4. Chapter 4
four
*AZADEH*
I let my fingers glide over the sandy-colored tiles on the wall of the corridor. Walking the halls of my home one last time, I want to take it all in. My father’s palace is wide and open, there aren’t many walls aside from the ones to our private chambers. Lots of smaller gardens and little oases are gracing the patios, the lush green a stark contrast to the desert surrounding us. The palace sparkles golden under the sun.
I step out onto the balcony of my room and let my gaze glide over the kingdom. There are smaller houses plastered all around the main city, a few bigger villas and we have a new school and infirmary. I don’t mingle much with the people outside the palace, as I was never allowed to go out on my own, but I love watching them. The Everlasting Desert only started flourishing recently. The heat and dry weather prevented us from cultivating our fields, but ever since my oldest brother invested into building that new watering system, things have turned for the better.
The weather is warm and dry as usual. In twenty-four hours, I won’t be allowed to call this my home anymore. The Kingdom of Eternal Ice will be my new home. A shiver goes down my spine, at the thought of what’s going to await me there. Father always said that they are barbarians, cruel and violent. He said it’s typical for werewolves to take whatever they want.
My heart sinks whenever I think of it. He wants me to become the wife of one of these monsters, as he calls them.
He hates me so much for just existing, that he sold me off to a place covered in ice with violent men leading it.
“Princess Azadeh?”
I turn my head, my gaze landing on General Shayan. “Is it time already, General?”
He nods. His normally hard and stoic face softens now, and he smiles gently. “Come, my princess.” He offers me my dark brown robe and I slip into it. It’s hopefully going to keep me a little warm when we reach the Kingdom of Eternal Ice. Beneath it, I’m just wearing a white, flowy tunic and my sandals. My whole wardrobe is made for life here in the Everlasting Desert, I will need to get new things once I’m in the icy lands. Another shiver goes down my spine, as I wonder how I will cope in the cold weather and with the rough men there.
Having a routine helps me calm
I tilt my head, looking at him nervously. “Are you going to come with me, Shayan?” I ask, dropping the formalities.
He nods. “I’d never let you be alone in a country you don’t know, with people you don’t know,” he says simply.
I feel a bit lighter at his words. Shayan is not only my bodyguard, but he is also the man my father made my guardian. He is in his thirties, composed, stoic and quite strict, but kind inside and he is closer to me than any other family member aside from my oldest brother. Shayan is the closest to a real father figure I have ever had.
At least my father showed me a little pity, allowing me to take my friend and mentor with me, although I believe it was rather on Shayan’s insistence than on my father’s.
Shayan leads me toward our caravan, consisting of a few carriages and warriors accompanying us on their horses. I look back up at the palace with its sandy colored walls and colorful windows, curtains in brimming colors are blowing in the wind. As I expected there is no one there to bid me goodbye, but on the top floor, I can see my father’s figure leaning against the balustrade of his balcony. I raise my hand and wave at him, but he doesn’t react.
None of my siblings are there, which doesn’t surprise me anymore. The only one I’m close to is my oldest brother Kiyan, but he is out on a mission. A bitter part of me knows that Father chose this day to send me away, because he knew that Kiyan would have intervened.
Sighing, I get into my carriage where, to my surprise, my maid and best friend is waiting for me. “Simin?” I blurt out.
“Oh, my princess,” she beams at me. “General Shayan told me not to tell you I was coming too. He said it’s a surprise.”
“Simin!” I exclaim again, wrapping my arms around her.
“It’s going to be okay, Azadeh,” she says softly. “I’ll be there and if one of those wolves tries something weird, they will have my foot in their face!”
Next to our window I can hear a loud snort, coming from Shayan.
“I mean it, General Shayan,” Simin pouts.
“I know,” Shayan says. He knocks quickly, making me pull the curtain aside. “Princess,” he tells me in a low voice, making sure no one else hears him. “I would never hand you over to a group of people who would abuse and enslave you. If this were your fate, I would instantly grab you and run away with you.”
“And with me,” Simin adds.
“Of course,” he sighs. “If I didn’t take you along too, you would just follow us anyway.” He looks at me. “Try to have faith in me.”
I nod at him. “I will try to.” My mind still feels heavy though, as I’m not sure what kind of fate awaits, but at least I have my only two friends with me. It’s more than other people have.
“We are setting off now, Princess,” he tells me. “I’ll ride with the warriors to make sure you arrive safely.”
I try to take a more relaxed stance. “Thank you.”
The caravan sets off, and Simin instantly starts to chat with me. “I’m so curious,” she beams. “I’ve never seen werewolves or any other shifters.”
“Me neither,” I admit. “Our kingdom only recently opened the doors to other lands and realms. It takes a while for people to mingle with each other.”
“I bet there will be lots of hot men,” Simin beams. “Werewolves are supposed to be very attractive and strong.”
My face instantly falls.
“What’s wrong?” she blinks.
“It’s just that… Father wants me to marry into the Kingdom of Eternal Ice,” I tell her. “He told me, it’s for me to finally show my worth.”
“He doesn’t have any power over you there,” Simin protests.
“He gifted me to the king,” I point out. “I’m being traded to underline their peace treaty.”
“But you don’t know what King Gillean truly wants from you. I’ve never heard of the Kingdom of Eternal Ice holding slaves,” she says. “You are powerful and literate, maybe he wants you to share your gift and intelligence with them.”
“Most people are afraid of me though,” I point out.
Simin is one of the very few here not scared of me, and it means more than anything else to have someone so kind and fun as my friend, someone who genuinely cares for me. The people in my country aren’t bad, they don’t treat me badly, but no one talks to me or even dares to look at me. They say I was born with the gift, whatever that means. I’ve read about it, but I don’t quite understand it myself. Shayan explained to me that it’s not hatred that pulls them away, it’s fear, ignorance and a lack of education.
“I’m just saying that this could also be a chance for you to finally be free from your family.”
I look at her skeptically. “Do you truly think that? All I’ve heard is that the werewolves are barbarians.”
“I don’t know about that,” Simin says quietly. “All I know is that it wasn’t the wolves that hurt me, it was our fellow humans.”
I look at her for a long while, pondering about what she just said. “You are right,” I concede. “Maybe I should wait and see before judging them.” I pause. “But it doesn’t hurt being cautious.”
To occupy our minds Simin offers to do my hair, which proves to be a challenge while sitting in the moving carriage. I smile slightly when she falls off her seat over and over again, and she just flashes me a grin. She manages to put my hair into two beautiful thick double braids that start at the top of my head and go to my neck, looking like a natural crown, the rest of my hair falling down in a long ponytail. “Your hair is amazing, Azadeh,” Simin proclaims. “I’m so envious. It’s thick, long and healthy. Mine is just flat, but yours… those slight curls make it look so full.”
“It’s really thick though,” I sigh. “It's a pain to wash and dry it.” I smile at her. “We are never content with what we have, right? And for the record I find your silky hair beautiful.”
She laughs. “In the Kingdom of Eternal Ice, I will get new inspirations, I promise. I will turn the both of us into ice princesses.”
“Are you hoping to find yourself a husband?” I ask curiously.
“You are there to stay,” Simin says, like it’s actually happy news. “So am I.”
We both fall into comfortable silence, while I shift the curtain aside a sliver to look outside. It’s a long ride, and for the first hours everything looks familiar; vast deserts, oases, here and there little towns; everything is part of my father’s kingdom. Then the terrain gets more and more difficult to pass, the road becomes rocky and we are approaching some mountains.
“Let’s take a break and rest here for the night,” Shayan says.
I wait for the carriage to halt before making my way out of it. The warriors work fast to put up a tent for me. They don’t talk much though, most of them don’t even dare to look at me. I feel the usual ache when I see them avoiding me.
“Ignorance,” Shayan tells me quietly. “They don’t mean anything bad.”
I look at him, before allowing my gaze to return to the warriors working. “Does it matter?” I ask him.
He tilts his head. “I guess it doesn’t,” he admits.
I open my hands to look at my palm. “I don’t understand it, Shayan. I can’t do magic. It’s just the oracle that claims I was born with the gift.”
Aside from me only one other of my sisters was said to be born with the gift. She is a cute, shy girl who won the heart of an elderly minister of my father, and married him. It massively improved her social standing. And she never actually did anything to scare our people off, unlike me.
With me it’s different. They treat me like I have the plague, like even talking to me would curse them.
“It’s the incident when you were a child,” Shayan explains. “When a sandstorm was approaching, and you saved these little children.” He pauses. “You probably don’t remember it well, because you were a little child yourself. But the storm approached, passed, and amidst it were you, holding these three kids and protecting them, with this confident strong expression in your eyes.”
“To me this makes you a hero,” Simin claims as she approaches us, bringing some dry fruits and nuts. “The warriors are going on a hunt soon,” she tells Shayan, who looks at the fruits with a frown. Simin turns her attention back to me. “You were just a child and you protected them, sounds pretty heroic to me.”
“That’s because it was.” Shayan’s serious face lights up with a smile. “It made me so proud to be your guardian.”
“Why do they hate me, then?” I shrug.
“They don’t, they fear you,” Shayan explains. “They think you could unleash the weather on them anytime when they do wrong. That day you had such a strong glint in your eyes, a grim expression. You were a child, yet you weren’t scared at all. It just proved their point.”
“Does Father think the same?” I want to know.
Shayan’s face falls. “I don’t know what King Naseem truly thinks or believes in.”
“I always thought you were friends,” I say.
“That was long ago,” he argues. Shayan is younger than my father, and I’ve heard he rose through the ranks fast when he was in his early twenties, due to his skills and his diligence. Then during one battle Shayan lost one of his eyes and his left hand. They tried to replace his hand with a prosthetic, at least Father made sure he got the best doctors to work on it. Shayan never wanted it to look like a real hand, so they went for a fantastic design out of a dark-gray shiny material.
He recovered most of his mobility, but his active days in battle were over.
“Was it because he degraded you to look after me,” I ask quietly. “Is this the reason your friendship broke?”
Shayan looks at me sadly. “Becoming your protector and guardian was a gift, my princess. I wasn’t graced with a family of my own, so you and Simin are the closest I have to children.”
Simin giggles. “I got adopted by you, too?”
I put my arm around her. “We are a package deal, aren’t we?”
“Tell that to the man you will choose as your husband. I bet he will be overjoyed,” Simin says dryly, and for the first time in a long while I have to laugh. Even Shayan smiles at her words.