Chapter 23
Sonya was taken to a royal carriage, the team of guards following behind her. She felt as if she was moving underwater, going deeper and deeper, further away from the light. She couldn’t breathe.
Her lips still tingled from kissing Azam not moments before, and she touched a hand to her mouth, feeling dizzy. She stumbled and a guard shot forward to catch her, but she steadied herself.
You’re stronger than you give yourself credit for, Winnie had said, and Sonya desperately tried to remember that now, even as she felt like crumbling.
She arrived at her carriage, a large and ugly thing, painted white with ornate gold finishings. The windows were covered with silk curtains. The coachman opened the door, helping her up.
The carriage wasn’t empty.
Her father’s chief advisor, Celeste, was already seated inside. She was a strict older woman with gray hair pulled back in a tight twist and sharp blue eyes behind glasses. She was wearing her usual uniform of a dull gray dress, the chain of a half-hunter watch hanging out of a pocket.
Sonya groaned, taking her seat across from her. Celeste was the last person she wanted to see.
‘Thank goodness you’re alright,’ Celeste said, looking at Sonya from behind her narrow glasses.
She almost sounded concerned, and Sonya perked up, but then Celeste’s tone took on her usual scolding quality.
‘You have no idea how worried the king and princes have been. And look at the state of you! What on earth has happened to your hair? And what are you wearing?’
Sonya ignored her commentary, but she touched a self-conscious hand to her hair, frowning. ‘H-how did you find me?’ she asked. She was finding it difficult to speak, to think, to do anything.
She sat limp in her seat as the carriage moved off.
She needed to hear Azam’s betrayal confirmed.
Celeste let out a long-suffering sigh. ‘That boy—the stitch-witch. He works for your tailor, didn’t you know?’
Sonya had known he worked for a tailor in Castletown. Hadn’t Enzo told her the tailor Azam worked for was employed by the crown?
I’m so stupid.
‘But how …?’ She was grasping at any hope that there had been a misunderstanding.
Celeste looked at her the way she always did: as if Sonya was a silly child. ‘You ran away in a maid’s uniform,’ Celeste explained slowly. ‘Azam makes the uniforms your maids wear. Stitch-witches are able to track garments made of their own magic.’
Sonya felt sick. Her lower lip trembled, and she turned away from Celeste, hiding half her face with her hair so the woman wouldn’t see Sonya break.
The night Azam had found her—that night he had saved her—it wasn’t a chance encounter. He’d been tracking Elspeth’s uniform.
It was no coincidence. No stroke of fate.
No wonder he never asked her questions—he hadn’t needed to. He’d known who she was the entire time.
The more Sonya thought about it, the more it made sense. Why he was always so hush-hush about his job, why he was suddenly able to take all that time off. He must have said he was out looking for her, which bought him some time to open up his mother’s shop.
It had all been a ruse. A deception. All this time, she had felt guilty for deceiving him, and she hadn’t known that he was the true deceiver.
The soldiers had known exactly where to find them because Azam had informed them.
But why?
Her stomach roiled. She couldn’t think of it any further or she would throw up everything she had eaten that day.
She looked out the window, where the sun had set, the sky turning to darkness.
Her heart broke again as the carriage carried her far away from Oakdale. She thought of Ream and her girls at the inn waiting by the door, anticipating Sonya’s return with stories of how the wedding had gone.
And Sonya would not come.
She thought then of Winnie and Enzo, then Caden and Butterscotch, then Dania and Kiri. With each name more and more tears welled in her eyes until she was taking in shuddering breaths as she cried, holding a hand to her chest as if she could settle the pain, but it was a bone-deep ache.
Even practical and cold-hearted Celeste looked affected; she silently handed Sonya a handkerchief, giving her a glance of pity. The handkerchief only reminded Sonya of Azam, wiping away her tears at the wedding, and she cried harder.
How would they explain it to Dania? Everyone else might understand, but Dania wouldn’t. She was so little! She would feel abandoned, she would be so confused, and the thought cleaved Sonya’s heart in two.
Eventually, she cried herself to sleep, in the hopes that this was all a bad dream. In the morning, she would wake, and Azam would be there, and they would have tea together, teasing each other and laughing and sitting in comfortable silence.
When Sonya eventually woke, early the next morning and still in the jolting carriage, she was far away from Azam, from the new life she had come to love. She was at the castle.
As if moving through treacle, Sonya followed Celeste as the advisor took her straight to her rooms. Everything felt foreign: these old halls, the grand stairs, the paintings on the walls and the ornate molding.
Even when she entered her room through massive wooden doors that were hand-carved with intricate designs, Sonya felt as if she had entered a different world.
But this was her old room, and there, her old bed.
Everything was in perfect, pristine condition, not a speck of dust to be found.
Despite being gone for months, the room was unchanged, as if her absence had made no difference.
She thought of her room at the Mirzas’ cottage, her things, everything so carefully collected and gifted and selected. The space she had made her own.
In her room at the castle, a team of maids was already standing by the washroom, waiting for her. Sonya searched for Elspeth, but did not find her. She must have been on the later shift today.
‘Get the princess ready for breakfast with the king and princes,’ Celeste ordered the maids. Her voice echoed in the big room, and Sonya jolted. This was all so strange. She felt as if she had stumbled into a very bad dream, and she did not know how to wake up.
But she had to remind herself: this was reality. Those weeks with Azam were the dream, and now it was time to return to her real life.
Sonya was ushered into the washroom, where they stripped her clothes, helping her into a hot bath.
Rose petals swam in the water, and she thought of the rose Azam had given her in the garden.
She had left it behind. She closed her eyes and she could almost picture it now: on the ground, trampled on.
Her heart squeezed painfully. She was so tired. Everything hurt. She barely paid attention to anything until she heard one maid ask Celeste, ‘What do we do with the clothes, ma’am?’
‘Destroy them,’ Celeste replied.
‘No!’ Sonya cried, but it was too late. The maid was already gone.
‘Hush now,’ Celeste said. ‘We all have our tasks to tend to. Let your maids do their work.’
They scrubbed her until her skin was red and, once she was clean, they dried and dressed her, maids working with the different pieces and laces. The corset was tighter than she remembered.
‘Tighter,’ Celeste instructed.
‘That’s as far as it’ll go, ma’am,’ the maid replied.
‘You’ve gained quite a bit of weight,’ Celeste said. ‘We’ll have to adjust the dresses.’
After she was dressed, they sat her down and fussed over her hair.
‘It’s too short,’ Celeste tsked. ‘Do what you can. Tie it back.’
They took small sections and braided it, twisting other sections back. By the end, Sonya felt as though she had fifty pins in her hair, but all of it was swept back, away from her face. The clothes were so stiff and uncomfortable.
Had it always been like this? Had she never noticed? Or did a cage feel smaller only after a bird had been free?
Finally, she was ready. Celeste took her to the dining room for breakfast. The doors opened, and her stomach twisted. Her father and brothers were already there.
The moment she entered, the room fell silent.
‘Sonya!’ Irfan cried. He rushed over to hug her, and her other brothers crowded around her.
‘Do you have any idea the absolute chaos the castle has been in since you left?’ Shahmir, the eldest, scolded. ‘Why would you do such a thing?’
Mustafa, the youngest, was quieter than usual. He seemed upset with her, too.
‘My sons,’ her father said, his loud voice booming. Sonya’s brothers parted, making way for her father. She looked up at his face, and her eyes pricked with tears to see him again. She had missed him. She had missed them all.
‘Beta jaani,’ the king said, touching her cheek. His mustache moved as he smiled, his eyes glassy. ‘We are so happy you are home.’ He pulled her into a hug, and she held on to him, inhaling the familiar scent of bergamot.
He led her to her seat, the one beside Mustafa, and they all sat. Breakfast was brought out, a grand affair of spiced chickpeas, minced meat, a semolina sweet dish, and fried flatbread. Her favorite. A maid poured chai for her, and she took a long sip of the strong tea.
This, at least, was familiar, though she was not used to her brothers being cross with her. Guilt needled through her, until her father spoke.
‘You have returned at the perfect timing, dearest,’ he said. ‘The suitors arrive tomorrow. Of course, we delayed their arrival twice, but no matter. The tourney will begin tomorrow night, and very soon you will have found your match!’
A sob rose in her throat. She had thought she’d already found her match, but she had been betrayed. Perhaps it was best to go along with her father’s plan, after all. Anything had to be better than the heartache she felt.
‘Yes, Baba,’ she said, playing with her breakfast.
‘You caused a great deal of trouble,’ Shahmir said, still fussing.
‘Enough, Shahmir,’ the king said, expression stern. ‘There is no need to dwell on that, now. Sonya is safely returned. Things will commence as originally planned.’