The Jasad Crown (The Scorched Throne, #2)

by Sara Hashem

How could the Jasad Queen be a mouthy crook who would sooner wrestle a rabid bear than hold her temper for ten minutes? The Jasad Malika couldn’t be vicious and loud and unreasonably confident in her comedic skills—

She was afraid. Sefa wasn’t sure why the revelation came as a shock. Perhaps she’d spent too much time with Sylvia, who seemed to believe she feared death until she encountered an opportunity to run toward it like a bull with a branch up its rump.

If they caught up to him, he would be executed for a bevy of different crimes, not the least of which was desertion, but what good plan didn’t involve at least some risk of beheading?

“Queen Hanan does not care a whit about me. Felix could pulverize me into soil for their gardens, and she wouldn’t stop to smell the flowers growing from my carcass.”

I wished I could look away, but in a room of beautiful things, Arin of Nizahl outshined them all.

Namsa shot me a knowing smirk. I squinted, not entirely convinced the woman I’d brought back from the cliffside was the same woman who had kicked my liver into my skull the first day we met. Who knew she had such emotional range? Until this morning, I would have said she was capable of two expressions: scowling and lightly scowling.

Life does not allow you opportunities to travel down every path, to see the outcome of every choice. You can spend your entire existence frozen in one spot, squinting into the future, or you can decide to move. Pick a path and never look back.”

Malika of Jasad or not, she still had the temperament of a deranged goose.

He spat out red. “I am not one for pointless musings, Suraira, but I am starting to wonder if whoever built my skull built it for the express purpose of surviving you.”

All of me is written in your name, he wanted to say.

“I am becoming oddly partial to your death threats,” Arin mused. “I seem to hear in them different words entirely.”

“There is no if you survive. There is no future where it is my hand that ends your life.” This close, I could make out the austere lines of anguish twining around his rage. “If your magic takes you, I will drag you back. It cannot have you.”

In the meadow of the ancient realm, I knew my days of running were coming to a close. I could go anywhere I wanted, but my destination would always be him. He had made himself the threshold to a world where it might finally be safe to land. To stay.

“I choose her.”

When Arin had dropped seventeen Jasadis to the ground, I stepped forward. Amusement warmed the eyes fastened to my face. “Do you never tire of trying to spill my blood, Suraira?” I quirked a brow. “Everyone needs a hobby.”

“I swear my loyalty to Jasad’s Malika.” I couldn’t breathe. “Everything I have is hers to command. What she wills, I will create. What she hates, I will destroy. I am the weapon of the Malika, and it is her alone I pledge myself to.”

“In the evening, I would come home to you.”

“I will never sit on the Jasad throne,” Arin said. “The Jasad crown will belong to my wife, and my wife alone.”

“You don’t understand,” she whispered. Jeru tensed, and we both glanced at her tear-stricken face. “What life is left? I can’t mourn him longer than I loved him. I am not strong enough for this.” “Nobody is,” Jeru said. “You do it anyway.”

“If you will not stay, then take me with you.”