The riots had lasted all night after Shira died. They were being called the Blessed Sultima’s Uprising, for now. But stories were written by the winners. If we lost this war, chances were the name would change to the Disgraced Sultima’s Uprising. They’d left a tension in the air that put a frantic damper on the preparations for Auranzeb. I could feel it even inside the safety of the palace walls.
When daybreak had come after the night of rioting, the Rebellion had claimed part of the city. Sam told me our side had used the riots to erect barricades all the way, hemming off most of the slums and some other parts of the city to claim them in the name of the Rebellion.
In one night we’d taken rebel ground in the capital itself. If that didn’t send a message, I didn’t know what would. There were suns painted on buildings across the city and, most unsettlingly, there was one in bright red paint smeared on a wall at the heart of the palace. Nobody could account for that, except for Imin, that is. But she was now a tiny, doe-eyed servant in the kitchen, and no one would suspect someone so small to be able to reach that high.
The dawn had also found the streets littered with bodies. A whole lot of them were wearing uniforms. According to Sam, Shazad had run a flawless strategy even if it was in city streets instead of a battlefield. And even if some of her troops thought they were just looting and burning, she’d managed to nudge them carefully one way or another, leading them like soldiers even if they didn’t know it.
Still, even though we’d won more than we’d lost, there was a nervous edge among the rebels. If there was ever a time for the Sultan to turn his new Djinni army out against us, it was now.
But it’d been three days and no immortals walked the streets yet. This was still a war among humans. And Demdji. And tonight I was about to get back to the side I belonged on.
The servants of the harem had dressed me in Mirajin colours. White and gold. Like the army. Only I looked like a different kind of soldier. The white glowed pale and rich next to my desert-dark skin. The cloth clung to my skin like a lover’s fingers, ending in a hem heavy with golden stitching that climbed upwards, scattered with pearls. I imagined walking past Kadir’s wives, and them grabbing at my khalat like they did at the pearls underwater. My arms were bare from the elbows down, except where golden bracelets rattled heavily at my wrists. In the burnished light, the gold powder that had been dusted over my whole body made it seem like the sun lived under my skin.
They had clucked over my shorn hair before finally resigning themselves to running sweet-smelling oils through it so that it stayed straight. They wove my hair through with strands of pure gold, threads of it that mixed in with the black and caught the light. I found it hard to care about my shorn hair any more. Whatever anger I’d ever had at Ayet left me when I saw her curled up on the floor of the prison, dead-eyed. She’d fought and she’d lost and I felt sorry for her.
When they were done they crowned me with a tiny circlet made of miniature gold leaves with pearls as berries. My mouth had been stained darker gold.
Every woman from the harem who was being allowed into the party was dressed in the same colours I was, Mirajin gold and white. But I was blinding. Like some untouchable gold sculpture that had been crafted to place in a palace and be admired. There was nothing of the desert girl left. I looked more beautiful than I’d ever seen myself, but unnatural, like a stranger.
But I knew who I was. I was still a rebel.
And tonight we were going to strike a real blow.
‘Announcing’ – the call came from the other side of the door – ‘the flowers of the harem.’ A hush fell over the crowd, expectant. The doors swung open. The girls around me rushed forward like children towards a new gift. I was jostled as I followed at a slower pace. I imagined for the guests it was like watching birds burst free from their cages, a surge of white and gold as we were released among the people.
The gardens were seductive in the late afternoon light. Fountains bubbled happily among guests in their finest clothes, music twisting its spell with the smells of jasmine and sweet food. High above us the sky was strung with golden ropes from one side of the garden to the other; small glass decorations hung from them, catching the light. When I craned my head back I saw they were crystal birds hanging from the golden wires. A servant passed me with a tray of soft cakes dusted in white powder. I took one and shoved it into my mouth, tasting the sugar exploding on my tongue as it melted there. I tried to savour it, but it dissolved quickly, until only the memory was left between the tip of my tongue and the top of my mouth.
I heard whispers go up in the crowd as we passed. The Albish queen’s eyes swept over one of the girls, who was wearing a sheer muslin dress that showed a whole lot more of her than you’d expect, and glanced away in disgust, smoothing her hands over her own full, heavy skirts.
I ignored her, my eyes darting around for faces I knew, for Shazad or Rahim. I caught the Sultan’s gaze through the crowd. Some of the revellers looked like they’d already started celebrating like the next dawn would never come. But not our exalted ruler. He was as sharp as anything. He raised a still-full glass to me in greeting before his attention was pulled elsewhere. I let out a long breath. I couldn’t look suspicious. I took a slow route around the gardens instead. Like I wasn’t looking for anyone at all.
Rahim found me before I could make it very far. ‘I’ve been assigned to keep an eye on you tonight by my exalted father.’ He was wearing a crisp white dress uniform and a sword at his side that didn’t look decorative to me. ‘There are a fair few foreigners around and apparently even after nearly getting you killed once I can still be trusted.’
‘Once I lost someone a hand during an ambush.’ It’d been early days in the Rebellion. After Fahali, before getting a bullet to the stomach. ‘It was my fault. When Ahmed sent me out again in a similar raid, I asked if he was really going to trust me. He said I was a lot less likely to make the mistake a second time than someone else was to make it the first.’
‘Well, let’s hope that’s the only thing my brother and my exalted father have in common. On that note, let’s go find your rebellion.’ He extended an arm to me. I held up my gold-dusted hands apologetically. ‘Ah,’ he dropped his arm. ‘Of course: look but don’t touch.’
We walked side by side through the glow of the garden. On a night like this, it would be easy to forget we were celebrating the Sultan’s coup. Two decades ago to the day, he had allied with the Gallan and taken our country by force. The sun had gone down with Sultan Oman’s father on the throne. Dawn had found him dead in his bed, and the palace packed with Gallan uniforms. The Sultim was found face down in a garden, like he had tried to run. Many of the Sultan’s other brothers met the same fate. He couldn’t afford any challenges to the throne. He’d left only the women and the brothers who were younger than him alive … Twenty years ago tonight the palace had been full of death and blood; now soft lights and music drifted through the walls and the buzz of conversation seemed to lull us all away from any memories of that night.
Except there were the statues. Among the guests and the musicians and the servants passing around wine and food, the garden was dotted with statues made of what looked like clay and bronze. They were frozen in agonisingly twisted shapes, buckled to their knees, arms up like they were protecting themselves.
‘I knew Prince Hakim when he was a boy, you know.’ The speaker was some Mirajin lord or other, talking to a young, pretty girl. He was gesturing at a statue.
They were the princes. Bronze sculptures of the twelve princes the Sultan had killed when he took his throne.
Someone had rested a glass in one of their upturned palms, leaving the dead prince’s agonised face to stare up at a half-finished wineglass smudged with oily fingerprints.
‘Well, those are in bad taste,’ a voice said in my ear, making me jump. A server was standing by my elbow with a tray piled with basbousa. I had an odd feeling of recognising him, only I didn’t. Until he rolled his eyes skywards.
‘Those colours don’t suit you at all, by the way.’ His eyes swept me appraisingly. If I’d had any doubt left in my mind that it was him, it evaporated at the disdain in those bright yellow eyes that betrayed him as a Demdji.
‘He’s one of yours?’ Rahim guessed. ‘How did he get in?’ He didn’t know the half of it and now wasn’t the time to explain that Imin was the same tiny female servant Rahim had helped abduct Shira’s baby a few days earlier.
‘I’ve got my ways.’ Imin took a piece of the sweet cake off his own tray and put it in his mouth. ‘Shazad is looking for you two.’ He licked his fingers clean and pointed. Shazad was a little way off, hair wrapped in tight braids around her head, like a crown. ‘She says it’s high time you kept up your side of the bargain and introduced us to whoever’s got this so-called army of yours.’
‘She’s with your rebellion?’ Rahim inspected Shazad sceptically across the garden. ‘General Hamad’s daughter? I always thought she was just a pretty face.’
‘So does everyone else,’ I said. ‘That’s how we figured she wouldn’t get searched too closely on the way in. Shazad’s the one who carried in enough explosives to free every Djinni down in the vaults.’
‘Explosives,’ Rahim repeated. He sounded nervous.
‘You didn’t tell him the plan?’ Imin asked, shoving more food into his mouth.
‘We didn’t even have a plan until a few days ago,’ I said defensively. ‘I’ve been busy since then.’ My hand drifted again to the tiny cut in my side.
Imin turned to Rahim. ‘According to Shazad, every Auranzeb, when the sun sets, the Sultan gives a speech, which means that all eyes will be on him. Using that as cover, Sam will sneak Amani and Shazad through the walls and out of the party.’ Imin jerked his head sideways, indicating our impostor Blue-Eyed Bandit. My eyes skated straight over him before I spied him. He was dressed in an Albish army uniform. So that was how he was getting around inconspicuously.
‘Isn’t it a crime to impersonate a soldier?’ My heart was starting to beat painfully in my chest now. There was so much that could go wrong tonight. Not being wholly sure I could count on Sam was just one of them.
‘I hear it’s a crime to desert the Albish army, too.’ Imin sucked on his teeth, moving around a seed caught there. He made a terrible servant. It was amazing that he’d gotten this far without getting caught. But he was right: the uniform fit Sam too well to have been stolen. Too well to be anything but tailored for him. My eyes went to the congregation of Albish soldiers, accompanying their queen here. It was a huge risk he was taking, as a deserter in their midst. And he was taking it for us.
Even as I watched him, his eyes dashed across the garden, landing on Shazad, who had started to cross the garden toward us. Sam’s eyes never left her. No, I realized, not exactly for us. Damn. I’d seen men fall for Shazad before but I’d never seen her fall back. This couldn’t end well.
‘Hala will meet you on the other side of the wall,’ Imin went on. ‘She’ll make you disappear long enough that you can get to the Djinn and set the explosives.’
‘And my sister?’ Rahim asked. He was casting around the garden for her. Come to think of it, I still hadn’t seen her, either.
‘You’re not a very patient man.’ Imin took his time, deliberately chewing. ‘If everything goes according to plan, Sam will get Shazad and Amani out of the palace straight from the vaults, and then double back through that wall for you and your sister.’ He nodded again, the other way this time.
‘You get Leyla, and wait for Sam in the southeast corner of the garden, away from the chaos that’s bound to come when something blows up in the palace,’ I said, shifting carefully as someone brushed past us, dangerously close to overhearing our conversation.
‘Then we figured Hala will get Tamid out under cover of an illusion, and I will get out in the chaos, just looking like another servant running from an explosion.
What could possibly go wrong?’
‘A lot could go wrong,’ Rahim pointed out.
‘It’s still far from being the worst plan we’ve ever come up with.’ I tried to comfort him.
‘No, the worst we’ve ever come up with ended with you flooding a prayer house,’ Imin offered, which was true but far from helpful right now. ‘So that’s not really saying much.’
‘Everybody survived that,’ I said defensively. Rahim was looking at me, an uneasy look on his face.
‘Welcome to the Rebellion.’ Shazad had reached us; she greeted Rahim with a devastating smile. ‘We make do with what we can get. Now, are you going to give us an army or not?’
*
We found Lord Bilal, Emir of Iliaz, leaning against one of the grotesque sculptures, eyes hooded. He was young, but he looked like he was already exhausted by life, or maybe by his own importance. It didn’t seem smart to tell him that out loud when we were trying to form an alliance. I probably ought to let Shazad talk.
‘So.’ Lord Bilal looked me over. ‘You’re the blue-eyed rebel everyone is talking about.’ He glanced at Shazad. ‘And you must be the face of the operation. You’re too pretty to be anything else.’ I watched my friend bite down on her annoyance.
‘And you’re the emir looking to turn rebel.’ She wore a bright smile the whole time and flapped her hands airily. Looking at her you’d think she was just a beautiful girl flirting with a man. Not a rebel planning a full-scale war. I realised why he’d chosen to wait for us here, in this corner of the garden. The music that drifted through the walls covered any conversation around us. I could only guess it covered our words, too. Still, Shazad spoke quietly.
‘I’m my father’s son.’ Lord Bilal shrugged one elaborately tasselled shoulder lazily. I thought I caught what looked like a sceptical eyeroll from Rahim. But when I looked at him head on, he was ever the soldier. Rahim had served under Lord Bilal’s father first. He’d know better than anyone if the son lived up to the father. ‘My father had no loyalty to the throne. He never forgave Sultan Oman for turning Miraji over to foreign hands. He used to go on and on about how Iliaz is the most powerful county in Miraji, how the rest of the country depended on us. He’d tell you until your ears bled how Iliaz didn’t need the rest of Miraji. It could survive as an independent nation.’
‘Are you saying you want your own country in exchange for your army?’ That sure wasn’t asking for much.
‘Are you in a position to negotiate that with me?’
Abducting Delila without permission was one thing. Giving away part of Ahmed’s country without his permission, that wasn’t something even Shazad and I could do. ‘No,’ Shazad said finally. ‘Even I’m not pretty enough for that.’ I snorted under my breath. She went to elbow me in the side, almost forgetting where we were, but she caught herself before she did, turning it into a gesture rearranging her sleeve. ‘But we can get you to Ahmed.’ Shazad paused pointedly. ‘Provided you can give me some numbers that will impress me.’
Lord Bilal raised an eyebrow at Rahim. His commander stepped in easily. ‘There are three thousand men garrisoned at Iliaz. Twice that number retired in the province who can be called upon.’
‘And you have enough weapons to arm them all?’ Shazad disguised the tactical question with a careful laugh, touching Rahim’s arm as if he’d just said something hilariously funny.
‘Amani.’ Imin, in the guise of a servant, appeared again at our side with an elaborate bow. ‘The Sultan is headed this way.’
I traded a glance with Shazad. ‘Go,’ she said. ‘I’ve got this.’
My stomach was too tied in knots to eat or drink as I left them. I made a show of inspecting the horrible statues that surrounded the garden to keep from glancing over my shoulder every few moments at Shazad and Lord Bilal in negotiations, Rahim in between them. The statues’ bronze faces reminded me of Noorsham. Only his bronze mask had been smooth and featureless. These were wretched reminders of what the Sultan could do to us
if he caught us in our treason before we could escape.
‘Announcing’ – the voice rang out through the courtyard again – ‘Prince Bao of the Glorious Empire of Xicha.’
I felt that tug of something that reminded me of Jin.
A small crowd of Xichian men stood at the top of the stairs. They were dressed in bright clothes that looked as foreign as anything I’d ever seen the Gallan wear, but entirely different at the same time. I’d seen the occasional Xichian dress on Delila, but there wasn’t a single woman among them.
A green-and-blue robe was draped over the narrow frame of the man at the head of the party. The six men around him were of similar builds. They reminded me of Mahdi and the rest of Ahmed’s scholarly set.
Except for one figure at the back. He wasn’t taller, but his shoulders were broader than those of the scholarly-looking men that surrounded him, and he held himself like he was ready for a fight.
My mouth went dry.
Instead of snapping, the string tugged harder. I took a step forward without meaning to, trying to get a closer look. Through the crowd, among the mass of people, his face swung straight towards me. Like we were tied together by some invisible bond. Like we were the needles of the paired compasses.
Jin’s eyes found mine. I was wrong. He didn’t have his father’s smile. Because that troublemaker curve to his mouth was all ours.
Chapter 36
There was an entire garden between us and we were on enemy ground. One mistake, one false move could cost the whole Rebellion. And still it took everything in me to keep my feet grounded. Not to obey that tug.
It was more painful than any order the Sultan had ever given me.
Jin leaned in and whispered something to the Xichian man next to him as they descended the steps into the garden. The man nodded, turning to say something back. The crowd shifted, and he vanished. I battled my instinct to move towards him. To fight my way through the crowd and damn the Sultan watching me.
Traitor to the Throne Page 29