"I ain't going there," I said. "I ran out on Tarrin cause that's where he wanted to take me."
Leila gave me this teasing little smile, but I turned to Naji and said, "You can't really think–"
"It's the only way," Leila said.
"I ain't asking you."
"I agree with her, Leila," Naji said. "You know I can't go there."
"Thank you," I said. Finally, he had learned how to talk some sense.
"Oh, Naji, the enchantment from that charm is so strong I could feel it when you were three days away. They'll never catch you."
"I still don't understand why you'd send me there, of all places–"
"You know as well as I that if you want any hope of breaking an impossible curse, you'll need the magic of the Isles. And besides," Leila gave a bright smile, "it's where the Wizard Eirnin lives."
"I've never heard of him," said Naji.
"He's from the north, from the ice-islands. I studied under him as a child. Long before I met you." She smiled and pressed herself close to Naji and he sank into her like her closeness was a relief. "I've seen him cast impossible curses before. And a cure is only one letter off from a curse."
I snorted and kicked at the powdery dirt of the floor.
Naji gave her long hard look. "It's too dangerous."
"So cast some more spells. Someone as powerful as you…" She made her eyes all big and bright. Naji gazed moonily at her. "You'll be fine."
"And what about me?" I said. "Will I be fine? I know what happens when the untouched go to the Isles of the Sky. They get turned into rainclouds and dirt or they get sucked down to the depths and drown over and over."
"You aren't untouched," Naji said. "You healed me by the river."
I glared at him. "Well, I ain't as strong as you, then."
"I have to protect you before I have to protect myself," he said. "Leila is right about the magic–"
"Of course I am," Leila said, reaching over to toy with the curl of his hair.
I couldn't say anything, thinking about the idea that he was putting my protection before his own.
"It may be my only option," Naji said to me.
"My only option, too," I said. "You're not the only one cursed here. And I still don't want to go." But already I knew it might be worth it, if the Isles really could break Naji's curse. They were the place where the impossible happened, after all. It was just that their impossible was supposed to be the sort of impossible that's also horrible.
Naji gave me a sad, confused sort of frown.
"Of course," he said, "no merchant ship is going to agree to sail to the Isles of the Sky."
"No pirate ship, neither," I added. "And that's what Port Iskassaya is anyway, a pirates' port-of-call."
"How convenient," Leila said, "that you travel with a pirate."
Naji pulled away from her and trudged away from the flowers, back over to the center circle. "We need to talk," he said to me.
"Can't argue with that."
He gave me one of his Naji-looks. For a few seconds I didn't think Leila was going to let us leave the garden, but she didn't say nothing when Naji grabbed my upper arm and dragged me back into the dripping dimness of the house.
"Told you she ain't trustworthy," I said. "She's been planning that little performance the whole time we were here. I'd put money on it."
Naji didn't say nothing for a long time. Then he said, and it damn near knocked me over, "You're probably right. I was… hoping… that she wouldn't play any of her games with me. Not now. Not… with everything." He slouched down on the cot and stuck his head in his hands. "I knew she trained in the north, that's why I came here, but I truly hoped–"
"And what did she mean about protecting us from the Mists?"
Naji dropped his hands down to his sides. "Oh, her word is good for that," he said. "She wouldn't do anything to actually kill me."
"That don't answer my question."
"Because the answer doesn't concern you."
"Really?" I said. "'Well, in that case, this curse of yours don't concern me neither. So if you don't mind, I'll be on my way." And I slipped off my charm and headed toward the front door.
"Ananna!" Naji jumped up from the cot and grabbed me again. I wasn't really going to go. I ain't so heartless I'm gonna let someone be struck down with pain on account of me. Even if that someone is a murderer and a liar. Hell, murderers and liars used to sing me to sleep.
I yanked my arm away from him. "Look, you want me to go with you to the Isles of the Sky – and I can kinda see how maybe it's not the stupidest idea in the world, all things considered, even if it's definitely up there – but if you really want me to go, you have to be straight with me. You gotta tell me things."
"Tell you things," he said.
"Yeah. You know how you didn't tell me who Leila was, or what we'd find here in the canyon? Or what that black smoke was when the Hariri clan attacked?" I glared at him and after a few seconds he nodded. "Well, no more of that."
"I know what 'tell you things' means."
"Sounded like you were asking. Keep in mind that if you want to barter passage on a pirate ship, you will need me. You don't got the cash to buy your way onto one, and ain't no pirate in the Confederation's gonna let a blood-magician on board without some kind of leverage." I jutted my thumb into my chest. "Which is me. So if you want to go on with your secrets, that's fine, but you can expect to wait out the rest of your days in Port Iskassaya."
Naji got that flash of a smile around his eyes. I was too worked up to care.
"I think that sounds like a deal," Naji said.
"Now why the hell should I be worried about the Mists attacking us?" Kaol, even saying Mists sent the creeping shivers up my spine.
"Someone in the Otherworld wants me dead," Naji said. "They'll have no fight with you, but they want me. It's a long–"
Leila appeared in the doorway, that white dress swirling around her ankles. She had her cruel smile on, teeth shining in the lamplight. Naji stared at her the way he did, his face all full of longing. Then he turned back to me.
"Let me tell you on the river," he said.
"Fine." So he didn't want to talk in front of Leila. "But if I don't know the whole story by Port Iskassaya, I'm gone."
Naji's eyes crinkled up again. Then he stuck out his hand. I shook it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Leila lent us the largest of the boats that had been tied up out front. It had a newly patched sail and a ropenet for fishing. I didn't want to trust that boat, but as much as it pained me to admit it, I knew Naji was right when he said Leila didn't want us – or him, anyway – dead.
She gave us a basket filled with salted fish and some of the river reeds we'd been eating. I never wanted to look at another river reed again, but I accepted the basket anyway. She also produced a bundle of black cloth for Naji, which he unfurled into an assassin's robe. Leila had cut up his old robe when we first got here, for patching sails and blankets, and he'd been wearing the same cast-off men's clothes I had the past week.
"Where did you get this?" he asked.
"Surely you remember, dearest." Leila winked at him, and Naji looked down at his feet.
"I'm afraid I don't have anything for you," she said, hardly turning her head to look at me. I resisted the urge to make some rude gesture at her. "Oh, and Naji dearest, I put your armor down below."
"Thank you," Naji said, lifting his head. They regarded one another for a few seconds longer, and I turned away and set to fiddling with the ropes so I wouldn't have to look at them.
And then we took off. Port Iskassaya was a three-day trip down river, according to Naji. (Leila'd told him, of course, though he don't know nothing about sailing.) When we arrived we were to release the boat the way you would a camel – I thought of our own camel and wondered if he was still trotting through the desert weighed down with our clothes and money and food – and it'd make its way back up the river to Leila's house. Magic again.
Naji moped that first day, leaning against the railing and looking out over the river. He hadn't bothered to change into his robes yet, and his hair fluttered around his face so that he looked like a prince in a story. I tried to busy myself with the work of sailing, but the ship took care of herself, and after a while I was so bored I leaned up beside him.
He glanced over at me but didn't say nothing.
"You miss her, don't you?"
He kept staring out over the water and didn't answer. The sun was sinking into the canyon, throwing off rays of orange and red, turning the water silver. I don't know why I asked him that. It was like I wanted him to say something to hurt me.
"You don't miss someone like Leila," Naji said, after enough time had passed that I figured he'd no intention of answering. "You merely feel her absence."
"That don't make sense."
"It's hard to explain. She's always played games, but it got worse after–" He stopped. "It doesn't matter. I only came here because I was desperate. I hardly see her anymore."
He leaned away from the railing. "Thank you," he said. "For coming with me to do this."
I was a little sore from hearing him talk about Leila, so I just dipped my head and said, "I told you. I don't want you hanging around me none, either."
"I'll find a way to repay you," he said. "When it's done. You'll be compensated."
I didn't like the way he said that, like I was some hired hand.
"I promise," he said.
I didn't respond, just left him there, muttering something about needing to check on the rigging. And he didn't say anything when I walked away.
I wished there was more for me to do on the ship, so I could throw myself into working and not spend all my time brooding. Mama would have called it the doldrums, but those always came when you'd been at sea for months and months and you were missing civilization so bad you're almost willing to fling yourself overboard and try to swim to land. And it wasn't the river that was causing my trouble anyway.
The second afternoon, Naji came out on deck and called my name. I was up in the rigging – not working or nothing, just sitting up there watching the walls of the canyon slide by. I hung onto the rope and leaned over and watched him clomp around, swinging his head this way and that.
"Look up!" I called out.
He stopped and then tilted his head toward the sky, shielding his eyes from the sun. "How'd you get up there?"
I shrugged and then swung down on the rope, crisscrossing through the rigging, until I landed on deck, a few feet away from him.
"I owe you an explanation," he said.
"I thought you forgot. I was looking forward to ditching you once we made port."
He shook his head. His expression was soft, almost kind, and I wondered what he would look like if he smiled properly. Even with the scar, I bet it was nice.
"Alright," I said. "Let's hear it."
"You remember the woman from the desert? The one who gave you the spell to banish me to the Otherworld?"
"I thought she was dead."
"No. I sent her back where she came from."
"But she bled all over–"
"They don't die," Naji said. "It's not something I can explain – just know that they aren't human."
I crossed my arms over my chest. This was a lot to work through in my head. I'd seen sirens before, and the merfolk too, but you can kill 'em easy as you can kill a man. No wonder I got cold thinking about the Mists.
"So what'd you do to her?" I asked. "That got her so pissed?"
"I didn't do anything to her," he said. "She serves someone in the Otherworld, one of the thousands of lords constantly clamoring for power. I severed some of her master's ties to our world."
"What?"
"I killed some of the children he planted here. They weren't children when I killed them," he added, since I must have looked appalled. There are lines that shouldn't be crossed. "They were attempting to rub bare the walls between worlds, in a move to gain power in the Mists. It's complicated, but…" His voice trailed off. "He was willing to sacrifice our world to gain power in his."
The air was real still. The only movement came from the boat as it sliced through the river water.
"Oh," I said. "You saved everybody. The entire world." I gave him a little half-smile, even though it was weird to think of him as a hero. "I gotta admit, I'm impressed."
"Don't be." Naji frowned. "I was hired to do it. I didn't know who the targets were. In fact, I didn't understand the implications of what I did until much later, when she first attacked me."
I leaned up against the rigging and thought about everything that happened these last few weeks, everything that happened before Naji went from my would-be killer to my protector.
"You don't need to worry about it," Naji said, looking all earnest. "But that's why Leila offered us her protection against the Otherworld. Because–"
"Just as long as we're on the river."
"What?"
"She only offered her protection as long as we're on the river." I crossed my arms in front of my chest. "And don't lie to me. You said yourself you were putting my protection ahead of your own."
Naji sighed. "Fine. I'm worried the Otherworld will use you – the curse – to get to me."
"Put me in danger, you mean? So you'd have to come and save me?"
"More or less. Although really, you don't need to worry." Naji shrugged. "I've seen you fight. You could hold your own against any monster of the Mists."
I turned away from him, embarrassed. The water glittered around us like a million slant-cut diamonds. The sky pressed down, heavy and bleached white with heat.