We Hunt the Flame (Sands of Arawiya #1)(47)

Zafira understood, now, where that courage had come from. Had she been given a taste of this freedom, this power, then she, too, would have fought her way through the Arz. There was sea spray on her tongue, wind in her hair, and sun on her skin.

Yet the longer she stared at the swelling waves, the more she thought of Lana and Yasmine, and the harder it became to breathe. Her stomach reeled as it did during her hunts in the Arz, when her distance from her family made her worry for them more than herself. Because if she were with them, they’d be safe. If she were with them, she would know what was happening.

That feeling increased tenfold now that the entire Arz separated them.

And it only worsened as night crept into the sky—her first night away from home. So she descended into the ship’s belly, growing accustomed to the gentle swaying and sudden lurches that came with the sea. The Silver Witch would take care of her, she knew. Because the woman needed something.

The thought didn’t make her feel any safer.

Something told her the witch was trying too hard. There was too much malevolence in the way she held herself, too much for mere redemption. Perhaps the lost Jawarat could deliver magic back to Arawiya, but it was more than that.

Zafira could feel it in her bones.

Which meant she needed to find it and bring it back to the caliph before the witch could get her hands on it. On her.

If such a thing were even possible.



* * *



When she woke the next morning, the cabin opposite hers was empty, Deen’s strewn dark sheets reminding her of a crimson smile. She made her way to the hold with a sigh, setting her lantern beside her when she sank onto a wooden chest. She unclasped her cloak and held it against her chest, her hair a curtain of darkness, the violence of the Arz’s return flickering in her thoughts—the crackling branches and moaning limbs as the forest reached for the skies like sharp-edged spears. What bothered her most was what the return of the Arz had shown her: it was a wall, beyond which stood all her yesterdays. Her voyage would take her to her tomorrows.

Possibly the last of her tomorrows.

If she hadn’t boarded the ship, she would have continued to hunt in the Arz, continued to help her people, ignoring that beckoning darkness as she always had. Ignoring the creeping forest until it devoured them, bones and all.

But oh, how everything had changed in the span of a few days.

She straightened when the stairs creaked with the heavy tread of boots.

“You’re blaming yourself,” Deen said by way of greeting, concern etched on his features.

“I’m supposed to, aren’t I?” She struggled to meet his eyes. “If I hadn’t stepped on this ship, you wouldn’t have.”

“If anyone’s to blame, it’s the witch.” He sat beside her.

“I’m afraid of proving him right.”

He knew she spoke of the caliph. “You’re not expecting to die, are you? The only way you can prove him right is by dying. And you have a penchant for punching death in the face.”

She cracked a small smile. “You don’t have to tend to me.”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” he said.

That drew a laugh from some part of her. “You are so very banal, Deen.”

He shrugged. “The way I see it, phrases become banal because they’re overused by everyone else. So I’ll say them again and again until you tire of them.”

The smile that curved his lips sorrowed his eyes.

She fiddled with the clasp of her cloak, the one little buckle that had separated Zafira from the Hunter for years.

She looked at Deen, at his sloppily wrapped turban, and felt the ridiculous urge to straighten it. He stilled, noticing the change in her thoughts. How was it that he noticed so much about her?

His eyes held hers as he reached for the cloak clenched in her white-knuckled fingers. “I’ll rid you of it.”

She shook her head, feeling stupidly, ridiculously weak. “I’m going to wear it.”

Whatever she had felt upon removing it had disappeared. She was still Zafira. Still just a girl with a bow and a hoard of venison to her name.

He was silent a moment, until he stood. “Very well.”

She started plaiting her hair and stopped when warm hands closed over hers.

“Let me?” he asked softly. “I’ll even crown it for you.”

She nodded. Deen’s fingers were deft, for this wasn’t the first time he had plaited her hair, but it felt different now, entwined with some form of melancholy. She tipped between lucidity and sleep the longer he wove.

Until she felt it.

Soft, barely there. The brush of lips against the back of her neck.

Zafira stiffened and felt him stiffen, too. She turned and met his eyes.

“No matter how many times, it’s always the same,” he murmured. “Akin to striking flint beneath the cold skies, striking and striking, until that gratifying spark comes to life. If only you knew.”

She didn’t know what he spoke of, yet she couldn’t find the words to ask him, not when he was looking at her with so much.

“If only you knew what it was like to feel the weight of your gaze,” he said, half to himself.

Oh. She pursed her mouth. Her neck burned from the touch of his lips, and she was abuzz with warmth like the first sun above the cold horizon.