|
Tell them, Laia.
Darin whispers in my head.
Tell them who you are.
They might kill me
,
I argue back.
I don’t know if I can trust them.
If you don’t tell them, I’ll die
,
Darin’s voice says.
Don’t let me die, Laia.
“The tattoo on your neck,” I shout at Mazen’s retreating back. “The fist and
flame. My father put it there. You were the second person he tattooed, after my
mother.”
Mazen stops.
“His name was Jahan. You called him Lieutenant. My sister’s name was Lis.
You called her the Little Lioness. My—” For a second, I falter, and Mazen turns
around, a muscle in his jaw jumping.
Speak, Laia. He’s actually listening.
“My
mother’s name was Mirra. But you—everyone—called her the Lioness. Leader.
Head of the Resistance.”
Keenan releases me as quickly as if my skin has turned to ice. Sana’s gasp
echoes in the sudden silence of the cavern. She’ll know now why she’d found
me familiar.
I glance around at the shocked faces uneasily. My parents were betrayed from
within the Resistance. Nan and Pop never learned who it was.
Mazen says nothing.
Please don’t let him be the traitor. Let him be one of the good ones.
If Nan could see me, she’d throttle me. I’ve kept the secret of my parents’
identities all my life. Telling it makes me feel hollow inside. And what happens
now? All of these rebels, many of whom fought alongside my parents, suddenly
know whose child I am. They’ll want me to be fearless and charismatic, like
Mother. They’ll want me to be brilliant and serene, like Father.
But I’m not any of those things.
“You served with my parents for twenty years,” I say to Mazen. “In Marinn
and then here, in Serra. You joined up the same time as my mother. You rose to
the top with her and my father. You were third-in-command.”
54
Keenan’s eyes flash between Mazen and me, the rest of his face still. Work in
the cavern halts, and fighters whisper to each other as they gather around us.
“Mirra and Jahan had one child.” Mazen limps toward me. His eyes go from
my hair to my eyes to my lips as he remembers, compares. “She died when they
did.”
“No.” I’ve held this in for so long that it feels wrong to speak of it. But I have
to. It is the only thing I can say that might make a difference.
“My parents left the Resistance when Lis was four. They were expecting
Darin. They wanted a normal life for their children. They disappeared. No trace.
No trail.
“Darin was born. Then, two years later, I arrived. But the Empire was coming
down hard on the Resistance. Everything my parents worked for was crumbling.
They couldn’t sit by and watch. They wanted to fight. Lis was old enough to stay
with them. But Darin and I were too young. They left us with Mother’s parents.
Darin was six. I was four. They died a year later.”
“You tell a good tale, girl,” Mazen says. “But Mirra didn’t have parents. She
was an orphan, like me. Like Jahan.”
“I’m not telling tales.” I pitch my voice low so it doesn’t shake. “Mother left
home when she was sixteen. Nan and Pop didn’t want her to go. After she left,
she cut off all contact. They didn’t even know she was alive until she knocked
on their door asking them to take us in.”
“You’re nothing like her.”
He might as well have slapped me.
I know I’m not like her
,
I want to say.
I
cried and cringed instead of standing and fighting. I abandoned Darin instead of
dying for him. I’m weak in a way she never was.
“Mazen,” Sana whispers, like I’ll disappear if she speaks too loudly. “Look at
her. She has Jahan’s eyes, his hair. Ten hells, she has his face.”
“I swear it’s true. This armlet—” I lift my hand, and it glints in the cavern’s
light. “It was hers. She gave it to me a week before the Empire caught her.”
“I’d wondered what she’d done with it.” The stiffness in Mazen’s face
dissolves, and the light of an old memory flares in his eyes. “Jahan gave it to her
when they got married. I never saw her without it. Why didn’t you come to us
before? Why didn’t your grandparents contact us? We’d have trained you up the
way Mirra would have wanted.”
The answer dawns on his face before I can say it.
“The traitor,” he says.
“My grandparents didn’t know who to trust. They decided not to trust
55
anyone.”
“And now they’re dead, your brother is in jail, and you want our help.”
Mazen brings his pipe back to his mouth.
“We must give her aid.” Sana is beside me, her hand on my shoulder. “It’s our
duty. She’s, as you say,
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
