“Tell anyone about this, skral, and the last thing you’ll see is my face staring down at you from the top of the pit.”
His mouth flattened into a hard line and his gaze lowered to the tile work at their feet, where elegant namsaras—rare desert flowers that could heal any ailment—repeated themselves in an elaborate pattern across the floor.
“Forgive me, Iskari,” he said, his fingers sweeping up terra-cotta shards. “But I’m not supposed to take commands from you. My master’s orders.”
Her fingers itched for her axe—which was on the floor against the wall, with the rest of her armor.
She could threaten him, but that might make him retaliate by spilling her secrets. A bribe would work better.
“And if I give you something for your silence?”
His fingers paused, hovering over the pile of shards.
“What would you want?”
The corner of his mouth curved ever so slightly. It made the hair on her arms rise.
“I don’t have all day,” she said, suddenly uneasy.
“No,” he said, the smile sliding away as he stared at her raw, blistering skin. “You don’t.” Her body was starting to shake from the infection. “Let me think on it while you treat that burn.”
Asha left him there. In truth, the shaking worried her. So while he finished cleaning up her mess, she returned to the shelves and found the ingredient she needed: dragon bone ash.
Alone, it was just as deadly as dragonfire, only it poisoned in a different way. Instead of infecting the body, dragon bone leached it of nutrients. Asha had never seen someone killed this way, but there was an old story about a dragon queen who wanted to teach her enemies a lesson. Inviting them to the palace as honored guests, she put a pinch of dragon bone ash in their dinners every night and on the last morning of their stay, they were all found dead in their beds, their bodies hollowed out. As if the life had been scooped out of them.
Despite its dangers, in exactly the right amount, with the correct combination of herbs, dragon bone was the one thing that could draw the dragonfire toxins out—precisely because of its leaching qualities. Asha popped off the cork lid and measured out the amount.
The mark of a good slave was to see what was needed before it was asked for, and Jarek only purchased the best of anything. So as Asha gathered her ingredients, crushing and boiling them down to a thick paste, Jarek’s slave tore strips of linen for fresh bandaging.
“Where is he?” she asked as she stirred, trying to hasten the cooling process. She didn’t need to say Jarek’s name. His slave knew who she meant.
“Asleep in his wine goblet.” He suddenly stopped ripping linen to stare at her hands. “I think it’s cool enough, Iskari.”
Asha looked where he looked. Her hands shook hard. She dropped the spoon and lifted them to her face, watching them tremble.
“I should have more time than this. . . .”
The slave took the pot from her, perfectly calm. “Sit,” he said, motioning with his chin to the tabletop. As if he were in charge now and she had to do what he said.
Asha didn’t like him telling her what to do. But she liked the violent trembling even less. She hoisted herself up onto the table one-handed while he scooped a spoonful of blackish paste and blew softly until it stopped steaming. She held her burned hand still against her thigh while he used the spoon to spread the grainy paste across the raw surface of her blistered palm and fingers.
Asha hissed through her teeth at the sting. More than once, he stopped, concerned by the sounds she made. She nodded for him to go on. Despite the horrible smell—like burned bones—she could feel the ash at work: a cool sensation sinking in, spreading outward, battling the scorching pain.
“Better?” He kept his gaze lowered as he blew on the next spoonful.
“Yes.”
He coated the burn twice more, then reached for the first linen strip.
When he went to wrap it, though, they both hesitated. Asha pulled away while he hovered, frozen, leaning over her. The off-white linen hung like a canopy between his hands while the same thought ran through both their minds: in order to wrap the burn, he needed to touch her.
A slave who touched a draksor without his master’s permission could be sentenced to three nights in the dungeons without food. If the offense were more severe—touching a draksor of high rank, such as Asha—he would be lashed as well. And in the very rare case of intimate touch, such as a love affair between a slave and a draksor, the slave would be sent to the pit to die.
Without Jarek to give permission, his slave wouldn’t—couldn’t—touch her.
Asha moved to take the linen to try to bandage her hand herself, but he pulled away, out of reach. She watched, speechless, as he returned to wrap her hand—slowly and carefully, his nimble hands cleverly avoiding contact.
Asha looked up into a long, narrow face full of freckles. Freckles as numerous as stars in the night sky. He stood so close, she could feel the heat of him. So close, she could smell the salt on his skin.
If he sensed her looking, he didn’t show it. Silence filled the space between them as he wrapped the linen around and around her salved palm.
Asha studied his hands. Large palms. Long fingers. Calluses on his fingertips.
A strange place for calluses on a house slave.
“How did it happen?” he asked as he worked.
She could feel him almost look up into her face, then stop himself. He reached for the next strip—a smaller one—and started on her fingers.
I told an old story.
Asha wondered how much a skral would know about the link between the old stories and dragonfire.
She didn’t say the answer aloud. No one could know the truth: after all these years of trying to right her wrongs, Asha was still as corrupt as ever. If you opened her up and looked inside, you’d find a core that matched her scarred exterior. Hideous and horrible.
I told a story about Iskari and Namsara.
Iskari was the goddess from which Asha derived her title. These days, Iskari meant life taker.
Namsara’s meaning had also changed over time. It was both the name of the healing flower on the floors of this room as well as a title. A title given to someone who fought for a noble cause—for his kingdom or his beliefs. The word namsara conjured up the image of a hero.
“I killed a dragon,” Asha told the slave in the end, “and it burned me as it died.”
He tucked in the ends of her bandage, listening. To get a better grip, his fingers slid around her wrist, as if he’d completely forgotten who she was.
At his touch, Asha sucked in a breath. The moment she did, he realized his breach and went very still.
A command hovered on the tip of Asha’s tongue. But before it lashed out at him, he said, very softly, “How does that feel?”
As if he cared more about her burn than his own life.
As if he weren’t afraid of her at all.
The command died in Asha’s mouth. She looked to his fingers wrapped around her wrist. Not trembling or hesitant, but warm and sure and strong.
Wasn’t he afraid?