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Back Black Salt Queen
Chapters (50)
  1. Praise for
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. City of Mariit: Capital of Maynara Map
  5. One
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. Six
  12. Seven
  13. Eight
  14. Nine
  15. Two
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Thirteen
  20. Fourteen
  21. Fifteen
  22. Sixteen
  23. Three
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Twenty
  28. Twenty-One
  29. Twenty-Two
  30. Four
  31. By Order of General Ojas,On Behalf of Her Majesty Hara Duja
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Twenty-Four
  34. Twenty-Five
  35. Twenty-Six
  36. Twenty-Seven
  37. Twenty-Eight
  38. Twenty-Nine
  39. Thirty
  40. Thirty-One
  41. Thirty-Two
  42. Thirty-Three
  43. Five
  44. A Coronation Prayer
  45. Thirty-Four
  46. Epilogue
  47. Acknowledgments
  48. Thank You
  49. About the Author
  50. Violetear Books x Bindery Books

Stabbing pain rocked up from the soles of Eti’s feet to her knobby knees. She had never walked so many steps in her life. The panic that flooded her veins as they’d fled the previous night had dimmed to a soft but constant pitch. Eti was anxious, exhausted, and, once she allowed herself a moment to let it all sink in, absolutely miserable. The crowds didn’t help. She was trailing behind Ariel as they walked alongside the market canal. The shirt he’d found for her was scratchy and hastily stitched together, but she needed to blend in.

Although the morning was young, the sun still pale and low on the horizon, it appeared as though half of Mariit had clustered around the canal. Their chatter rang in Eti’s ears. Their elbows rammed into her sides as they brushed past. The bustling market was a far cry from the peace of the palace courtyard. Eti kept her eyes to the ground and tried to shut the rest of the world out.

Part of her longed to return to the warehouse where she and Ariel had spent the night. It wasn’t much, but it felt safe enough, dusty stacks of inventory shielding them from view, a wall between them and the rest of Mariit. But they couldn’t stay there. The warehouse belonged to someone, Ariel warned⁠—and that someone would not be happy to discover that Eti had broken their padlock.

Eti had broken a great deal of locks lately: the padlock on the warehouse door and, before that, the lock on the servants’ entrance through which she and Ariel had escaped. Perhaps all she was good at was breaking things.

“Come along, Eti,” Ariel murmured, casting a concerned look at her over his shoulder. “Just a bit farther now.”

He’d offered her the same words of comfort as they’d fled the palace, when Eti couldn’t breathe through the panic rising in her throat. Any fear the Orfelian harbored he’d transformed into gentle protection. Eti hadn’t realized how much she needed that until the midnight feast, when the walls shielding her from hardship came crashing down.

The tears came before Eti could stop them. She froze where she stood, wrapping her arms tightly around her middle. “I can’t, Ariel. Everything that’s happened⁠—it’s all too much,” she whispered. If she rolled herself into a tiny ball, maybe she could slip between the cracks in the cobblestones and hide there until this all blew over.