The Last Namsara (Iskari #1)(25)

“Is there a fight scheduled?”

Maya nodded.

Her brother would be there. Asha needed to tell him she’d done what he asked. And then, at last, she could return to hunting Kozu.

She took the blue bundle. “Show me the spring.”

At the opposite end of the city, near the south gate, sat the pit. Built during Asha’s grandmother’s reign, the walls of the arena rose up like jagged teeth. Its front entrance gaped open like a mouth, and—as usual—draksors stood just outside, protesting the fights. Just a few months ago, a protest got so out of hand, the soldats couldn’t control it and the fight had to be canceled.

Now, the protesters threw rocks at the soldats. They shouted in the faces of the attendees. By the time Asha arrived, more than half of the protesting draksors were clapped in irons. One of them glared at Asha as he was hauled off by a soldat.

Draksors like these, those who thought the skral should go free, would be enraged if they knew Asha was hunting Kozu for her father. They believed the old ways should be returned to, not snuffed out. They were no better than scrublanders.

But everyone knew what would happen if the skral were free: They would turn on their former masters and finish what they had come to do during Asha’s grandmother’s reign. They would take Firgaard for themselves.

These draksors were fools if they thought any different.

Inside the arena, Asha stuck out like a scrublander, dressed as she was in a simple blue kaftan, absent of beading or embroidery and years out of fashion. Worse than the kaftan, though, was her lack of armor and weapons. Asha had left both her slayers in the temple. She’d go back for them later.

Asha moved deeper into the arena, surrounded by roars of applause. It stank like too many men standing too close together. The arena bowled out and upward, half full of draksors watching matches play out in the pit below.

But news of the Iskari’s arrival traveled faster than a windstorm and soon the roars turned to nervous whispers. The clapping hands became clenched fists. As everyone turned to look at her, the crowd dispersed, not wanting to be anywhere near the girl who’d called down dragonfire on their homes and stolen the lives of their loved ones.

“Hey,” came a voice at her shoulder. Asha looked up into her cousin’s face. Safire dutifully kept her gaze on the ground at their feet, littered with olive pits and pistachio shells. The hood of her new mantle hid her face, helping her blend in. “Where have you been? We were worried.”

“I’m fine,” Asha said as they passed cages full of criminal slaves behind bars, waiting to be sent down to the pit. She wondered what their crimes were. “Where’s Dax?”

Safire nodded to the crimson canopy at the top of the arena. The pit was ringed with benches, like the ripple made by a stone dropped into a pool, and the dragon king’s tent rose high above these ripples. It had the clearest view of the fighting down below.

They made their way toward it, up the sloping path, away from the slave cages. When they were surrounded by cheering draksors on all sides, Safire stepped in close, keeping her voice low, her mouth near Asha’s ear.

“There’s a rumor going around.” Safire cast quick glances around them, checking for eavesdroppers. “People are saying someone broke into Jarek’s home, attacked him, and made off with one of his slaves.”

A prickling fear spread across Asha’s skin.

She thought of her brother, pinned to a brightly woven rug in one of the palace salons. Remembered Jarek’s thick hands around his throat and the way Dax’s legs kicked as he fought for breath.

Jarek didn’t like people taking his things.

Asha’s eyes fixed on the tent up ahead. Its red silk walls billowed, straining against the wind. All she had to do was give Dax the information, and then she could leave.

More spectators parted as the two cousins approached the crimson canopy. Asha stepped into the tent while Safire stayed behind.

Her father sat in a gilt throne. He nodded to Asha as she entered, a question in his eyes. Why aren’t you hunting?

I’m trying, she wanted to tell him. Instead, she looked to Dax, sitting with his scrublander near the front of the canopy. Roa wore that blue sandskarf wrapped loosely around her shoulders and head. In the desert, sandskarves were worn to protect from the wind and dust, the cold and heat.

Asha watched the way Dax leaned toward the girl, his hand gripping the bench behind her. He kept glancing at her, then away, chewing his lip, bouncing his knee, frowning hard.

When it came to girls, Dax was usually all confidence and swagger. He knew the right things to say. Things that would make a girl glow, then pine for him as she fell asleep at night.

But this . . . this was something else.

Roa seemed tense. Her back was rigid and her hands were gripped firmly in her lap, as if she were not enjoying herself. She didn’t even seem to notice Dax. Instead, she stared straight ahead, out over the pit, her white hawk perching on a leather patch on her shoulder. Like she was thinking of a hundred things other than the boy at her side.

Perhaps plotting to kill all of Firgaard in its sleep, thought Asha.

It was dangerous, bringing her here. So close to the king.

Suddenly, someone stepped in front of Asha, blocking Dax and Roa from view.

She looked up into the face of her betrothed.

Glossy hair. Strong, severe jaw. Freshly shaved cheeks. The only thing out of place was the black bruise blooming across his temple.