Humusi climbed to the top of the Libbu wall with a bow and arrow and fired at the guardsmen in range, knocking them down one by one. Time stood still as the horror rained down upon us. There was nothing more than clanging metal. Billowing smoke from a fire started near the Palace entrance. Crashing bodies and broken bones as both the nobility and poor were caught in the fury.

And where were Dagan and his brothers? They’d run toward the kitchens, our way in when we’d poisoned Uruku before. But though they might be able to get into the Palace, they’d never get Uruku. Not this way. He was likely already in hiding, scared off by the sounds of bloodshed.

Pulling myself up to follow them and warn them away, I gasped and slid back down to hide as a young man in rags thrust a dagger into the chest of a nobleman mere handsbreadths away. He collapsed, writhing amid the mayhem, a hand pressed against the blood. A rich man, covered in gore, snuck up behind the poor killer and swung at his neck with a gleaming sicklesword. The young man dodged the first swing, but the rich man was stronger and faster and ran him down, hacking off the poor man’s head with several furious, bloody strokes.

Dropping my head into my arms, I sobbed among the screams of the dying. People were fighting a war they didn’t even understand. There was no reason to kill that poor man and no reason to fight the nobility, either. They were both caught up in Uruku’s madness. They should be working together to get Uruku off the throne! I wept and watched as a reserve of guardsmen, looking bigger and stronger than those who’d been in the Libbu before, poured from the Palace with a great war cry. They flooded the marketplace and the Manzazu army spread out, some scaling the walls to hurl spears, others fighting hand to hand. But the women were outnumbered by a lot. By quite a lot. Assata joined Humusi and fired arrows at the growing number of guardsmen.

Tightness gripped my chest as they fought relentlessly through their terror with bravery.

Yet, I lay in the scrub, cowering.

No. The word surged through me. I didn’t have to lie here. Though I couldn’t help those who had died, I could do something about those who still lived.

I pushed myself up from my belly with shaking arms to wobbly legs. Men, women, guardsmen, and a few Manzazu warriors lay strewn about like broken dolls beyond the safety of the weeds. Their legs were twisted beneath them. Their bodies seeped blood. With my hand, I stifled another sob rising in my throat. Others writhed in agony, hands pressed to gaping wounds.

The soft groans from some people lying farther down toward a more secluded area of the Libbu—away from the battle zone—compelled me from behind the tree with shaking, faltering steps. I ducked underneath the cracked branches, grasped the rough trunk of the tree to steady myself, and took a few tentative steps out into the open.