I reeled at her angrily, nearly wrestling her, but she hooked my arm through hers and pushed me out of the collapsing room.
My anger faded. It’d nearly gotten us both killed.
I covered my mouth with my sleeve, but the smoke was already so thick it coated my lips and lashes. It was harder on Ammi. She was choking on it. If we didn’t get out, she’d suffocate. She’d die.
We stumbled down the wooden stairs, one step ahead of the flaming falling beams. The altar by the door had crumbled, the painted faces of the gods melting, and the oranges that had been offered in prayer were charred like the dark side of the moon.
When at last we made it outside, Ammi sucked in a desperate gulp of air. I did the same, the cold stinging my throat before it settled into my lungs.
The other guests stood, helplessly watching the fire devour the inn, its flames roaring against the cloudless black night. None of them knew how it had started, or where it had come from. But some were starting to speculate.
“The forests in the North have fires like this. You see the red tips?”
“Demon fire.”
I whirled and looked at the fire more closely, watching the edges dance with an unnaturally red sheen. My fingers still burned. No more sparks danced from their tips, but my nails were blackened and burnt. And suddenly I knew.
I had been the one to start the fire. Not Bandur, but me.
He was right. This—all this—was a warning that I was changing. That if I didn’t come to Lapzur, I would hurt those I cared about.
“We have to go,” I said to Ammi. My voice crawled from my throat. I needed to get out of here, as far from what I had done as possible. Before I hurt anyone else.
“We have to help them. The inn, all these people—”
“Nothing can help them now,” I replied crisply. “We must go before the emperor hears of this and finds us. Or the shansen.”
As soon as I’d said it, I wished I could take the words back.
Ammi looked at me as if she didn’t recognize me.
I tugged Ammi away from the blazing inn when my demon’s sight flared, showing me a little girl screaming inside. Her mother crouched over her, shielding her with her body.
The roof of the inn cracked, and my heart clenched.
My eyes burned with the same terrible heat before they turned red. Not caring who saw, I barreled into the inn, threading through the flames as if they were gusts of wind, not torrents of fire. My lungs shrieked for want of air, but I kept going.
The girl and her mother were barely conscious, huddled in the corner of the room, heartbreakingly close to the window—their means of escape. When I reached them, they hardly acknowledged me. The little girl let out a groan.
The human Maia couldn’t carry a mother and her child to safety. Couldn’t even drag both of them the few meters across the room to the window.
But the demon Maia could.
A laugh echoed inside my mind—or was it the crackle of the fire around me? I could not tell. I hurried toward the pair and rushed them to the window. It was already open, but the fire had progressed to the roof, gnawing hungrily at the gray tiles. We’d have to get down somehow. Before the inn collapsed and the girl and her mother perished.
Each second mattered. I tore the enchanted rug out of my pouch and set the mother and daughter on it. I wouldn’t fit.
“Fly!” I yelled as it quivered to life. “Take them down!”
Once the rug spiraled out of sight, I leapt after it onto the roof. The fire sprang after me, needling my ankles, and I danced along the clattering roof tiles to keep my shoes from burning. I felt no pain. I did not burn.
Once I saw the carpet deliver the mother and girl to safety, I circled to the back of the inn where no one would see me and jumped to the ground, my arms held out as if they were wings.
I landed silently, with impossible grace.
Well done, Maia, Bandur purred. But it is just the beginning. Will you put more innocent lives at risk? Or have you learned your lesson? Will you face your fate at last?
“I’ll come to Lapzur,” I whispered. My throat burned. Everything tasted of ashes. Of doom. “I’ll come to Lapzur, but on my terms.”
My voice hardened. “I’ll be there before the next full moon. I’ll not come before I see Edan.”
A claw of fire bit into the inn’s roof, and I stifled a scream as tiles smashed down onto the ground.
You have nerve, to bargain with a demon.
“You want your freedom, don’t you? Then let me relish the last of mine.”
You do not seem to understand that it is you who are the danger. The longer you stay away from the isles, the more harm you will bring to those you love.
He laughed. I will give you two weeks. Bring the enchanter if you wish, but I won’t promise he will be safe on Lapzur. If you do not arrive by sundown, no one you love will be safe anywhere.
“I’ll be there.”
No sooner did the promise leave my lips than rain poured down in sheets. Steam rose from the inn’s walls, a sudden wind chasing away the smoke. As fast as it had come alive, the fire began to die.
The villagers fell to their knees, thanking the gods. I watched from afar as they took in the stranded guests and gave them shelter.
No one had died in the fire, yet guilt writhed in my chest.
Whatever consequences I’d have to face for agreeing to go to Lapzur were worth it. I’d never been so relieved to see rain. I couldn’t help but feel it was washing away the blood on my hands.
Ammi found me, hiding in the shadows.
“How are they?” I asked. “The mother and the child.”
“They’ll live. Thanks to you.” She knelt beside me. “You told me you’d be more of a danger than help to A’landi if you stayed in the Winter Palace. Is this what you meant by it?”
“Yes,” I whispered. My pulse pushed into my throat. “We should part here. I’ll only get worse. The fire, I think I started it because I was angry—” I stopped. How to explain it to her? I didn’t know where to begin.
“I’ve noticed your eyes,” she said. “They burn red sometimes. It frightened me at first, but I know you, Master Tamarin. Maia. This isn’t you.”
This isn’t me. That was what I’d been telling myself all this time. But soon it would be me. Soon I wouldn’t be able to hide from myself any longer.
“Ammi, I…” I wanted to tell her what was happening to me. She’d already guessed and come close, but still, I held back the truth.