“I took it from the castle ruins,” Cas confesses, setting the perforated dome in place and giving it a tiny spin. “It’s pointless having an alfaro out here. But last night, when I first saw the stars, I realized the reason I didn’t know the constellation before—it’s not a constellation they teach us in Puerto Leones.” I follow his gaze up to the heavens. Millions of stars wink at us, but one is brightest. The fixed point of the Marinera that we used to sail here.
“Maryam called it the Lion’s Paw,” he says, and exhales a laugh. “It corresponds with my mother’s birth month.”
“I suppose you were always born to be a lion, then.”
“I wonder what other secrets my mother kept.”
“Only the dead can say.”
“I miss her.” He takes the bottle from me and drinks. “I don’t want to miss her, but I do. There is so much I want to ask, and I wasted it because I was angry and terrible. I’ve been thinking about what Leo said back in Little Luzou. I realize that I hurt the women I love.”
“What do you mean?”
“I pushed Nuria away because I thought I was protecting her. I denied my mother forgiveness because I wanted to make her feel the anguish I felt for so long. I—I don’t want to hurt you.”
“We all have regrets, Cas.” I brush his hair away from his face, and he leans into my palm. Women he loves. He loves me, but he hasn’t said the words.
“Do you think that after all this is over,” he begins, “that we can convince Argi to return? Not forever, if she doesn’t wish it, but to share some of this knowledge with the Moria on the mainland?”
We.
“When the time comes,” I say, “we’re all going to make the best decisions we can for our nations.”
He leans on his knee and spins the copper alfaro between us. “Say what you mean, Nati.”
I bite my bottom lip and taste the guilt of all the things I’m not brave enough to say out loud.
“I didn’t mean what I said,” I confess with shallow breaths. “When I asked you to kiss me and make me forget. I don’t ever want to forget you. I want every moment, no matter how cruel or perfect, because I wager we have plenty of both. When I’m with you, part of me wishes we could be other people.”
“Why?” He touches my chin softly and guides my gaze back to his. “Why, Nati?”
Isn’t it obvious? “Because you and I don’t have a future together.”
He looks away. “You don’t know that.”
“I do. We aren’t going to make plans right now, Cas. Let’s say we perfect the memory projection and then I retrieve the Knife. After that, what will I be to you? You are going to be the king of Puerto Leones.”
“I know that,” he says darkly.
I sigh, frustrated. “When I’m with you, I want to forget that I’m a girl without family or land or title. And before you say that you don’t care about these things, know that the rest of the world cares. Your council will care. Your allies will care.”
“Then I won’t be king,” he says, and every word is spoken slowly but with conviction.
“Cas—”
He takes my hands in his and gives a rumbling laugh. “Did you not expect your ‘most ardent enemy’ to say that?”
I remember the words I wrote to Lady Nuria beseeching her help. It feels like ages ago now. Like we have outgrown our skin and bones and are becoming new versions of ourselves.
“Are you drunk to suggest such a thing?” I ask.
“The cider is watery at best,” he says, “and no, I’m not drunk. We’ve been on this island for only two days, and I have never been happier. Except when we were in Acesteña.”
I hate you.
I hate you more.
“We’ve done nothing but fight.” My voice trembles with the weak excuse.
“I love fighting with you. I love that you question me. Correct me. I—We can stay here, Nati. Or reclaim our ship from the pirates and go anywhere, if you’d prefer. I will sail you wherever you want to go.”
“You’re not that great a sailor.”
“I wasn’t a good swordsman at first either, but I beat my body into form, didn’t I?”
What about the Moria and the people who will be casualties of King Fernando’s war? What about Dez and Leo and Leyre? What about Argi and the pirates San Piedras? What about us, Castian and me? Don’t we owe it to the children who made homes in hidden libraries and under the wide kitchen tables of the palace? I feel the memory burn over my heart, light shimmering between the open laces of my tunic.
“What is that?” he whispers.
“It’s you, Cas.” I climb on his lap and sit astride him. We’re face to face and inches apart. I summon the memories along my torso, the ones that I’ve chosen to keep. I pull my tunic off and feel the heat of his stare on my bare skin. “You said you’d kiss me again, truly kiss me. So do it.”
I used to think that I was the hurricane and Cas was the eye of the storm. That I was the earthquake and he was the quiet before the ground split apart. But when he kisses me, we are every one of those things all at once. He takes my bottom lip into his and gently puts pressure there, parting his way with his tongue. The breeze blows cool against my skin, hot from his grip around my arms. His touch slides down my sides, encircling my waist. I feel every part of me come awake, reaching for him, wanting him closer still.
When he pulls back to breathe, I groan in protest. He laughs as he kisses me. “I’m not going anywhere. You can have me as long as you want.”
“I want you always, Cas.” I kiss him softly, memorizing the swell of his pert mouth, the salt on the skin of his throat. I want him forever. But even if he gives up his throne and family, I won’t be there, and he needs to know that. My eagerness quells, but when he takes off his tunic, my words evaporate like clouds after the rain.
“Then you will have me always.” He takes my hand and kisses the inside of my palm. I have always pulled away when Dez held me this way, afraid that my magics would hurt him. But I realize that I trust Castian in a different way—down to my bones, I trust him. I trace the line of bare skin along his trousers. Cas tilts his head back and hisses a curse at the night sky. I marvel at the lashes resting against his cheeks, the way his mouth parts with each intake of breath. I make him react this way.
When he presses his forehead against my chest, he guides me onto the blanket. Grass tickles my bare shoulders and for a moment, I remember another night like this. I smell the bright green of leaves, hear the ghost of a rushing river from the night before Cas took Dez from me. My heart flutters at both the memory and Castian as he peppers kisses down my stomach. I try to push the thought of Dez away, but that memory is never far. It feels different now, though, and I can see that it’s what that night represents. The desperation of wanting to be close to someone. The need to keep them close. I kiss him harder, afraid it might be for the last time.
Tell Castian.
The kingdom is waiting for us. Tell him that this can’t last.
But nothing lasts except the earth and heavens and sea, and even then they change. The stars move. Clouds morph into something else. The earth erodes and makes way. Who will remember me when I am gone? I imagine the world Castian will build after. After this place. After me.
And then magics pulse between us.
The light from the alman stone in my pocket is warm, bleeding rays through the fabric. I draw it out, and it’s hot to the touch. When we look up, we are in my last memory—beside the river. I whirl around, and the temple is gone, and one memory tumbles into the next. Cas pulls me against him as the forest falls away, and we are engulfed by flames. For a moment, I am back in the small village of Esmeraldas. The burning house turns into the flaming streets of Riomar and it feels so real, Castian lurches to his feet to fight the soldiers that fade like smoke as they run through us.
And then we’re inside the palace gardens, hidden inside a hedge. There’s a woman on the ground, her golden hair is tangled in the grass, and her crown has
been discarded. She’s barely breathing. Her eyes are red and swollen as a palace guard scoops her into his arms. This memory is of Castian’s mother, the one and only time I caught a glimpse of her when I was a little girl in the palace.
He lets go of my hand, and the spell breaks. The illusion is gone. It is just us standing in the dark.
“We did it,” I say. Together, our magics were strong enough to project not one but four illusions.
“That we did,” Castian says, turning in place as the illusion recedes, and the faint glow of the temple, the silhouette of hedges comes back into focus. At our feet, the cider has spilled on the blanket, and the candle wax has pooled into the wool. I thread my fingers through his, and he brings my knuckles to his lips, still warm from our kisses.
“We can’t stay here, Cas.”
“I know.” He pulls me close, embracing me with a promise to never let me go—a promise neither of us can keep. He kisses me again. “I know.”
We dress, and march back into the living quarters to wake our crew.
THE FINAL RESTING PLACE OF GALATEA, PRINCESS OF MEMORIA, IS A GRANITE mausoleum with a white peregrine falcon carved of alman stone over the threshold. In a cave beneath lies the Knife of Memory. I clutch the purple wildflowers I gathered along the gravel path, but now I wonder if this gesture is childish and sentimental, unworthy of the warrior girl so full of life and promise.
Castian, Leyre, and Leo accompany me, as we all want to pay our respects to a princess whose fate and memory were severed from this world. As we follow Argi, Elixa, and Maryam inside, my eyes adjust to the white marble and alman stone, and I rub the prickle of gooseflesh on my arms.
Galatea’s suit of armor is bolted to the far wall, and her tomb lies in the center. Its lid is a carving of a girl shrouded by a veil, an image so lifelike that the silk seems to have been frozen in marble as it fluttered in the wind. Her eyes are closed, and her hands are wrapped around a sword, a symbol of her warrior status. I place my flowers in the crook of her arms.
“You are not forgotten.” Even though I whisper, my voice echoes.
Argi presses a faint circle carved in a wall. There’s a deep groan as stone moves against stone. I push open the entrance to the cave and glance back at my friends. Argi’s words earlier ring through my mind. Have care with your heart. But it’s too late for that. Castian takes a single step forward, but he can’t follow.
Summoning all my strength, I turn away and take the stone stairs down two at a time. With every step, I convince myself that I do have time. I can hear Leo sing once more. I can listen to Leyre’s adventures before we land in Puerto Leones. I can tell Castian the truth, all of it. A small part of me wonders, What about the others? But how many times have I seen bodies cut down in the middle of a fight or rotting in a cell? Saying good-bye is a luxury I do not get.
My sandals barely brush the stone stairs, though somehow are as loud as my panting breath, the drum of my heart. I feel as if I am propelling down a mountain, into the mouth of the deepest cavern in the Six Hells, the level of the desolate.
The final step gives way to a narrow stretch of powdery white sand. The cave glitters with jagged crystals shooting out from the ceiling and the ground. A lake begins three paces from where I stand. There, at the very center of the sapphire-blue water, is a glinting light. The Knife of Memory.
I glance around the cave for some sort of raft or boat to carry me across and find nothing. It’s about a half mile away. I’m not a strong swimmer, but I could make it, so long as there’s nothing under the water. I remove my sandals and my clothes—nothing will weigh me down. White sand sucks at the soles of my feet as I step into the cold water.
I take a deep breath and dive in. The cold threatens to knock the wind out of me, but I kick my legs hard and swim. Bubbles and a clear blue are the only things in my line of sight. I concentrate on my steady heart, my limbs cutting a straight path. I surface for air, kicking to stay afloat. Above me the ceiling’s jagged crystals glitter. That is when I hear the first voice.
Who are you?
Is the cave whispering these things to me, or is it a memory?
I keep swimming.
Who is Renata Convida? Sayida once asked that of me. She helped me uncover the memories of a little girl buried beneath the stolen ones. I couldn’t answer that once, but I know now.
Stay for more. Lozar’s words tumble through me. I offer a silent prayer for the Moria prisoner who reminded me that there was more at stake than vengeance for Dez, for a boy who did not come back for me. The water grows darker. Colder. I stop, a weight dragging me under.
Where is my Nati? I see a luminous light up ahead. My mother. She is in front of me now, chasing me around the house as she would when we played my favorite game of chasing forest spirits.
Show me who you are. The cave’s voice finds me even underwater.
I push all my strength into my legs and swim, cutting across the sapphire cold until I can see it—a column of alman stone. The shaft vanishes into the deepest bowels of the cave. It is impossible to tell how far it goes. I swim toward it, my lungs burning. The stone is smooth, with eroded nooks and crannies where an ancient pattern of whorls might have been. I follow its length to the surface and gasp for breath. The glittering crystals that line the ceiling wink at me as I grab the lip of the column and heave myself onto the flat surface.
The Knife of Memory is driven through the top of the column, down to the hilt. It takes me a moment to recognize the chattering echo in the cave as my own teeth. My limbs are frozen and weak, but I crawl and grab the platinum hilt.
It doesn’t budge.
The cave shudders and the column begins to sink. Water sloshes over the lip, wrapping around my ankles like cold hands.
Show me who you are, the voice asks again. This time the cavern trembles and bits of crystal fall like hail from the ceiling. One cuts my cheek. I think of Argi walking in circles around me, always demanding answers. Who am I? Nobody. Everybody. Slivers of crystal slice at my naked skin, the trickle of blood like fire on my cold flesh. And then, all at once, I know what to do.
I let the rest of my stolen memories go. They flit by in swirls of gray smoke. The remaining walls of the Gray splinter, my magics unfurling across my skin. I hold on to the hilt despite the ache in my muscles, the way my legs seize with cramps. I open myself to the Knife, and it feels as if someone has stepped into my mind with me.
I know who I was. Who I am. Who I will be.
I was a child. I was a weapon. I am a Robári.
I am going to return the memories of my kingdom.
The Knife slides out of the stone, and the cave explodes with light.
“I THOUGHT PERHAPS IT MIGHT BE BIGGER,” LEO SAYS AS WE MAKE THE JOURNEY back to the ship. Leyre gives him a tiny shove, but I can’t help but laugh, even if the cut on my cheek stings.
I finger the Knife sheathed at my hip. Every time I touch it, my skin goes numb with its power. When I returned with it to the temple, shivering and wet, our few belongings were already packed, and the others were ready to hike down the hill. Castian walks at my side, his quiet like a blanket around my shoulders. Then I feel his stare on me, and as much as I try to focus on the ships waiting in the distance, I think of his idea to run away together.
“Speak your mind, Cas,” I say.
His brows shoot up, and something like pride possesses his smile. “You’re different.”
I feel different. The Gray is gone. Since I stepped out of the cave’s lake, my Robári marks have stretched up to my shoulders. Out of habit, I search for the vault in my mind, but I only find pieces of my own life, things I’d forgotten. My father’s voice. The children I used to play with in my village. The first time I lost a tooth. The smells of my mother’s kitchen. There are darker memories—the Hollows I’ve created are still mine, even if their memories aren’t. I see the dead of their eyes, their empty faces. And yet, there’s room for more of me now. I take a deep breath and touch the hilt of the Kn
ife again, feel the deep hum of its power in my veins.
I reach for him. “Do you like it?”
Cas catches my hand in his, and our fingers intertwine. “I hate it with every fiber in my being.”
“Good.”
Argi glances disapprovingly at Castian and me. It shouldn’t matter what she thinks, but she’s the closest thing I have to a mentor. I owe her more than I will ever be able to repay, but this thing between Castian and me feels right. Selfish as it is, I can’t let him go.
We say good-bye to Argi and Maryam. Elixa will take us to the ship, and from there we will make for Puerto Leones.
“I have a gift for you,” Argi tells me. She hands me a wooden chest as Moria pirates load the canoes that will carry us back to the ship.
“What is it?” I set the heavy box in our canoe.
Argi’s crow’s-feet are more pronounced when she smiles. “My, Renata, don’t you understand the concept of gifts?”
“I don’t care for surprises.” I laugh and take her hand. “Unless you’re going to give us some of our food back.”
She pulls me into an embrace, and I press my forehead into her shoulder for a moment. Touching others used to come with a thread of fear. All I had ever been taught was that my magics were unwieldy and dangerous, that they made me dangerous to touch. I can’t change what was done to me, but now I know the truth, and I return her embrace.
“Come with us,” I say.
Castian nods, but something in the way he turns his head tells me he may have already extended this offer.
“As I told your prince,” she explains, “when he reverses the orders against the Moria and disbands the Arm of Justice, my people will choose for themselves.”
“And what will you choose?”
“I’m already home, little Robári.”
I think I understand what she’s feeling. If I went back to find my village, it wouldn’t be home again, like the story Leyre told us of the princess and the glacier. She was gone for too long and wasn’t of her world anymore.
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