We didn’t have a prayer house in camp, but we’d always made do. The Holy Father had prepared the ceremony in a clear space at the edge of the sand where the ground sloped up just enough to give a good view of the whole camp below in the last of the light. The wedding began at dusk, the sun setting over the canyon. Like they always did. A time of change in the day for a moment of change in two lives.
Imin wasn’t wearing a repurposed sheema. It was a true wedding covering, made of fine cloth stitched with bright thread, and when the sun hit it, I could just see the outline of the face she had chosen through the thin yellow muslin. It wasn’t one I’d seen on her before. Imin was our best spy, staying alive by looking unremarkable. But the face she’d chosen today was stunning, and she was beaming like I’d never seen Imin smile.
Hala caught my gaze as the two of them knelt in the sand side by side. It’d been an unspoken pact between us Demdji to keep one eye on Imin after that night Navid declared his love for her. None of us had ever seen Imin’s walls drop for anyone in camp before Navid.
Imin and Hala might share a Djinni father, but by the sound of things they couldn’t have had more different mothers. Rumour had it Hala had torn her mother’s mind apart, driving her crazy on purpose because she hated the woman so much. The Rebellion had found Imin in a prison waiting for execution at the hands of the Gallan. Imin had spent sixteen years hidden in the house of grandparents who shielded their daughter’s Demdji child. Alone and lonely, but safe. Until the day Imin’s grandmother collapsed from the heat on their doorstep. Imin was otherwise alone in the house. The sixteen-year-old waited, hoping a neighbour would notice. But finally, desperate, Imin ran out to help wearing the same slender girl’s form she’d donned to fight the heat that morning. The body was too weak to drag a grown woman, though. Imin shifted into a man’s shape out in the open.
Word reached the Gallan. They killed Imin’s whole family on the same doorstep, as they tried to block the soldiers’ path.
Until Navid, Imin had treated anyone who wasn’t a Demdji with distrust. Even me, on account of how I’d thought I was human for sixteen years.
It would take the slightest misstep from Navid to send Imin back behind walls. But even Hala hadn’t been able to find anything wrong with him, and she’d been trying real hard. Anyone could see the way Navid looked at Imin. And it didn’t change no matter what body our shape-shifter wore, woman or man, Mirajin or foreign.
The Holy Father stood between Navid and Imin as they faced us, sitting in the sand, legs crossed. He recited the usual blessings for a wedding as he filled two large clay bowls with fire. He handed one to Imin and one to Navid. He spoke of how humanity was made by the First Beings out of water and earth, carved by wind, and lit with a spark of Djinni fire. He reminded us that when Princess Hawa and Attallah became the first mortals ever to wed, their fires were twinned and burned so much brighter for it. All these centuries later we still uttered the same words they had.
As he spoke we came up, one by one, the women of the camp to Imin, the men to Navid. Each of us dropped something of ours into their fire to bless the union. In Dustwalk I’d always given an empty bullet casing or a lock of hair. I didn’t have anything else to give.
For the first time in my life I had more, and I’d had to think about what I ought to give, as Shazad and I got ready. For just a second my fingers had drifted over the red sheema. The one Jin had given me in the burned-out mountain mining town of Sazi. As I closed my eyes for Shazad to press dark kohl into my lids, I could picture myself tossing it into the fire, watching the red cloth catch. It would go up in seconds. I was angry but I didn’t hate him. I’d fastened it around my waist like a sash instead, the way I always did with Shazad’s clothes.
I stood behind Hala, who held her hand above the fire, pricking each of the remaining three fingers on her left hand with a needle in quick succession. Blood was the traditional offering from family members, even if the father Imin and Hala shared didn’t bleed. Bright red dots welled at the tips of her golden fingers, then sizzled noisily as the blood hit the fire. As Hala moved out of the way I held up my gift above the fire and a handful of desert sand slipped out between my fingers, scattering into the flames. I caught the slightest hint of a smile from Imin as I stepped aside, leaving room for Shazad to drop a small comb of hers into the fire. Next to her, Ahmed dropped a Xichian coin into Navid’s bowl. He wore a clean black kurta edged with red that made him look more like he belonged in a palace than in a rebellion. He and Shazad made a well-matched pair, standing side by side in front of the twinned wedding fires.
Behind Ahmed, the twins, Izz and Maz, were holding a blue feather, alternately snatching it out of each other’s hands and shoving each other in a silent war over which one would get to drop it into the fire. The warning look Shazad gave them as she turned around was loud enough to get them both to behave. When they spotted me standing on Imin’s side of the fire they waved frantically. I hadn’t seen the twins since I’d been injured. They must’ve gotten back while we were in Saramotai.
When the whole camp was done, finally Imin and Navid turned to face each other to speak their vows.
‘I give myself to you.’ Imin carefully tipped her fire into the third bowl that the Holy Father held between them, the ashes of our gifts mingling with bright coal embers and sending up sparks as they spilled from one bowl to another. ‘All that I am I give to you, and all that I have is yours. My life is yours to share. Until the day we die.’
Navid repeated the same as he tilted the contents of his bowl in after hers until a single fire, larger and brighter than the ones they had held alone, burned between them. The Holy Father waved his tattooed hands over it in blessing.
There was a moment of silence as the sun disappeared entirely behind the canyon wall, casting the camp into a gloom broken only by the fire. And then Navid sprang to his feet, unabashedly picking Imin up, arms around her waist, before pulling her into a kiss. The whole of the camp cheered. The ceremony was over. It was time for the celebrations to begin.
‘Amani!’ I didn’t have a chance to turn around to see who’d called my name. A pair of bright blue arms grabbed me around the waist, spinning me around gleefully. I laughed, shoving Izz off as my feet found the ground again, staggering. Maz was wearing clothes, but Izz had already stripped down to nothing but his trousers. The twins had a real aversion to clothes. Their animal shapes didn’t need them and it seemed to confuse them that their human shapes did.
Izz gestured at the bare blue skin of his chest and my khalat. ‘We match.’ He beamed stupidly at me.
‘And luckily only one of us had to take off our shirt. I see you both survived Amonpour.’ The Albish had made an alliance with our western neighbours of Amonpour after losing Miraji to the Gallan twnety years ago. According to Shazad it had been nothing more than some men’s signatures on paper. Until the Albish suddenly got the news of the Gallan being turned out of the desert. And then suddenly they were using that piece of paper to convince Amonpour to let them camp on their borders, waiting for an opportune moment to try to claim Miraji as a prize again. They were getting a little too close to us for comfort so the twins had been sent to spy on the Albish troops camped along our western border. In case they got itchy feet and decided to march through our half of the desert. The last thing we needed was a fight on two fronts.
‘Elephants!’ Izz flung up his arms so excitedly I staggered back, nearly stumbling into the fire at the strange, foreign word. ‘Amonpour has elephants. Did you know about elephants?’
‘Were you holding out on us?’ Maz slung an arm around his brother’s bare shoulders, pointing at me accusingly. It was easy to forget one of them was blue and the other one just had blue hair when they were like this, moving and talking like one person. Maz’s dark-skinned arm almost seemed like an extension of his brother’s body.
Izz winked. ‘Fess up, Demdji.’
I rolled my eyes at them. ‘If I did I probably would have kept it from yo
u anyway, judging by the slightly crazy look in your eyes.’
‘Do you want to see one?’ Maz was already kicking off his shoes.
‘We might need more space.’ Izz started to gesture around himself, as if trying to get people out of the way.
There was no way this could end well. ‘Is this going to be like the time you learned what a rhinoceros was all over again?’
The twins froze, swapping a sheepish expression. ‘I mean—’
‘Elephants are—’
‘Slightly bigger, so—’
‘Then how about you show me sometime when there aren’t quite so many people, who aren’t quite so full of liquor, around?’ I suggested.
The twins traded a look as they seemed to silently debate the wisdom of that versus how badly they wanted to show me their new trick. Finally they nodded and contented themselves with giving me a very detailed explanation of what elephants looked like, and telling me nothing else about how Amonpour had gone. Well, I supposed we weren’t invaded yet.
Torches were lit. Music had started and with it, dancing and eating and drinking. I was grateful to know that for a few hours we wouldn’t be fighting a war. It was on nights like this in the rebel camp that I believed more than anything in what we could do. Nights when everyone stopped fighting long enough to live like we were promising the rest of Miraji it could.
*
It was a few hours after dark when I spotted him through the crowd.
I’d had enough to drink that I didn’t trust my eyes at first. He was a flash of an impression as I spun. Head tilted back, laughing, at ease, like I’d seen him a thousand times. I lost my step, staggering too close to the fire. Someone grabbed me, pulling me back before I could set Shazad’s clothes aflame. I tore myself out of the dancing and looked back, searching for him through the hazy mess of faces in the dark. But he was gone, as quick as if I’d imagined him. No, there, the crowd split.
Jin.
He was back.
He was standing on the other side of the fire, still wearing his travelling clothes, dust clinging to his dark hair. He looked like he hadn’t shaved lately, either. I had a sudden flash of the last time he’d kissed me when he’d been a few days without a razor. My heart stumbled towards him, but I caught it, fighting to right it.
I turned away quickly, before he could spot me. I wasn’t in any kind of state to face him now. My head was fuzzy with alcohol and exhaustion. I looked for Shazad. She was a few paces away, deep in conversation with Ahmed, hands moving as quick as the dance of insects around a fire as she argued something passionately. And a little tipsily. Shazad wasn’t much for unnecessary motions when she was sober. But when she caught my eye she read me like an open book all the same. I gave a small nod behind myself. Her gaze steadied. Like it did when she was trying to track down an enemy in a fight. I saw the shock register on her face the moment she spied him. Good. That meant it was really him, not some conjuring by Hala designed to torture me.
I had hoped that by the time I saw him again I’d be ready to face him head on. But now I felt split open. Like if I faced him it was all going to come spilling out in words. I wiped away the sweat on my neck. My hand came away red.
For one stupid moment, I thought seeing Jin really had split me open. No – the wound across my collarbone had reopened. The rushed patch-up job in Saramotai hadn’t fared all that well against the dancing and drinking. Shazad had called it a scratch, but right now it looked a lot like an escape to me.
Jin had run away. Fine. I could do the same.
*
The warmth and noise of the camp faded behind me as I picked my way toward the Holy Father’s tent, set far to one side of the camp. It had changed some since it’d been Bahi’s domain, the place I’d first woken up in camp, under a canopy of cloth stars. But that didn’t make it any easier when I had to step inside. Half a year since Bahi had died at my brother’s hands and I still thought I could smell burning flesh sometimes when I got too close to where he’d worked. It was no wonder Shazad steered clear. I’d known him a handful of weeks. She’d known him half her life. The new Holy Father had kept his patchwork of stars. It was the first thing I saw as I pushed my way into the tent.
A woman’s head darted up from one of the beds. I hadn’t been expecting anyone to be here. Leastways not anyone awake. In the bed nearest to the entrance Sayyida was sleeping still as the dead. Across from her was a young rebel whose name escaped me, bandaged from elbow to wrist, where there used to be a hand. He’d been dosed with something that would keep him dreaming he still had ten fingers, by the look of things. And in the third bed … I’d almost forgotten about the woman we’d brought unconscious from Saramotai. The one who’d called me by my mother’s name.
Seemed she wasn’t unconscious any more.
‘I – sorry.’ I hovered, holding one tent flap back, looking for an excuse. Only I didn’t need one. I belonged here. More than she did. So why was I shuffling my feet like I was a kid back in Dustwalk again? ‘I didn’t mean to wake you. I’m just bleeding.’ I held up my hand. Like I needed to prove it to this stranger.
‘The Holy Father isn’t here.’ The woman pushed herself to her elbows. Her eyes darted around frantically in the dim lamplight, like she was looking for some escape of her own.
‘He’s still at the celebrations.’ I finally stepped over the threshold and let the tent flap fall shut. I tried not to look at Sayyida as I pressed forward. ‘I just came for supplies.’
I’d been stuck in this tent for a good long while after I woke up from nearly dying. I could’ve drawn every corner of it from memory. Down to the iron-and-wood chest emblazoned with holy words, where the Holy Father kept his supplies.
‘It’s locked,’ the woman said as I dropped down next to the chest.
‘I know.’ I reached up for the small blue glass oil lamp that the Holy Father always kept burning when there was someone in the sick tent overnight. Nobody ought to be left to suffer and die in the dark. I felt around the base until my fingers closed around the tiny iron key that he kept lodged there. The trunk lock gave way with a satisfying click.
Inside were rows and rows of bottles and needles and powders and tiny knives all neatly lined up. It was so unlike Bahi’s mess of tools and supplies scattered out across the ground that it almost hurt a little. Like there was less of him left in camp every day since he died.
‘Believe it or not, this isn’t my first visit,’ I said over my shoulder, as I picked out a bottle of something clear I’d seen the Holy Father clean wounds with before and put it to one side. I held the set of needles up to the light, squinting. I’d never noticed how big they looked until now, but I had to figure one of them was smaller than the others.
‘You’re going to sew yourself up?’ she asked from behind me, like she didn’t know whether she ought to be appalled or impressed.
‘Not the first time for that, either.’ I picked a needle at random before turning around to face her head on. She looked a whole lot better than she had when we’d found her in that cell in Saramotai and she’d barely been able to focus on me. Her fever seemed to have broken and she was alert now, her face almost a normal colour.
‘I—’ she started and then hesitated, running her tongue along cracked lips. ‘I’ve got some talent with healing. If you’d rather not.’
I didn’t need her help. I could take the supplies and leave. I could forget I’d ever been the girl from Dustwalk who had a mother named Zahia. But if I left now I’d have to face Jin. And I was having trouble thinking of a single time running away from my problems had actually worked. Besides, it wasn’t like I was all that excited about shoving a sharp object into my own skin.
I sat across from her, handing over the bottle, thread, and needle. She seemed skittish as she pulled away the collar of the khalat. Her fingers drifted over the wound, dabbing the liquid over where the blood had caked, making a hundred tiny pinpricks of pain sing behind it. But I wasn’t paying it much mind. I was watching
her face in the dim glow of the lamplight. Trying to recognise something there I might know.
‘You’ve been drinking,’ she said finally. ‘I can smell it on you. That’ll be why it started again. Thins the blood. You don’t need stitches, just a bandage and to learn how to hold your drink.’
It was the way she said drink that made me sure. Her accent had been worn smooth by years in other places, places that didn’t swallow that word like they were always thirsty, but there was no mistaking it. Not with the way the rest of the words dropped and rose. I could’ve picked out that accent in the cacophony of a bazaar. It was my accent.
‘You called me Zahia,’ I said, biting the bullet so fast I didn’t have time to lose my nerve. ‘That was my mother’s name. Zahia Al-Hiza.’ I watched her close for a reaction. ‘But she was born Zahia Al-Fadi.’
The woman’s face folded like a bad hand of cards. She pulled away from me, dropping the collar of my khalat, and pressed the back of her hands to her lips, stifling what sounded like a sob.
I stared at her, unsure of what to do. I ought to give her some privacy or some comfort. But I couldn’t tear my gaze away from her.
‘That would make you Amani, then.’ Her voice sounded choked when she finally spoke again. She shook her head angrily, as if to dispel the tears. Desert girls didn’t cry. ‘You look exactly like Zahia at your age.’ I’d heard that before. She reached out a hand like she was going to touch me. There were tears in her eyes. ‘It’s like seeing my sister the day I left Dustwalk all over again.’
‘Your sister?’ I pulled away before her fingers could so much as graze my cheek. ‘You’re Safiyah Al-Fadi?’ I saw it as soon as she said it. I might be the spitting image of my mother but I saw her in this woman, too. She was the middle sister of the three Al-Fadi girls. My mother and Aunt Farrah’s mythical third sister. The one who had famously vanished out of Dustwalk to make her own life. Who my mother always talked about running away to find. Who I’d been headed for when I first left Dustwalk. Before I’d chosen Jin and the Rebellion. ‘You’re supposed to be in Izman.’
Traitor to the Throne Page 7