"Why aren't I at the Order?" I said. "I tried -- after everything -- I meant to go there."
"I don't know. I woke up last night to your screaming and found you bleeding all over the floor." Her hand dropped away and disappeared from my sight. "You stank of blood magic. And you were --" She stopped.
"What? I was what?"
I kept seeing the fire flickering in my head, golden and sparking, my twisted face in the flames. Not exactly my face, no -- my face as it was seen by the people of the Empire. My face as if it belonged to a monster.
I looked at Leila, and she was trying to keep her expression blank and failing.
"What!" I said. "What's wrong with me?"
"Nothing." She sounded insincere.
"Leila!" I struggled on the bed, trying to push myself up. I felt as if I were tied down. "After all this, you're still going to keep secrets from me? Really?"
She narrowed her eyes. "I told you not to go," she said. "I don't call that keeping a secret."
"Leila, what the hell is wrong with me?"
She went still. I thrashed on the bed and then exhaustion overpowered me and I went still too. I stared up at the patterns of sunlight on the ceiling. In the empty space where my body should have been I felt creeping, dreadful coldness.
The bed lightened. I dropped my head to the side. Leila was rummaging in the drawer of her vanity. She wore a backless dress and her skin glimmered in the yellow light. It was beautiful.
She walked back over to me and sat down and laid the mirror in her lap.
"What is it?" I whispered.
She hesitated.
"Show me!"
Leila sighed and held up the mirror. It was small, filigreed with little carved flowers. It looked expensive. I noticed all this before I noticed the face. Not my face. The face in the flames. My face, only monstrous.
I didn't understand what I was seeing at first. Then Leila spoke.
"It'll heal, of course, but there will be a scar.”
She handed me the mirror and stepped away. My face-that-wasn't-my-face stared back at me. The right side was fine, but the left was melted, the skin reddened and charred. At first I couldn't connect that face to my body. And then I could.
"It’s a shame it had to happen by magic,” Leila said. “Otherwise there might’ve been something we could do about it.”
I hurled the mirror aside and it shattered on the floor. Leila looked at it with a calm, implacable expression.
“Although you might find something at the night market. To help, even if it wouldn't get rid of it completely.”
"You don’t care,” I said.
"What?"
"About helping me."
She fell silent.
"I'm scarred. What would you want with a scarred man? I know you, Leila. You care too much about beautiful things."
She didn't answer, and I knew I was right. I forced myself up to sitting, ignoring her protests. I still couldn't feel my body but I could feel my anger, my humiliation, my sorrow.
"Naji, wait," she said.
"I need to go back." I pushed out of the bed and slammed up against the wall. A narrow strip of shadow stretched out from beside the vanity. I stumbled toward it.
"Don't," Leila said, but I noticed that she didn't bother to stand up, that she didn't otherwise try to stop me.
I didn't look at her as the shadows crawled around me. It was exhausting, stepping into the darkness. But I couldn't look at Leila anymore. I couldn't look at myself.
In those seconds before I arrived back at the Order, my thoughts went to the woman at the dance hall. The smoky blue light. Her spangled dress. I thought of how she had smiled at me. How she hadn't been frightened.
And I knew she would be frightened if she saw me now.
The End.
‘The Witch’s Betrayal’ is a short story set in the world of Cassandra Rose Clarke’s YA fantasy adventures The Assassin’s Curse (out now from Strange Chemistry) and The Pirate’s Wish (coming in June 2013 from Strange Chemistry).
Ananna of the Tanarau abandons ship when her parents try to marry her off to an allying pirate clan. But that only prompts the scorned clan to send an assassin after her. And when Ananna faces him down one night, armed with magic she doesn’t really know how to use, she accidentally activates a curse binding them together.
To break the curse, Ananna and the assassin must complete three impossible tasks — all while grappling with evil wizards, floating islands, haughty manticores, runaway nobility, strange magic, and the growing romantic tension between them.
After setting out to break the curse that binds them together, the pirate Ananna and the assassin Naji find themselves stranded on an enchanted island in the north with nothing but a sword, their wits, and the secret to breaking the curse: complete three impossible tasks. With the help of their friend Marjani and a rather unusual ally, Ananna and Naji make their way south again, seeking what seems to be beyond their reach.
Unfortunately, Naji has enemies from the shadowy world known as the Mists, and Ananna must still face the repercussions of going up against the Pirate Confederation. Together, Naji and Ananna must break the curse, escape their enemies — and come to terms with their growing romantic attraction.
Cassandra Rose Clarke is also the author of The Mad Scientist’s Daughter, a science fiction novel for adult readers (published February 2013 by Angry Robot).
“Cat, this is Finn. He’s going to be your tutor.”
He looks and acts human, though he has no desire to be. He was programmed to assist his owners, and performs his duties to perfection. A billion-dollar construct, his primary task now is to tutor Cat. As she grows into a beautiful young woman, Finn is her guardian, her constant companion… and more.
But when the government grants rights to the ever-increasing robot population, however, Finn struggles to find his place in the world.
Following her acclaimed Young Adult debut for our sister imprint Strange Chemistry, The Assassin's Curse, the very talented Cassandra Rose Clarke moves on to more adult themes, in a heartbreaking story of love, loss …
and robots.
For more from Cassandra Rose Clarke, visit her website at www.cassandraroseclarke.com