Nahri bit her lip, recalling her own impression. “I’m not sure the ring bonded with you the same way it did with your father. Muntadhir said the heart needs to be burned, and the ring reforms from the ash, but I’m telling you, I can sense that thing intact and clear as day, just below the heart muscle.”
“But you put it on my finger before we left Daevabad. Why wouldn’t it have bonded?”
“I don’t know.” Nahri found herself drawn to the spot on his chest, an ache in her own heart. “It feels like it’s right there. Like I could just pluck it out.”
“Want to try?” Ali nodded at the ruined pomegranate. “I promise I’ll be a better patient.” Despite the jest, there was a genuine plea in his voice.
“No,” Nahri said, aghast. “I’d have to cut into your heart.”
“You cut into a child’s skull.”
“That was different!”
But Ali looked grim. “I feel like I’m not meant to have this. I remember the way my father’s heart burned in your hands. I can feel mine burning when you touch me. It wants you.”
“It doesn’t want anything. It’s a ring. And we’ve already discussed this. You know what Manizheh said about my being a shafit. If I took the seal, it would have killed me.”
“She was lying, Nahri. She was trying to get under your skin.” His expression softened. “Listen, I can’t imagine how difficult—”
“No, you can’t.” Nahri rose to her feet, stalking into the shadows of the ruin.
There was a moment of silence before Ali spoke again. “Then tell me. God knows you’ve listened to enough of my family’s problems. Let me return the favor.”
“I wouldn’t know what to tell you. No one bothers to keep me in the loop. They didn’t even tell me my own mother was alive.”
“Do you have any idea who your father might be?”
“No,” Nahri replied, checking the ache in her voice. “And I can’t imagine the kind of man Manizheh would have fallen for. He probably murders kittens to relax. Not that it matters. If he’s shafit, that’s all the Daevas are going to care about.”
“You don’t know that,” Ali argued. “I’ve seen you with your people. They love you. If you told people who you really were—”
“They would turn on me.”
“Or maybe you’d bring everyone together. In a way no one else can.”
For a moment, Nahri imagined it. Declaring her true identity to the world, finding peace with both her communities, defiant proof a shafit could be anything, even a Nahid healer.
And then it was gone. That kind of optimism had been beaten out of Nahri a long time ago.
“I envy you sometimes,” she said softly. “I wish I had your faith in people’s goodness.” And then before she could see the pity she’d hate in his eyes, Nahri turned and walked away.
NAHRI DIDN’T RETURN UNTIL SUNDOWN, AND AFTER A tense meal of stale bread and dates—they’d learned to mutual chagrin early in their journey that each assumed the other had more cooking experience—they went back to the boat, sailing until the day’s light was gone before dropping anchor. Ali fell asleep fast, the pain from his marid magic taking a visible toll.
Nahri should have found a way to keep herself awake. Ever the soldier, Ali had suggested they trade shifts. But it had been a long day, and she found it impossible to keep her eyes open as the warm velvet of the darkening sky and gentle rock of the boat lulled her into a drowsy spell.
The sounds of distant sobbing pulled her back to consciousness. Nahri blinked, momentarily forgetting where she was, and then another wail came. It sounded like a woman, somewhere upriver, ending in weeping that carried along the water.
A finger of ice brushed down Nahri’s spine, adrenaline banishing the remnants of her stupor. She must have been sleeping for some time, because it was now pitch-black, so dark she could barely see her own hands. And utterly, unnaturally silent, the usual drone of insects and the creak of frogs gone.
The weeping came again. Nahri sat up and then tumbled as the boat lurched in the water, rocking as though the sail had caught. Which was impossible because the sail was tied back and the anchor let out.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a night like this. She crept forward. The moon was a bare sickle, its weak light scattered on the flowing water, and the scrubby trees and reeds on either bank were impossibly black, the kind that seemed capable of swallowing one whole.
Her bearings lost, she stumbled directly into Ali’s sleeping body. He popped upright like he was on a spring, the gleam of his khanjar already in hand. She opened her mouth to explain, but then the weeping came again, the plaintive cry nearly musical.
“Is that someone singing?” Ali asked.
“I don’t know,” Nahri whispered back. The woman did seem to be singing now, though not in any language Nahri had ever heard. It cut through her, bone-deep, and goose bumps erupted over her arms. “It sounds like a funeral dirge.”
The glint of the khanjar disappeared as Ali resheathed it. “Maybe she needs help.”
“That’s unfortunate for her.” When Ali glanced at her, disapproval in his glimmering eyes, Nahri spoke more firmly. “I don’t know what stories you heard growing up, but I’m not hunting after some mystery voice in the middle of the night.”
Light suddenly burst before them, fire flaring so brightly that Nahri held a hand over her eyes. The scene came to her in starry pieces: the large, pale lumps scattered across the choppy water, the rocky riverbank and spiky brush jutting up like teeth.
The woman swaying on the bank, fire gushing from her outstretched hands.
The burning singer before them was definitely not some lost farm girl. Her skin was pale—too pale, the color of bone—and her black hair was uncovered, falling in glossy waves past her ankles to pool in the shallows at her feet. She was
