Hector.
Sadness crushes my heart as I press my hand to the throbbing in my chest.Every day it intensifies and manifests into a knot, a ache that burns every time I take a breath.No one told me it would be like this when I left Hector. How being separated from my husband would make me crave him more, long for him more, need him more.
I lean against the headboard, pull my knees up, and rest my hands against them. At least a thousand times, I have thought about what will come next, and every time, my throat clenches at the thought of never seeing Hector again.
I suspect it will be impossible to stay away. My binding tattoo calls me to him the way the sandy shore calls the waves. Until then, the memories we created together will keep me company. All those nights. Those stolen moments. Those intimate kisses we shared.
Maybe he knew exactly what he was doing when he had Alf engrave the magical binding tattoo on my wrist. It will bring me back to him.
At night, when I am feeling desperate, I convince myself that I can change his mind about conquering the other five tribes of Tarrobane. Then, with the dawn, that optimism fades, and doubt returns.
None of that matters right now. Not when I’m stuck a summer in the past. A calendar painted on the wall of the nearby cobbler shop confirmed what I hadn’t wanted to believe.
I press my hand to the bloodstone threads Hector tied around my wrist weeks ago. Without them, I would not be able to use magic. And I wouldn’t have to worry about a curse erupting from my mouth. But it is one of two things that Hector gave to me—both I carry with me, even now. And I don’t think I could bear to lose that connection to him.
Maybe that is the darkness convincing me I cannot let the threads go. With this relentless pull I feel toward Hector, I would do anything to keep his gift, even fight against the darkness.
So, I cling to the only tangible thing I have left: the hope that, with Everly’s help,Ican direct my Fate, not the high gods.
She’s out there somewhere. I just have to find her.
ChapterTwo
Thick, dark clouds hover over Rock Mountain, the border city near the Bloodstone mountains. It’s one of the only areas within Tarrobane that anyone can freely roam. It doesn’t matter what tribe they’re from.
Everly is here somewhere. Otherwise, I wouldn’t feel her presence as vividly as I feel the raindrops pelting my face.
As the rain eases to a drizzle, I weave through the crowd of people. I brush shoulders with beggars and merchants, my eyes scanning every face for my friend. When I pass a group of men gathered around a street performer, someone calls out, and my heart skips a beat.
Everly?
I pivot toward the voice, but my hopes are squashed when it’s just a young woman calling for her friend. They run toward each other and laugh. Sadness washes over me as I turn away and continue my seemingly endless search, my determination unbroken.
Though it gets tiresome after a while, I force myself to walk with my shoulders hunched and my eyes downcast. If people think I’m a frail old woman, they will not bother me.
I search every alley and hidden corner, calling out Everly’s name to anyone who will listen, but she is nowhere to be found.
Still, I continue, marking every hour by the increasing ache in my neck, back, feet, and stomach. I would do nearly anything to be back in the palace at Karra. I never went hungry while I was there.
As the sun slips below the mountains in the distance, the streets empty, and the city takes on a different atmosphere. The shadows grow longer, the air cools, and a muffled sob floats on the evening breeze, making me shiver and pull my cloak tighter around me.
My surcoat whips around my legs as I quicken my pace, following the noise into a deserted alley, where I spot Kahlia, a young Calcite woman, huddled in a corner, clutching her torn, bloody surcoat.
Kahlia works in a bakery close to my cottage, and she is the only person who has been kind to me. Three days ago, she gave me an entire loaf of bread—an act of compassion that could have cost her apprenticeship, yet she did so with a smile.
I kneel in front of her and take in her bruised face and her brown curls matted with dirt and blood.
“He took everything I had,” she whispers. “And then…then…”
She doesn’t need to say the rest. Horror is written in her wide eyes and in the paleness of her skin.
“Who?” I ask between trembling lips.
She clutches her torn surcoat closer to her body and lets out a ragged breath.
Disgust surges through me at whoever did this to her. “Who did this?”
She hesitates, but then reluctantly gives me the name of one of the men who frequents the alehouse where I used to work.
