Chapter 15
Fifteen
The sun is barely up when the commotion outside the tent pulls me from a dream so sweet I try to fall back into it—something about warmth, safety, a hand tracing lazy circles over my hip.
I blink through the disorienting moment between asleep and awake to realize I’m staring at the back of Declan’s head.
His dark hair curls slightly at the nape of his neck, mussed from sleep.
The sheet is settled across his waist, revealing his naked back.
At some point in the night, I must’ve reached for him, because my arm is draped over him, my hand pinned to his chest beneath his.
He’s heavy and warm and solid. My fingers twitch, brushing through the coarse hair on his chest, and I breathe him in—salt, smoke, and spice. I want to nuzzle closer, to stay like this a little longer, to pretend the day hasn’t already begun.
“Morning,” he murmurs, voice rough with sleep.
“Hi,” I manage, which comes out more like a squeak than an actual word.
He rolls over to face me, and suddenly we’re eye to eye, the space between us small enough that I can feel the heat of his breath against my lips.
He shifts closer, his voice a lazy murmur. “You talk in your sleep, you know.”
My stomach flips. “What did I say?”
“Something about a donkey parade.”
I laugh and the sound catches between us. “Fennel’s infiltrated my subconscious.”
Morning light spills across the sheets from the narrow crack between the door flaps, cutting a bright stripe over the tangled linens.
The beam slides across my arm, then over the bare lines of Declan’s chest where my hand still rests.
His heart beats steadily beneath my palm, grounding and dizzying all at once.
His fingers close gently around mine, and he brings my hand to his mouth. His lips brush my knuckles as he murmurs, “Today might be the day.”
The day I stop pretending not to want him. The day I finally tear down the wall between us.
“The day for what?” I ask, voice barely a whisper.
He smiles against my skin. “The day we get home.”
The words hit like cold water. I let my thoughts drift somewhere softer, somewhere dangerous and far from the only things that matter: finding Fortune, getting us back before this place or my feelings swallow me whole.
I pull my hand back and push myself up, swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
“Right.” I force the words past the lump in my throat. “And we can’t do that from bed.”
I move to the trunk and pull out another dress similar to all the others, light and silky and long. Declan stays in bed, watching me with that unreadable look that feels like it sees too much.
When we’re both dressed and braced to face the day, we push through the tent flaps and step into the sunlit bustle beyond.
The air is thick with the smell of roasting dates and spiced lamb. Fennel presses close to my side, his fur brushing my knees as we weave through the crowd with Declan and his “queen,” Cinder resting in his arms.
“What’s all this for?” I ask, glancing at the flurry of movement around us. Dancers practice synchronized steps in the sand, acrobats tumble through hoops soon to be set aflame, and young women sit alongside a newly constructed dais stringing together garlands of marigolds.
Cinder hisses and jumps from Declan’s hold as he stumbles back, narrowly avoiding two men hauling a massive, gilded throne draped in ribbons.
“Tarek was telling me about this. Damn, what did he call it?” Declan rubs a hand through the scruff on his jaw. “The Festival of the First Flame. Something about celebrating the monarchy.” He shrugs. “We were about to go onstage. I wasn’t listening all that well.”
Something about the pageantry makes my stomach knot.
The perfect rows of offerings lining the raised platform.
The way groups rehearse chants word for word.
The rigid smiles stretched across people’s faces.
It looks less like joy and more like a rally I once saw in a documentary—flags waving, speeches roaring, everyone pretending to be grateful because the cost of doubt was too high.
It isn’t joy. It’s control woven through the air like invisible thread.
“It doesn’t look very celebratory,” I mumble, and my lip curls before I can stop it.
“Careful,” a voice murmurs behind me.
I turn to find a boy no older than Nessa carrying a basket of fig tarts. His bright green eyes flick from my face to the dais. “Best not wear such a look,” he warns. “Eyes are quick to notice, mouths quicker still to speak.”
Heat spikes across my cheeks. “I wasn’t—”
“You were.” He nods to the basket and lifts it up between us. “Take one. If your mouth is full, no one may claim you forgot your lines.”
I take a tart, sugar sticking to my fingers, and the boy slips away into the crowd as quietly as he appeared.
Declan drifts closer. “Making another friend?”
“Making sure I don’t get us executed,” I mutter, biting into the tart. It tastes like ash under all that sugar.
Tarek barrels up behind us and seizes Declan’s shoulders with both hands.
“Flaming arrows!” he booms, shaking him.
“First to strike the bull’s-eye shall be declared victor and supplied with mead for the whole of the four-day festival!
What nobler tribute could there be to the Great Families who delivered us from lawlessness? ”
Declan’s gaze cuts toward the practice area where guards and others taking a break from setting up the festivities dip arrowheads into open flames then loose them at straw targets painted with red and black rings.
Fire streaks across the air before thunking into hay, sparks and smoke spiraling upward.
He lifts a brow. “Is there a climbing option? I was never good at archery.”
“Come! You will enjoy it.” Tarek claps him on the back. “Almost as much as I shall enjoy the endless supply of mead.”
Before Declan can protest further, Tarek drags him toward the targets. Cinder bolts in the opposite direction, wisely uninterested in flaming arrows, and Fennel trots after her.
I spot Nessa in the crowd and call out to her. She hurries over, saffron skirts swirling, cheeks flushed, and presses a basket into my arms.
“How pleased I am to see you. You must help with the shrine,” she insists, nodding toward the raised dais swathed in garlands.
“The queens and the ancestors of the Great Families must be honored before sunset, and we are already behind because someone”—her glare slices toward Celine, who yawns and flicks a speck of sand from her dress—“did not harvest the sunflowers. And with no camels left to fetch them from the Everspring we are forced to make do without a symbol of loyalty and devotion.”
“Lavender and rosemary,” I suggest, peering into the basket of marigold and daisy garlands.
Her blue eyes brighten. “By the gods, yes! You are brilliant.”
She links her arm through mine and sweeps me into the shrine’s preparations.
The dais brims with offerings: copper basins filled with water where chrysanthemums float beside flickering tea lights, bowls of figs stacked like pyramids, garlands wound around the wooden posts until they gleam gold and white and green.
Women sit cross-legged in the sand, weaving crowns of dried flowers from two great mounds spilled onto the ground, stacking them into precarious towers that sway in the breeze.
I kneel beside Nessa as we untangle a stubborn garland from the basket. “How’s your fire eating coming?”
“The Player says my flame control is stronger than most apprentices.” She grins. “And when I sang at our last rehearsal, she noted how my voice carries even over the drums.”
“You’re a singer?”
“Since I was small,” she admits, tugging the garland free with a triumphant nod. “My first audience was our goats. Now I sing for the queens.”
A ripple of unease stirs in my gut. “Won’t spitting fire damage your voice?”
Nessa shrugs, careless as only a sixteen-year-old can be. “What is a little discomfort to destiny? Besides, I can’t dwell on what hasn’t happened. I must do as you do and think positively.”
Dav’s warning rings in my head—reckless advice, dangerous encouragement. I almost tell her to slow down, to guard herself with more than words and thoughts. But the sparkle in her eyes stops me. This is what she wants. Who am I to strip it away?
“You’ll shine brighter than anyone out there,” I say instead, stringing the garland around a post.
Her smile widens, drinking in the words like sunlight. But my own chest feels oddly hollow, the affirmation echoing back at me like lines from a script.
“When will you hold another class?” Nessa asks eagerly.
A flash of white fur blurs past.
“Fennel!” I shriek as the donkey barrels straight through the towers of flower crowns, a bundle clamped between his teeth. Petals scatter, trailing behind him as he plows past the dancers.
A woman sprints after him, skirts flying, arms flailing, shrieking curses that only make him tuck his ears back and run faster.
“Fennel!” I call again, and he skids to a halt, nostrils flaring, eyes bright. “Fennel, wait! Stay right there.”
With him stopped, the woman makes up ground and shouts, “Damn donkey!”
His ears flick back, his muscles tense.
“Don’t you dare,” I warn.
He bolts. The crowns dangle from his mouth like he’s just been named prom queen.
Cinder streaks after him and leaps onto his back, claws dug in like she’s riding into battle. Together, they break through the gathering crowd, sand scattering up from his hooves.
“Shit.” I drop the garland and sprint after him. “A little help?” I shout as I bolt past Declan and Tarek.
Declan abandons his flaming arrows with a muttered curse, cutting across the square at full speed.
We fall into a rhythm as we attempt to corral the donkey and cat team. He dodges left, I dart right. He cuts Fennel off near the troupe of acrobats, sending them stumbling out of the way. I reach for the crowns as the little menace swerves.
The crowd claps, cheers, laughs—our donkey/cat rodeo turned into prime-time entertainment.
“Got him!” Declan lunges, catching Fennel’s flank.
The donkey bucks hard, nearly unseating Cinder.
Declan dodges Fennel’s hooves, and I grab his arm to steady him, the momentum spinning us together, chest to chest. We’re tangled together, trying to reach around each other to grab a piece of the four-legged troublemakers.
Fennel brays, and Cinder’s lemon-yellow eyes go wide as he barrels straight between us.
We jump apart as he zooms past, narrowly missing our shins.
We chase the pair in a loop around the festival grounds, dodging onlookers, nearly colliding with a spit of lamb, finally boxing them in against the shrine. Cinder, sensing the end of the chase, abandons ship with a regal leap onto the dais and settles in among the offerings.
Fennel jerks left at the last second, nearly bowling Declan over, but Declan plants his feet and clamps one muscled arm around the donkey’s neck. Then, in a move that makes the entire crowd howl, he swings a leg over and ends up straddling the miniature beast.
I dive for the prize, prying the soggy crowns from Fennel’s stubborn jaws while Declan hangs on for dear life. Petals fly. Fennel brays. My fingers slide against slobbery teeth, then snag in the woven flowers, and finally the crowns tear free.
The crowd erupts into applause.
Declan straightens, chest heaving, dried flower bits clinging to his dark hair while I wipe sweat and grime from my cheek with the back of my hand. We exchange a glance, shrug, join hands, and take a bow.
Fennel exhales in great gusts, his sides shuddering, nostrils flaring like bellows. He sidles up to me, breath hot against my thigh, and drags his damp nose down my leg.
“Unbelievable,” I mutter, petting his soft ears. He snorts, then trots off to a patch of shade and drops like a stone. Within seconds, he’s out cold.
The crowd disperses in ripples of laughter, and from across the grounds Tarek keeps clapping, grinning like a man who’s already had too much festival mead.
He strides toward us, calling, “Look at you two, stealing the people’s hearts before the hour of spectacle!
At this rate, they’ll be tossing flowers at your feet instead of the queens. ”
I try to scrub the donkey slobber off the crowns, but the woman who chased Fennel storms up and snatches them from my hands, spitting curses under her breath.
“Sorry!” I call after her, though why I feel responsible for the braying menace is anyone’s guess.
Nessa returns to untangling the garland we abandoned, still giggling. “Fennel is rather adorable. Were he not, his theatrics would be only half as entertaining.”
Declan brushes sand from his pants, then reaches over to pluck a dried marigold petal from my hair. His knuckles graze my cheek as he tucks the loose strands behind my ear. “Shrine duty or donkey wrangling. Which do you prefer?”
“Neither. Both.” I smile and lean into the warmth of his touch. “Depends on if I get hazard pay.”
Nessa’s laugh dies in her throat. Her fists tighten around the garlands, her whole body stiffening. The crowd straightens as one, lilting murmurs snuffed out like a flaming wick pinched between fingers.
The Player sweeps into view, flanked by robed guards. Dav is among them, his expression hard as stone. Her gown is crimson silk embellished with gold coins, sleeves trailing like banners. She lifts her arms wide, voice carrying like a bell through the hush.
“In honor of the Great Families and the benevolence of the Crown whose hand delivered us from pandemonium, an additional performance shall be given this night. Ready yourselves.”
The streak of red paint across her face gleams like fresh blood beneath the sun.
The light seems to fade as she leaves, and the Kingdom of Wands shifts back into a stage. Whether we’re ready or not, the show is about to begin again.