Sabiya buried her face into the sheets as Uthias appeared in her mind again. Lovers didn’t happen for her. Men winked at Shana, not her.
“I don’t think Mama’s right because you would be crying like a babe if you had to be sent away. I think you ran off to him, but he turned you down and so you came home. He isn’t of noble blood like us, so he lives in the city, in one of those tenements.”
“Shana,” Sabiya whispered, “I have no secret lover. It is pointless to love any man until you know he is the one you shall marry, and Father hasn’t told me yet whom I shall wed. I ran off with no one. Do you know of the scoundrels that dwell in the desert beyond our safe home?” Something touched her back, like a finger of ice. She whipped her head around, lips parting, yet no one was there. Had a spirit followed her back?
Shana’s eyes widened. “Do you mean to say a scoundrel loves you?”
“No! Never would I let a scoundrel think of me in such a way.” She paused. “It was a scoundrel who stole me. I was imprisoned, and some of my clothes were taken.” She deserved to slap herself. She made it sound like a drama, not a memory.
“He left you naked?”
“I still had some bits of clothes to protect my modesty to a decent degree.” More of that drama, as though the actors presented for their entertainment.
“How did you escape with your life?” Shana had lost the reality of it.
“There was another captive held with me. He had a wonderful brother and the dear man came to save him. Such devotion not even my precious Shana can provide me with.” Sabiya heard her nonchalant tone, yet when she tried to tear up with emotion, all she found was a gaping hollowness. “They were wonderful men, if it is not too bold to say. The younger, the man held with me, was named Harick, I recall, and our savior went by the name of Uthias.”
Shana’s head snapped around. “HJave you heard the tales told of the wicked man who calls himself the Killer, the one who plucks off our nobles as though they were no more than flies?”
Sabiya scowled. “Of course I have. He’s against everything our country stands for. He wishes to kill our wondrous king and murder all of our fathers. He kills our children and takes our women. He abandons our elderly.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “He eats us alive.” Most of the tales, Sabiya assumed, were just that – tall-tales.
“His given name is Uthias.”
Sabiya stiffened. The stories had circulated in the past nine years, yet it was impossible to think her warrior was the grotesque Killer, for he’d saved her, held her in his arms, and she’d pledged to him thanks and gratitude.
She’d offered herself to the Killer.
Tears burned her eyes. Impossible. It couldn’t be him.
“He lived in Juniper City with us, didn’t he?”
“No.” Her belly clenched. “They were of the Jadaidi clan, those people who live in the outskirts of the desert.” More Amalitan than Sian although they lived in the desert of the country of Sia, outcasts from society.
The Killer was Jadaidi.
An invisible hand slid over her neck, tracing her shoulder blades. Imagination. I’m imagining things now.
Chapter 2
Start from the beginning
