Chapter 7
In the early dusk, as the emperor tests my resistance to the poisons of a?i creatures, my fingers brush against Eliyas’s letter, tucked in my waist-sash.
‘Three poisons conquered in only two weeks,’ the emperor murmurs, as if to himself. If only he knew of how I trained by myself to master them. A coldness seeps into his onyx eyes. ‘But I need more.’
‘More?’ My voice scrapes through a dry, swollen tongue.
‘Do you doubt me?’
I sit on my folded legs, pressing the ivory blade to my forehead, and bow. ‘Never.’
His smile is a scar in the dwindling firelight. ‘Rise, young Zahr. Your sacrifices will be rewarded.’ His next words stun me. ‘I’ve decided . . . you will be named.’
I drop the blade. It clatters once and falls silent.
‘A name,’ I breathe.
‘There was an Eajīz whom the Adamic legends tell of, for she met the firebird, the third bird who flew above Nuh’s ark but never landed, choosing to never interfere directly in mankind’s affairs.
At the height of the Jinn Wars, she ventured to the Mist Mountains to tame the wild wisdom of the Heavenly Simorgh, returning alive at black winter to tell the tale.
For your loyalty, you will bear her name.
At dawn, you are born anew, and I will be your master. ’
The shadow behind the emperor seems to leer at me. The letter burns against my ribs. Loyalty. If I do not tell the emperor about Eliyas, will I lose my name, my clan – another home?
I stoop so low, my back curves as a babe tucked in the womb. To serve as though I’m laid under the executioner’s blade, squealing like a bald rooster stripped of its feathers beneath a butcher. My life is simply a mistake in the cosmos. It was made for sacrifice.
In the monks’ teachings, they say prayers make everything better, they make the bad go away. But as I recite prayers, I only feel sick. Those prayers are for a girl with dreams.
But I can have none of those.
As the emperor opens his mouth to announce my name, I croak out, ‘Wait.’
His brows bunch together.
My hands lift, grazing the gifted earrings.
An heirloom of this clan. I remind myself that Eliyas is the emperor’s favoured son.
The clan would not kill him. I see it in the softness of our emperor’s eyes; in the way he addresses him.
Even when Eliyas left the clan, the emperor was lenient in maintaining his son’s courtly status.
Yes. I must do this. Slowly, I retrieve the letter from my waist-sash.
I tell him about Eliyas’s betrayal.
I cannot wear the emperor’s new name as a liar.
When I am done, the emperor’s silence is long, heavy, until I tremble beneath its weight.
‘Khamilla Nūr-e-S?ltana,’ he rasps before reaching out and taking the tremoring letter. ‘That is the name of the warrior which belongs to you. I do not know who to trust. But you . . . you have proven that you are an emperor’s sword.’
My gaze flits up; his voice is grief-stricken before he blinks hard. He stands, crumpling the letter. As he takes a step forward, a breathless Yun barrels into the apothecary.
My brother grasps my shoulder before yanking his hand back. ‘You’re burning in fever!’
‘Emperor,’ Hyat Uncle says from behind him. ‘A page from the winter palace has arrived.’
With their gazes as bleak as midwinter, I ask, ‘What is it?’
Now Hyat’s words tumble over one another.
‘Yalon is lost. Sajamistan took advantage of the dissenting warlords and invaded. Yalon’s prefect allied to Sajamistan, allowing their army to reconquer over half of the winter capital.
And then the Arsduq prefecture was next.
Our informants informed me that last eve, Sajamistani garrisons broke in and started a melee against Arsduq, wounding your daughter.
I do not know if Governess Bavsag is alive. ’
I’m reeling from Hyat’s words, barely able to take in the disarray of his robes, the wild sheen in his eyes.
‘How?’ I sputter. ‘The winter capital is gone?’
‘It’s that bastard,’ Yun says, seething.
‘I advised against the prisoner exchange. It was part of Warlord Akashun’s strategy.
He used Sajamistan’s delegation to covertly negotiate and cut a deal, encouraging them to invade Yalon, while our warlords turned against the Zahrs, undermining your rule, Dada. ’
The emperor brushes his hand against my hair, strangely tender. But his hard eyes are on his son. ‘You leave tomorrow, to help your sister in the Arsduq campaign. Do not fail me.’
Yun bows his head. ‘Of course.’
The emperor turns to me. ‘As for the traitor in our midst . . .’
A sudden shout from the hall rends the air and a guard rushes into the chamber. She bows. ‘There’s been a breach at the walls – a riot—’
The emperor rises swiftly. Hyat and Yun follow at his heels. My eyes drop to the letter left discarded on the floor.
I scoop up the parchment and hurry out into the corridor, a haze of smoke shrouding the air, making me cough.
In the chaos of the corridors, servants spill to the gates leading outside, escorting notables to the safety of the inner palaces. In the sehan, the palace guards run in the opposite direction toward thick smoke wafting from the outer walls, barking orders, scimitars flashing in their hands.
In their midst, a familiar monk stands before the entryway of the women’s quarters, pulling elders inside.
‘Eliyas!’ I yell out, running toward him.
‘Little bird.’ Eliyas grabs my arm when I reach him. ‘There was an attack at the walls. You must flee into the inner palace as a precaution—’
I gulp hard and pull him into the trees, eucalyptus swaying against the stone walls in the dusk, their ominous shadows growing at my feet. ‘Older Brother. Do not act as if you did not know about this attack.’ I unfold my hand, revealing the letter from the temple.
Eliyas stares at it, his expression hard.
‘Well?’ I demand.
‘I suspected you knew for a long time,’ he simply says. ‘I love my family, and I love our people beyond this city-state. It is from this love that I know we do not deserve to rule them.’
My fingers curl in and I struggle to speak through the sheet of smoke now clouding the air and my shaking voice.
‘It’s because of your betrayal, that you’ve encouraged – no, helped – the warlords to turn against Zahr rule!
Look around you; is this attack what you wished for?
What of Bavsag? Your own sister wounded – possibly killed – in Arsduq! ’
‘Bavsag,’ his voice turns into venom, ‘is as cruel as our dada. Besides, it’s just as well – violence has already occurred outside these walls.
Good that it has finally caught up to us.
If a man does not value his own daughter, how can he value his subjects?
The emperor has always failed in keeping the warlords in check.
He grants his clan authority above all else, giving kinsmen priority for governorship in prefectures instead of the local tribes, while antagonising our borderlands, leading to raids.
The famine racking our lands is on him.’ Eliyas explains his treason calmly, even with the shouting around us, and that angers me.
‘Warlord Akashun is no better!’
‘Akashun is the better of two poisons. The other warlords fear him. He believes in unifying Azadniabad outside tribalism. And,’ Eliyas’s eyes darken, ‘he understands Sajamistan. He’s less stubborn, and open to new alliances, to exchange scholarship.
He’s curious about Eajīzi and the jinn-folk of the Unseen world, and for that he values the ancient ways’.
I stumble backwards at that revelation. ‘Is that why you’ve trained me?
Have I always been a study to you? You were intrigued because of my affinity; you betrayed our entire clan for .
. . for what? The promise of more knowledge, to quench your thirst?
Even if it means allying with our enemies across the border and inside our own court? ’
His gaze narrows. ‘Do you have such a low opinion of me? I did this out of belief. Our clan has lost its morals. We were once a clan that defended these lands fearlessly; we patroned the monasteries in this capital and valued the local tribes and monks. Now . . . look around you at the emperor’s men desperate to protect the people inside these palace walls instead of the people outside of them.
’ And reluctantly, I follow his gaze peering into the smoke.
‘The way the emperor pins our own clansmen against each other. I will not apologise for my actions, but I will always regret that I never took you into my confidence sooner. That I could never save you from him.’
‘I don’t need saving,’ I say, but weakly. ‘I will not lose another clan nor home. I am a Zahr-zad. I only wished for my Older Brother at my side. I wonder, did you see me as a sister, or a well of information for Akashun?’
That makes him snap. He clenches my arms. ‘Do you dare? What more must I show you? I’ve raised you in my care!’
I shiver, whether with rage or fear, I cannot tell. ‘You spied, for his sake.’
His lips pull down. ‘I was shielding you, from our enemies, from the way Dada uses and hurts you, from our clan. If not me, someone else would have trained you in poisons – trained you into the grave. You cannot understand now. But I ask you to wait. To put your trust in your Older Brother. You deserve a clan where you could be free to practise your affinity. To not hide away your birth out of fear. If I could, I would tear you away from empires and clans. I would take you far, far away. I would return you to the lands of your uma’s clan if I could. ’
‘They are dead. And the ones who slew them are dead too, by my hands.’ I laugh quietly, the threat not lost on him.
Eliyas shifts forward, shoulders squared. Out of instinct, I move too. My foot slides into a low horse-stance, my finger hooking through my ivory blade. But Eliyas simply loops his arm around my neck, burying my face in his chest.