
I nodded solemnly as if this were new information, happy to be underestimated. But really, I knew this better than anyone. I just didn’t have the luxury of choices.
 |
The sun beat down on the back of my neck as I squinted at the cottage. Beside me, Miraselle cooed over some peonies, gently stroking the petals between her fingers. I had no idea where she went when she wasn’t wandering around Max’s garden, but she always seemed to materialize whenever I was outside alone. This suited me fine—odd as she was, I liked Miraselle. She was easy to be around and one of the few people who didn’t make me painfully aware of my accent, because her vocabulary was even smaller than my own.
Shortly after I made my agreement with Nura, she had turned to Max—who had been unusually quiet—and asked to speak with him alone. It was an obvious signal for me to leave, so I retreated to the gardens to practice on my own.
Still, I kept glancing at the house as the minutes ticked by. My curiosity gnawed at me.
Eventually, they emerged. Nura only waved to me from a distance before whisking herself away, which I chose not to take as an insult. Max didn’t look at her before striding toward me.
Miraselle jumped to her feet. “Good morning, Max! Isn’t it a beautiful day?”
“What. The hell. Were you thinking?” Max snapped, turning his face toward me with a set jaw, his words sizzling between clenched teeth.
“What was I thinking?” I almost laughed. “What else was I supposed to do?”
“That’s not how this works. You think you won something in there?”
“No,” I said. “Not entirely. But I had to try.”
Miraselle edged closer, her beautiful face contorted with exaggerated concern. The woman had no sense of personal space. “Max, why are you so upset?”
Max held up his hands, gently pushing her away. “Miraselle—” he snapped, then caught himself, letting out a breath. “Three steps, please. That’s all I ask. Three steps of space.”
Miraselle took one, two, three steps backward. “What would you suggest I do?” I asked.
“Say no. That’s what I’d suggest.”
“I can’t do that.”
“You don’t make deals with the Orders. Never. And it’s not even a Blood Pact or anything that would stop Nura from going back on her word. Not that she even gave you her word. She’ll try.” He scoffed. “Please.”
I regarded Max quietly. His reaction made me nervous, but his words weren’t new. I knew there were no guarantees. I had noticed Nura’s distinct lack of promises. I knew I had only secured Serel a slim chance, and nothing more.
But it was something. It was all I had.
“My friend needs a chance,” I said. “I have no other option. Even if Nura had said no, I would still have agreed.”
I couldn’t quite interpret the look Max gave me at that. “You shouldn’t.”
“I need to impress them. You know this.” I flinched as Miraselle’s hands began combing through my hair, and I had to resist the urge to swat her fingers away.
“Miraselle—” Max’s voice sounded strained as he struggled not to snap at her. “Give us a minute.”
Miraselle looked briefly hurt before wandering back into the rose bushes.
“What’s a Blood Pact?” I asked once she was gone.
“A deal sealed in magic so neither party can break the terms.”
“What happens if they do?”
“They can’t.”
“But what if—”
“Tisaanah, that’s beside the point. You can’t trust them. They will use you.”
I was using them too. And besides, what possible use could I be to the Orders, organizations filled with the world’s most powerful wielders? “For what?”
“I don’t know yet.” Max looked at me, his strange eyes bright beneath a furrowed brow, his mouth twisted in thought, shoulders tense. His concern settled heavily in my stomach.
“I can do this,” I said quietly.
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” He took a deep breath, his nostrils flaring as he exhaled. “I hoped I’d never find myself on a battlefield again.”
I blinked at him, surprised. “She said you must go too?”
Max snorted. “Nura? She can try and see how far that gets her. But if you’re going, then I’m going.”
“You—”
“I’m not letting you go out there alone, Tisaanah.”
The realization—that my goal and the sacrifices I made for it were no longer mine alone—hit me so suddenly that I felt myself swaying beneath this new responsibility. I looked at Max in silence, lips parted, groping for words and finding none.
I had been nervous about marching on Tairn, but only in a resigned, distant way. Now something sharper pierced my heart as I realized that, intentionally or not, I was pulling Max back into everything he had fought so hard to escape.
“You don’t have to.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I didn’t graduate from the Zeryth Adris school of shitty friendship.”
“Max—”
“Not a discussion.”
Max continued to regard me with that contemplative stare, and I just stared back, two realizations dawning on me.
The first was that I wasn’t going to talk him out of this.
The second, which hit me harder, was that something had shifted in the nature of our relationship, and I had simply failed to notice. But I understood with a resolve that settled deeply in my chest that I had been given something precious in this fragile, tentative friendship. I closed my fingers around that delicate gift and drew it close.
“Thank you,” I said, and Max nodded. One look at his distant expression, and I knew he was already on that battlefield.
