Page 95 of Children of Anguish and Anarchy

Mae’e is like the very goddess that watches over her temples. Her divine fire passes through the crowd. Her rally stirs her people into a frenzy. Terror burns to the hunger for blood.

“She has sent us allies!” Mae’e grabs my arm. I’m not prepared for her to lift it into the air. “One who carries the power of the storms in her blood!”

Mae’e turns to me. Her sparkling eyes dare me to speak. I look out at the crowd, and my chest expands with awe. I can hardly believe where I stand, that people would look to me in a foreign land.

“We will fight for you, New Gaia!” I scream in their tongue. The people shout with such force it shakes through the wind. “We will give everything we have! We will rip through every Skull!”

“Death to the Skulls!” Mae’e releases a battle cry.

“Morte aos crânios!” her people scream back.

Their cries for blood stir the lightning in my veins.

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

TZAIN

THE FEAST THAT FOLLOWSthe war rally is unlike any I’ve ever seen. New Gaians dance to the beat of crimson drums. They howl to the full moon. Golden plates filled to the brim with slow-cooked pork and rice pass from hand to hand. Children nibble on chocolate truffles. People join together in the marketplace, cleared out for the New Gaians to rally.

“Vai! Vai! Vai!”

I pass a crowd that’s formed around Mae’e. She dances between twirling skirts, throwing her fists and stomping her feet. Her raven hair flies free. She’s almost too beautiful to see.

Amari stares from outside the ring, transfixed by the woman before her. A new glint shines in her amber eyes, and a flush rises in her cheeks.

It’s the way she used to look at me.

Watching her now, I think of all we were supposed to be. I see the life I thought we would live. The son of a fisherman with Orïsha’s future queen. Somehow, it always felt too perfect to be true.

“Tzain,” Amari calls out to me. I join her from the fringes of the crowd. Amari’s brows lift at my Lâmina tattoo: a bone axe to replace the Skull’s.

“Ready for tomorrow?” she asks.

Despite all we’re up against, I nod. Over the past nine days, training withthe Lâminas has transformed. No longer on the outside of their pack, the warriors have pushed me past my limits. We’ve battled from dusk to dawn.

“Are you?” I ask.

Amari flashes me her side, and I catch the obsidian sword attached to her waistband. She flexes a burst of blue magic in her hand, illuminating the carved vines swirling down the black glass. The girl who questioned her place in this fight has disappeared. The valiant warrior I know is here.

“They got her once,” she says. “We can’t let it happen again.”

As we stare out at the sea of New Gaians, Amari leans her head on my arm. I close my eyes and soak in her soft touch. Her gentle breath. The cinnamon scent of her hair.

I put a hand over her shoulder, and her body softens. The simple gesture takes me back. I still remember the first time I saw her, the moment she pulled the brown cloak from her head after we rescued her from Lagos. Even without her headdress, I could see it in her amber eyes.

The very air she exhaled was rare.

All I wanted was to be enough. To live day after day witnessing the smile on her face. When she told me she loved me, that dream became real.

I felt like I held the entire world.

“Have you seen my sister?” I ask. The crowd that swarmed Zélie after the rally terrified me as much as the Skulls. She couldn’t leave for hours. Mae’e’s people embraced her like she was their own.

“Aurelia!” they shouted. At the time, I didn’t know what it meant. Later, Köa shared the translation:Aurelia. The Golden One.

“I think she’s underground,” Amari answers. “The Green Maidens snuck her into the vine bunkers. It was the only place she could be alone.”

I nod and start to move, but something holds me back. I push past the way my heart aches.

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