by Somaiya Daud
My days had grown predictable of late—the mornings were mine, but in the afternoons I spent much of my time observing Maram’s court, and reviewing lists and notes, focusing on the information I had yet to learn. I was summoned usually in the evening to be tested on the day’s learnings by Nadine, but Maram had lately not bothered with me.
Part of me wondered why, and if our last interaction had kept her away.
Good, I thought with some viciousness.
“They’re giving you a final test before the ball,” Tala said simply, and then, voice softening, “I’m sorry. I don’t know anything more than that.”
I stared at my reflection in the mirror as Tala moved around me, tightening the sash around my waist, arranging the folds of my gown. There was jewelry, too—a large bracelet for my right wrist, and several rings for my left hand.
My hands shook as I followed the droid out of the courtyard. So far my tests had been simple. But I was dressed as Maram today. There would be more at stake.
* * *
The droid led me toward the north wing of the Ziyaana, where Maram and the king had their quarters. All my training had been done in the abandoned east wing where my chambers lay—home, I had learned, to the queen before she died, and deserted now, shuttered off.
This portion of the palace somehow surpassed the beauty of the old queen’s wing. Gleaming stone walls were carved with arabesque arches and inlaid with bright blue and orange tiles. Many of the walkways opened up onto gardens and courtyards, and birdsong twined with the sound of babbling water. True sunlight streamed through glass ceilings. I was led through porticoes and lovers’ alcoves, passed through clouds of perfume and air filled with the trill of music. Here I could imagine the Ziyaana of old.
At last, the droid opened up a door at the end of a hall onto a rotunda. The air was clear and crisp, bright with the sunlight that poured in from an opening in the dome. The floor was white and smooth, and my footsteps echoed, punctuated by the rush of fabric as my gown swept behind me. Just beneath the opening of the dome sat Maram, and just behind her stood Nadine and another droid.
Maram smirked as I sank to my knees before her dais. She was perfectly arranged in a gown identical to the one I wore, spread around her like a flower. She reached forward and tucked a soft, manicured hand under my chin.
“My,” she said, examining me with a sharp eye. “I could almost believe you were beautiful.”
She rose effortlessly, and gestured me up to the dais.
“Your Highness, how may I serve?” I murmured as I settled down and arranged my skirts. I sounded flippant, even to myself. Part of me felt as though a sliver of my soul had floated up into the ceiling and was watching an exchange between a pair of cruel twins. I marveled at my new ability to remain cool, even as Maram smiled.
“Show me that you can be me, village girl. Show me what you’ve learned.” With those words, Maram stepped out of sight, behind a pillar. Nadine said nothing as the great doors opened to admit a bevy of servants.
The servants set up several wardrobes, a second dais, several mannequins, and a display of fabrics. They arranged themselves like a small souk just in front of the dais. I watched them, a bored expression on my features. Maram, I knew, barely consented to dress in the fusion of Kushaila and Vathek attire she often wore—a reminder she was the link between regimes, between cultures. Every fitting was a struggle.
I sighed, the picture of irritation, when the head seamstress dropped a spool of fabric and it rolled toward my dais. Her face paled visibly, and she froze, as if unsure if she should come forward to collect the mess or leave it as it was. She was old, and I imagined she had dropped the spool because of her shaking hands.
“Well,” I snapped as Maram so often did, “are you running a zoo or do you expect me to pick it up?”
“N-no,” she stammered. “I—I mean, yes, of course, Your Highness.”
“I don’t see why this is necessary,” I said, looking at Nadine.
“The seamstress has new fabric she’d like you to approve for the winter gowns,” Nadine replied, the corner of her mouth twitching.
My own mouth stayed in a grim line. I did not find the humor in the situation; what would happen if they discovered me to be a fraud?
“You set up a dais for me to merely approve fabric,” I said, my voice cool.
“We also have a new gown for you,” the head seamstress piped up, speaking out of turn.
My back stiffened, Maram’s rage radiating out of me. I turned my gaze to the head seamstress and watched her turn pale. She was more than three times my age, older than Nadine even, and yet she sank to her knees before me, her knuckles white in the folds of her gown.
“How many seamstresses do we have?” I said without breaking my gaze.
“Several,” Nadine replied.
“I never want to see this one again. I should have your tongue cut out for speaking out of turn. Happily for you, I am in a good mood today, and I don’t wish it spoiled by blood on the floor.”
“Y-your—”
I lifted an eyebrow and she choked on her own words and lowered her head.
For a moment, I understood. Was this what Maram always felt like—secure in her power? Secure in herself? Absolutely in control because she knew even the strongest, oldest tree would bend to her will on a whim?
It was heady and sickening all at once.
“Escort her away,” I said, and the droid beside Nadine lurched forward.
The only sound for some minutes was the sound of the seamstress’s heels skidding against the marble floors as the droid dragged her away.
“Where is the fabric?” I asked, after the doors had closed. My shoulders relaxed in a practiced move, the same sudden change to leisure I’d seen Maram make a hundred times.
A seamstress came forward, holding a roll of fabric, and knelt before me, bearing it up over her head. It was velvet, or something quite like it, rich and soft, rippling with shades of blue and black. I ran a steady hand over it, and for a moment had the cruel impulse to twist my hands in it and tear the whole thing away from the girl.
“I hardly think it’s a flattering shade,” I said at last. “And what would you make out of it?”
Silence.
“Was I not clear in my question?” I said after a heartbeat. “Or am I meant to drape it over myself like some sort of barbarian?”
“W-we hadn’t—”
Maram’s smirk emerged on my features without thought. “You took a portion of my morning to display to me a piece of fabric with no design in mind?”
The silence stretched, until the air in the room was tight as a drum.
“Get out.”
The women scrambled to pack everything up, and did it admirably quickly before they rushed out into the hall. The doors clanged shut behind them. For a moment, their echo was the only sound.
Maram appeared beside me, stepping out from the shadows. She was grinning, a true, radiant smile that transformed her angry features into something beautiful—and happy.
“That was magnificent,” she said, grabbing my arms. “I hardly thought you could do it. Isn’t that right, Nadine?”
“Indeed,” she drawled, amused. “One hardly thinks a village girl has it in her to berate first an old woman, and then all her subordinates.”
Maram continued to beam at me, though she released the grip on my arms. I felt an answering smile rise, tentative and hopeful, and I struggled to contain it—why should I relish her praise?
“I’m quite pleased,” she said.
Her pleasure seemed to make Nadine sharpen. “There are days left before the ball where you will make your debut,” she said to me. “Have you any idea where it is? For whom? For what?”
The voice that came out of me was not mine, but Maram’s. “The festival is held yearly in the northern continent, in the mountainous country of Atalasia. It is a celebration of their first snowfall, and it imitates the Vathek custom of the wintermarch.”
; For the first time in our brief acquaintance, Nadine looked impressed.
“Very good,” she said after a beat. “I suppose you’re ready.”
atalasia, andala
10
In the center of the Ziyaana was a giant dome that doubled as a landing area for the palace’s spacecraft. As far as the eye could see, the royal household stood in rank, prepared to leave for Atalasia and the Terminus ball. There were three air transports, luxury cruisers, lined up and gleaming in the early-morning sunlight. Those in the court’s favor would ride in the royal transport. Everyone else would have to find their own way to Atalasia.
A guard stood at one end of the suite designated for me, arms folded across his chest, silent and watchful. Dressed as Maram, I had chosen to ride alone in her quarters rather than risk discovery before the ball even began. I used these precious few hours to review the invitation list for the ball, memorizing names and faces from the holoreader Nadine had provided.
All my hopes at success rested on my debut as Maram. She had stayed behind so that no one could chance on her while I was at the ball. Succeed, she’d commanded me before I left. I didn’t want to entertain what the cost would be if I failed.
The transport traveled quickly, crossing the vast desert more rapidly than I could have imagined. Before I knew it we’d sailed over the sea separating the main continent from the northern climes, and the orange, sunburnt sky turned blue. I sat by a window with a round table in front of me, laden with bowls of fruit and a crystal decanter filled with a drink I didn’t recognize.
The door at the far end of the train car hissed open, and I looked up to find Tala there.
“Are you ready, Your Highness?” she asked, but I heard the question she was really asking—was I ready for my masquerade?
Disembarking was fast and efficient. The Atalasian air had a bite to it that even I, who had grown up at the foot of Cadissian mountains, was not prepared for. I pulled my cloak tighter around my shoulders and looked up at the carved stone wall of the palace. It was a long, flat structure, a single story, with turrets rising out of the outer wall at regular intervals. The very tops of the walls were carved with sharp geometric shapes, and every now and then a large, heavy tapestry dropped over the wall. It was stationed on a hill, and behind it rose up the tallest peaks of the Atalasia mountains, snowcapped and intimidating.
I was put in a series of chambers meant to be Maram’s, as opulent and luxurious as anything I’d seen in the Ziyaana. Dark wood and thick fabrics decorated the room. There was a gilded mirror set just above a vanity covered in glittering pieces of jewelry. And at the far end of the room a table bore a tea set, the pot made of precious excelsior, the glasses gilded and traced in gold. Hanging on the armoire was what I was meant to wear tonight.
I was to be the winter queen to Idris’s waning autumn prince. It was a tradition cobbled from Vathek and Atalasian ways. Before the occupation, Atalasia had venerated a series of seasonal monarchs and the Vath had feasted under the eyes of a summer queen on their home world. Now that Andala was the capital of their empire, they had reversed the tradition to ingratiate themselves in the country that fell first on Andala.
I couldn’t resist touching the gown. It looked heavy, silver with wide sleeves, buttoned up to the neck, the skirt shot through with bright white thread and studded with tiny, glittering rocks. They weren’t diamonds, were they? Hung around the waist was something closer to the Kushaila waistband, which ran from just below the chest to low on the hips, made to wrap around more than once. And hanging from the shoulders was a sheer, gauzy cape that was feet longer than the skirt of the dress, studded with embroidered snowflakes.
I’d suffered and trained for this moment, and at last I would have my chance at success. A flutter of nervousness rose in my belly. I was confident of fooling her cousins and courtiers. I was less sure about fooling her fiancé. I’d seen them together—always close, like confidants. The dress wouldn’t be enough to fool him.
I didn’t think Maram really had friends, and if she were believed, her engagement to Idris was a matter of the state and nothing more. Nevertheless, I worried. What did he expect of Maram? And if she’d kept secrets about their relationship from me, how would I manage?
Why would she keep secrets? I thought.
Why did Maram ever do anything?
Tala made sure I ate before she helped me out of the gown I wore and sat me in front of the vanity to do my hair. She braided the ends and twisted them against the back of my head, then caught them in a silver net hung with ornaments shaped like small raindrops. She looped a chain across my forehead, from which a dark blue gem swung. I watched as the face already alien to me grew even more so.
“One last thing,” she said, and lifted a pair of enormous earrings, flattened silver from which hung two smaller gems of the same color.
The end product, with the gown and its cape, was someone who looked as if she’d been born into wealth, someone beautiful, someone sure. I couldn’t help remembering the last time someone had adorned me with beautiful jewelry—my mother, on my majority night—and felt a pang of guilt and longing deep inside my chest.
Tala smiled behind me and squeezed my shoulders. “You can do this,” she said. “I have faith in you.”
I nodded, and set my shoulders. Tonight, I would be Maram before the entire Vathek-Andalaan court.
I could not fail.
* * *
The Kushaila of Andala didn’t really hold balls, not the way the Vathek did. We held large banquets that went far into the night, where we sang and played instruments and conversed. But Vathek balls involved dancing, and, despite my training, I was nervous. Dancing with a human was different from dancing with a droid.
Idris waited for me in the entryway. His dark hair was dusted with gold, and he wore a Vathek military uniform—black jacket and black trousers—with red trim. His only concession to Kushaila dress was the sash tied around his waist. It pained me to look at him, the leader of the bravest of Andala’s houses, dressed as one of them. Turned into one of them.
He smiled when he saw me. “Your Highness,” he said and held out a hand. “Ready?” I slipped a ringed hand into his, which he squeezed as if he sensed my nerves. My heart pounded a steady rhythm in my chest.
The doors yawned open before the two of us, revealing a balcony that led down to the ballroom floor, and beyond that, a dining area. It was decorated like a winter wonderland with an enormous ice sculpture at the very center of the room of a tesleet rising into the air, wings outspread. Tesleet were creatures of heat, made of fire with molten gold in their veins. Despite the incongruity, its presence comforted me.
“The High Princess of the Vath, Protectress of Andala and her Moons, Maram vak Mathis and her escort, Idris ibn Salih.”
He held my hand tightly as we descended the stairs together. Everyone was dressed in varying shades of gold and silver and blue, and it seemed to me as if the entire cavernous room shimmered with their jewels and the ice and a nervous energy, as though they all expected some axe to fall tonight.
Idris led me immediately to the center of the floor for the inaugural dance we had to lead. Just as the instruments began to play he tugged me against his side and settled a hand on my waist.
“Ready?” he asked again, but this time with a lifted eyebrow, testing me. I didn’t flinch when he leaned in close, and his mouth brushed against my ear. “This can’t be harder than last year, can it?”
He was so close, and I could feel my face warming, which was not like Maram at all. He was far more beautiful in person. His eyes were ringed with thick lashes, and his face—stoic now—looked as if it had been carved out of antiquity. I swallowed my fluster and lifted my chin. A hint of a smile reemerged when I looked up, determined, and the arm around my waist tightened in support. His continued poise in the face of hundreds of court members watching us helped me to remain upright and steady. We stepped easily into the waltz, one step and then another, the trail of my gown
whispering against the marble floor. I could hear the music as if through a roar, and the titter of other dancers and members of court watching us. Idris’s hand on my waist was ever present and warm, and every now and then he would lean in close and his hair would brush my cheek.
The dance ended with Idris bowed over my hand. The only sounds I could hear were of my earrings swaying and my heart pounding in my chest. The rest of the room came to me in flashes: people clapping; a mix of Andalaan and Vathek courtiers passing us by; Idris’s frown, there and then gone in a second; and Nadine’s watchful eyes from where she stood on a riser, observing me.
“Ah,” Idris said, and settled a warm hand on my waist again. “Here comes your most ardent admirer.” His hair brushed against my cheek and for a moment I could not help staring, he was so close.
“Your Highness,” someone said from behind me. Remember why you are here, I told myself, and turned around. Maram’s smile was reserved for a precious handful of her cousins, and she’d been sure to educate me on just how much of her goodwill was spread through court so that I wouldn’t accidentally compliment one of her disliked peers.
“Corypheus,” I murmured as the Vathek man bowed over my hand. It was not difficult to imitate the barely veiled disdain Maram had expressed toward him. I was hard pressed not to wipe my hand on my skirts when he released me at last. “You remember my fiancé, His Grace of the Banu Salih.”
“Yes, of course,” he said and straightened. It seemed Maram’s lip curl was a trait shared by all her distant kin. “The Upstart.”
I bristled, but held my tongue when Idris tightened his grip around me.
“How are your holdings faring, Cor?” Idris asked.
The vak Aphelion family held the oldest excelsior mine on Vaxor, the planet around which their own terraformed moon orbited. But its source was thinning after many centuries of mining. They were close to their end if the king continued to ignore their emptying coffers.
Corypheus, for his part, looked furious. Two red spots flamed to life on his cheeks. I said nothing because Maram would have said nothing. She enjoyed watching Corypheus twist in the wind. He’d had hopes, she told me, that his family could finagle an engagement out of the king. But nothing had come, and he’d become increasingly desperate.