A smattering of applause. Less than she’d hoped for, more than she had any right to expect.
The ripple of a gasp that went through the crowd and another drop on her nose were Luca’s only warning. An instant later, as she walked toward the carriage, the sky opened up. She was soaked to the skin before Bastien could get the carriage door open. She pushed her sopping hair off her face and looked at Bastien’s forlorn expression as he dangled his bedraggled cuffs. For the first time in a long, long while, she laughed.
CHAPTER 43
WAKING UP （REPRISE）
This time, Touraine woke up in a tent. She recognized the tightness in her body—recovering injuries. And the bone-weary exhaustion that hounded her after Aranen had healed her the first time.
“Good morning,” someone beside her said in Shālan.
Touraine was too tired to jump in surprise. She rolled her head just enough to see Aranen sitting next to her pallet. The thin woman looked awful. Half-starved and haunted. Her nose was red; her lips chapped. Her knees clasped to her chest, she looked like an overgrown grasshopper. With golden eyes.
“And to you,” Touraine said, automatically responding in Shālan.
Aranen’s dry lips cracked as she smiled. She put a hand to Touraine’s forehead. “You remember the language.”
“I don’t know.” Touraine switched to Balladairan, struggling to piece her Shālan together. “I could sleep forever.”
Aranen answered in Balladairan with a pained smile. “You almost did. And after I healed you, you were sleeping for a month. I’ve been keeping you… It’s hard to explain.”
Touraine’s memories were fuzzy. She remembered her body begging to die, not much more than that.
“What did you do?”
Aranen’s lips and jaw tightened, and her eyes shone. “I would rather not speak of it.”
Touraine realized what she must have done, and her heart broke for the priestess.
“Who—why—” The questions came out even though she knew it was kinder to silence them. Djasha’s slit throat.
“Djasha gave her life to kill that bitch. I wasn’t going to let her sacrifice go to waste. If I could have slit my own wrists, I would have.”
The merciless steel of Aranen’s voice left Touraine stunned and terrified.
“Was that… all?”
“No. You… did the same thing. To the man who was going to shoot you.” She met Touraine’s gaze tenderly and put a hand over Touraine’s. “Are you a believer, then?”
Touraine wasn’t ready to answer that question.
“Is Pruett alive? She’s a Sand. Gray-blue eyes, dirty mouth?” Her tongue still felt thick, but she had to know.
“Your friend the sniper.” Aranen scowled. “She’s been teaching some of the kids to shoot chicken skulls from rooftops.”
Pruett was alive. Touraine tried to grin but turned into her pillow as sobs of relief overwhelmed her. Aranen put a hand on her shoulder.
“I have to tell you. I’ve only been waiting to say goodbye. And thank you. You risked everything to save me. Djasha loved you.”
Djasha. “Where—”
“We’ve burned her, as we do. We have that in common with Balladaire.” She looked at the floor.
Touraine blinked away her own tears to study the other woman. She looked a skip away from death. “You want us to burn you, too.”
Aranen looked away. “Yes.”
“But…” Touraine was struggling to put the thoughts together, but one thing was clear. “We need you.”
The priestess shook her head. “I can’t. I can’t anymore.”
It was a few days before Touraine could walk much farther than the tent.
Jaghotai woke her early in the morning with a brusque shake.
“Come with me. There’s something I want to show you.”
They walked through the slums, toward the south, away from the city. Away from the compound, which was slowly emptying like a leaking water canteen.
They walked in silence for a long time, the wind whipping through their scarves and making their clothes billow around them.
“Are we going to let Aranen die?”
“We?” Jaghotai shook her head. “I can’t make her want to live.”
And she had tried. Touraine had heard them. Jaghotai begging for Aranen to help her put the city together. To train more priests and priestesses, to teach doctors. Begging not to be left alone.
Jaghotai sighed. “We used to build monuments to honor those who fell in great tragedies. Before Balladaire.”