Ghassan shook his head. He looked even more resolute. “I believe you, Alizayd. That’s the problem. Like your namesake, I think you want to help the shafit so much that you’d be willing to bring the city down just to see them rise. And I can’t risk that.”
His father said nothing else. He didn’t need to. For Ghassan had always been clear when it came to his views on kingship. Daevabad came first. Before his tribe. Before his family.
Before the life of his youngest son.
Ali felt oddly light. He cleared his throat, finding it difficult to breathe. But he wasn’t going to beg for his life. Instead, he hardened his heart, looking his father in the eye. “When do I meet the karkadann?”
Ghassan didn’t drop his gaze. “You don’t. I’m stripping you of your titles and Treasury accounts and sending you to Am Gezira. The other tribes will assume you went to lead a garrison.”
Exile? Ali frowned. That can’t be it. But as his father stayed silent, Ali realized there had been a warning in the story of his birth.
Foreigners might think it just a military assignment, but the Geziri would know better. When Alizayd al Qahtani—Alizayd the Ayaanle—showed up in Am Gezira impoverished and alone, the Geziri would know he’d lost his father’s protection. That this second son, this foreign son, had been abandoned, and his blood could be spilled without retribution. Geziri assassins were the best and readily available. Anyone hoping to curry favor with his brother, with his father, with Kaveh, with any of the enemies Ali had made over the years—it didn’t even have to be someone he’d personally angered. The Qahtanis had a thousand adversaries, even among their own tribe.
Ali was being executed. It might take a few months, but he’d end up dead. Not on a battlefield, fighting bravely in his family’s name; nor as a martyr, clear-eyed in his choice to defend the shafit. No, instead he was going to be hunted down in an unfamiliar land, murdered before his first quarter century. His last days would be spent alone and in terror, and when he inevitably fell, it would be to people who would carve him up, taking whatever bloody evidence they needed for payment.
His father climbed to his feet, his slow movements betraying his age. “There is a merchant caravan headed to Am Gezira tomorrow. You’ll leave with them.”
Ali didn’t move. He couldn’t. “Why don’t you just have me killed?” The question came out in a rush, half plea. “Throw me to the karkadann, poison my food, have someone cut my throat while I sleep.” He blinked, fighting back tears. “Would that not be easier?”
Ali could see his heartbreak mirrored in his father’s face. For all the jokes about how strongly he resembled his mother’s people, his eyes were Ghassan’s. They always had been.
“I can’t,” the king admitted. “I cannot give that order. And for that weakness, my son, I apologize.” He turned to leave.
“And Nahri?” Ali called out before his father reached the door, desperate for any bit of consolation. “You know I spoke the truth of her.”
“I don’t know that at all,” Ghassan countered. “I think Muntadhir is right; your word on that girl is unreliable. And it doesn’t change what happened.”
Ali had destroyed his future to tell the truth. It had better mean something. “Why not?”
“You slew Darayavahoush before her eyes, Alizayd. It took three men to drag her kicking and screaming from his ashes. She bit one of them so badly he needed stitches.” His father shook his head. “Whatever was between the two of you is gone. If she did not consider us enemies before, she most certainly does now.”
30
Nahri
“Oh, warrior of the djinn, I beseech thee . . .” Nahri closed her swollen eyes as she sang, drumming her fingers on an overturned bowl sticky with crusty bits of rice. She’d taken it from the pile of moldering dishes at the door, remnants of the meals she’d barely touched.
She picked up a wooden shard from a smashed chair and cut deeply into her wrist. The sight of her blood was disappointing. It would work better if she had a chicken. If she had her musicians. Zars were to be precise.
The blood dripped down her arm and onto the floor before the wound closed up. “Great guardian, I call to you. Darayavahoush e-Afshin,” she whispered, her voice breaking, “come to me.”
Nothing. Her bedchamber stayed as quiet as it had been a week ago when she was locked away still covered in his ashes. But Nahri didn’t let that dissuade her. She’d just try again, varying the song slightly. She couldn’t remember the exact words she’d sung in Cairo so long ago, but once she got them right, it had to work.
She shifted on the floor, getting a whiff of unwashed hair as she pulled the filthy bowl over. She was slashing her wrist for the umpteenth time when the door to her room opened. A woman’s dark silhouette was visible against the infirmary’s blinding light.
“Nisreen,” Nahri called, relieved. “Come. If you keep the beat on the drum, then I can use this plate as a tambourine, and—”
Nisreen rushed across the room and snatched the bloody shard away. “Oh, child . . . what is this?”
“I’m calling Dara back,” Nahri answered. Wasn’t it obvious? “I did it once. There’s no reason I can’t do it again. I just have to get everything right.”
“Banu Nahri.” Nisreen knelt on the floor and pushed the bowl away. “He’s gone, child. He’s not coming back.”
Nahri pulled her hands away. “You don’t know that,” she said fiercely. “You’re no Nahid. You know noth—”
“I know slaves,” Nisreen cut in. “I helped your mother and uncle free dozens. And, child . . . they cannot be separated from their vessels. Not for a moment. It’s all that binds their soul to this world.” Nisreen took Nahri’s face between her hands. “He’s gone, my lady. But you are not. And if you’d like to keep it that way, you need to pull yourself together.” Her eyes were dark with warning. “The king wants to speak to you.”
Nahri stilled. In her mind, she saw the arrow tearing through Ali’s throat and heard Muntadhir screaming as Dara scourged him. A cold sweat broke across her skin. She couldn’t face their father. “No.” She shook her head. “I can’t. He’s going to kill me. He’s going to give me over to that karkadann beast and—”
“He’s not going to kill you.” Nisreen pulled Nahri to her feet. “Because you’re going to say exactly what he wants to hear and do exactly as he orders, understand? That is how you survive this.” She pulled Nahri toward the hammam. “But we’re going to get you cleaned up first.”
The small bathhouse was steamy and warm when they entered, the wet tiles redolent of roses. Nisreen nodded at a small wooden stool in the misty shadows. “Sit.”
Nahri obeyed. Nisreen dragged over a bowl of hot water and then helped her out of her filthy tunic. She poured the bowl over her head, and the water streamed down her arms, turning gray as it rinsed the ashes from her skin.