Crown of Cinders (Imdalind #7)(23)

I wished I had a pail. Then I could use it as a helmet. I could feel every jagged edge of rock against the soft tissue in my arms and back. Wood and stone hit my face and head with the strength of a battering ram. And while I rolled, I hissed and gasped in an attempt to break free from the bind Risha had placed over me as her malicious laugh echoed throughout the fog. She was quite pleased with herself.

“We’ve won, Míra!” Risha said, running right up to me and placing her foot square on my rib cage, posing beside me like a big game hunter with a new kill. “I have defeated him, and it was glorious!”

Míra’s dark, little laugh resonated over the rubble and fog as she ran up to us like a bullet, her arms stretched out like a plane, the frayed floral shirt clutched securely in her fist.

“We win! We win!” she said, skipping and jumping, her hair waving away the smoke behind her.

Even oddly construed here on the ground, a smile seeped across my face. It was such an odd occasion to get anything more than a sneer and a glare out of that little girl.

“Very funny,” I grumbled, still trying to shift underneath the lock that Risha had pinned me with, still unable to move more than an inch.

Perfect. I was a lion down for the kill, pranced around by Míra. And to make matters worse, Jaromir joined her dancing and prancing, screaming “We win” right alongside his sister.

“Hey!” I yelled, my voice distorted, my cheek smashed uncomfortably against a large bit of stone. “You’re on my team, Jaromir!”

“Not anymore!” The boy laughed with his sister as they danced and played, stone and wood crunching around me in an odd orchestra.

“Jaromir knows whose side is the winning one, Ryland,” Risha teased as she stepped down from my sore and bruised torso, releasing the magic with the softest touch of her fingers against my face.

My stomach swooped and spun at the contact.

“He defected?” I was aghast, my eyes wide as I sat up to face the treacherous child.

He didn’t even seem affected by the strength of my glare. He laughed harder, his face squishing oddly due to the large kiss on his cheek as he continued dancing behind his sister’s long, blonde curls.

“Yeah, he didn’t want to lose, I guess,” Risha said, sitting down beside me and trying her best to find a clean bit of rubble to avoid soiling her long skinny jeans.

I wanted to tell her it was hopeless yet couldn’t bring myself to do it.

“You sent him away, right toward Míra, and we didn’t even have to bribe him.”

“Ah …” Realization dawned on me more quickly than it normally did. “It was a rookie mistake.”

“They are a tad bit loyal to each other.” Risha lifted her thumb and forefinger, as if to display the depth of that loyalty. Instead, she framed the children who were still dancing and playing and laughing.

“Let’s hope that loyalty can switch in other ways before it’s too late.” I tensed. I had spoken out of turn, and I knew it. Risha did, too.

Her back straightened as much as mine had. It was a very clear rule that we didn’t discuss everything within earshot of the twins. Although I was confident they were both preoccupied enough that neither heard, I could never be certain with them. They didn’t miss much.

If I had thought Jaromir was attentive, it was nothing compared to Míra.

“Patience, Ry,” Risha sighed, her focus still on the kids. “I think we are closer than we were a few days ago. She hasn’t tried to kill you in the last few days, so that’s a step in the right direction.”

“Well, it’s a good thing I can fight back. Otherwise, I might be short an arm by now. Maybe I deserved it. I am dangerous.” I laughed, and Risha did, too. It wasn’t much of a joke, not with the way Míra looked at me. You would think I had one eye and three heads or something.

Or maybe you look like me.

The voice came without warning, the unwanted depth rippling inside me like a stab wound, and I recoiled. I hadn’t heard the haunted voice blossom from inside of me for days. Almost a week, in fact. I hadn’t put words to it, but the hope was there that I was free of it forever. Yet, here he was again, shattering my desire and infecting my mind with a poison that burned within me like acid.

“Ignore it,” Risha said without looking at me, extending her hand to wrap around mine, the silent vow of support as wanted as the way her touch made my insides tango.

“I wish I could,” I said more to myself than to her. After all, the voice was right; it was the reason Míra was afraid of me. It was also the reason I was here.

I carried the image of my father, and she had lived under his rule for months. From what Joclyn’s prescience had shown her, Míra had lived through the same hell as I had. She had lived with the same violence and threats. She had lived through the same brainwashing nightmare.

No one in this camp would understand that. No one in this camp would know how to face that.

No matter how my eyes and curls terrified her, I was the only one who could understand what she had gone through and help her overcome it.

I guessed the dark, broken piece of my subconscious was good for something besides the crazies.

“You can, and you will,” Risha reassured me, her thumb gentle as she ran it over my knuckles. It took everything in me to restrain the shiver that moved up my spine at the touch, my stomach flopping around like a dead fish. “I know you can,” she repeated, her voice soft.