Manizheh’s words washed over her. You cannot take the seal. Possessing it will kill you. You simply aren’t strong enough.
Nahri grabbed Jamshid’s hand, slipped the seal ring from his finger, and shoved it over her thumb.
She had barely drawn a breath when the world burst into flame around her. Pain and power—raw and unbridled, as if she’d stuck her hands in a bolt of lightning—ripped through her and Nahri fell to her knees, choking as she tried to scream. The ring scorched her skin, so hot Nahri was certain she was about to combust, to be ash in the next moment. Black dots blossomed against her vision, and then everything flooded in. The stomach gurgles of a hungry guard across the palace squirmed in her belly, her temples thudding in time with a woman in the village having a headache.
Nahri couldn’t breathe. She clutched the floor, the boards warping and smoking at her touch. Her heart felt like it was about to explode.
No. Nahri refused to let Manizheh be right. To let every so-called pureblood in Daevabad who had ever snubbed a shafit as lesser be right. To allow the worst of her ancestors—the ones who would have killed her as a child—have their prejudices confirmed. That magic was dangerous in the hands of the shafit. That they were reckless and weak, people to be wiped out or controlled.
Nahri was not weak.
She grabbed the edge of the wet table, sucking in air, and then hauled herself to her feet. She plunged her hands back into Ali’s chest. More practiced than Jamshid, Nahri found his heart immediately, the ruptured valve standing out like the last ember of a charred piece of wood.
Heal, she commanded it.
Darkness engulfed her, a clammy chill crawling over her skin like she was being seized by unseen tendrils of ice. Nahri fought the instinct to let go, the taste of salt filling her mouth.
Not salt. Blood. She coughed, the spray that came from her lips as black as bitumen.
“Nahri!”
She was dimly aware of Jamshid calling her name, but it seemed from a great distance. Heal, she urged again, pulling at the frayed tissue and gushing blood. HEAL.
The room vanished, a memory that wasn’t hers stealing her away. Nahri floated in a midnight blue lake, her eyes just above the surface as she watched rocks and sand erupt from the water, swirling beneath a young woman in a faded chador and muddy dress. An island, growing larger and larger as the woman made her way down a forming path. She knelt to run her fingers through the dust, a gold-and-pearl ring glittering from one hand.
The woman glanced up, her black eyes pinning Nahri.
Anahid smiled.
“Nahri, let go!”
The vision shattered, replaced with an equally unbelievable sight: Ali’s heart healing before her eyes, the membrane knitting back together and smoothing without a scar. His rib regrowing, nearly spearing her hand as Nahri jerked it away. Tissue, muscle, and skin raced to cover it, and then Ali seized, his eyes shooting open.
“Oh my God,” he gasped, sitting up. “What happened?” He let out a strangled sound as his fingers brushed the rib fragment beside him. “Ah!”
Nahri didn’t answer. She’d fallen with her brother to the floor, both of them weeping.
JAMSHID POKED AT THE RING ON NAHRI’S FINGER. “I thought it would be bigger. And somewhat grander.”
“You’ve spent far too much time with Muntadhir if you’re not impressed by the millennia-old ring, once worn by a prophet, that literally shaped our world.”
“Oh, I’m plenty awed, trust me. Baffled but awed.” A note of worry entered his voice. “How are you feeling?”
Nahri opened and closed her fist. The ring was still hot against her skin but no longer searing. “The room has stopped spinning. And I’m no longer suffering the headache of a woman in town or feeling the urge to vomit alongside a guard two floors below, so that’s a mercy.” She snapped her fingers, a conjured flame bursting between them. “It’s my magic, but it doesn’t feel more powerful than usual. Not like it did when I first put the ring on.”
“Can you sense anything of the seal? I don’t see the mark on your face.”
“Maybe that’s because the ring is still on my finger.” Nahri tapped it against her knee. “I don’t understand. I don’t understand any of this at all.”
“That makes two of us.” Jamshid sighed. “Though you’re clearly the right Nahid to be wearing it.” He sounded ashamed. “Nahri, about before, I’m so sorry.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. You were asked to do something you couldn’t possibly know how to do. And I pushed you. If anyone should apologize, it should be me.”
Jamshid didn’t look convinced. “I feel like such a failure. I could have killed him. I would have killed him if you hadn’t been there.”
Nahri knew that feeling. She also remembered the woman who’d picked her back up after all her mistakes and accidents, who’d taught her everything she knew about healing. “This wasn’t your fault. But even if it was, that’s okay—you’re going to make mistakes. Honestly, if you end up doing this work for decades, let alone centuries, you’re almost certainly going to kill someone.” Her stomach twisted. “I know I have. But that’s a fear you’ll have to manage if you want to help the many, many more people you’ll help.” She touched his hand. “Give yourself time, big brother. This takes patience and practice.”
“But we don’t have time.”
“For this we do. On the slim possibility we survive everything and take back our city, I am setting the Daevas straight and going back to my hospital. And if it’s what you want—what you want, not what you think you should do—I will teach you how to be a healer. I promise.”
“I’d like that.” Jamshid glanced past her shoulder. “I know we have a lot more to discuss, but I’ll give you two a minute.”
Nahri followed his gaze
