She had her arms around him when he woke up, one draped heavily over his shoulder, the other tucked under his head, cradling it against her chest. Her fingers were cold; he could feel them through his clothes where they touched. Her body wasn't warm; it didn't benefit him much to be in that position. He ought to move out of that embrace. He didn't.

They were always cold, those fingers. He knew that from memory, from having held them between his palms, from those times when he'd warmed them with his breaths, in the morning, at night, when they were out riding for a long time, in the wind.

Another man's memory, to be precise, from a time when he couldn't make his own choices.

Choices, Rhykal thought.

He wondered if his choices would have been different had he been allowed to make them. Would he have sworn the same oath, spoken the same words, felt the same hurt every time he was reminded she had to marry? Would he have reached for her cold hands the same way, given a choice?

He didn't have the answers. He thought he might for that last thing. He did want to warm her hands now, but perhaps that was the other man's feelings interfering with his own.

'He is there, isn't he? Watching you? Watching us?' she'd said.

It would be a lie to say he wasn't. He'd been feeling the other man's presence, along with his pain, his anger, his fears everywhere he went, so intensely and frequent that he was beginning to confuse them for his own. He used to be able to tell them apart without much effort, now it had become more and more difficult a task. Now, he wasn't sure who'd saved her from the flood, or why he could find neither will nor reason to move out from under these arms.

It felt comfortable, there was that. A feeling he hadn't had for a long time. It felt comfortable, and he was tired. There was no wrong in staying for a while, was there?

Somewhere in the middle of those thoughts, he drifted off to sleep again. This time, there were no dreams, no nightmares, no memories from a distant past to wake him up several times a night. This time, he slept soundly––something he couldn't remember doing since the the night of the raid. This time, he wanted to stay sleeping just like this, and for the comfort to last.

When he woke up again, she was no longer there. It was still dark, despite the timing of everything that told him dawn must have arrived by now. They seemed to be in a cavern somewhere inside the mountain, washed in by accident during the flood. He had no knowledge of this place; either Deo hadn't told him about it, or it hadn't yet been discovered, which was a problem. Finding a way out of a cave system was always difficult, but without some sort of fuel to light a fire, impossible might have been a more suitable word. The darkness took his eyes a long time to adjust, and even then, moving around without walking into something or stepping into the water by accident was a challenge.

The water was still there, pushed through by the flood and was now being trapped inside this air pocket, forming a temporary lake below the patch of higher ground they'd taken shelter. He fumbled his way around the protruding, needle-like formations of the cave that came from both the ceiling and below, ducked through a passage barely big enough for him to squeeze through to the adjacent chamber, and found her.

The Bharavi was standing on a small islet, surrounded by another temporary lake made by the flood. Her braids had come loose, leaving her near-white hair undone and in a tangling mess that hung loosely over her back and shoulders. It was glowing, not white, but blue.

He followed her gaze to the ceiling and realized why. Nestled in the nook and crannies of the chamber, along the cave's tapering fingers of minerals growing down from the roof, specks of blue lights blinked slowly in and out of existence, turning the entire ceiling into what looked like the desert's night sky on a clear day, except the stars here were not silvery white, but iridescent blue. They numbered in the thousands, illuminating the cave with enough lights for him to see the outlines of her tunic, the still-wet strands of her hair, and the way her shoulders moved up and down as she tried to chase her breaths.

Something compelled him then, to experiment, to try. He took a step closer, and called her from behind, "Djari."

It brought everything to a halt. Her body went rigid, her breathing stopped immediately. She stayed in that same position for a long time, before she turned to face him.

Her eyes lingered on his face for a few heartbeats, tracing it like a sculptor trying to decide whether the subject was worth the creation. Then came the disappointment, the sagging of her shoulders, the release of breath she'd been holding for a different someone. She filled her lungs again, and said, with an agitation she didn't care to hide, "You've never called me that before. What changed?"

She made it sound like a crime, the fact that he'd used her name, and yet he found it somewhat liberating. The Bharavi was, he had come to realize, the only one who'd never once confused him with the other man.

He smiled. "I wanted to see if you can tell."

"I know my sworn sword," she replied and turned back to the lights.

He made his way toward her, reached for one of the twinkling lights that had landed on her shoulder. She stiffened at the contact, but made a point to stay where she was, not backing away.

"Glow beetles," he said, placing the small insect on his palm for them to see. The bug went dark for a while at contact, before it resumed blinking its blue light again. It was the size of a small bee, had wings but didn't seem to want to fly anywhere.

She leaned over to look at it. A clump of her hair fell down and brushed softly against the side of his hand. It was still wet and cold to the touch. He wondered if her hands, too, were still cold.

"There's supposed to be a cave full of them near Cakora." It was also his first time, seeing these beetles. "We may be able to find a way out of here yet, with these lights."

"One miracle," she said triumphantly, then she went to the water, and leaned over to touch it, "after another."

The Bharavi whose name he wasn't allowed to call dipped her maimed hand into the pool, dragged it across the water in front of her, and made a splash that would have been bigger had her fingers been whole. The lake glowed blue where she touched, along the edges of the path she'd created, and around where droplets of water landed. Circles of blue waves rippled out one by one. It lit up the lake for a short moment, before the darkness ate them all up again. She looked at him then, like a child waiting for an explanation, perhaps also an approval for having discovered something all by herself. She was a child, still, he'd almost forgotten. You didn't get to see that side of her very often, not even through the Sparrow's eyes.

"Tiny creatures in the sea." He smiled as he gave her the explanation. It was difficult not to smile. "They produce lights when disturbed. They wash up on the beach sometimes along the coast of Samarra when the condition is right. On a moonless night, you can see your footprints glow blue. I've seen it happen once or twice."

Her eyes lit up at those words, forcing him to take an unnecessary breath, leaving something behind in his chest on the exhale that felt like it was going to stay.

She parted her lips to speak and then decided against it. He could see it written all over her face, nonetheless. She could never hide them, those emotions and desires. He said, "You may be able to see it when we get out of here. It's quite common."

She nodded, held on to another set of words, and said, instead, "It's still a miracle."

You could call it that, he supposed––having survived the quake and the flood, having found these two phenomenons in the same place, at the same time, and having found not one, but two sources of light when they needed to find their ways out of the cavern. He'd never believed in miracles, now he found himself looking for the fourth one.

Something moved in the water. They both turned to look. She gasped at three winged creatures gliding near the suface of the lake, turning it blue wherever they touched. Long, glowing lines followed their paths, stirred into life by their needle-like tails.

"What are they?" she asked, forgetting to hold back this time.

"Manta rays," he said. "Juvenile ones. A mature adult's wingspan can grow three times the length of a horse. They must have been washed in here during the flood." These three were a third of their adult size, but still big enough to excite someone who'd never seen them before. He watched them glide around the islet they were standing on, pausing every once in a while to check out something underwater. "They're looking for a way out."

"Can we follow them, then? If they find it? Are they dangerous?"

"No." If he was worried, it was about something else. "They're not dangerous. It's possible they might find an exit, but I'd try to find a dry one first." He didn't like the idea of jumping into that water. They might still have to swim through at some point, however.

"Do you believe now?" she said. "In miracles?"

He turned and saw her standing there, holding a smile, her yellow eyes catching the blue light, turning more green. Suddenly, it felt harder to breathe. Something foreign was in his chest, growing in size, in weight, slowly taking up space behind his ribcage without permission.

He said to her, over a tug, a pull of some kind, without a clear understanding why he did, "It still hurt? That hand?"

She looked at her maimed hand in surprise, as if she'd somehow forgotten about it. "A little," she replied, then changed her mind. "A lot. Were you really going to cut me?"

"At the time, yes." It was true. He had no reason to lie.

"But not anymore?"

"I don't know." That, too, was no lie.

She stared at him, like she was looking for something he was trying to hide. "You can say you're sorry," she said. "I can accept an apology."

His turn, to be surprised. "You want to forgive me? Why?"

"You saved my life," she replied, like it was the easiest explanation in the world. "I'd say we're even."

Another glow beetle landed on the mess of her still-damp hair. It blinked slowly, steadily, matching the speed of his pulse, or controlling it, he wasn't sure. He didn't like that––the idea of being controlled. "It wasn't me."

"You're lying."

He did lie. "How would you even know?"

She raised her chin defiantly. "I know my sworn sword. I can tell you apart. I think you know this. Why did you save me?"

He did know. He shrugged, indifferently. "I felt like it at the time."

She walked toward him slowly, steadily, the same way someone might try to back him up with a knife. She didn't like taking no for an answer, this Bharavi. She said, "You left me to die before, by that river. You could have left me behind last night and find your freedom. Why didn't you?"

Why hadn't he? He had left her behind before. It had been easy then, just not anymore. Last night, he simply didn't like the thought of her dying. His heart was beating harder, faster at that question, however. "It matters to you? My reasons?"

"I need to know if you're an enemy or a friend. It's only natural, isn't it?"

He bristled at that, for reasons he didn't understand. The words she'd used bothered him. The stillness of the cave bothered him. The closeness of her that still filled the space between them with something thick and indestructibly solid bothered him. "What if I want more than that?" he said without thinking. "Than to be your friend?"

The careless question resonated, lingered, got tossed around in a chamber with no way out. She stared at him as if he'd produced a knife, or a weapon she hadn't seen coming. Two yellow orbs, among thousands of blue lights, in the silence of the cave that underlined how alone they were.

He could have left it there when she didn't reply, but by then it was too late, and he was too tired to hold anything back out of caution.

"What if I want to stay?" The discovery came to him as he said each word, out of nowhere and without ceremony. "What if I want to take his place? To swear that same oath? To be that man who stops you when you cross the line?"

He could do that and find his own place in the world, couldn't he? He could take her from the other man, the same way the imposter had taken years of his life. It would make everything right, even, and fair. He could accept that, move forward, forgive, forget, leave the past behind, if there was something in it for him, something in exchange.

"I can protect you better than he can." He'd always been the stronger, faster man. "I can be your sworn sword for a better cause, a better reason. I will save you because I want to, not because I must, not because you're the gods' chosen one, not for another woman who died because of me." He still didn't believe in prophecies, or fate, or destiny. His feelings were more simple, more personal than that. "There is no one in my past, no wrongs I must right, nothing to be undone. My heart is not taken, and you can have it whole. You asked me why I saved you." He'd come to understand the reason, just now. "I want his place in your life. I want you to choose me. I want to stay."

***

'For them to share..." Saya's words came back to her then, cutting her like daggers, like knives. "He will have to love you, and you will have to love them both,'

There was a way to save them, after all, a way for them to share. The offer had been given, and she wouldn't have to be the monster who killed Rhykal if she could take it. They wouldn't have to go see Deo Di Amarra, to risk any more lives. Everything would be all right, and would go back to the way they were.

She could do that, and Hasheem would stay. He would stay and endure whatever happened, tucked in a corner somewhere behind Rhykal's existence. He'd sworn to do that when she married, hadn't he? To follow when she must leave for her husband's Kha'gan. There was no difference in this, and in what they already knew would happen, was there?

It made her understand something else, however. Something Saya had also said.

"I told Saya how I wished there was a way for you to coexist, to share." The conversation had hurt her then. It hurt more now, having to recite it. "She told me the only way for that to happen, was for you to share the same goal, the same determination to fight, the same reason to live or die." She paused to breathe, to deal with that reality, and what it implied. "That you will have to want to swear the same oath, to love me the same way, and I will have to love you back. I will have to love you both. I think she was right."

She stepped closer to him, close enough to see it in his eyes, what no one else was supposed to see. "But she was also right about one other thing." She reached out to touch his cheek, as her own tears began falling. "I cannot compromise. I never could. I don't think I ever would, not in this lifetime. Tell me," she said to Rhykal, knowing the answer without needing hear it, "he's crying in there, isn't he? Listening to us?"

She knew her sworn sword, knew him well enough to catch the first drop of tear before it rolled down his cheek. Hasheem was listening to every word. He could hear everything she said, could still see everything she did or didn't do.

She held his face with both hands, to make sure he listened, and remembered it for life.

"You are my sworn sword and blood. Whatever happened in your past, whatever the future has in store for us, you will always have that place by my side." She could feel it again now, the bond that held them together, how it wound tighter around them the more things they had to sacrifice. "We'll stay together, we'll fight together, we'll find a way to survive this together no matter what life throws at us. I gave you my promise that night, and I intend to keep it. We do this together, you and I. I won't let you do this alone."

There would always be, she thought, a place in his heart she couldn't occupy, but she had decided some time ago, when she'd cut off her fingers, when he'd tried to kill Rhykal to save her, that whatever memories he still carried with him, whatever place she had in his life, and whatever that made her, she would not be another woman who leaves him behind.

And then, when the other man took over, when those tears stopped falling, she told Rhykal, making sure this, too, was clear, "You can stay and fight with us. You can be my shield, my sword, my companion, if that's what you want. But I cannot give you his place by my side. I choose Hasheem. I will not compromise. And I will get rid of you if that's what it takes to save him."

Rhykal stilled for a while, staring at her. His breathing became shallower, sharper. He was going through a different kind of anger, she could feel it.

"And your promise to let me go if di Amara can't fix it? What of that?"

"I lied." Was it considered lying if you knew the result of a bet beforehand? "But even if I didn't, even if I were to let you leave, can you not see how pointless it is?" He ought to be able to, and must have known it for some time.

"There's nowhere for you to run, no place for you to hide. Wherever you go, Hasheem will always find a way. He will always come back to me."

***