Daughter of No Worlds (The War of Lost Hearts, #1)

by Carissa Broadbent

My name is Tisaanah, and I have abandoned everyone I love. And I am a killer.

I disregarded Max’s statement. It felt good to have the ability to disregard the opinion of a man.

Oh, he was pretending that my accent wasn’t that noticeable. Very cute.

That one sound made me want to snap him in two.

Hours passed. The sun set. I lit lanterns. I wouldn’t go inside because I didn’t trust myself not to slap Max if he snickered at me.

I couldn’t read him, and I did not try. I was long past caring what he thought. In that moment, I didn’t care what any of them thought — all of these people who, my entire life, had used me as a part of their stories, had assumed that I was a set piece in their lives. Like Esmaris did. Like every lord I seduced. Like Nura, using me to get under Max’s skin. And now, like Max, who saw me as a representative of some petty grudge and not an actual human being.

There was a certain meditative quality about throwing myself against a stone wall again and again, chipping away at it. I could feel it cracking beneath my fingers, even as I felt it cracking me. At the end, one of us would be left standing. And I wasn’t about to let myself break.

“I thought living in the middle of nowhere meant that I didn’t have to lock my doors. What did I ever do to make my house so welcoming?” Max’s voice,

“I so deeply enjoy when you come here and criticize everything about my life. Put that down, it’s not finished.”

“You were invited to the Palace to be honored after the end of the war. But you didn’t come.” “You were only six years old then, my Queen. I thought it would likely be past your bedtime.”

the realization that something had shifted in the nature of our relationship, and I had simply failed to notice. But I understood with a resolve that settled deep in my chest that I had been given something precious in this fragile, tentative friendship. I closed my fingers around that delicate gift and drew it close.

“But I’m sorry,” she added, more softly, “that what I did affected you, too. No one prepared you for that.” “No one ever does.”

“The way I look at it,” he said, very solemnly, so quietly that his words slipped into the air like steam, “you didn’t forget what you were. I think you remembered. And I hope no one ever again has the fucking audacity to tell you otherwise.”

“I figured you should have something both beautiful and functional, like you.”

“Max,” I breathed, touching my heart with exaggerated awe, “you think I’m functional?”

A dancing smile glinted in his eyes. “I think,” he said, “that you are breathtakingly functional.”

“I’m both disgusted and impressed by the delight with which you flaunt your superiority over a bunch of children,” Max said, when I rejoined him between stages. “At least try to look like you aren’t enjoying it quite so much.” “Why?” “Some might call it distasteful.” I gave him a sly smirk. “But not you.” The corner of his mouth twitched. “No,” he admitted. “Not me.”

“Ascended above,” Max groaned. “Don’t do it, Moth. Valtain girls are trouble.” I laughed. “Even me?” “Especially you.”

“Well,” he replied. “You would have to get in line behind all of the other women who want me to undress them.” I rolled my eyes, turning around and lifting my hair. “Have I not earned first place?” A soft chuckle. “I suppose that is undeniable.”

Look at me, I commanded to every person who gazed upon my tattered back. And I showed each of them pieces that were as Fragmented as I was, little carefully chosen parts of a whole. But it was here, in this gaze, that I was seen — seen for every incongruous part of me. And nothing had ever flooded me with such sweet, agonizing terror.

I looked at his mouth and wondered what it would feel like to show him another vulnerability, another truth. To let myself want. Don’t what? Don’t stop touching me, seeing me, needing me. But I forced a light smile back onto my face. “Don’t flatter me,” I choked out. “It’s unlike you.”

“If the Orders offer me support, then I need it,” I rasped. “I have nothing else.” And there was no hesitation, no pause, as he stepped closer and said, “You have me.” My chest hurt.

“Do you trust me?” Gods, I did. More than anyone. “I trust that you are trying to protect me above all else.” A flicker of hurt crossed his face. “What does that mean?” “It means,” I said quietly, “that I am willing to make sacrifices that you are not.”

Words abandoned me. I didn’t deserve her. No one deserved her.

another part of me that felt an odd, primal sense of relief in the weight of her against me. Like some missing puzzle piece had been restored.

To call it strange would be an understatement. To hear fragments of the worst day of my life whispered back to me from the lips of someone who had become so precious to me. To be reminded of everything I had already lost while looking into the eyes of everything I had left to lose. I dreaded morning.

a fiery glitter seeped into her eyes, and I let their flames strip me, burn me, consume me, until there was nothing left but ash.

{I know. Perhaps we will make each other whole, Tisaanah, Daughter of No Worlds.}

A flush rose to his cheeks. He extended one hand and waited. When I stared at it, confused, he muttered, “Your hand, Tisaanah.” I laid my palm in his and tried not to laugh as he planted a clumsy brush of a kiss against my knuckles. “Good luck,” he said, then too quickly dropped my fingers as he gave the three of us one final, hurried wave and was ushered away with his new instructor. “Moth, breaker of flowers, spy glasses, pitchers, and hearts,” Max mused, shaking his head. “He is your apprentice after all, Sammerin.” “He’s a little smitten, I think. But I suppose it can’t be helped.” And I tried not to notice how Sammerin’s gaze slid to Max as he said, “When I saw that red dress, I knew we were all in trouble.”

The answer, of course, was, Yes, frequently, in great detail. But I would pretend that wasn’t the case as long as I possibly could. I was, after all, a well-practiced, world-renowned expert in denial.

Your goals made me respect you, yes. But it was everything else that made me—” He shut his mouth, cleared his throat, looked away. Then back. “I told you that together we would find a way to do this, and I meant it. But I stand with you until the end. You, Tisaanah. If you wanted to run, I swear we’d find a way out. And if it all goes up in flames, I’ll burn right beside you and it will still be the best thing I—” I didn’t realize I was crying until I tasted salt. “Stop.”

“It’s easy to die for someone,” I said, “but it is so much more valuable to live. I do not give you permission to fail if I fail. Do you understand me?” When he didn’t answer, I pressed, “Do you understand?”

“I don’t believe you.” I placed my palms on either side of his cheeks, resting my forehead against his. He still smelled like ash and lilacs, like he had carried the remnants of his garden all the way across the sea. “You are the best of men, Maxantarius Farlione, no matter how much you try to convince the world otherwise. Promise me that you’ll keep fighting your battles even if I lose mine.” “You won’t—” “Promise.” His fingers found my face, tracing a warm trail down my cheek. And then, as if a thread had snapped, he pulled me into a sudden, fierce embrace. I sank against it so smoothly, my arms sliding over his shoulders, my knees adjusting so that I curled around him. “I promise,” he murmured into my hair.

I brushed my lips against his throat. His fingers tightened at my back, and that touch seared up my spine, heartbeat rising to the surface of my skin. And in that moment, a truth solidified in my heart, my soul, my blood — a piece of me that wanted nothing more than to seize this chance. Because I wanted him. I wanted him in so many ways. As a friend, as a kindred soul, as a fierce teammate. As skin and lips and teeth. As a hitched breathless moan in the darkness or a lazy embrace in the sunrise. I wanted that. I wanted it all.

It was like walking into a world of color when all I’d ever seen was black and white.

the sight of him caught in my chest and squeezed — that face, the gaze that met me with such bare, raw honesty. I was in love with him.

My last thought, as sleep took me, was that I wouldn’t mind at all if I was tethered to his harbor forever.

know you want to have a moment, you romantic bastard, but no time for that now. When this is all over. Sunset and all.”

I was running towards Tisaanah. I do not give you permission to fail if I fail. All I could think was that I loved her. I hadn’t told her that, but as that unsettling blue light grew closer and closer, I’d never felt any greater certainty. I loved her for her strength, for her beautiful brute force, for seeing what no one else did. I loved her for everything the world constantly used against her. I loved her for continuing anyway. Promise me that you will keep fighting your battles even if I lose mine.

I stood with her, only her, until the end of our stories. But I refused to allow hers to be a retelling of mine.

And with all my body and soul, I wept.

She was so beautiful that she could not be human. Definitely dead. Apparently I said that aloud, because Tisaanah replied, “You are not dead.”

that every moment in life was a coin with one dark side and one light. They fell on the ground with one side facing up, but the other always lay beneath it, there, but hidden.

love that burned for all of them like an enduring flame deep in my chest.

My name is Tisaanah. I am a free woman and yet still a slave. I am fragments of many things but a whole of only myself. I am a daughter of no worlds, and all worlds. And I am not done yet.