Page 22 of A ?Sky Beyond the Storm

Beside me, Rehmat’s glow pulses. “Is this where you wish to die,daughter of Mirra and Jahan?” it asks. “Imagine your power as a cloak of darkness. Take shelter there. Then pull the Blood Shrike and the Mask within.”

“How do I know you aren’t tricking me? That you aren’t some perversion of the Nightbringer?”

“Trust me or die, child,” Rehmat growls.

A longboat looms out of the dark. There is a Mask aboard and I freeze, my fear taking hold. Then the Shrike is past me, leaping onto the Mask’s boat as our own dinghy lurches. The Mask bares his teeth and draws scims, meeting the Shrike’s attack stroke for stroke.

Another boat of soldiers bashes into ours and now Avitas is at the Shrike’s back, swift and otherworldly. They are a four-armed monster, destroying, deflecting, defying Keris’s men to come closer.

“They cannot fight forever, Laia,” Rehmat says. “Reach for the magic. Save them. Save yourself.”

“Itried—”

“Try harder.” Rehmat’s voice, stern before, is steel now. “You are a child ofkedim jadu, girl. Old magic. For centuries, I have waited for one of thekedim jaduto defy the Nightbringer. You did so, glorious and fearless, and now you quake, child? Now you quiver?”

There is an irrefutability in Rehmat’s tone that rings a bell at the core of my being. It is as if the creature is simply uncovering something that has long been carved into the arc of my life. Perhaps it has tampered with my mind, or the Nightbringer has.

Or perhaps my instinct has been honed by enough betrayal that when it sings truth, I listen. Perhaps I finally believe that my victories have been because I decided to fight, when others might have given up.

The Shrike slings arrows and the boat rocks beneath me. Avitas curses as the Martials draw closer.

The world seems to slow, as if time no longer exists. It is a moment of perfect chaos, and within it, I hear my nan.Where there is life, there is hope.

I will not accept death. Why should I, when there is life yet burning in my veins? I will not let the Nightbringer win so easily when it is my fury that will destroy him, and my strength that will release the Scholars from the yoke of his terror.

Disappear. Power breaks over me and I shudder at the force of it.This? This is what I can do?

“Imagine the darkness enveloping the Blood Shrike and Avitas Harper,” Rehmat says. “Quick now!”

This is more difficult, for I do not understand how to do it. I stretch the darkness that covers me, and try to toss it over the Blood Shrike. She flickers.

“Again,” Rehmat urges. “Hold it this time!”

Sweat breaks out on my brow as I try again. And again. Each time, the Shrike flickers, though she does not appear to notice. The Mask she fights gapes at her in bewilderment, and she runs him through.

“Shrike!”

A long shabka—a boat with a single mast and two sets of oars—looms out of the darkness. Darin stands at its prow, and relief floods me. He, however, looks like he wants to throttle the Shrike.

“Where’s Laia?Where’s my sister?”

The Shrike parries an arrow that nearly pegs her in the heart. “Don’t get your knickers in a bunch,” she shouts. “She’s right—”

In that moment, I cast the darkness wide enough to cover both her andAvitas. One second, the two of them are fighting. The next, Keris’s men lower their weapons, staring at an empty boat.

I grab for where I think the Shrike’s shoulder is, hoping to the skies that neither she nor Avitas think to swing a scim into my neck.

“They can’t see you!” I whisper. “Get into Musa’s boat. Quick!”

Air rushes past me as the Shrike slides by and pulls herself up to the deck of the shabka. Harper follows, and I reach deep within, until I have cast my invisibility over a wide-eyed Darin and Musa.

“Stop rowing,” I hiss to the Beekeeper. “No one move!”

The shabka drifts, even as the Martials search the darkness, all their might and numbers nothing against my magic.

The soldiers close in on our vessel, but after scanning it for passengers, they navigate around us, making for the dinghy where we were last seen, peering into the water. We remain silent as long minutes go by. When the soldiers are out of sight, Musa and the Shrike take up the oars and row as quickly and quietly as they can, until the lights of the market are a distant glow behind us. Finally, I drop our invisibility. Everyone speaks at once.

“Thank the skies you’re all—”

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