The Archshade

Twenty-Six

I jump to my feet and throw my arms around Baden's neck, burying my face against his chest. He stumbles back, taken by surprise. Then, with sudden realization, his arms tighten around me and he lifts me into the air, spinning around.

"It can't be! Gods!" he exclaims. "I thought I lost you."

Laughing, we hold onto each other as I stain the front of his shirt with joyful tears. His sweetly accented voice, his familiarity, his aura of home—it all fills an empty space in my core. I breathe it in, but I can still barely believe it.

"H-how?" I stutter. "How'd you get here?" Pulling away from him to look at his face, I notice his once gentle dark eyes have grown fiercer, but as he looks down at me, a bit of their hardened edge melts away.

"I promised I would find you." He runs a hand along the fabric of my headwrap. "I won't let them take you again," he mutters. "Everything will be better now."

"But you're a runaway now," I remind him. "Any guard will kill you!"

Baden barks out a laugh. "The Arcadian guards steer clear of the slums. For obvious reasons." He glances at the slumped figures at our feet then flicks his eyes around the rest of the alley. "Speaking of which, I'm not too keen on waiting for these guys to wake up. Come on. I'll take you somewhere safe." Covering my hand with his, he takes off, tugging me along behind.

Baden and I hurry from block to block, following a route which he seems to know intimately. Ducking around main thoroughfares and striding past overlapping intersections, he treats the streets and alleys of this strange northern city as if they were the Lower.

"How do you know your way around so well?" I ask between breaths as we dart through winding alleyways and slink around deserted corners.

"I've been searching through this city for three days now."

"For what?"

"For you, of course," he says, looking back at me with a roll of his eyes. "News of the Archshade's exotic concubine from Aaru-Sheol was buzzing through the city when I got here. I knew you were in the palace, but that place is locked up tighter than the Empress' corset! I've spent the past three days searching for a way in."

A crisp line of gold breaks over the edge of the horizon, though I can barely see it through the thick forest of buildings. The stirring noises of the city are now in full force, echoing through the streets with renewed fervor. My absence has no doubt been noticed by now.

"Of course," Baden continues, "it never occurred to me that you'd be coming out. What are you doing in the slums anyways?"

"Just on an errand," I deflect the question and quickly change the topic. "Hardly a daring escape compared to what you must've endured to get across the desert."

Baden shrugs as we dash around another corner and slow to a walk, heading down a cobblestone street lined with shops. "Well, a little while after you were taken," he explains, "the Thrall Keeper let me out of the dungeon and forced me to work late hours in the kitchens. Big mistake on his part. I slipped out of the palace that night and found an acquaintance in the Lower willing to smuggle me into Jannah."

I raise an eyebrow at him as I recognize the funny tone in his voice when he's not telling the entire truth. "Mmm hmm," I grumble through my pursed lips, not at all convinced.

"Alright," he relents. "Maybe my acquaintance wasn't so much willing as he was... well, misled a bit."

"Baden, you—"

Baden lets go of my hand and whirls around to face me. His eyes still radiate the same determination which they always have, but as he looks at me now, there's something else within them—something much more aggressive.