“I . . . I don’t know.” The thunder continued to rumble, but beneath it was something else, almost like a whisper on the wind, an urging in a language she didn’t understand. The breeze came again, rustling and tugging at her hair, smelling of those same spices. Peppercorn and cardamom. Clove and mace.
Tea. Khayzur’s tea.
Nahri immediately drew back, filled with a foreboding she didn’t understand. “I think . . . I think there’s something out there.”
He frowned. “I didn’t hear anything.” But he sat up anyway, untangling his limbs from hers to retrieve his bow and quiver.
She shivered, cold without the warm press of his body. Grabbing his robe, she slipped it over her head. “It wasn’t a sound,” she insisted, knowing she probably sounded crazy. “It was something else.”
Another bolt of lightning cracked across the sky, its flash outlining the daeva against the dark. His brow furrowed. “No, they would not dare . . . ,” he whispered, almost to himself. “Not this close to the border.”
Still, he handed her his dagger and then notched one of his silver arrows. He crept toward the cave’s entrance. “Stay back,” he warned.
Nahri ignored him, shoving the dagger in her belt and joining him at the cave’s mouth. Rain lashed their faces, but it wasn’t as dark as it had been earlier; the light from the moon was reflected in the swollen clouds.
Dara raised his bow and gave her a pointed look as the fletched end of the arrow caught her stomach. “At least a little back.”
He stepped out, and she stayed at his side, not liking the way he flinched when the rain hit his face. “Are you sure you should be going out in this weather—”
A bolt of lightning struck just ahead, and Nahri jumped, shielding her eyes. The rain stopped, the effect so immediate it was as if someone turned off a spigot.
The wind whipped through her damp hair. She blinked, trying to clear the spots from her vision. The darkness was lifting. The lightning had struck a tree right near them, setting the dead branches aflame.
“Come on. Let’s go back inside,” Nahri urged. But Dara didn’t move, his gaze locked on the tree. “What is it?” she asked, trying to push past his arm.
He didn’t answer—he didn’t have to. Flames raced down the tree, the heat so intense it instantly dried her wet skin. Acrid smoke poured off the wood, seeping past the roots and pooling into hazy black tendrils that slithered and twirled, solidifying as they slowly rose from the ground.
Nahri backed up and reached for Dara’s arm. “Is . . . is it another daeva?” she asked, trying to sound hopeful as the smoky ropes twisted together, thicker, faster.
Dara’s eyes were wide. “I fear not.” He took her hand. “I think we should leave.”
They had no sooner turned back toward the cave when more black smoke swept down from the cliffs above, surging past the rocky entrance like a waterfall.
Every hair on her body stood on end; the tips of her fingers buzzed with energy. “Ifrit,” she whispered.
Dara stepped back so fast that he stumbled, his usual grace gone. “The river,” he stammered. “Run.”
“But our supplies—”
“There’s no time.” Keeping one hand clenched on her wrist, he dragged her down the rocky ridge. “Can you swim as well as you claim?”
Nahri hesitated, thinking back to the Gozan’s fast current. The river was likely swollen from the storm, its already turbulent waters whipped into a frenzy. “I . . . maybe. Probably,” she corrected, seeing alarm flash across his face. “But you can’t!”
“It matters not.”
Before she could argue, he pulled her along, racing and scrambling down the limestone hill. The steep decline was treacherous in the dark, and Nahri slipped more than once on the loose, sandy pebbles.
They were running along a narrow ledge when a low sound broke across the air, something between a lion’s roar and the snap of an uncontrolled fire. Nahri glanced up, getting the briefest glimpse of something large and bright before it slammed into Dara.
The force knocked her back, her balance gone without the daeva’s firm grip on her wrist. She grabbed for a tree branch, for a rock, for anything as she stumbled, but her fingers raked uselessly through the air. Her feet met nothing, and then she was over the ridge.
Nahri tried to protect her head as she hit the ground hard and rolled down the incline, the jagged rocks gouging her arms. Her body bounced past another small ledge, and then she landed in a thick patch of mud. The back of her head smashed into a hidden tree root.
She lay still, stunned by the blinding pain, the wind knocked out of her. Every part of her hurt. She tried to take a small breath and cried out at the protest of an obviously broken rib.
Just breathe. Don’t move. She needed to let her body heal. She knew it would; already the sting of her torn flesh was fading. She gingerly touched the back of her head, praying that her skull was still intact. Her fingers met bloodied hair but nothing else. Thank the Most High for that small piece of luck.
Something in her abdomen twisted back into place, and she sat up, wiping her eyes free of blood or mud or God only knew what. She squinted. The Gozan was ahead of her, the rushing water glistening as it crested into rapids.
Dara. She climbed to her feet and staggered forward, peering through the darkness at the ridge.
Another flash blinded her, and the air crackled, followed by a deafening boom that knocked her back. Nahri threw up her hands to protect her eyes, but the light was already gone, vanished in a haze of quickly evaporating blue smoke.
Then the ifrit was there, towering over her with arms as thick as tree boughs. Its flesh was pressed light, its skin shimmering between the ashy white of smoke and the crimson-tinged orange of fire. Its hands and feet were coal black, its hairless body covered with a scrawl of ebony markings even wilder than Dara’s.
And it was beautiful. Strange and deadly, but beautiful. She froze as a pair of golden feline eyes settled on her. It smiled, its teeth blackened and sharp. A coal-colored hand reached for the iron scythe at its side.
Nahri jumped to her feet and dashed across the rocks to open water, landing in the shallows with a splash. But the ifrit was too fast, snatching her ankle as she tried to swim away. She clawed at the muddy river bottom, hooking her fingers on a submerged tree root.
The ifrit was stronger. He yanked again, and Nahri screamed as he dragged her back. He’d grown brighter, his skin pulsing with hot yellow light. A scar ran across his bald head like a smear of extinguished charcoal. The thief in her could not help but note the gleaming bronze chest plate he wore over a simple linen waist cloth. A string of raw quartz stones looped his neck.
He raised her hand as if in shared victory. “I have her!” he screamed in a language that sounded like wildfire. He grinned again and ran his tongue over his sharp teeth, a look of unmistakable hunger in his gold eyes. “The girl! I have—”
Recovering her senses, Nahri grabbed for the dagger Dara had given her in the cave. Nearly slicing off one of her fingers in the process, she plunged it deep into the ifrit’s fiery chest. He cried out and dropped her wrist, sounding more surprised than hurt.
He lifted one painted eyebrow as he glanced down at the dagger, obviously unimpressed. Then he slapped her hard across the face.