She had stifled the urge to study him since he arrived. It’s rude to stare, she knows, but Kelo was more than worthy of study. His body was living and breathing, yet curiously devoid of pain and the need for sustenance. Should the Church get custody of him, he would be shunned by the priests and honored by the physicians.

  She greeted him with a small bow, smiling as if the sun was setting in his direction. He is perched limply on a wooden bench in the corner of the king’s tent, an empty cup coated with the sticky remains of winter melon wine sitting next to him. Inebriated, he reaches out to shake her hand with a bony, nearly fleshless appendage. She takes it gratefully in her own hand, shaking vigorously.

  “You were on the trip here,” he says. “The pretty one. My brother thinks highly of you,” Kelo smiles, revealing the stitches in the corners of his lips that hold his flesh together.

  She blushes, as does the king from his seat on the bed.

  “Kelo has agreed to let you examine him,” Taeg says. “It took quite a bit of wine, but I believe he is rather pleased to meet you, Anarah.” He leans heavily into his left elbow, holding a wineskin in the other. His cheeks are flushed. His green eyes match the color of the doublet he wears over his torso.

  “I’m grateful for this, Kelo. You are a wonder. I want to apologize in advance if this seems a bit forward.” She nods, casting her blue eyes in the younger man’s direction.

  “Not at all,” Kelo says. “I’ve had worse. Wonder was never a common reaction around me.”

  Anarah washes her delicate hands in a basin near the door, then walks to the young man seated in the corner. He watches her with great black eyes. She looks at them first, raising her hand to the side of his face, her propriety finally staunching her enthusiasm. Kelo nods and she moves to gently lift a thin eyelid. His pupils are enlarged, their irises swallowed up in black.

  “How is your vision?” she asks, stepping back to gaze at his eyes.

  He shrugs. “Fine, I think. Though the desert sun bothers my eyes at times.”

  “Your pupils are enlarged. It’s as if they took over the iris. For what purpose, I wonder.”

  “I see quite well in the dark.”

  “Do you know what color your irises are?” she asks, tilting her head.

  He’s silent for a moment, and she drops her hand from his skin.

  “Maybe goldish-green,” he says, shrugging. “My mother would know better than I.”

  Anarah looks over his mouth, where makeshift stitches are holding his lips together at the corners. His skin, white and peeling, is delicate and thin. A small scrape could open his flesh wide. His hands are skeletal. The bones of his left hand peek through the papery skin, shining brightly in the candle light.

  “Your mother is in Tauris, yes?” she asks, lifting his forearm with a delicate hand. Kelo is staring at the tanned skin of her own forearm, his brows draw down.

  “Yes.”

  She pinches the thin skin of his arm. If he had blood to spill, it would have bruised instantly. “Do you feel pain?”

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  “No,” he shakes his head. “When I found the Xelinite, I fell from her windowsill, snapped both ankles, jerked them back into place, and kept running.”

  She shudders, “You’re lucky. I think some of us would kill to be free from pain.” She blushes as Kelo raises his eyes.

  He chuckles, “Would you give up your pretty skin to look like me for no pain?”

  She knew he meant well, but the comment stung. “I’m sorry,” she replies.

  “You get used to it.” He looks away, staring at the floor. The wine seems to be wearing off and his hands begin to shake. Anarah continues cautiously.

  “May I look at your ankles?”

  “Sure,” he shrugs.

  The king perks up from his bed. “Anarah, do you think we could find a cure for this?”

  She hears a dry scoff from the skeleton boy as she examines his ankles.

  “I mean, without sacrificing people,” comes the king’s correction.

  “It’s not a disease, Taeg,” Kelo spits. “It was a sacrifice. There is no cure.”

  Anarah, feeling the tension in the small space, eases the silence. “I remember my studies in the movement of energy. The physicians were especially interested in this concept as a method of healing. The scrolls read that should there be an imbalance in the energy of the body, it must be righted with either an intake or by expelling energy from another part of the body. Think of a balance. If you place too much weight on one side, the other side goes up while the weight falls. If you equal the weight, it is in balance.”

  Kelo looks at her with curiosity. She rises to her feet, gazing at the patchy black hair on his head.

  “If the alchemists used your body to create a greater power within another, then there must be a way to regain that power to restore your body without sacrificing another. I believe what you saw in Tauris was the result of poor alchemists with little knowledge of their magic. Even when you receive the Crown Mark as a castle guard, we teach the recipients about the effects of a great influx of power to a body not equipped for such an energy shift. It can be difficult for the body to accept. We draw power from our own flesh. If it’s overdrawn…” She trails off, tucking a strand of dirty blonde hair behind her ears.

  The three sit in silence. She can hear the laughter of men and the clang of steel as they wait for a verdict from the commander. She hears a shout just over the ridge of the mountain and a thunder of hooves.

  “Maybe Nathis?” Taeg suggests. “He disappeared earlier.”

  Anarah crosses the tent to open the heavy cloth door. Splitting the curtain, waning sun strikes the needles of every evergreen, creating golden hues across the hillock. Three riders approach. Nathis, Tygoh, and Drair crest the rise in the setting sun. Drair is stripped of her boots, and Tygoh without his cavalry half-cape, both dark in the eyes. Tygoh’s gaze finds hers and his shoulders seem to drop further; whether with relief or disappointment, she cannot tell.

  “It’s them,” she calls into the tent before letting the curtain fall behind her. She smiles up at the three riders as they approach.

  “Them?” comes the king’s muffled reply.

  Her father, jubilant with energy, slides from his horse as if his disease had never been, and beams in her direction. “Silon is willing to work with us!” he shouts, grabbing both her shoulders in meaty hands. Before she can ask, he rushes past her toward the king’s tent and disappears through the curtain. She watches, puzzled, as Drair throws the reins of her horse to an equally puzzled young soldier and stamps off in the direction of the nearest cook pit. Tygoh remains seated in his saddle, his tan-skinned hands resting on the horn.

  “You’re alive,” she murmurs, looking him over.

  He nods. “Best get ready to travel again,” he says.

  “Will you be joining us this time?”

  She hadn’t meant for the words to be laced with bitterness, but felt the sting on her tongue anyway. He shrugs, and a mischievous smirk creeps into his lips. To those who knew Tygoh as “General,” he was a rigid leader, and though she hadn’t seen it in some time, she knew the man she met was still there.

  “There you are,” she grins.

  His eyes roll and he drops heavily from his horse as if his limbs were made of stone. “I believe the king will want to see us soon after what the General has to say.” He flips the reins of his mount over the saddle horn and offers his hand as he approaches. “Shall we?”