We Free the Stars (Sands of Arawiya 2)

The men murmured among themselves, hope spiraling with the sun.

Altair glanced about sharply. “Don’t. You may not understand the workings of men, and you may not have been made for battle, but I will not let you destroy their hope.”

“I’m not destroying what never existed.”

“This battle banks on hope. Humanity banks on hope,” Altair seethed, throwing up his sword. His voice rose over the sudden howl of the wind. “Yalla! It won’t be long before the Lion hears of the fire.”

Hears of it? Skies, by now he would have to be smelling it, seeing it, feeling it. The world would know of it soon enough.

They’d barely made it past the gates before the ifrit converged, shrieks filling the air.

Zafira ducked when an ifrit made it past the ranks ahead and lunged for her. Her heart leaped to her throat as she ripped her jambiya through the dark soldier. Safin steel, unlike Baba’s dagger, now far away in Bait ul-Ahlaam. Even still, it was ten times more frightening than aiming a bow from a distance.

Beside her, Kifah unleashed a handful of throwing knives, felling three ifrit before turning to impale another. Altair and Nasir, despite their bickering, fought back to back, the prince’s sword flashing quicker than the other’s single scimitar, and she wondered if that was why Nasir was at his side.

Death sweeps toward us.

She paused at the Jawarat’s murmur. Already, men and ifrit littered the ground, shadowy forms beside human ones.

A fire crackled behind her, a warning before she whirled, tackling the stave away with her dagger, singeing the tips of her fingers in the process. Kifah turned to her aid with two well-placed thwacks of her spear.

“All right?”

“All right,” Zafira replied with some disappointment. She didn’t need a sitter. She needed a bow and an arrow.

Staves flashed without end. Misk’s men fought valiantly, making full use of their rough-edged swords and jambiyas, the pride of their fathers. But they needed to power ahead, to push past Aya’s house and make for the palace. The ifrit would only keep coming.

A shout rang out to her right, another to her left, this one older. For the rebels weren’t all spry young men, but those who had lost enough to fear death a little less. Altair deftly saved the first rebel as Misk sprinted toward the older man.

Zafira didn’t know why she watched him, why she was paying heed to the half Sarasin, half Demenhune who had stolen the heart of her dearest friend.

Until one of his archers shouted a warning that Misk didn’t hear.

And a stave pierced him from behind.

Zafira forgot to breathe.

The ifrit pulled the stave free and pierced him again, higher now. Misk choked. Zafira felt as if the stave were ripping her own heart. Sound became pulses. She stumbled.

Stole someone’s bow. Nocked an arrow and fired as pain tore through her mending wound. The ifrit fell. Her bow fell.

Misk fell.

Misk, Yasmine’s husband, the man she spoke of with anger and happiness and love. He had lied and he had withheld, and yet he had loved her just as much.

“Zafira,” Misk murmured as she sank to her knees beside him, yelling for help and knowing nothing could be done in time.

Someone screamed. Zafira looked up to find the doors flung open and Yasmine racing through the dark haze, a bundle of blue as bright as the sky. Too late, too late.

He sighed when he saw her. “Yasmine.”

“Time apart, Misk. Time apart,” she breathed. “Not an eternity, not life and death.”

Misk brushed his hand down her cheek, his smile tender.

“Forevermore,” he whispered. “In life, and in death.”

Zafira’s face was damp.