Descendant of the Crane(50)

But the cut could have been worse. The mercenary had given everything to that swing. He’d expected Hesina to fall. He was still riding the momentum when she raised her forearm in the move Sanjing had helped her perfect. Recognition flared through the man’s eyes, and he fought to regain his center.

She cut to the right before he could.

Her blade took to him like a wire through clay. His blood splattered her cheek, but it was his gasp that made Hesina stumble. She watched, paralyzed, as he clutched his arm, ropes of scarlet gushing through his fingers.

His roar snapped her out of her daze. It was primal and raw, and when he ran at her, sword held high, she knew better than to meet him. She dropped and rolled and rose—valiant for all of a second before someone crushed her back down.

Hesina had had enough. She bucked her head back, and something clicked. Someone oofed. The weight shifted, and Hesina wormed free. She grabbed her attacker by the neck and was midway through grinding his face into the sand when she noticed the twine securing his hair at the nape.

“Stay down,” coughed Akira as throwing stars volleyed overhead.

He helped her to her feet once the danger passed. “Turns out sand doesn’t taste half bad.” Then he whirled behind her and hefted his rod. “Not that I’d like to try it again.”

He sounded fine. He seemed fine, apart from the sand burns she’d given him. Had the wine not been poisoned?

No time for questions or apologies. The next wave of attacks bore down. Together, they parried and slashed. Akira filled in her openings. Hesina covered his back. Their movements were one, an alliance of steel and wood, and when it broke, it wasn’t because of a mercenary.

It was because Akira had come to blows with their very own scout.

“What are you doing?” snapped the scout as the mercenary she’d been fighting slipped away.

“That one’s on our side,” said Akira.

Hesina scanned the fighters in puzzlement. “That one” had already moved on to his next opponent—one of Hesina’s own guards. The guard swung. “That one” ducked, letting the sword befall the oblivious mercenary behind him while he dashed on, a raven-black braid whipping out from his hood.

Her hood.

Before Hesina had a chance to draw a breath, Mei blurred between a two-on-one fight, slashed the kneecaps of both mercenaries, and sidled up beside her queen.

“You came,” Hesina said, her shock fizzing to somewhat inappropriate elation.

Mei wiped her knife clean. “It seemed like my presence might be appreciated. Do you have a plan?”

She did. She had. A plan contingent on Sanjing answering her call.

But she could do without him. “No. Just fight.”

With a curt nod, Mei set to work. The tide of the fight turned with her help. Eight standing mercenaries became seven, seven became five, five became four.

Three.

Two.

Then one. Akira and Mei finished him with a rod between the legs and a knife handle to the skull.

Sweat-soaked and blood-soaked, Hesina lowered her sword. Her entourage followed in suit and faced the Crown Prince with her. They weren’t a pretty sight, but the same could have been said for the fallen mercenaries. All were bruised and bloody.

And none, not a single one, had burst into flames.

Adrenaline addled Hesina’s mind. Slowly, too slowly, she realized that the mercenaries weren’t responsible for the trick with the moving sand. Neither were the children, who’d barely managed to summon dew. But then, who was?

“Impressive,” said the prince, smiling even as his forces moaned on the ground. “But you have not won.”

At his beckon, one of his advisors stepped forward. She removed her screened hat, revealing a face that was young and smooth and—to Hesina’s surprise—oval, hinting at Yan blood. What was a Yan doing on Kendi’a’s side?

As if in answer, the sand beneath Hesina fell away.

A shout tore the air as she plummeted to her calves. It wasn’t hers. Hesina was too stricken by that oval face watching her sink.

She was the culprit behind the vanishing villages, the reason Yan was on the brink of war. The prince murmured something into her ear and she responded, raising both hands.

Hesina and her guards sank deeper. Sand encircled her hips, her chest, her limbs.

Persuasion was futile, but so was everything else. “Don’t do this!”

The sooth’s eyes flickered open to a blank, uncomprehending stare. Hesina faltered. The girl couldn’t understand her. She was of Yan descent, but she’d never known her motherland or its tongue.

Because of your ancestors, growled the monster in her gut. Because of you.

“Dakan.”

Akira’s voice silenced the monster’s. Hesina stared as he repeated the strange word. “Dakan.”

She didn’t know what it meant, but she understood it by its texture and weight. It was a mirror to her heart, a translation of her intent, and it reflected courage back into her. “Don’t listen to your prince. Join us!”

“Dakansan Vrakan uz. Siubtehn.”

The prince laid a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Tulsan, cricholon uz. Senyn cricholon.” Then, in the common tongue, with his eyes on Hesina: “Join them, and they will kill you after they use you…”

Sand coiled around her neck.

“Like their eleven killed your ancestors after using them.”