Pirates beside them began to stir and wake. Bree’s small head peeked above her hammock behind Burlz’s shoulder, eyes wide. In the next breath she had crawled from her bed and scurried up the far stairs leading on deck.
So much for bunkmate loyalties, thought Niya as none of the other crew moved to intervene. In fact, most told Niya and her assailants to shut up and let them sleep.
Burlz ducked into the same row as her. “You seem the type of gutter trash that needs nightly remindin’ of their place.”
“And you seem the type of swine whose prick is so small they need to hurt others to feel big,” countered Niya. “Or perhaps you have no prick at all, which is why you need this one to feel like you do.”
Sensing his sidekick approaching from behind, Niya threw back an elbow.
“Oof,” grunted Prik as he doubled over, dropping a wire rope he had been angling to wrap around her throat.
Niya punched him in the face, blood splattering from his lips as one of his four teeth was flung free.
“You bitch!” he spat, dropping to his knees and searching for his tooth as though he could put it back.
Niya ignored the man on the ground as she ran straight toward the charging Burlz. Using a beam for leverage, she kicked off it, spinning and knocking away the dagger in his hands. She swung against a hammock, a crew member growling in protest at being jostled from sleep, before she threw herself up and onto Burlz’s shoulders, wrapping her legs around his neck and locking her ankles together.
She squeezed.
Burlz growled and clawed at her legs for release.
She didn’t give him a sliver.
Yes, purred her magic, harder. It vibrated in her veins. Her hands heated with her gifts, and she pressed them against Burlz’s face.
He howled, the smell of his burning flesh filling Niya’s nostrils, and she grinned.
Burlz smacked them up against another beam, over and over, but Niya just grunted through the pain. Nearby lanterns flared along with her magic, which she pushed to feed into her muscles and reinforce her strength to tighten her legs, tighter, tighter, until—
Crack.
Niya jumped from her perch as Burlz toppled to the floor, dead. Neck broken.
The crew’s quarters were drenched in silence as Niya took in deep breaths, her magic crackling around her, hungry for more movement, for her to dance. Those with the Sight would have been able to see the red haze pulsing from her skin. She looked from Burlz’s lifeless body to Prik, still bent over at the far end of the row.
Niya picked up the dagger that she had kicked to the floor. “All right, lover boy,” she crooned, stepping over Burlz and toward Prik. “You’re next.”
“You’ll stand down now, girl,” Kintra’s voice commanded from the stairs behind Niya.
Turning, she found the quartermaster’s dark gaze, a small Bree by her side. Kintra glanced over the scene, from Burlz’s body and the sniveling Prik to the pirates who watched on from their hammocks, before her hard eyes landed back on Niya. “You’re to come with me,” she said. “The captain wishes to see you.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Niya would be the first to admit that murder was often a tedious business.
And despite the lore surrounding him, the Thief King was a lenient master, considering the heathens he allowed to make up the majority of his kingdom. To lose favor with him meant you had done something very terrible indeed.
Niya would always remember the first life she and her sisters had been ordered to send to the Fade. She’d been fourteen, young, but old enough to respect the power she had been given at birth.
Despite it being winter in most of Aadilor, Niya was warm within the Thief Kingdom, tucked into her bed beneath the palace. Her sheets were silky against her skin as she stretched, letting out a yawn. Her night had ended only moments ago, but it had been a night like many others here. She and her sisters had been entertaining the court members for the past year, their performances consisting of spinning a roomful of guests into slobbering animals. Yet Niya could always feel the potential for more as she danced, tempting whispers within her magic. More desperation from the crowd, more twisting of pain into desire. The potential to make puppets of the giftless and hypnotize the less powerful. It called to Niya, just beyond the surface of her skin, buried in the center of her flames—hot, consuming, greedy. Take, it crooned to her. Consume.
Niya turned over, eyes resting on the dancing flame of the candle beside her bed. She had felt all these emotions earlier tonight. But Arabessa was always there, with her guiding notes and perfectly played instruments keeping Niya from walking forward into that dark, Larkyra from twisting her voice sharp. Arabessa, their conductor, who kept the Bassette sisters contained.
A knocking at her door brought Niya’s thoughts back to her chambers.
Who could that be?
It was absurdly late. Or rather way too early, a time when not even the thieves and gamblers kept court. But the knocking sounded again before a servant entered, one who’d been born without sight.
“The king orders an audience with the fire dancer,” they explained.
“Right this moment?” grumbled Niya, sitting up.
“Immediately. Your companions are to meet you in the hall in a quarter sand fall.”
Niya knew they meant her sisters, though none here knew that they were related, only that they performed together.
In a rush Niya found herself cloaked and disguised in her gold mask, entering the throne room with Larkyra and Arabessa.
None of them knew why the king had sent for them, but even if they had, Niya would still be gripped with a crackling of nerves as she was now.
Their master sat within his swirl of black smoke at the far end of his throne room, only his suppressive power seen and felt.
Before him knelt a woman, her long gray hair covering her bowed head. A shattered mask lay in pieces beside her, while her arms were bound behind her.
“We have a traitor in our midst.” The Thief King’s deep voice filled the cavernous chamber, and the smoke covering him vibrated with each of his words.
Niya’s skin chilled in anticipation, feeling her king’s anger in the air, flowing in the lava lining their narrow walkway. He was not their father in these moments. No, Dolion Bassette was merely a shadow in their presence, possessed by whatever ancient power kept the Thief King ruling, filled with memories and knowledge and secrets from a time when the lost gods had not been lost but had roamed Aadilor in their glory.
Niya stood silent beside her sisters, waiting by the foot of his throne.
“It appears this creature desires that our kingdom be split open, that all of Aadilor know how to get in. Isn’t that right, Valexa?”
The woman’s head snapped back. Her pale complexion was folded and wrinkled, gaps of missing teeth showed in her snarl, and yet her eyes held youth, clarity, in their glowing yellow depths.
She is a senseer, thought Niya, feeling the thick magic stirring in the woman. One with gifts that could not reach out, only inward, as they listened to the minds around them, reading thoughts.
Niya instantly shuttered her mind, just like Achak had taught her and her sisters.
Yet the woman must have sensed her effort, for her gaze fell to Niya, then Larkyra and Arabessa, taking in their black cloaks and gold masks. A twisted grin inched up her face.
“These three,” she croaked. “These three are special to y—” She sucked in a sharp breath as the king’s power squeezed, a silver leash flowing from his clouded form and wrapping around hers. She coughed as he let go, a wheeze mixed with a laugh. “You cannot hide behind your smoke forever,” she forced out. “The sins of this kingdom will be known. Your sins and your sinners. Such a place must be found. Destroyed!”
A purist. How boring.
“No.” Valexa turned her attention to Niya, hearing her thoughts, and Niya silently scolded herself for letting her guard down. “I once was like you, a cretin of gluttony and glory and vice. It will serve y
ou for a time, child, but know this: it will destroy you in the end. Masks, they are. Nothing but thin veils. This place is a disguise for evil to roam free, to let damnation out without guilt following lost souls home.”
“And without such a place, where do you think these ‘sinners,’ as you call them, would go?” the Thief King rumbled. “How would they curb their vice? Let out their carnality? The Thief Kingdom exists to relieve Aadilor of what would otherwise plague its lands. To accept what is deemed unacceptable. We welcome chaos to allow calm.”
Niya had heard these words before, in lessons from their father. For the world to remain at peace, it needed a place that could safely hide desires otherwise condemned by society. The world needed a sanctuary for pleasure and folly and sin. Which was why the Thief Kingdom was not marked on maps of Aadilor: to maintain a semblance of control over who came and went, to allow their king to collect the secrets of every soul who entered his domain, to keep the havoc in.
“But you know this,” the king mused. “You needed this kingdom once, Valexa. Very badly.”
“And I have paid for that need ever since,” she spat.
“A price you agreed to. Do not place blame on others for decisions you have made. You have lived long enough to know such ways are tiresome.”
“Too long,” she mumbled.
“A burden you will no longer shoulder after this night.”
Niya looked to her king, as did Valexa, but the black-and-silver cloud around him remained impenetrable.
“Silencing me will not stop others. I have spoken of the evil here, of the tyrant who rules within the caved city. Others feel as I, and when they find this place, Aadilor will—”
Valexa’s words were cut off. The king’s magic tightened around her once more, her complexion turning purple from the blockage of airflow.
“My devoted subjects,” the king’s voice boomed, acknowledging Niya and her sisters. “I called you here tonight to extend an invitation at my court. You perform for my subjects, but now I ask you to perform for me. Will you help keep this kingdom safe from those who wish it otherwise?”
Niya’s heart picked up speed, her magic gleeful with the dark promises that spun in the air. She had been waiting for this moment.
Niya and her sisters answered as one. “We will, my king.”
“Will you obey my commands loyally and without question?”
“We will, my king.”
“The tasks ahead will not be easy. Most will fear you, some will hate you, but all will respect you. Are you willing to become such creatures?”
Niya could feel the thrum of energy from her sisters, from each of their gifts, their quick hesitation, before, “We are, my king.”
“Then I name you my Mousai, members of the Thief Kingdom’s guardians,” he declared. “And to prove your faith to me and our people, you will send the guilty before us to the Fade.”
“You are . . . all . . . monsters,” Valexa gasped through the king’s grip, her eyes full of determined fire, it seemed, until the very end.
“Perhaps,” the king replied, “but even the sun casts shadows.”
A sand fall later, Niya and her sisters stood in the dark hall of the court, dressed in one of their many opulent disguises, fully covered from head to toe to fingertip in costume. Despite the hour, the hall was now packed with court members. Word seemed to have spread fast regarding the Mousai and their intended performance. A buzz of excitement filled the high-ceilinged black onyx hall. Desire to watch punishment and pain.
Achak stood in the center of the hall. Valexa knelt at their feet.
“Our king has found a traitor in our midst,” the brother said, hushing the crowd. “It appears there are those who do not condone the conduct of this kingdom. There are those who wish it to fall at the mercy of the ignorant and fearful.”
Boos and shouts of displeasure echoed against the cool, inky walls.
“Here kneels such a member. They have been linked to the many explosions that have taken lives and destroyed irreplaceable parts of our kingdom.”
The yelling grew louder. Niya’s magic spun impatiently inside her veins at the mass of movement and energy to feed off. She did not yet know how to feel about sending Valexa to the Fade, but she soaked in the anger in the room, solidifying her resolve that the bent, broken woman before them deserved her end.
“Our dear magic performers, the king’s Mousai, have agreed to demonstrate what we do to those who dare defy our master, who dare to cast judgment on those who have done them no harm. Who are different from them.” Achak lifted their voice higher. “Our dear Mousai will give us a performance none have yet seen. They will give us a performance that will send this soul to the Fade.”
The following roar was deafening, the spiked hall reverberating with animalistic glee. Niya felt heady with their excitement. Yes, purred her gift. Yesssss.
Yet still, Niya felt a slip of uncertainty. What will it be like to dance without constraint?
“Follow my lead,” Arabessa whispered beside Niya, her form unmoving as she held tight the neck of her cello. Larkyra stood on her other side. None but they would be able to tell she was speaking. “Do not doubt the right of this wrong, sisters. Our king guides us true.”
The floating chandeliers dimmed, save for one right above where the Mousai stood and Valexa knelt. Achak slipped away into shadows to stand with the others.
Niya met the gazes of each of her sisters through their masks, seeing the resolve in Arabessa’s eyes, the trepidation in Larkyra’s. She understood why Larkyra would be nervous.
While this would be Arabessa’s and Niya’s first kill, Larkyra had suffered endless hardship with taming her gifted voice since birth. An upset wail from her had unintentionally harmed many. Niya and Arabessa certainly had the scars, as well as a buried cat, as proof. Larkyra had only recently learned to master her voice’s immense destructive power, which made Niya wonder why she would be asked so soon to let it out again. But while Niya could question her father, she could not doubt her king. His reasoning for things ran deeper than their Jabari lives or even this caved kingdom.
For a moment Niya and her sisters did not move but held each other’s stares. We are one, the energy around them seemed to say. We are forever bound by what happens next.
With a collective deep breath in, they began their performance.
A melodic note from Arabessa’s cello had Niya twisting softly to the tune. Her eldest sister sat to her right, her arm and fingers fluidly moving to bring forth a song that spun its way into Niya’s bones. It was a haunting tune, deep and drugging. It started simple, but Arabessa soon used her powers to double and then triple the notes, layering one on top of another.
Niya’s hips swayed before she turned her body over completely to the swirling tempo. She felt her skin warm, as if it glowed from the fire in her blood, and perhaps it did, but Niya’s thoughts had turned inward, to the whispering of her powers.
Bewitch them, spin them, draw them in. Their souls are weak for you to win.
Niya closed her eyes under her disguise, allowing her limbs to move as desired. Larkyra’s voice joined in, elevating the vibrations in the room to edge insanity.
Though she had heard it many times, Larkyra’s singing still devastated Niya. So beautifully inhuman were the notes flowing from her mouth that they made one instantly desperate, hungry. As if the listener knew such sound had left with the gods and this moment would be fleeting.
Arabessa’s song picked up speed, as did Larkyra’s. Sweat ran along Niya’s brow as she wove between their magic, bending and twirling through the purple and golden threads, adding her own red to dazzle in the air. She spun in circles around their prisoner, sensing the senseer’s desire and agony as she strained against the shackles that kept her bolted to the ground. Valexa was trying to fight against their spell, but she was old, and her capture had weakened her. As though Niya had plunged a sharp knife into skin, she sensed her powers take hold of the senseer. But instead of scr
eaming, the old woman moaned, surrendering to their sweet torture, swaying with the tempo they set.
Larkyra concentrated their efforts by molding her voice into words.
Welcome to your final summons,
The will of our righteous king;
No one slips here uninvited,
For only terror and agony we bring
Bend forward and break the traitors,
A promise to darken all dreams;
Here is your final undoing,
Our pleasure to let out your screams
Niya was now merely a reaction to Larkyra’s song and Arabessa’s sounds. In the distance she could hear a scream, like steam from a kettle, but it was lost in her dark euphoria. Her magic had turned dangerous, hotter and pointed, a slice from a sharpened blade. The sensation was frightening in that it felt so good.
But Niya’s worry was weak, for faith in her eldest sister was stronger. Arabessa would keep them true, guide them back. Arabessa would make sure they fulfilled the purpose of their performance.
And Arabessa did.
She conducted them, pushing and pulling her bow against strings.
It is time, her melody said. It is now.
Niya danced her thread of magic to ball up into the center of the room with her sisters’. The air turned vibrant with their mixed spells. A star shining deadly bright.
Burn, her magic cooed. Feed on flesh and bone. Take her heartbeat for your own.
Yes, she thought, yes.
Niya’s mind filled with the crescendo, melody and notes soaring high, high, high, until it all came crashing down on the woman, a glittering, deadly wave. Her head tilted back in a scream. Their spell funneled into her open mouth, the star swallowed up with a snap of her jaw.
Thud.
The body dropped.
The room was drowned in dark quiet.
A single chandelier shining light on what remained.
Valexa lay motionless on the black marble floor. Her shackles broken, her eyes and mouth frozen open in her last pleading wail as blood trickled from her nose and eyes.
Niya breathed heavily in the stillness that settled over her mind, deaf to the roars of hedonistic delight rising from the court around her. All she could do was stare at the body by her feet.
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