The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire, #1)(86)

I was doing it too. I’d used a shard to power the command I’d placed in Uphilia. I’d left Numeen’s shard in Bayan’s keeping. I’d failed to do anything to help Bayan when he’d needed it the most. I hadn’t had a choice – or I’d thought I hadn’t. Numeen was risking everything to help me, including his family. And I hadn’t been willing to take Numeen’s shard from Bayan and risk discovery.

Perhaps it wasn’t Bayan who was so like Father, but me.

“I was afraid,” I blurted out before I could stop myself. “Your shard. It’s in the keeping of my father’s foster-son. If he found I’d taken it, he could tell my father.”

Numeen looked at me in the way he might a child who’d disappointed him. “But you know where it is.”

“Yes.” I dropped my gaze to the floor and felt my heart follow. What would he do to me now?

He didn’t admonish me or shout. His sandaled feet shifted on the floor of his workshop. “You should go before your father finds his key missing.”

My father, whom they all feared. It kept me in line. It kept Bayan in line. It kept all the citizens of the Empire in line.

I remembered the fear I saw in his eyes each time we sat alone in the dining room together and he questioned me. All the time he spent on his experiments, isolated from the other islands. The servants he constantly watched.

He ruled by fear, and was ruled by it.

As desperately as I yearned for his approval, as desperately as I yearned for a kind word from him, I didn’t want to be like him. I wouldn’t be ruled by fear.

“The lie I told you . . . it’s something my father would have done.” I shook my head as though I could shake myself free of the guilt. But guilt was there to remind me of when I misstepped. The only thing I could do now was to make amends. I met Numeen’s gaze. “I won’t be like him. The next time I come here, I will bring your shard, and the shards of all your family – no matter the risk to myself. I’ll find other ways to protect the people of the Empire. I swear it, upon the sky, the stars and the Endless Sea itself.”

Behind him, the fire crackled, as if sealing my promise with its heat. Numeen only put a hand to his chest and then bowed. “Wind in your sails, Emperor.”

I ran back to the walls of the palace, my feet as light as my heart.

I’d made it back in time. Bing Tai only glanced at me from his spot on my father’s rug, and I was able to slip out the door without anyone noticing. I took the long way back to my room, walking by Bayan’s room as I’d done several times over the past days.

Father wouldn’t answer questions about Bayan except to say he was resting. But there were no signs of Bayan in the palace, and his door remained locked.

I could hear Mauga in his room, grunting as he settled down for the night. A few doors down, I stopped outside of Bayan’s room. I stepped softly to the door and pressed my ear to it, just to check one more time.

Nothing.

“Are you spying on me?”

My heart leapt into my throat. I whirled to see Bayan – whole and well, standing outside his room with arms crossed.

He wasn’t dead, and somehow this surprised me. I threw my arms around his neck, relief making me reckless. “You’ve recovered!”

Bayan stiffened. He held his arms out to the side as if unsure what to do with them. “I had a fever,” he said. “It was hardly the bog cough. What’s wrong with you?”

I drew back, all the hairs on my arms prickling. “I thought you were dead. Bayan . . .” I trailed off, unsure if I should keep calling him that. Was this even still Bayan?

He rolled his eyes. “A little bit dramatic, don’t you think?”

Well, he still had the attitude. “It wasn’t just a fever, and you can’t convince me that it was. You were practically melting. Bayan; your skin was peeling away from your eyes!”

He stared at me, eyes narrowed. “Is this some sort of trick? Are you trying to spy on me or not?”

I stared back at him. It was like seeing a ghost – because this wasn’t the Bayan I knew from a few days earlier. That Bayan had softened to me, had come to me for help. This was the Bayan where nothing had changed between us. “You don’t remember.”

He huffed out a derisive breath. “I’m not the one who can’t remember, remember? I recovered my memories. You’re the one still bereft.”

“I’ve remembered some things. I earned another key. Do you remember that?”

Bayan merely rolled his eyes. Part of me remembered why I’d hated him for so long, but another part knew that this was merely the crust of Bayan, a brittle shell that covered dark insecurities. “One more key – such an accomplishment! Will you move? You’re in my way.”

“What did he do to you?” I wasn’t sure what else to say. “Was it . . . was it the memory machine?”

For the first time since I’d seen him again, Bayan’s sneer faded away. “What do you mean?”

I wasn’t sure how much to tell him or what to say. If this was Bayan from earlier – I couldn’t trust him. He’d take whatever I said to Father, just to curry more favor. But he couldn’t be that different from the Bayan who had shown me the cloud juniper. I took a chance. “You came to my room a few nights ago. You were . . . sick. Very sick. You wanted me to hide you, but my father came and took you away. I haven’t seen you since.”