The queen reclined against the pillows, taking in my and Ai Ling’s stunned expressions. “So what’s it going to be, Empress? Still want me inside your head?”

I stared, the memory of Da Seo’s dance still tingling through my arms, her love and primal devotion hot beneath my skin. Then I retrieved the sputtering oil lamp from its resting place on the breakfast tray, leaned toward the brazier, and lit the kuso-kuso leaves.

“If you’ll have me in yours,” I said.

Then the four of us joined hands, and for the second time—the cursed saga of Tarisai of Swana began.

CHAPTER 16

The smell of burning Kuso-Kuso leaves could stop A charging lion in its tracks, reducing it to a purring lapcat. But the moment that thick, heady scent touched my nostrils, every muscle in my body seized.

I had thought, just for a moment, that it was possible to tell the truth. That Min Ja might understand. But now, as my mind raced through its sordid collection of my weakest moments . . . I knew I was asking the impossible. The queen might be a killer, but at least her victims were monsters. When I had hurt Dayo, he had been innocent—more so than anyone. He had barely survived, and from there my body count only grew. Olugbade. Thaddace. Somehow, even the abiku massacre at Ebujo Temple felt like my fault.

And my motivations? My brave, noble reason for sticking a dagger in my oldest friend, and for betraying a secret that had killed both an emperor and a High Lord Judge?

A pat on the head from my mother. A chance to see her smile.

I couldn’t show Min Ja my story. So instead, when the kuso-kuso smoke filled the airy tent, curling around us in green tendrils . . . I held my breath. I measured each one, inhaling in slow, shallow gasps as the others took deep breaths, slumping in a blank-stared trance. Eventually, my shoulders relaxed too, but as my vision slipped into a dream, my will remained lucid.

The first rush of memories were my days at Bhekina House. My mind skimmed across the first seven years, which were hazy and imprecise—studying for Mother, waiting for Mother, performing for a lovely face that always tutted no, not enough, what a shame. Distantly, I sensed Ai Ling, Min Ja, and Da Seo possessing each memory. Under the influence of the kuso-kuso, they had turned into my shadow-selves, and beneath that pale blue tent, four Tarisais sat instead of one.

In the fog of my childhood, some memories glowed clear—crystalline stars against a vast, murky sky. In unfaded color and full volume sound, we relived the night I first met Melu of Swana.

After this memory, the story would curdle, growing sour and grim. My seven-year-old self would develop an irrational faith in The Lady’s protection. That little girl would spiral into self-destruction, hurling herself into firepits and poisoning herself with spiders, marked every cheated death as proof that her mother loved her.