Rebel of the Sands (Rebel of the Sands, #1)(70)

“I'm not a weapon,” Noorsham said.

Maybe Jin was right. Maybe there was no arguing with belief. I looked out the window again. Izz was lower now, keeping pace with the train. “So how come,” I asked, steadying myself against the bar, “you can’t take the armor off?” His fingers flew to the clasp on the side of the mask that was welded shut just as Izz, in the shape of a giant Roc, flung himself at the train.

The train rocked sideways so hard, I thought we might tip straight off the rails. I crashed into the bar, knocking the air straight out of me. I heard metal tear, and from the corner of my eye I saw a piece of the carriage wall ripped away in Izz’s razor talons.

I bolted to the narrow opening, desert sprawled on all sides.

Then a shape in bright desert clothes launched herself into the sand. Shazad landed in a practiced roll, on her feet before she vanished from my sight, two soldiers following her out. A golden girl grappling with a soldier hit the sand next.

The door banged open. Naguib rushed in, coming to find Noorsham. I moved with the sort of speed that usually belonged to Shazad, reaching across the bar. My hand fastened around the neck of a bottle. I turned, swinging it, narrowly missing Naguib’s face. He grabbed my wrist, wrenching it downward. I felt a shot of pain through my whole body and screamed. The bottle shattered against the ground, distracting him long enough for me to pull free.

Someone called my name. Jin was standing in the doorway. A huge hole torn in the train separated the two carriages, but damn him, was he thinking of coming for me?

“Go!” I shouted at him. “I’ll be right behind.” He knew better than to argue with me. He jumped as I started to run for the tear in the side of the carriage.

I wasn’t far behind him, my arms bracing either side of the gap in the wall.

Noorsham.

I glanced backward. He’d been knocked sideways by the blow. There was a dent in the metal helmet he wore, but he was righting himself. I glimpsed through the gap that we were coming up on a canyon, where the rails crossed over the chasm.

I had to jump. Now. But I couldn’t leave Noorsham. I couldn’t leave him alive. I couldn’t leave him here in Naguib’s hands. I had to kill him. Or save him. Our blue eyes locked across the debris littering the carriage.

The noise inside me sounded like Bahi’s scream, begging me to cross the carriage and rip off his mask, drag him away. But the valley was almost under us; I might have already waited too long.

If I went back they’d have me trapped and there wouldn’t be time to jump.

If I jumped now, I might go over anyway.

I was damned either way.

I flung myself through the rip in the carriage. The wind caught me, tossed me. I hit the ground and my body exploded into a constellation of pain. Momentum carried me through the sand as easily as if it were air; I was in too much agony to fight it. My vision cleared just in time for me to see the canyon gape open to swallow me. My empty fingers scraped through the sand. I fought for purchase that wasn’t there to stop my body. There was nothing to cling to but sand.

My legs went over, taking the rest of me with them.





twenty-five


My fingers caught on something. I felt a tug of falling in my stomach as I willed my injured hand to hold on. My body swung against the canyon wall and I heard my ribs connect with the sickening noise of bones breaking. I cried out, agony taking me over. For a moment all I could do was hang, eyes shut, breath shallow, telling myself not to look down. Willing my hand to hang on.

Only then I realized I didn’t know what I was holding on to.

I was shaking so hard, I could barely move. It seemed like it took forever to open my eyes. I tipped my head back slowly, like any move might throw me off balance and send me hurtling to the bottom of the chasm.

I’d grabbed hold of the sand. Or rather, the sand had grabbed hold of me. An arm made of sand had clamped around my wrist. It was holding on to my life.

I dropped my head, squeezing my eyes shut. Trying to remember how my lungs ought to work. How fast my heart ought to beat.

I’d seen dozens of things born from the sand and the wind and the spirits in the desert in my sixteen years. I’d heard every story, about immortals and ghouls alike that came from the sand. But this was something new. And it felt wholly foreign and entirely familiar at once.

This wasn’t a creature from the sands. This was me.

I took a deep breath. My ribs stretched into an endless ache that wrapped around my whole body. I swung my left arm up, the motion ripping a cry out of me, catching the sand-arm by the wrist, trying to pretend I didn’t feel grains of it slipping between my fingers.

Slow as the setting sun, it recoiled into the sand, dragging me up with it. My hand started slipping and a new sand-arm snaked out from the desert, grabbing me. And then another. A dozen hands held me, pulling at my clothes, my arms. Pulling me back to the desert.

And then I was up, lying flat on my stomach. I crawled away from the edge, my body shaking. I didn’t know if it was pain or something greater waiting to crash into me. Something my body knew before my mind. I was blank. Watching without grasping it. Around me, a dozen arms of sand disintegrated. I flinched.

Nothing else moved. Not even me. Then I reached toward a heap of sand that had saved my life. I hadn’t even touched it before it began to rise toward my palm, like the snakes in baskets called by charmers.