“Yes, Commander.” She ran out of the courtyard, her sickleswords bouncing on her hips.

“What happened?” I asked Ummi.

“This man tried to assassinate your exiled sarratum, it seems. I caught him in the act, and as he fell, his blade slipped from her throat to her ear.”

She kicked the man over onto his back. He had a patchy beard and lean, rangy face that looked oddly familiar. Sucking in his breath, Nasu dropped to a knee next to the man. After a moment, he looked up gravely.

“I know him. He’s an Alu guardsman. I used to spar with him near the Pit.” He swallowed, throat bobbing. “He was quiet as a fox and lethal with his knives. Lugal Marus used to send him on missions like this, and now it appears Uruku is, too.” His lip curled in disgust. “To think he’d attempt to kill the rightful heir to the throne of Alu.”

Arwia’s hands shook. “This is why I left Alu. I don’t want anything to do with the throne ever again! I simply want to live in peace, which is what I keep telling Sarratum Tabni. She insists I must make plans to reclaim my throne.”

“Wait a moment. How did Uruku know you were still alive?” I asked her. “For all he knew, you’d died in the tomb. He thought we all did.”

She furrowed her brow. “I don’t know.”

I looked at Dagan. “What about the men you paid to dig us out of the tomb? They could have told someone that we escaped our death sentence. Maybe someone heard about an exiled queen living here in Manzazu, and Uruku made the connection.”

Dagan shook his head, his hands on his hips. “Those men are loyal to me. They would have never done something like this.”

“For enough coins? There are those who would slit their own ummum’s throat to be wealthy,” Arwia said, wincing when I pressed the cloth more tightly to her wound.

Dagan’s faced darkened in anger. “Then they will answer to me for it. But I can’t imagine that they would be so cold. I’ve known those men all my life.”

Nasu stood, brushing sand from his hands. “It’s not because there is talk of an exiled queen, Kammani. There is talk about you outside the city.”

“Me?” I pulled the cloth away from Arwia’s ear to check the bleeding, and as soon as I removed it, blood seeped again from the wound. I pressed it back firmly.

“On my last trading mission with Ilu’s father, we stopped at Laraak, a trading encampment outside Alu. The traders gossiped about Manzazu’s healer from the south who’d saved the warrior maidens. It was a big deal. Some of the traders there knew Mudi, your healer friend, and apparently she’d talked.”

Dagan’s face flushed and he pointed angrily at Nasu’s chest. “Why were you trading in the south so close to Alu? You were supposed to have died in that tomb as well to protect the maidens in the Netherworld! What if someone saw you in the trading camp and that is what led Uruku’s men here?”