Chapter Twelve
Nothing could have prepared him for the emptiness. He searches for a trace of her, reaching out in the hollow of his chest, desperate to feel the echo of her soul respond. He’s met with only the heavy, lonely beating of his own heart.
INDIAN RAILWAYS, INDIA
The train car is occupied.
A horse paws at the ground, ears pinned to its skull and snorting at the scent of blood. Its salt and pepper coat shines in the low light from the open slots as it pivots anxiously, tail high. It’s only the lead rope tied to the opposite end of the car that prevents it from moving any closer.
Carefully, Anna guides Khiran onto a stretch of straw far enough away from the hooves beating against the wooden subfloor and coaxes his hands away from his wound.
The blade had nestled itself neatly between his ribs.
Heart in her throat, she tears his kurta open, sees the bubbles in his blood, and her fears are confirmed.
His lung. It’s pierced his lung.
“Khiran?” His name escapes her like a question. A prayer for guidance and assurances.
There’s so much red.
The same color as any of the thousands of patients she has treated over the centuries.
Anna knows that wound, without the extensive treatment only a hospital can provide, would be a death sentence to anyone else.
She puts her hands over his own, adding more pressure.
Sweat beads down her neck, rolling down her collar.
She can taste the salt of it on her lips. “Khiran, I don’t—”
“It will heal,” he assures her, but he sounds winded. Out of breath. When he coughs, the sound of it rattles in the cage of his chest. “Slowly, but it will heal the same as everything else. Don’t worry, I’ve suffered worse.”
She wants to believe him. Wants his reassurances to be spun more of truth than thinly veiled comfort. She looks down at her hands, at the blood—his blood—smearing over her skin. Darkening the etchings on her ring.
Her ring.
Blood and bone.
His blood. His bone. His magic.
The horror she feels is as sharp as the blade in her pocket. “Khiran…”
“I’ll heal,” he repeats, quickly. It’s meant to reassure her, but all Anna can hear is the wheeze in his breathing. His head lulls to the side, eyeing the blood coating her fingers with a level of detachment that scares her.
“I know what she’s tracking.” She swallows, closing her eyes. “You told me it was born of you and you alone. Your magic.” She looks at him, watches the understanding reach his eyes and the horror part his lips. “It’s the ring, Khiran. That’s how she’s tracking us.”
He swallows, breath coming faster. Anna can’t tell if it’s because of the panic rimming his gaze or because his undamaged lung is now doing the work of two.
“I—” A cough cuts him off, wet and bloody.
He cringes, red coating his lips and staining his teeth.
“When I regain my strength. I’ll find a way to remove it. ”
Find a way. Find a way because he can’t. Doesn’t know how.
Anna does.
The solution is heavy in her pocket. The blade Silas insisted she needed to hold on to.
The blade she never had the opportunity to use.
Anna pulls it out, unsheathes it, and stares at the chipped edge.
A blade forged with the blood of a god for the sole purpose of cutting through divine flesh.
And she knows—she knows—it wasn’t meant for battle.
It was meant for this.
Khiran follows her gaze, his brow furrowing in confusion. “Anna,” he breathes, “Where—”
“Silas gave it to me,” she says, voice thready and weak. Her eyes lift, meeting his stare. “He told me I’d need it.”
He must see the apology in her expression, see the way she holds her ringed hand to her chest in a final goodbye. “Anna, no.”
But she has to. Marcia will keep hunting them for as long as she has a scent.
Anna doesn’t know how fast she heals, but she can’t help but remember the way she hobbled after them—the strength in which she threw her daggers—despite an injury that should have left her bleeding out over the earth.
Too fast. She heals too fast. She’s probably chasing their train even now.
Preparing to wait them out at the next stop, ready to ambush them the moment the engine slows.
Khiran is in no shape to run. He won’t be for days, at least. Anna needs to throw her off the trail now. Needs her to believe they’ve already jumped the train so she won’t be there at the next stop.
He lunges for the blade in her hand, a pained shout passing his lips.
Anna is quicker.
She raises the blade above her head, splays her hand out over the straw like a sacrifice, and brings it down with all her strength.
Khiran is silent as he wraps her hand.
The rest of his kurta lays, cut into strips by the same knife that severed the ring finger on her right hand.
Anna stares at the empty space that remains; watches the blood seep through the cotton.
The flow has slowed to barely a trickle as it clots.
Another ten minutes and it should be done completely.
She wonders if Marcia has found her finger and the ring encircling it, caked with dirt and dried blood, where she threw it from the train car.
Better yet, maybe a stray animal picked it up before she could.
Maybe she’ll spend precious hours searching and find nothing but a scavenger for her trouble.
Khiran ties it off, tucking in the loose end neatly. It’s surprisingly well wrapped. Anna wonders if he’d learned from watching Eira or if it’s a skill he was forced to learn from attending the wounds The First and his followers have dealt him.
“I would have found a way,” he says, the words soft with regret. His hand lingers on hers, thumb brushing the edge of the bandage, hesitating over the knuckle missing its limb.
Anna stills his hand with her uninjured one, fingers curling around his palm. “I couldn’t risk you.” An echo of the words he spoke to her a lifetime ago. She’s not sure he recognizes them.
He flinches. “I made it to protect you.”
“It did. For eight hundred years, it did.”
“It used so much magic—was a piece of me. I should have realized—”
“Don’t,” she says, a gentle command. “You told me to stop shouldering blame that wasn’t mine to carry. So stop blaming yourself for something I wouldn’t have changed.”
She waits, patiently, for him to meet her gaze.
Tries to soothe the guilt she finds there with a smile.
“Eight centuries ago, you gave a piece of yourself to protect me.” She reaches for the star-shaped scar along his ribs, resting inches below his wound, feeling the shape of it.
“Now I’ve given a piece of myself to save you. ”
He takes her hand, kisses the fingertips that traced the edges of his scar just a moment before.
“I won’t be able to find you,” he murmurs, voice soft.
Anna can hear the fear in it—can feel its echo reverberating in her own chest like a warning.
She breathes deeply, concentrating on the way air fills her lungs and rushes past her lips so she can ignore the gnawing pit weighing heavy in her stomach.
She straightens her spine and pulls her shoulders back. As if looking confident holds the power to make her feel it. “I wasn’t planning on letting you leave.” She leans toward him, their foreheads touching. “Together, remember?”
His sigh is pained. Weighted. She can feel his worry as easily as she feels the tremble in his breath. “Together.”
The word tastes like a promise. Anna makes sure to seal it with a kiss.
Every time the train slows to a stop, Anna finds herself holding her breath—her ears straining and her body ready to flee. By the time the metal wheels begin turning beneath them again, her lungs burn and her chest aches.
They’re unloading cargo now—she can hear them a few cars down.
She glances at the mare, finding the animal’s dark eyes staring back at her as she lays in the straw.
She’s a beautiful creature and obviously well taken care of.
Anna imagines she must have been sold as a broodmare for a hefty sum.
Khiran insists they wait a few more stops until they reach Delhi.
A city full of people makes a better hiding spot than a village.
Anna only hopes the mare’s destination proves to be farther than theirs.
Charming as he is, she suspects even Khiran would struggle to explain the bloody mess they’ve made.
Khiran studies her, his body slouched against the train car wall. “Do you feel different?”
It takes her a moment to understand what he’s asking. Then she remembers Cassius’ theory and the conversation that followed in the privacy of their room. She looks down at her hands, gaze snagging on the missing piece of her. “No.”
Power wasn’t the reason she wielded the blade, but it doesn’t stop her from feeling disappointed.
Bitter, even. She gave up their connection to protect themselves.
Having any semblance of power would have made it all the easier to stay safe—to spare Khiran the burden she knows he shoulders alone.
The only one of them with magic as a last line of defense to save them both.
She wishes, fervently, that she could lift some of that weight from him.
There is a subtle shift in his eyes, a sigh that feels a little too long, that makes her think he might feel as disappointed as she is.
Still, he forces a smile and holds his arms up in invitation.
Anna accepts, curling into his uninjured side and resting her head on his chest. His heartbeat is a steady rhythm against her ear.
He kisses her crown. “It’s alright,” he murmurs into her hair. “It’s not something we were counting on.”
“Still would have been nice,” she grumbles.
She can feel his huff of laughter. “I couldn’t agree more.”
Beneath them, the train starts creeping forward.
Anna can feel the vibrations of the wheels on the track through the floorboards.
She holds her breath as it gains momentum, releasing it once they’re closer to normal speed.
Khiran’s fingers play with the ends of her hair, coiling and uncoiling a lock around his finger.
She tilts her head, her cheek resting against his collar and her eyes tracing the line of his jaw. “Do you think she’ll still find us?”
The corded muscle in his throat flexes as he swallows. “Eventually.” A kiss to her forehead. “But it will be harder—take them longer. You have bought us time we didn’t have before.”
Anna wishes it felt like enough.