There is a fourth POV.
Exactly who this new perspective will be …?
Thats something shes not ready to reveal just yet, although readers have their suspicions.
Credit: HarperCollins; Joseph Siroker
What Tahir is able to share is an excerpt fromReaper, which will hit shelves on June 12.
It followed a slave girl named Laia who hopes to rescue her imprisoned brother from the oppressive Martial regime.
Thats (without delving into spoilers) approximately where we left off.
The events of the previous two novels have taken their toll on the central characters.
They are far from the optimistic, or sometimes naive, young people they once were.
How does that change her from the girl she was?
The answer isnt simple.
Shes more courageous, certainly, but bravery has its consequences and sometimes, they are pretty ugly.
The exclusiveReaperexcerpt below focuses on Laia, now accompanied by her brother, Darin.
He is among a group of Scholars who have escaped imprisonment, but their troubles are not yet over.
This chapter will give readers a glimpse of what Laia will be facing on her journey, Tahir says.
As ever, its not an easy one.
But it will make her wiser and stronger, if she survives it.
Excerpt fromA Reaper at the Gates, by Sabaa Tahir
Everything about this raid feels wrong.
Darin and I both know it, even if neither of us is willing to say it.
Though my brother does not speak much these days.
The ghost wagons we track finally roll to a stop outside a Martial village.
I rise from the snow-heavy bushes where weve taken cover and nod to Darin.
He grabs my hand and squeezes.Be safe.
My breath wreathes up in white clouds, like a snake undulating to some unknowable song.
Elsewhere in the Empire, spring has scattered its blossoms.
But this close to Antium, the capital, winter still whips its chill fingers across our faces.
Midnight passes, and the few lamps that burn in the village sputter in the rising wind.
As I prowl toward the ghost wagons, my skin prickles.
I whirl, my instinct rearing in warning.
The nearby ridgeline is empty, and the Martial auxiliary soldiers on guard do not so much as twitch.
Youre just jumpy, Laia.
My brother has not forged a single scrap of Serric steel.
I have not responded to the letters from Araj, the Scholar leader who escaped Kauf Prison with us.
Still, that does not guarantee success with this caravan.
For this caravan is different.
Beyond the perimeter, familiar black-clad figures move in on the camp from the trees.
Afya and her men, responding to my signal, preparing to attack.
Their presence gives me heart.
The lock picks are blades of ice in my hand.
Six wagons sit in a half circle, with two supply carts sheltered between them.
Most of the soldiers busy themselves with the horses and campfires.
The pins within are enigmas to my freezing, clumsy hands.Faster, Laia.
The wagon is silent, as if empty.
But I know better.
Soon, the whimper of a child breaks the quiet.
It is quickly shushed.
The prisoners have learned that silence is the only way to avoid suffering.
Where the burning hells is everybody?
a voice bellows near my ear.
I nearly drop my picks.
A legionnaire strides past, and a tendril of panic unfurls down my spine.
I do not dare to breathe.What if he sees me?
Wake up the innkeeper.
The legionnaire turns to the aux hastening toward him.
Tell him to roll out a keg and prepare rooms.
Inns empty, sir.
Martials do not abandon villages, even in the dead of winter.
Not unless a plague has come through.
But Afya would have heard if that were the case.
Their reasons for leaving are not your concern, Laia.
Get the locks open.
The aux and the legionnaire stalk off toward the inn.
The moment they are out of sight, I get my picks in the lock.
But the metal groans, stiff with rime.
I have no time to think of my friend, and yet I cannot quell my worry.
His presence during the raids is the only reason we have not been caught.
Hesaidhe would be here.
What in the skies could have happened to Elias?
Is she punishing him?
I know little of the Soul Catchershe is shy, and I assumed she did not like me.
But skies know, Im no judge of hidden malice.
But we owe it to Mamie Rila and the rest of the Saif prisoners to venture to free them.
Eliass Tribal mother sacrificed her body, freedom, and Tribe so I could save Darin.
I cannot fail her.
Elias is not here.
The lock finally springs open, and I make for the next wagon.
In the trees just yards away, Afya must be cursing at the delay.
The longer I take, the more likely it is that the Martials will catch us.
When I crack the last lock, I croon a signal.Snick.
Snick.Darts hurtle through the air.
The Martials at the perimeter drop silently, left insensate by the rare southern poison coating the darts.
A half dozen Tribesmen approach the soldiers and slit their throats.
I look away, though I still hear the tear of flesh, the rattle of a final breath.
I know it must be done.
Without Serric steel, Afyas people cannot face the Martials head on, lest their blades break.
But there is an efficiency to the killing that freezes my blood.
I wonder if I will ever get used to it.
A small form appears out of the shadows, weapon glinting.
I hiss at Afya Ara-Nur so she knows where I am.
Took you long enough.
She glances around, black and red braids swinging.
Where in the ten hells is Elias?
Can he disappear now too?
That day, the Tribeswoman cursed him roundly for a fool before finding me.
Afya swears in Sadhese and moves toward the wagons.
She explains softly to the prisoners that they must follow her men, that they must make no noise.
Shouts and the high twang of a bow echo from the village, fifty yards from where I stand.
Tribal arrows and darts fly, deft counters to the Martials deadly blades.
I dash into the fray, slamming the hilt of my dagger into an auxs temple.
I neednt have bothered.
The soldiers go down quickly.
There must be more men nearbya hidden force.
Or a Mask lurking, unseen.
I jump at my name.
Darins golden skin is dark with mud to hide his presence.
A hood covers the unruly, honey-colored hair that has finally grown in.
Looking at him, no one would ever know hed survived six months in Kauf Prison.
But within his mind, my brother battles demons still.
It is those demons that have kept him from making Serric steel.
Hes here now, I tell myself sternly.Fighting.
The weapons will come when hes ready.
Mamie isnt here, he says, turning when I tap his shoulder, voice haggard with disuse.
I found her foster son, Shan.
He said the soldiers took her from her wagon when the caravan stopped for the night.
She must be in the village, I say.
Get the prisoners out of here.
The village shouldnt be empty, Darin says.
This doesnt feel right.
Ill look for Mamie.
One of you bleeding needs to find her.
Afya appears behind us.
Because Im not going to do it, and we have to get the prisoners hidden.
If something goes wrong, I say, I can use my invisibility to slip away.
Ill meet you back at the camp as soon as I can.
My brother raises his eyebrows, considering my words in his quiet way.
When he chooses to be, he is as immovable as the mountainsjust like our mother was.
I go where you go, sis.
Darins mouth curves in a brief, crooked smile.
Get out of here.
The prisoners need you.
Before he protests, I dart into the village.
The wind wails through neatly tended gardens, and I nearly trip over a broom abandoned in a lane.
The villagers left this place recently, I sense, and with haste.
I tread carefully, wary of what might lurk in the shadows.
Scholar families found in burned-out encampments in the Free Lands.
Wightstiny winged menacesdestroying wagons and tormenting livestock.
All of it, Im certain, is the foul handiwork of the creature that called itself Keenan.
I pause to peek through the front window of a darkened cottage.
In the stygian night, I can see nothing.
He is a step closer to destroying the Scholars.
When he finds the rest of the Star, hell set the jinn free.
Then what, Laia?
And there might be more than one piece left.
There might be dozens.
A flicker of light ahead.
I tear my thoughts from the Nightbringer and move toward a cottage along the north edge of the village.
Its door stands ajar.
A lamp burns within.
The door is propped wide enough that I can slip through without disturbing it.
Anyone planning an ambush would see nothing.
Once inside, it takes a moment for my vision to adjust.
When it does, I stifle a cry.
Mamie Rila sits tied to a chair, a gaunt shadow of her former self.
Her dark skin hangs loosely on her frame, and her thick, curly hair has been shaved off.
I almost go to her.
But some old instinct stops me, crying out from deep within my mind.
A boot thumps behind me.
Startled, I whirl, and a floorboard creaks beneath my feet.
