13. Zari
Chapter thirteen
Zari
E xhausted from a night without sleep and a very long morning, Zari collapsed onto the cabin’s narrow bed. Even if it was only mid-afternoon, she craved rest. Her father used to tell her that any tempest was better navigated after a good night’s sleep.
The narrow cot creaked and swayed as the train journeyed north, making her rest fragmented and worrisome. Tivre had yet to explain how they’d go from the terminal stop, a small town called Wesburg, all the way to the fae isles.
Indeed, Tivre had yet to explain many things. Her thumb traced over the mark on her wrist. A crescent made sense, for the stories said fae magic was strongest at night. The droplet, though. Was it blood? Water? Would Tivre tell her if she asked? Doubtful.
As sunlight spilled through the cabin’s small window, Zari gave up on sleep.
She washed her face in the basin, then finger-combed her tangled curls into some semblance of order.
When she turned, her elbow caught the edge of Tivre’s bag on the dresser.
It slid off with a thump, spilling a bundle of papers and a few neatly tied bunches of dried herbs across the floor.
Muttering a soft curse, Zari knelt to gather them. Her fingers paused on the papers—recognizing the strangely familiar looping script. Her breath caught. She’d seen handwriting like this before, even though she couldn’t read the language .
Zari dug through her purse to find her father’s letters. Carefully, she sifted through the worn pages until she found the one that had surfaced in her memory. It had arrived only a few months before he’d died.
Zari,
I must ask a favor of you. Enclosed, you will find the drafts of a document that I co-wrote with a fae who wants peace as deeply as I do.
Keep my letters close to you. If you do not receive another letter from me, it means I have fallen in the war.
Therefore, bring this draft to Lord Lockwood and demand he take it to Parliament.
Zari had kept the letter, though, thankfully, she hadn’t needed to confront Lord Lockwood, as the next, and final, letter arrived a week later. The Rhydonian government had taken much longer to ratify the Accords after that.
Now, she compared one of her father’s pages to Tivre’s documents.
The drafted version of the Accords was two columns: one Rhydonian, one Fae.
Her father’s boxy handwriting contrasted sharply with the flowing script on the right-hand side.
Those symbols in silvery-hued ink must be the fae translation of the Accords.
Had Tivre been the fae mentioned in the letters?
Tivre had promised her that he could be trusted, and yet, she still was not sure of that.
He still hadn’t returned to the cabin and it was now hours past dawn.
Where could he be? Carefully, she put away both the items from Tivre’s bag, and her own letters.
When she had a chance, she’d ask him about it.
She didn’t need to admit to seeing his writing to show him her father’s letters.
The train thundered onward, curtains swaying with each jolt of the tracks. Overhead, something struck the roof. Thud.
Zari held her breath, as more thuds echoed. They sounded, alarmingly, like footsteps. She turned toward the window just as a glittering pink shape appeared on it. A heartbeat later, the glass shimmered and began to melt, disappearing like frost in the sun.
Quickly, she searched for something, anything, to use as a weapon, but there was nothing. Not unless she wanted to swing a pillow or bag at whoever was melting the window, which didn’t seem effective in the least .
If she screamed, would anyone hear her?
A figure swung into the cabin through the now wide-open window frame. The intruder was tall, easily over six feet, with eyes too bright, ears too pointed, and a presence too otherworldly to be anything but fae. His Rhydonian clothing did nothing to disguise his true identity.
Long blond hair brushed against broad shoulders, and intense, cerulean blue eyes scanned over Zari, cold and calculating.
There was a sword hanging from his belt, a quiver of arrows on his back, and band of knives strapped around his hip, but it was the sight of his bare wrist that scared Zari the most.
A dark birthmark covered most of the exposed skin. The same droplet and crescent on Zari’s own. Except hers was fake and she knew, from the sight of him alone, that his was real.
There was an Oathborn warrior in her train cabin.
Fear rooted Zari to the spot, and just as she opened her mouth to scream, another figure slipped in soundlessly through the window.
This one landed light as a cat, the ruffle of her skirts the only sound.
A pink jacket hugged her waist, trimmed to match the flared skirt beneath it.
A netted pillbox hat perched atop thick blonde curls.
Altogether, she looked like she’d stepped out of a fashion magazine.
Except for the swords at her hip. And the fae eyes, gleaming with unearthly light.
Her gaze raked over Zari, as if measuring her up, or perhaps deciding how best to kill her. “Oh my,” she said, in heavily accented Rhydonian. Sharp canines flashed in her smile, adding to the stunning otherness of the two strangers. “How adorable you are, little Oathborn!”
“I…” Zari could retreat no further. Her back was already at the door. “Who are you?”
“I am Hazelle,” the female said. The woman’s left sleeve hung empty, as if no arm was there to fill it. A war wound, perhaps. “Stellaris of the South Star Isle, and this is my cousin, Daeden.”
The Oathborn inclined his head. In a low, rumbling voice, he asked, “where is Cal Tivre? ”
She could only assume the word before Tivre’s name was some sort of title. She also had to assume it would be safest to be honest with the warrior. “He, uh, has stepped out of the cabin.”
“Oh, where has that brat gone now?” Hazelle rolled her eyes. “To think he left you alone!”
“He, um,” Zari bit her lip, fishing desperately for the correct response.
Before she found one, Hazelle drew one of the two gleaming swords from her belt. Zari screamed. She scrambled backward, just as the door swung open. Her collision with whoever entered knocked the air from her lungs.
“In all the stars…” Sighing, Tivre began. “Lady Hazelle and Sen Daeden, may I present Zari, the newest of our Queen’s Oathborn. Would you like to explain why you’re attacking her?”
“I’m not.” Hazelle sounded annoyed, not furious or bloodthirsty. Still, she held out the wickedly sharp sword. “I only meant to give this to her. An Oathborn is owed a sword, and a lady, a blade as sharp as the point of the crescent moon.”
The words flowed like poetry. Zari repeated, “A lady is owed a blade?”
Hazelle nodded. “This belonged to my sister, who was a brave Oathborn. I would like you to have it, as a gift, welcoming you to your now-discovered heritage.”
A heritage that didn’t belong to Zari at all. She was human, completely and entirely. No fae blood, no Oathborn magic. How long would it take these two to see through her deception? Zari risked a glance in Tivre’s direction, wondering if he had a plan in place for something like this.
“Another Oathborn. Well met indeed.” Daeden pulled her to her feet and threw his arms around her, as if she was truly a long-lost family member.
Zari ducked out of his arms. “Uh, that’s very fresh of you, sir.”
“Fresh?” he echoed. Despite his muscular build and commanding presence, Daeden’s confused expression reminded Zari of a golden-hued puppy.
“She means you insulted her, Dae,” drawled Tivre. “That’s what happens when fools travel south. They make a mess of customs. If the wrong person opened this cabin, we’d have a new war by sundown. ”
Zari shook her head. “The Accords are not so fragile. My father would have never—”
“Would have never believed you were part fae,” Tivre cut her off, clearly reminding her not to share too much about her own family.
“Forgive me,” she said, and since Hazelle had the title of Lady, Zari curtseyed. It seemed the right thing to do, and manners, she hoped, might keep her in the fae’s good graces. Zari had no wish to see how terrifying one of the immortal beings might be, if insulted.
“What is this gesture?” Hazelle attempted to mimic the curtsy, then elbowed Daeden, motioning for him to try.
“It’s a curtsy,” Zari explained. “It’s a sign of respect.” Zari paused. The words felt funny, almost as if her mouth moved to make the shape wrong. “My voice… It sounds strange.”
“Ah, that.” Tivre waved a hand. “You speak our language now. You were rather broken, as far as communication and—”
“Tivre!” Hazelle glared. “People are not broken, and it is not magic’s job to alter them.”
Zari’s thoughts matched those exactly, even as her mind tried to catch up to the implications of what Tivre had said. He’d changed her. Used magic to alter something foundational about her, something far deeper than his application of the Oathborn mark upon her wrist.
Tivre just rolled his eyes. “She knew a useless language, Old Rhydoni. I replaced it with ours, which is a vast improvement.”
“You did not have my permission!” Zari snapped. The antiquated tongue was only used for formal events, but she had no desire to lose it. Not when she’d spent years learning the language, all for him to take it away. What if she needed it in her medical studies?
“What next?” Hazelle asked. “Will you magic me a new forearm and hand, Tivre? To replace the one I was not born with?” With defiance burning in her eyes, she rolled her sleeve to show the limb, which ended at her elbow.
“Are people not good enough as they are born? Do you think yourself so much better than us, so much more wise, that you feel you can change others at your whim?”