“Your good looks and what remains of your identity as Joaidane. Your autonomy. Surrender what remains of your freedom and power as an ifrit, and then I will believe you truly love this girl.”
His hopes disintegrated. “You would make me a human?”
Plump lips pursed in thought before she answered. “No, not human. I would leave you a mere scrap of magic and make you a jinni, bound to this hideous and fragile body and bound to the service of others.”
“Is this your new amusement for me, Queen Yasmina? My suffering as a weak and common jinni?” Until wished by their master, a jinni bound in servitude to a human lacked access to his powers. The weakest of them required gifts given freely in exchange. Usually a gold coin for mere tricks or sentimental item for the most powerful spells.
Compassionate masters received that kindness back threefold, while those bound to harsh slavers gave only what was asked of them until their inevitable escape.
Her eyes flashed brightly. “Is that how you think of them? Weak and common?”
“No, my queen, it’s only that—”
“Weak and common.” She spit the words with the force of a verbal whip, each lash harder than the last. “And for this reason and many others, I see no reason to coddle you. What was given in kindness will be stripped anew. Until the day your curse is broken, you will remain in this body, a jinni compelled to serve mortals in exchange for mere tokens of gratitude.”
“Then I’ll do it. I love her. I… Tell me what’s happened.”
Smoldering eyes stared at him, burning through to his soul as the deal was struck. Agony ripped down the center of his chest, and his powers were torn from him in entirety, leaving little more than a magic-imbued husk. He gasped and fell to his hands and knees in the hot sand.
In the next second, Yasmina shared visions of his lover’s future with him. By the end, he wept in the sand in disbelief and anger for what her father had done and brought upon her family.
“It is done. As for your human, these events have not yet come to pass, but I see them etched in the Great Tapestry of Fate. You’ll find your mortal at the sultan’s castle when you return. Now go. Go now before it’s too late.”
With her blessing and the rejuvenating water from the well, Joaidane made it back to the oasis in half the time. Sensing his distress, Mithran trotted to him.
“Fly like the wind, Mithran. Zarina’s life depends on us.”
Chapter
An intoxicating haze wrapped around Darrius, fueled by potent liquor and sweeter smoke. As was custom, he had joined his fellow merchants for their monthly high-stakes game. Solterras had no place among them, and each man had a pile of rubles on the table.
The fates had been kind so far, granting him two winning hands early in the evening. The sum piled before him even surpassed the fortune of their esteemed visitor. Although he owned the den, the sultan’s nephew and grand advisor had never joined their table before. He’d always observed from above them, surrounded by his women as enormous quantities of gold transitioned from gamers to the house pot.
Something had changed. The nobleman studied them all with cool eyes and a thin smile from their level. For the first time, Vizier Bijam had joined them in the private room.
“Before we draw the next hand, I believe refreshments are in order,” Bijam said. One clap of his hands summoned three women from the adjoining room, each dressed in the semi-translucent silk garb of the palace harem.
“We must thank you again for the generosity of allowing us your servants,” Hakkas told the vizier. The wealthy gem merchant eyed the ladies with a lascivious smile. He kept two mistresses in addition to a wife always outfitted in the finest fashions and loveliest jewelry.
“It’s my honor to share such beautiful pleasures, just as it is their honor to serve.” Bijam leaned back in his chair with his hands folded against his chest and smiled. The girls refilled cups and added more herbs to the brazier. Bijam caught one around the waist and pulled her into his lap.
In his kindness, the vizier had brought not only girls but also a delicious cordial brewed from dragonthorn. The hardy shrub grew in the deepest desert, far from any oasis, and only tenacious explorers could harvest it to create aphrodisiacs prized by the elite.
When news reached him of the children acquiring enough to sell in the shop, he’d rushed there one night and found only their standard stock. Rummaging around through the stores had also revealed hidden sorcery, magical defenses armed to shock any intruder until his hair stood on end and his fingers blistered. He’d scowled and left his own store empty-handed.
Damned kids. Didn’t they realize the store belonged to him?
“Your deal, Darrius.” Azir passed the cards to him, then leaned back in his seat and stroked his long, graying beard. The humble vintner was the friendliest of them, a man of sixty-three who always wore his thinning hair beneath a violet wrap.
Darrius dealt the next round while his acquaintances enjoyed the company of the harem girls. Each was pretty, he supposed, but they didn’t hold a candle to his deceased wife, Renata. He dulled the stab of pain invoked by her memory with a long drink. The burning heat spread through his body, replacing melancholy with brash confidence.
“You haven’t seen beautiful until you’ve set eyes upon my daughter. Even though Kazim is to inherit the business, his sister works harder than any other. In her spare time, she sews robes and dresses to sell at the market. She’ll have a shop of her own one day, my Zarina.” Darrius chuckled and pushed another stack of coins toward the center of the table, upping his bet.
What would he do without his sweet daughter?
He hadn’t been kind enough to her, but he planned to improve. Once he made off with his winnings, he’d track down Renata’s silk scarf he’d taken months ago, buy it back from the merchant, and give it to Zarina. It was the one item she hadn’t been able to find, or so he overheard one night when she and Kazim believed him to be too drunk to notice.
This is the start of a new beginning, Darrius thought. I will no longer sell Renata’s things. I’ll prove the children wrong.
Hakkas chortled. “Your daughter sells rags at a vendor. Mine has borne me seven grandsons, each one smarter than the last.”
Azir snorted. “Who cares of sewing skirts and bearing brats? My daughter is an accomplished sorceress like no other. I sent her abroad to Liang to learn the art of the flame, and she’s found a Liangese nobleman. His family paid me to keep her. My new son came with a dowry of five thousand rubles. Can you believe it? She is a grand duchess now and happier than me!”
Not to be outdone by Azir, Darrius cut in with another boast. “There is no sorcery greater than my Zarina’s. She can spin straw into gold.”
The whole table erupted into laughter.
“Please.” Hakkas snorted. “If such were true, you would be drowning in more riches than even you could squander.”
“Oh? And how would I do such when all the straw goes to the palace stables? But I tell you, she can do it.” He raised his wager to remain in the game.
Bijam leaned forward. “Boasts will not win your hand, spice man. But I have heard exaggerated tales of your daughter’s beauty. Perhaps one day I should visit to see if the claims are true. She can’t be too impressive to remain home at her age.”
Furious heat spread from Darrius’s collar to his face. But he said nothing, lacking the courage to stand up against the sultan’s powerful nephew. Not when Bijam owned shares in every gambling den and half the cordial houses across Naruk.
Bijam smirked. “Now, show your hands, gentlemen.”
One by one, they spread their cards on the table, revealing a combination of losing hands. In a blink, over half his accumulated winnings vanished, taken by the vizier.
Discouraged by the loss, Darrius sat out the next game as the tower of golden coins grew. Hakkas took the round, raking in a miniature mountain of gold. And he took the one after that as well, acquiring even more of Bijam’s fortune.
&
nbsp; Envious, Darrius glowered from his spot at the table and counted what remained of his winnings.
“What a shame that you cannot play. You hardly have anything. Except for your pride, and I suspect even that is damaged.” Hakkas laughed.
“Perhaps I was rude to bring your daughter’s appearance into our discussion. Allow me to make amends for it and float you with another loan since you’ve at last repaid the previous one,” Bijam offered. He leaned forward and refilled Darrius’s glass, then dealt him several cards from the stack. “What do you say, my friend? Will you chance your hand against my loan?”
Darrius looked down at his cards, then to his pitiful stack of coins. Destiny had been kind before, and he was certain she was aiding him again. His hand was strong, better than any other from the night.
But if he were wise, he’d drop out and go home. “I’ll take your loan,” he said.
And then he won the game.
Hakkas growled under his breath. “Shit.”
Darrius grinned at his friend. “My pride seems to be just fine. What of yours?”
“It’ll survive,” Hakkas gritted back.
The next round brought a sheen of sweat to Darrius’s brow. His weak starting hand teased his insecurities and threatened his meager fortune. Then he drew two more favorable cards, and his confidence skyrocketed.
He could win. He could win another game and have the coin to visit the pawnbroker to recover all of Renata’s lost goods.
Then the children wouldn’t scorn him anymore. Kazim and Zarina would look up to him again. He could marry his daughter off to her unknown sorcerer and save her good name.
One of the harem girls dabbed Darrius’s brow with a handkerchief.
“Raise your bet?” Bijam asked.
Darrius hesitated. If he raised it anymore, his entire pot of winnings would be at stake. But if he backed down, he’d forever be seen as a coward in the eyes of the wealthiest and most influential man in Samahara next to the sultan himself.
If he dropped out, he’d have enough money to repay Bijam’s loan and go home with a considerable prize.
“I’ll raise it,” he said.
The other participants dropped out, setting their cards down one at a time.
“Too much for me. Farrah would skin me if I came home penniless again,” Azir said.
“Then I’ll remain in the game,” Darrius muttered. He pushed the rest of his pot toward the center and then drew a card, discarding the unfavorable one he didn’t need. A golden ifrit joined the four princes in his hand.
“Now then,” Bijam said. “Let’s see your hand.”
As Darrius laid his cards on the table, Bijam spread a sultan and four golden ifrit cards beside them.
“Huh? That’s not possible. There are only four ifrit in a...” Darrius glanced down again. He had a silver jinni. No. I know what I saw. I had a golden ifrit. I won that game. I won!
Vizier Bijam’s satisfied smile glowed from across the table. “Yes, there are only four, and I seem to have drawn each of them.”
Numbed by the loss and unable to rip his gaze away from the cards on the table, Darrius remained motionless long after Azir swept them together into a new deck. “I don’t understand… I was certain…”
Hakkas howled with laughter. “You’ve lost again, Darrius. Once a loser, always a loser. As always, you leave with nothing.”
“And you owe His Excellency,” Azir murmured.
“Indeed,” Vizier Bijam said. He flashed them a smarmy grin and rose from the table.
After the game ended for the night, Hakkas snickered and left the room. Azir squeezed his shoulder in passing. As the last to leave, Darrius took the long path home from the cordial house.
That dirty, rotten cheat of a mage had swindled him out of his wealth and put him in debt at the same time. Dreading the arrival home to the children who expected the worst of him, he circled around by the fountain and considered his options.
How had things gone so wrong? Was there anything to sell that wouldn’t invite Zarina to stare at him with fury and disgust in her eyes—in Renata’s eyes. She and her brother had their mother’s sterling gray eyes.
He couldn’t go home. Not yet.
“A moment, Darrius. There’s a matter to resolve regarding your debt.” Bijam’s voice cut through the shadows, and the man emerged from darkness flanked by a pair of palace guards armed with enormous scimitars and heavy cudgels.
Darrius stiffened. “I will need time to collect it, Your Excellency. There’s no way to gather a hundred rubles at this hour while the bank is closed.”
“Ah, ah, ah. I’m afraid that won’t work. You owe me far too much money to leave my sight this evening.”
“There’s nothing else that will work. You took me for everything I had.”
“Everything you had and more, I fear. You won’t be allowed in my establishment anymore.”
The two hulking giants closed in on Darrius, one moving up to each side and sizing him up with sadistic smiles on their heavily bearded faces. One palmed the grip of his baton.
“You cheated me with magic, and this is how you treat me?”
“Break his legs,” Bijam ordered.
Darrius blinked. “What?”
“You’ve damaged my honor with your outlandish accusation. I can respond no other way.” Bijam nodded to the man standing on his left. “Do it.”
“No, not my legs! Please, I beg of you, give me a chance to acquire the money I owe—”
The thick baton crashed into Darrius’s left knee, dropping him like a stone to the ground. Explosions of pain radiated up and down his leg as the guards carried out a merciless, brutal attack, efficiently kicking and beating him.
When the commotion broke out, the few nearby onlookers scattered. Passersby at the edge of the residential square hurried away. Doors closed and windows shut.
With batons and staves, they beat him over and over, cracking polished wood against his hips and lower body. He roared in pain when his shin snapped beneath a guard’s foot and the fractured bone pierced the taut skin and protruded through his flesh.
A breathless palace guard wiped a few specks of blood from his cudgel. “What should we do with him, Vizier Bijam?”
“Leave him.” The sultan’s nephew gazed at the house in the distance. “But fetch the girl before we leave. Whether or not she can truly spin straw into gold will be determined at the palace. And if not… I am certain we have other uses for her.”
Chapter
A loud crash startled Zarina from her bed seconds after she closed her eyes to sleep. It had been a long day, and early nights of sleep were a necessity when Joaidane was due to return before the week’s end.
“Kazim? Father?”
She threw on a robe and hurried from her room, expecting to find her shambling drunk of a father bouncing off the furniture or knocking over the shelves in the foyer. Instead, she found Kazim with a sword pointed at his throat by a royal guard.
“Please,” her brother said, “whatever slight has been given, allow us to make amends.”
“Oh, you’ll make amends,” the guard said. “You. Girl. Your presence is commanded.”
Freezing in the doorway, she stared at the burly guard and shrank away a step. “I don’t understand. If you’ll just allow me a moment to fetch my father—”
“Your father?” The guard’s insidious chuckle twisted knots of tension into her belly. “Your father has been disciplined for transgressions against Vizier Bijam. You, girl, will pay his debts.”
“Never!” Kazim cried.
Zarina had watched her hotheaded brother get into fights for her family’s honor all his life, defending either her father’s drunken reputation or her failure to acquire a husband. He tensed, ready to spring forward in her defense, but she lunged forward and grabbed his arm.
“Don’t, Kazim!” Her mother’s death had been hardship enough without bearing witness to her brother’s murder too. Unarmed and going up against two palace gu
ards, he’d have no chance. They would fillet him like a fish and leave his remains strewn over the floor. “I’ll go with them.”
The guard reached for her. “Smart girl. Now come.”
“I must change,” she said. “I’m not properly dressed for travel or the company of Vizier Bijam.”
The man’s gaze raked over her night attire, and a big grin curved his thick lips, revealing chipped and tobacco-yellowed teeth. “I think not. You will come as you are.”
The pair allowed her a cloak but nothing else. Treated no differently than a criminal, they marched her toward the town square where a man waited upon horseback. Identifying him by the familial resemblance to the sultan, she shivered and bowed at the waist until her long hair drifted toward the dusty ground.
“Do you know why you were brought before me, girl?”
“No, Your Excellency. I was only told that my father wronged you.” She kept her gaze lowered.
“Your father has boasted you to be a skilled artisan beyond compare, able to spin gold from straw.”
Nothing could have startled her more. Her gaze snapped upward to the vizier’s sneering face. A protest died on her tongue, mouth too dry to form words of disagreement. A harsh, awkward lull passed before she could utter a word. “I… with all respect, Your Excellency, my father is a drunk.”
“So he is, and a terrible card player as well. His debts leave few options, so I shall bring you now to the sultan. Whatever he decides, you will pay off your father’s transgressions.” He clapped, and the guard beside her snapped to attention. “Bring her.”
The rough soldier tossed Zarina over the back of a saddle and mounted behind her. Never before had she been so humiliated as she was now, lying on her stomach across the stinking, sweat-stained leather as if she were a common whore from the red silk district. The gelding’s gait dug the pommel into her belly with every step through the city until the journey brought her before the majestic Ruby Palace.
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