“She left in the middle of the night, two nights ago, intent on delivering a message to Queen Asha before Azrael unleashes his forces on the rest of the world.”

I breathe a sigh of relief, rubbing the back of my neck. I don’t miss the faint smile of vengeance on the female’s lips.

“You knew saying she was gone would make me think she was dead,” I say in irritation.

Piper shrugs. “What’s it to you? You’re the one who almost let her fall into a vat of liquid sunlight. If it weren’t for me, she would be dead.”

I grit my teeth, having nothing good to say to that.

Piper cranes her head at me, taking me in. “What made you change your mind about her?”

I flick my gaze at her. “How do you know I changed my mind?”

“Because when you thought she was dead, you looked like you were contemplating joining her.”

I swallow, unable to look the female in her eyes. “What message is she bringing the queen?”

Piper glares at me. “I suppose if you manage to catch up with her, she can tell you herself.”

“Well, then I best be leaving,” I say, shrugging past the girl, headed south, though I’ll need to stop in an inn on the way. By the way the stars are angled, I can tell it’s almost morning.

A hand grasps on my shoulder. It’s shaking as Piper spins me around to face her. I shrug her off, but there’s something in the way her expression’s changed that makes me regret it. It’s like a mask has fallen off her features, and she’s letting me see the concern underneath.

“She’s going to try to cross the Sahli in a night,” she says, her voice barely a whisper.

“A night?” I ask, my mind immediately swirling in calculation. “But night barely lasts five hours in the desert. And the sand…”

Piper shakes her head.

My chest constricts. “She’ll never make it,” I say, anxiety weaseling its way into my stomach. I find myself running my hands through my hair.

“No,” Piper whispers. “No, I’m afraid she won’t.”

I pause, fingers halfway through my hair. It’s not as though my feelings for Blaise have returned.

That doesn’t mean I want her to die.

I can still see her falling, the crushing realization of my betrayal on her face in the warehouse when I chose ending Abra over saving her.

I hadn’t wanted her to die then, either. But not wanting someone to die is a far cry from love.

“Why are you telling me this? I would have thought you’d want me to run after her, maximize the pain when I realized I was too late.”

Piper blinks. “Because I don’t want you to be too late.”

I frown. “When does she plan to do this?”

“Tomorrow night.”

Tomorrow night. I’ll never make it in time. Not when I’ll have to stop at an inn during the day.

Piper nods, biting her lip, her eyes wide as she stares down at her feet. When she finally looks at me, there’s a grim determination in her eyes. “You can die and come back, right?”

I pause, the question catching me off guard. “Yes. If you snap my neck, my heart will stop for a while, but it’ll always restart.”

Piper stares off into the distance, tapping her foot against the ground. “How do you feel about murder?”

“It’s not my preference.”

Piper raises her eyebrows, bobbing her head. “And if someone probably deserves it?”

“You watched me rip the head off of Queen Abra. I think you know the answer to that question.”

When Piper breathes out through her nose, it shoots streams of fog into the air. “Good. Good. Because I think I know a way for you to get to Blaise faster, so long as you don’t mind a little blood on your hands.”

My fangs ache, pushing at my gums at the very thought.

CHAPTER 89

BLAISE

The sand of the Sahli is surprisingly pleasant against my bare feet, the heat of the day soaked into its grains.

It will only remain pleasant for the next five hours.

Five hours.

That’s how much time I have until the sun rises and scorches the ground—and me with it.

I made it across Charshon at a record pace.

Well, I assume it was a record pace. Not that I looked it up.

It took me less than a night. Of course, I had to stop in an inn during the day, but now that the sun has set and I’ve reached the edge of the desert, it’s a race against the morning.

I could help you. Together, we wouldn’t burn, whispers the voice from the box as I stare across the wide expanse, the towering dunes that block my path, cresting smoothly over the horizon as if to lie and say they’d block it for me.

“Shut up,” I tell it.

And then, I run.

My limbs cut across the frigid night air as my feet pound the sand. My muscles are lithe, stretching further and more efficiently than I ever could have imagined as a human.

That doesn’t make the sand any less problematic.

It doesn’t seem to matter how powerful my legs are, how much force I slam into the bottoms of my feet. The sand absorbs my efforts with an open mouth, like I’m pouring my energy into it with a funnel.

It’s like one of those dreams where you’re being chased, but suddenly you realize your legs can’t run nearly as well as you thought they could, and it takes all the mental energy in the world to get them to move, but the air around you might as well have turned to water for the speed you’re moving.