The Glass Arrow(45)

And then I know what I must do.

There is one other way to leave the Garden. Not Promised. Not dead. But marked. With a scar on my cheek. They’ll expect me to make a living in the Black Lanes, but I won’t do that. I can be strong like my ma. I can pass through the city gates and be reunited with my family before the next auction.

I must fail the medical inspection. And I must do so before the mayor’s brother has a chance to lay his hands on me. Maybe it’s not what I wanted, not now anyway, but at least I’ll get to choose who touches me, and when.

Silently, I stand, telling Brax to stay while I creep around the side of the building. Daphne’s sleeping on the bedroll, covering herself with all four of the blankets meant to be shared between us. I can see her chest rise and fall. Inside, the Watcher has laid down to sleep too.

I tiptoe back around the plaster wall, to the hidden place behind the office, and pick a small pebble off the ground. Then, with all my might, I heave it in the direction of the barn. It plunks off one of the paddock fences. A horse snorts and stamps his feet.

And then I sit, and wait for Kiran.





CHAPTER 11

KIRAN TAKES FOREVER.

Or maybe time has just stopped since I made my decision. Either way, I’m pacing behind the Watcher office, as far as my tether will let me, thinking that he’s not going to come at all, and why would he after I screwed up his escape, and sent him away, and told him such stupid, stupid stories … when he finally appears in the back exit of the barn.

His shirt glows pale yellow in the lights from the rec yard fence, and his hair is tousled. There’s something soft about the way he looks from this distance. Something not quite real. The edges of him should be sharp against the dark behind him, but they’re not. They shimmer, as though he’s a mirage. Like the dark can’t touch him, no matter how hard it tries.

Then he starts walking towards me, stride long and purposeful, and I see the way the horses flick their ears and stomp their hooves and that golden, shining feeling inside of me gets eaten up by the worries. He hesitates, like always, just before the stream, and when he’s sure the Watcher’s not watching, he leaps over. From the look on his face, I can tell that there’s something he wants to tell me, and it doesn’t look good.

For the first time, I’m glad he can’t talk.

I stand my ground and tell myself the same thing I’m always telling myself: This is Kiran. There’s nothing to be scared of.

Just before he reaches me he stops short. His mouth falls open in surprise. Very slowly, one hand reaches forward to brush aside my hair, and my neck tingles, because the curls feel foreign to my sensitive skin when he moves them.

His face falls. His hand falls. He’s seen the missing earring and knows what that means.

“The mayor’s son,” I tell him, the shame weighing down my words. “A boy.”

Kiran watches me intently, his gaze clinging to my mouth as I talk. A scowl etches deep lines between his brows. There’s too much knowing in his eyes.

I can’t do this.

I have to do this.

It will be quick, I tell myself. Like pulling out my earring. Like taking a punch. Laying down with Kiran will mean nothing. But it already hurts in my soul, stretching my skin too thin, like I’m made of glass and he can see everything, all of it. I don’t want to feel these things. I just want to do this and be done with it.

“Brax, go home,” I say. The wolf’s jaw snaps shut, and he looks up at me. “Home,” I stress, and point to the sewer. Brax whines like a child having a tantrum, then stalks away, boney shoulders rolling beneath his gray fur. He glances back once, and I feel the judgment in his stare, thicker than my own. As soon as he is gone panic spikes in my chest. I lift my chin to Kiran as bravely as I can.

“My thanks for what you did today,” I say to him. “I know what it might have cost you.”

I think of the bodies carried down from the stage by the Watchers just before the auction and shiver. One of them could have been Kiran.

I tell myself I never asked for his help. Not until now.

“There’s another way, you know,” I say, unable to look him straight in the eye.

He’s still watching; I can feel his gaze on me and wish these last moments before I ruin this—whatever it is—would last a little longer.

I take a jerky step forward, noticing how much taller he always seems up close. We’re just inches away now, and the smell of horsehair and leather dusts his skin. I can see each piece of golden hair that’s matted behind his ears. And somewhere deep inside of me I know that I will never again breathe in the scent of leather or see the sun’s bright rays and not think of Kiran.

His body becomes very still, his kiran-stone eyes seeking mine. And suddenly I don’t know. This seemed so easily achievable before. But now it seems wrong. I can’t be Salma. I can’t lie down with some boy on the outskirts of town and then say good-bye, maybe forever. And that would be exactly what would happen. If I lie down with Kiran, I will be marked sometime tomorrow, turned loose by nightfall, and out the city gates before the sunrise.

I will never see him again.

Something begins to twist inside of me, and I knead my stomach absently, trying to force it down. I’m staring at his bare feet and my bare feet, so close they could touch even if I just shifted my balance. I think about the night he touched the scar on my leg. How strange and soft that felt. And I think that maybe it might not be so terrible if he touched me again, just like that.