Chapter Sixty-Five Samira
SIXTY-FIVE SAMIRA
The pain was bright, but my surroundings were pitch-black. I was in so much agony that I could do nothing more than gape in a silent scream. It stole my voice, my breath. I collapsed to my knees on a ground that was both rough and pillowy. Almost like clouds but slightly off.
Out of the abyss of unending torment came a silky, sultry voice. “Well, well, well.”
Every hair on my body stood straight up. I knew that voice. He’d only been a shadow before. An interloper in Zarqa’s fortune. But when I lifted my head, he was no longer a mere shadow.
Slitted orange eyes emerged from the darkness.
Sensual lips curled on an expertly chiseled face that was at once human and feline, beautiful and deadly.
Hair black as the Shroud hung around his face.
Despite the dark, his golden skin held a vibrant sheen.
Thick muscles strained against silver armor, ancient carvings pressed into the metal.
“Shaya,” I breathed. Terror blasted through me.
I dropped my head to the cushiony ground and lay myself prostrate, fighting the pain long enough to gasp out, “Forgive me, God of the Underworld.”
Shaya’s feet didn’t make a sound, but I knew he’d come closer when his voice sounded directly beside me. “Forgive you?” he repeated.
“Yes, I—I took power that was not mine to take. I don’t know why I— A moment of madness. I am so sorry. Please, take it back.”
He laughed, the sound like boulders tumbling down a mountain. “Do you really believe you could steal from me?”
My brows furrowed. But I could only manage another “Forgive me.”
He clucked his tongue. “Get your face off the floor, Samira.”
My head jerked up at my name. But of course Shaya knew who I was. He was the God of the Underworld. There was no deception possible with him.
“Stand up.”
Swallowing hard, I obeyed. My knees shook so terribly, I nearly fell right back down.
The god towered over me by at least a foot if not more. I’d seen his likeness all over Khada Palace and in the figurine in Rade’s room. And yet my mind struggled to process it here and now. Right in front of me.
He’d come to punish me, to send me to the Trench. Every worst fear I’d ever had, everything I’d spent my whole life working against, was about to—
“Honestly, Daughter, get a hold of yourself. Your fear reeks.”
I stared up at him, the world around me going quiet. “What… what did you call me?”
His slitted eyes gleamed. “You stole nothing from me, Samira Makara. The power was yours to take. Because you are my daughter.”
I hadn’t heard my surname in so long, I had forgotten it. But the moment he said it, it was like a bell ringing in my brain. That was my name. That was my name. Samira Makara. That was who I was.
But his daughter? That I most certainly was not.
“No. No, Amunet Khada is—”
“Amunet Khada is no one,” Shaya interrupted.
“A contingency plan. No longer needed, now that I have you back.” He put a finger under my chin and tilted my head so that I was met with the full force of those feline eyes.
“They tried to hide you from me, my daughter. But I never gave up my search. Now here you are.”
My breaths came faster, power roiling in my veins. An alien feeling. All of this was alien.
Amunet Khada was Shaya’s daughter, not me.
But my qareen had orange eyes. Not brown. Orange. Just like Shaya’s. Now so did I. And I had green runes. Not black or even red. Green.
Rade had felt something when our runes touched. And Keir smelled something on them.
Out of fire were you born… Shaya commanded fire, ruled over an entire realm of it. Out of water were you found… I’d gone through a waterfall to find my qareen and take this power.
Oh gods.
“There is much you have forgotten about yourself, Samira. I want to help you remember. If you’ll let me.” He released my chin and said, “Let me show you the truth.” He held out his hand. He’d said something similar before. You do not know yourself. Let me show you.
And just like then, I felt an irresistible urge to take his hand. What he said was impossible, unthinkable.
But.
If it was true…
Shaya’s face softened. “Why did you kill your qareen, Samira?”
I blinked at the sudden change in subject. Part of me didn’t want to answer, didn’t want to think about the killing at all. “I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.”
“It was— The Merging required—”
“That’s not why, Samira.”
I shook my head as the pain inside me flared, and I found myself gasping, “She wouldn’t stop crying. I wanted her to stop crying. To stop being so weak. Always so scared and so, so weak.” Horrible guilt rose up inside me. What sort of monster was I to think such a thing?
“Because you saw your weakness reflected in her, and you hated it.”
My eyes flew up to his.
Shaya’s jaw was tense, anger making flames lick along the edges of his orange irises.
But the anger was not directed at me. “You are the daughter of a god. Daughter of an Uncreated. You should never have had to feel weak.” He spat the words with ferocity.
“I lost you, my only daughter, and I failed you. But I vow to you, I will never allow you to feel that way again. All that I do will be to restore you to the mighty being that you are. Let me show you how strong you can be.” He held his hand out more insistently.
I stared, heart beating too fast.
I was sick of being afraid and alone. I wanted to be strong, wanted it with a desperation that staggered me.
If I said yes now, maybe I would have the ability to save Kaldfold and Ashorah, save everyone, and never have to be scared again.
Greed destroys, greed burns.
It was easy for someone to condemn greed who had never known nothing. No money, no real home, no friends or family, no power or agency of any kind.
I didn’t want that life anymore. I hadn’t wanted it for quite some time.
I ignored the warning of Zarqa’s fortune and took Shaya’s hand.
It wasn’t fire or pain that flooded me then.
It was air. Like I had been starved of oxygen until that very moment, and with one gasp, I pulled in all of it.
All the air that ever existed. Refreshing and electric and alive.
It filled my lungs, spread to the very tips of my fingers and toes, and stoppered that void that had opened up in the Eye of Ketet.
Power. That was what it was. Strength and power. My power.
And as more of it flowed into me, I could feel my fear slipping away until the emotion was so foreign, I could hardly believe I’d spent so much of my life feeling it.
“Let us help each other, Daughter.” Shaya’s smile glinted with pride.
Keir was still fighting his qareen. Rade was still lost to the Mirror Realm. The Shroud was still a threat.
Yet when I looked up at Shaya, my lips curled into a smile identical to his. I gripped my father’s hand tighter and let him lead me into the darkness.