When Touraine fell back into a fitful sleep, she was woken from dreams of incessant digging by an intense rustling of her tent wall and the whimper of a child. She thought it was part of the dream, until a second, more insistent voice joined the whimper.
“Mulāzim!” Touraine recognized the voice of the fighting girl with the braid. Her name was Ghadin, and she lived with her uncle and her grandmother and her little sister. Touraine had spent a little of her time each day roughhousing with the children, because somehow, it made the weight of the rebellion less. But Ghadin was a serious kid, the self-proclaimed leader of the slum children, and she wouldn’t wake Touraine up in the middle of the night for nothing.
Touraine rolled to her feet and pulled up the tent flap. The cold air bit at her hot skin, and judging by the thin line of pale blue on the horizon, it was early morning, not the middle of the night. Outside the tent, Ghadin held a small boy’s hand and tugged her long braid with a worried expression.
“This kid was looking for you,” Ghadin told Touraine as explanation. Like most of the children, she spoke to Touraine in what Touraine was beginning to think of as “Qazāli”—that combination of Shālan and Balladairan. The girl nudged the boy forward gently.
“What?” Touraine asked, gesturing for him to speak.
He flinched when she looked at him, hesitated at her open palm. She recognized that fear. Droitists had gotten to this kid. Sky-falling fuck. She forced her hands down and open instead of making fists to imitate the sudden rock of anger settling in her gut. Fucking Balladaire.
“She said it was important,” he said, voice barely squeaking out.
“It’s all right, it’s all right.” Touraine knelt down on one knee to meet his eyes. “What do you need, dear one?” She used the Shālan endearment, and the boy’s face relaxed marginally.
“The lieutenant from the guardhouse. She told me to get help.”
Touraine’s stomach dropped to her bare feet. “The lieutenant. The one with bluish-gray eyes. That lieutenant?”
“Yes. She said look for the Mulāzim. Everyone sent me here. To you. I know you.”
Pruett. How did she know the name—？ Pruett.
“Help for what? What’s happening?” She had to stop herself from gripping the boy in her desperation for answers.
“I don’t know. I don’t know! She didn’t say, sir.”
“Sky above.” She pushed back into the tent, swearing as she fumbled on the rest of her clothes. Her limbs were heavy; her mind was slow and bleary with fever.
There was so much for the rebels to do, still so much to plan. But Pruett needed her. The Sands needed her. Her family needed her.
CHAPTER 37
A REMINDER
The carriage rattled Luca’s concentration as she practiced her latest speech. Already, Qazāli civilians were acting on yesterday’s declaration of reparations. They queued at the Balladairan bank, waiting to be verified, to have their grief quantified and paid for.
Cantic still insisted on Luca saying something before the hanging to encourage “loyalty and duty.”
“Loyalty and duty,” Luca muttered to herself.
Beau-Sang, on the bench across from her, nodded.
“Indeed, Your Highness. The most important attributes of a civilized citizen.”
“Indeed,” she echoed. Loyalty. Its opposite, treachery. So hard to detect sometimes. She sensed no loyalty in Beau-Sang, so she wasn’t worried about mistaking him for an ally. On the other hand, she’d been blinded to the treachery in Touraine.
“My family has been most loyal to the Ancier crown, in fact.”
Luca raised an eyebrow. “Indeed.” She waited.
“I suppose you must think me ham-fisted and vulgar”—he smiled—“but a father with his children’s best interests at heart can’t help but notice. You’ve spent time with both of my children of late.”
At that moment, the carriage jostled over a rough patch in the street, and Luca used the surprise to cover up the flush of embarrassment that crept up her cheeks.
“To my eye, a match would be beneficial to both of us,” the comte said after the road evened out. He adjusted his coat carefully around his broad shoulders. He clung to Balladairan-style clothing despite the heat, and in return, the tight coat and trousers clung to him, and sweat stained the layers of silk and wool even though the morning was still cool to Luca.
“Indeed?” Luca tried not to yawn, and the effort almost cracked her jaw.
Beau-Sang gave Luca a paternal smile, as if it would reflect the depths of his affection for his own children. “I understand what’s at stake for you here. You’re afraid of failing to crush the rebellion, your uncle calling a trial of competence against you.”