The Empire of Gold

by S. A. Chakraborty

  “You wouldn’t have come here without Manizheh’s knowledge if you trusted her,” Zaynab said, her voice more urgent. “Razu thinks there’s still some good in you. Please help us.”

  Manizheh’s hand on his cheek, lifting Dara’s face while he wept at the Gozan and giving him the only hope he’d had since Daevabad’s fall. Watching her as she cared for and inspired her followers in Daevastana, knitting together a ragged band of struggling survivors.

  Dara clasped his hands behind his back. “I have given you my warning.”

  “And I’ve given you my response. We will not surrender to her. So let me pass along a warning. You want to avoid more bloodshed? Deal with the woman at the root of it.” Zaynab turned on her heel. “We are done here.”

  DARA RETURNED TO THE PALACE UTTERLY DISPIRITED. Still healing—or not healing or whatever in creation was going on—he found the hike exhausted him, and by the time he was making his way to the small room he’d claimed near the stables, every part of his body ached.

  He clutched his wrist to his chest as he walked. Suleiman’s eye, the damned relic hurt, the weight of the metal tugging at his still-healing skin. Not for the first time did Dara contemplate simply cutting his wrist off and letting the consequences play out where they might. Hell could not be much worse than this.

  Two warriors were waiting outside his door. One was Irtemiz, the other a new recruit, some sallow-faced youth whose name Dara could not recall.

  He stopped, annoyed. “You are blocking me from my bed.”

  Irtemiz looked stressed. “Afshin, where have you been? We’ve been searching for you for hours.”

  Dara was suddenly very aware of the dead leaves clinging to his boots. “Walking.”

  The young man frowned. “It’s the middle of the night.”

  “And?” Dara glared. “In my day, had I spoken to a superior officer like that, I would have been cleaning simurgh enclosures for a year.”

  “He doesn’t mean any offense,” Irtemiz explained quickly. “Banu Manizheh asked us to retrieve you.”

  Dara didn’t like the sound of that. He hadn’t spoken properly to Manizheh since she’d thrown him out of the arena and couldn’t imagine a worse time to do so than right now, with his body exhausted and his emotions a mess after meeting Zaynab.

  Nor could he deny her.

  Giving a last longing look at the door—his bed really was comfortable, and the faint smell and sound of the horses below could have so easily lulled Dara into the fantasy that he was elsewhere—he grimaced. “Of course. I am here to serve. Always,” he added, not bothering to keep the sarcasm from his voice.

  They led him to Manizheh’s office—Ghassan’s old one. It had surprised Dara at first when she took it, Manizheh going so far as to have the dead king’s desk repaired so she could claim that as well. Dara had offered to use his magic to conjure her a new room, someplace light and airy, close to the infirmary or the gardens, but she’d refused.

  “Ghassan took everything from me,” she’d said at the time, running her fingers over the ivory filigree set in the polished wood of the restored desk. “It pleases me to take what I can from him.”

  Dara’s mood soured even further when he entered the office. Manizheh wasn’t alone—Vizaresh sat across from her. Odd. It was typically with Aeshma that Manizheh kept company, Vizaresh busy with Aeshma’s orders or generally doing whatever evil nuisances like him did to fill their days.

  “Afshin. Finally. I was beginning to fear something had happened.” Manizheh’s gaze went to the leaves on his clothes. “A walk in the woods?”

  “I like the woods. There are no people there.”

  She sighed, glancing at his soldiers. “Would you leave us?”

  They obeyed, shutting the door behind them. The air in the room was stifling, and feeling a little light-headed, Dara nodded in the direction of the fastened curtains. “Do you mind if I open the window? There is a pleasant breeze coming off the garden.”

  “I do not wish to look upon the garden. It reminds me of my brother.”

  Dara winced. He had indeed heard her express that sentiment before and forgotten. “Forgive me.”

  “It’s fine. Sit.” Manizheh motioned to the cushion next to Vizaresh.

  The ifrit gave him a wicked smile. “You look pale, Afshin. Is your latest resurrection not agreeing with you?”

  “It is not,” Dara replied with as much sincerity as he could muster. “It is doing this thing where I become irrational and unpredictable and stab the throats of whichever fiery being is closest. Speaking of, have I told you just how bright you look this evening?”

  “That’s enough,” Manizheh said testily. “Vizaresh, would you mind leaving us as well?”

  With an exaggerated bow, the ifrit obeyed.

  But it did little to help the tension in the room. Dara pressed his hands against his legs, struggling for words. He had never felt this way about someone before—this mix of loyalty and dread, love and revulsion.

  Being alone with Manizheh reminded him of who else should have been here, so he started with that. “I am so sorry, Banu Manizheh. I know I said it earlier, but I am so very sorry about Kaveh.”

  “I know you are.” Her voice was quiet. “I am too. But his death was not in vain. It made things clearer.”

  “Clearer?”

  “Yes.” Manizheh actually smiled at him. “But I’m getting ahead of myself. How are you feeling? I was alarmed to learn you’d left the infirmary. I need to know where you are, Afshin, at all times. Your well-being is important to me.”

  Dara cleared his throat. “I am fine,” he lied.

  “Are you truly? You’re not feeling different? Weak?” She reached out, touching the linen Dara had wrapped around the relic in his wrist. “I would have thought you’d have questions about this.”

  He fought the urge to yank his arm away. “I assumed you would tell me in time.”

  “Yes, of course. Indeed, it’s one of the reasons I summoned you here. I want to fix things between us, Dara. Our families have been tied together too long for our partnership to be so strained. I would like us to speak honestly with each other.”

  “Then what happened in the arena?” The question burst from him. “I saw you use magic. And the Daeva woman who was on the platform …” Dara shuddered. “You demanded her name. You demanded she kill herself in your name.” Manizheh’s expression was still calm, eerily so, and frustration broke through in his voice. “Please explain. Tell me I am misinterpreting things.” He was nearly begging now. “That kind of magic, it is not ours. It is wrong.”

  “Why? Because its knowledge comes from the ifrit?” She shook her head. “Those so-called nobles were traitors, and they were going to die either way. Why let the power in their blood drain into the sand, unused, when we needed it?”

  Oh, Manizheh. It had been obvious in the arena but hearing her casually admit to something so ghastly broke Dara’s heart all over again.

  And then Zaynab’s warning came back.

  He felt a decision settle inside him. But not one that had anything to do with violence. Manizheh was still holding his wrist, which made it easier for Dara to do something he’d never done before.

  He took her hands. “Banu Nahida, I think we should leave.”

  Manizheh blinked in surprise. “Leave? What are you talking about?”

  “We should leave Daevabad. This week. We’ll take supplies, all the Daevas who wish to accompany us, whatever is left of the Treasury. We’ll return to the mountains and—”

  She jerked her hands away. “Have you lost your mind? Why would we leave Daevabad? The entire point of the war was to retake it!”

  “No, it was to save our people. To reunite your family. And on that note …” Creator, it was so hard to say. “Banu Manizheh, we have failed. The city is falling apart, and our people are turning on us. I do not see a way we can fix things.”

  “So you want to run just because a few traitors and djinn don’t like having to bow
their heads? Absolutely not!”

  “Because it is turning you into a monster!” Dara tried to steady his voice, but it was impossible. “Banu Nahida, you and I had this conversation back at camp about the vapor. You did not listen to me then. I beg you to listen now. Let us return to Daevastana, to our roots. Let us build something real. Without blood magic, without the ifrit.”

  “And Daevabad?” Manizheh sounded disgusted. “The Daevas who don’t follow us to the mountains? The ones who can’t? My children? You would abandon them?”

  “I would see them live,” Dara replied, hating the truth in his next words. He did not dare name Kartir, but Zaynab had impressed him, and he strongly suspected the Daeva priest and the others of their tribe would be able to negotiate a manageable peace with the princess, provided that things did not get worse. “At this point, I think they’d be safer not being tied to us. And perhaps if they believe Daevabad is safe, Nahri and Alizayd will return with the seal.”

  “And Jamshid?” Her voice was more cutting now. “I know he’s not the Nahid you’re infatuated with, but you might remember my son is currently a prisoner. And if you think Hatset is letting him go while I take a break to rebuild my strength, you’ve misplaced any tactical cleverness you once held.” Manizheh stood up and paced away. “I’ve lost Kaveh. I will not lose Jamshid.”

  “Then we’ll get him back. If you don’t need me in Daevabad to hold the city, we could go to Ta Ntry and try to—”

  “No.”

  It was a curt answer, the kind of command that once would have shut him up. Now it only made Dara angrier. He dug his fingers into his cushion, fighting the desire to tear it apart.

  Manizheh had stopped at the shelves opposite the desk. “The workers found something in here, you know, when they were going through the damage.”

  The change in subject took him aback. “What?”

  She was already retrieving a slender black case. She opened it and turned around.

  Dara went cold, rising to his feet. “That’s an Afshin arrow,” he said, recognizing the scythelike ends only his family had been permitted to use. But this particular arrow’s style of fletching … “That’s one of my arrows. Suleiman’s eye. That must be from the rebellion.”

  “I thought it might be.” Manizheh ran her fingers along the arrow, and unease crawled over Dara at the possessiveness in the gesture. “I said I wanted to speak honestly with you, and you’ve clearly unburdened yourself. I would like to do the same. We are obviously and unfortunately at odds when it comes to our goals.”

  Her calm tone was maddening. “Our goals? You’re murdering Daevas for blood magic and using the corpses of your relatives to heal me. We are not ‘at odds.’ You’ve gone too far, and I’m trying to bring you back!”

  She closed the case and put it back on the shelf. Her other hand toyed with something around her neck. Jewelry, perhaps. “You know, Rustam said the same thing.” Manizheh pulled free the gold chain underneath her braid and with a sudden jerk on the pendant, broke it.

  Bewildered, Dara saw too late what had been hanging from the necklace.

  His ring.

  He lunged forward, but Manizheh had already slipped it over her finger.

  “Stop,” she whispered.

  Dara stopped so suddenly it was as if he’d slammed into a wall. Shock froze his tongue.

  Manizheh’s eyes were wider than he had ever seen them, her entire body trembling. “Don’t move.”

  The words were no sooner out of her mouth than his entire body went numb, as though his limbs were encased in stone. Dara tried to scream, but it was like his body no longer obeyed his commands.

  His body no longer obeyed his commands. His ring was on Manizheh’s finger …

  No, this couldn’t be happening. It wasn’t possible. Dara had to be dreaming, hallucinating. Not even Manizheh had that kind of power. Only the ifrit—

  Manizheh hadn’t moved either. She looked like she wasn’t certain, but then suspicion stole over her face. “Where were you this evening? Tell me the truth. You may speak.”

  His mouth released from her control, Dara gritted his teeth, biting his tongue so hard he tasted blood. It didn’t matter—there was the burn of magic, and then his lips were opening. “In the forest.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “With whom?”

  He writhed against the unseen bonds holding him. “Zaynab al Qahtani and her warrior. The freed djinn Razu.” He groaned, fighting to shut his mouth. No, Creator, no. “Kartir.”

  Fury flashed across her face. “You and that blasphemous priest met with Zaynab al Qahtani? You stood before the woman I’ve been begging you to find, the woman upon whose life my son’s life depends, and you let her walk away?”

  “I was trying to make peace.” He couldn’t stop speaking. “To convince her to surrender before you—”

  “Before I what?”

  “Before you used blood magic against her.”

  Manizheh’s eyes glittered. “You told that sand fly princess I was using blood magic?” She seethed. “Is there anything else you’ve been keeping from me?”

  “Yes.” Dara gagged, the words coming so fast that he tripped over them. “I helped another freed djinn flee to Ta Ntry.”

  Manizheh paled—she obviously hadn’t expected that. “Who? When?”

  “An old man named Issa. Weeks ago.”

  Manizheh took two steps toward him, grabbed the knife from Dara’s belt, and then smashed the hilt across his face.

  “Traitor,” she hissed. “So you too have been working against me?”

  Despair and pain swept him. “I have been working for you. All I wanted to do was follow you. To follow the best version of you. To see our people thriving and free under good and honorable Nahid leaders.” Dara hated the words as they were ripped from him. How naive they sounded.

  How naive he’d been.

  You let them destroy you. Time and time again, you loved them, and they destroyed you for it. Vizaresh’s mocking warning and Aeshma’s look of cruel triumph. They’d known all along where this had been heading. The ifrit hadn’t just taught Manizheh blood magic.

  They’d taught her the worst thing they knew.

  He blinked back tears, part of him still refusing to let the true horror land. It would drive him mad. She couldn’t have done this. Not really. The relic, the ring, this desperate mimic of ifrit cruelty. She couldn’t mean it. Manizheh was a Nahid, his Nahid. This wasn’t—

  “On your knees,” she commanded.

  Dara crashed to the floor, his knees hitting the carpet. Blood ran into his eyes from where she’d hit him with his knife. “Please let me go.” He was not above begging now, his voice trembling like a child’s. “Please do not make me a slave. Not again. Do not take my freedom from me. We can fix this. I can fix this!”

  A little of the rage left her face. “I actually believe you. I believe you want to fix this.” Manizheh reached out, wiping the blood from his eyes with the edge of her sleeve. “I’m going to make it easier.”

  “Easier?”

  “I know you didn’t want the responsibility of more bloodshed. So now you won’t have to carry it,” Manizheh assured him. “I’ll carry it. I’ll make the decisions.

  “You’ll just be the weapon.”

  The full impact of what she’d done hit Dara like a pile of bricks. Once again, he tried to struggle. “No, my lady, please, you do not—”

  She laid a finger on his lips. “I will wake you when you’re needed. For now sleep, Afshin. You seem so very tired.”

  Dara was tumbling into darkness before she even finished speaking.

  36

  NAHRI

  Nahri teased out the last tendril of iron from her patient’s neck with the surgical hook in her right hand, her left clamped against the back of his skull. With a precise twist, she caught a loop in the iron fragment and then carefully pulled it out, letting the metal drop in the tin pan beneath her elbow.

  Her patient, one of Fiza’s fellows, tried t
o speak. “Is … that …” His words came out slurred, echoing the daze in his glazed eyes. Nahri had given him a potion that partially paralyzed his muscles to make the procedure safer.

  “Almost done,” she promised him. “And you’re doing great. Let me just check something—” Nahri closed her eyes, letting her mind sink deeper into her healer’s sight. In a moment, his neck seemed to open before her—muscles and ligaments both there and gone, bone and blood and tissue shifting into separate particles. All traces of the iron were finally eradicated—al Mudhib’s foul brand removed.

  With but a nudge of intent, the wound healed, and Nahri watched the torn flesh give way to healthy skin. After weeks without her magic, she’d been healing everyone who would let her, from burned cooks to soldiers wounded in training accidents. And not just because it was a relief to finally, properly have her abilities back.

  But because staying busy was the only thing keeping her from jumping on a boat, sailing out to sea, and making some very unwise decisions involving fire and attempting to threaten an ancient marid queen.

  She refocused, sensing a specter of the paralysis potion drifting through his blood. Nahri urged it to lessen its grip, though she’d already warned the man it would take another day to fully leave his body.

  She let him go. “You are well and free, my friend. If you feel any pain or stiffness in your neck, come right back, but otherwise I think you’ll be fine.”

  Her patient touched his throat, looking close to tears. “I never thought I’d get out of my indenture,” he confessed, his words clearer now. “Al Mudhib always found new charges to add against my debt.”

  “Well, he can’t do anything to you now. He’s probably still waving a fist at the sky and cursing Fiza.”

  His face fell. “I hope the captain comes back. She certainly seemed confident of it—she told us she’d gut us if her ship got damaged, but …” He trailed off, perhaps unwilling to put his fears into words.

  Nahri knew how that felt. She’d been astonished to learn Fiza had gone after Ali, torn between relief and gloom. Fiza seemed like the type who picked the right gambles, and God knew Nahri was desperate to see Ali survive. But it had also meant another person Nahri liked, a woman who had the makings of a friend, ripped away.