by Lucy Tempest
My heart splintered into a million pieces.
“Ada, what do you say?”
I took a shuddering breath. “I say that neither of us can afford to think of ourselves. You have a responsibility to your people, and I have one to mine.”
“Ada—”
“They need you, your family needs you, and Fairuza really, really needs you.”
“What are you talking about?”
It was her secret, but he needed to know it.
I drew in a ragged breath. “Fairuza is cursed, Cyrus! And only by earning the love of the most noble of men can she break the curse.”
But even if he married her and couldn’t love her, she’d be as good as dead. Another doomed princess in the House of Shamash. A repeat of Jumana’s tragedy.
But with me gone, with Cyrus giving up on his dream of us, with Fairuza changed, he might love her, might save her…
“Ada. Ada, please,” he begged, pounding on the door with each word, desperation now filling his voice. “I can’t love anyone else. It’s beyond my control. I would be no good to her. She must find the man to love her to save her before it’s too late. We can both help her find him. But you have to stay with me. To do this and everything else with me. You can’t leave me, Ada, not after all this. You can’t do this to us.”
This wasn’t working. He wouldn’t go away, wouldn’t give up on me.
I raised my hand, watching my magic ring catch the afternoon light from my window and exhaled my anguish. “There is no us.”
“But there will be, if you just listen to me and trust me to find a way to fix this I promise you my father won’t be able to interfere. I—”
“I wish you would understand I’m doing what’s best for all of us,” I whispered to the ring with a heavy heart. “I wish you’d give up and leave.”
Cyrus stopped talking and moved off the door. I heard him walk away from my room and leave the hall, his fading footsteps as steady and as heavy as my heartbeats.
It was over.
I sagged down against the door, heaped on the ground and let go of my last shred of control.
I didn’t know how long I wept. All I knew was that I’d wasted enough time being a daydreaming, self-pitying fool.
But at least I had saved Cyrus from making a grave mistake. And if he forgot about me, I might have also saved Fairuza. Now I had to do what I’d come here to do, save the Fairborns.
Though my world and heart were shattered, after all I’d been through since I’d arrived in Cahraman, I now at least had power—and a plan.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
My plan was set. As was its backup.
The first one was simpler, depended on many variables, some I was certain of, some not so much. While the second was harder, but built around everything I’d learned in the past five weeks, about Nariman, and myself.
But both revolved around the ring. Around the symbol of our brief, tragic betrothal.
If either worked, Cyrus’s love for me might still end up saving us all.
Now was the ultimate test for the ring and my ability to wield it, a final run before I faced Nariman.
Opening the door, I raised the ring to my mouth and whispered, “I wish every guard on duty would fall into a trance.”
I peeked outside my room. None of the guards showed signs of being affected.
There wasn’t anything else I could do. I had to leave, unseen or not.
Chest tight, I exited my room.
The guards remained looking ahead as I passed as they always did, but as I approached the third guard, my tension began to ebb. They all had the same unfocused gaze, seemed unaware of my presence, or anything else.
It had worked!
More confident of my plan, I disguised myself with a shawl and headed back up to the king’s quarters, every step fueled with determination and dread.
I stopped at the corner before the king’s quarters.
The doors were closed and the guards stood in a stupor outside. But with the way their spears were held at attention, the king was inside.
It felt like it had been ages since I’d last staked out a target. I’d always studied the place and its people to know the first’s layout and the latter’s schedule and habits, charting my plan’s ins, outs, and contingencies.
In the perfect one I’d fantasized about, I would have stolen the lamp, confronted Nariman, gotten the Fairborns back, and returned to Cyrus. But with the reality of the heartrending developments, this was going to be a theft like any other—a break-in arranged on the day I skipped town, never to look back or be tracked down.
The idea that I could influence the king, make him give me the lamp, or approve of me—or both—flashed again, like an irresistible gleam of gold, blinding me to everything else.
And again, it took long, heart-pounding moments to squash the temptation.
Influencing others for their own good was one thing, doing it for my own gain was another. But to rob the king of his will, for the rest of his life, would be far worse than anything Nariman had done to me. To hold that kind of power over someone’s life would be destructive for them, corrupting for me, and catastrophic all around.
I wouldn’t do it. I couldn’t go down that road.
I only wished for him to leave his quarters.
Minutes passed with me crouching against the wall, my head swimming with too many emotions and worries. My target was on his bedside table of all places. It would have been better if it had been in a safe so he wouldn’t immediately notice its absence.
I was amending my wish that the king would also stay away for as long as it took me to escape when I almost blacked out with fright. The doors swung open suddenly, and the king strode out with two councilmen in maroon robes in his wake.
I hurried to hide behind a statue of Xerxes II, heard them coming my way. As they passed, I caught some of what Darius was saying.
“I should have never let myself agree to this,” he grumbled to his silent companions as they headed down the staircase. “I shouldn’t have trusted him to choose his own bride to begin with. I chose my own and look what that got me.”
He chose Jumana? I thought they were like Cyrus and Fairuza, forced together through every other consideration but choice.
That just made their story a lot worse than I thought it was.
It also made his reaction to me a bit more understandable.
Once they were out of my earshot, I rushed past the entranced guards and entered.
The king’s quarters were the size of our hall. The gigantic space was neatly arranged with gilded furniture, and his bed—predictably, king-sized—sprawled on a platform above the rest of the room. The bedside table was, to my surprise, cluttered, with the only personal touches I’d seen in this palace. It held an antique lantern, a colorful glasswork jar, a silver picture frame of a small painting, an incense burner and, finally, the reason I was here.
The lamp. As long as my forearm and shaped like a squat teapot with a snout-like spout. It felt strange to finally be so close to the reason my life had been turned inside out.
Picking it up, I examined it. It was heavy. I lifted its lid, but there was no inside. This lamp was made of pure, solid gold. On the surface, it served no further purpose. But I knew what was inside. A genie.
But why did Darius keep it by him the way people kept glasses of water? If he’d used it to banish Nariman, then he knew of the genie. Had he used it again since? Before? Did he use it as part of the kingdom’s magical defenses? Was it his, his family’s, or had she told the truth when she’d said it was hers, and he’d promised to marry her only to swindle her and use it against her?
None of my questions could have answers. Only those two knew the truth.
But since genies fulfilled wishes, and I’d proved I could command one effectively, my first plan was to try using that one. My genie couldn’t or wouldn’t bring me the Fairborns, but if I could command this one, too, maybe it would. I wouldn’t even need to d
eal with Nariman. Her threat would be gone, and she’d remain in exile outside of Cahraman and unable to hurt anyone.
For the next ten minutes, I tried everything to get a response out of the lamp.
I’d shaken it, rubbed it, talked to it, hit it—and nothing.
I couldn’t believe I had it in my hands after all this time and I could do nothing with it.
It couldn’t need a witch to work it, since Darius wasn’t one. So how did it work?
Frustrated, I examined it closely. The only mark on it was a pattern around its lid. At closer inspection, it looked like calligraphic etchings that resembled ancient Cahramani, but not exactly.
I was starting to wonder if I’d gotten it all wrong. That there was no genie, and Dairus had banished Nariman with something else entirely.
I wished for answers from my ring, but it yielded none.
This meant it was on to the second plan. I’d always feared, and expected, it would come down to that, anyway.
So far, the only reliable power the ring had let me exercise had been over my own body and the wills of others.
That would have to do.
Tucking the lamp into my sack, I rushed out. .
Passing by my room on the way to our old dorm and the trapdoor leading to the tunnels, I found an armored Ayman. He was nudging an unresponsive guard.
At my approach, Ayman whirled around, bumping into the column where the bust of Princess Zafira perched, nearly knocking it off its platform. “What happened?”
“I don’t know,” I wheezed, the lamp feeling as heavy as my guilt. Over what I’d done to him, to Cyrus. “Ayman, I know I don’t have the right to ask anything of you, but can you tell me if the tunnel in our old dorm can lead out to the city?”
Instead of answering, he leveled me with a probing stare. “What happened with Cyrus then?”
“Please, don’t ask,” I begged him, the sound of Cyrus’s name was enough to drive me to the verge of collapse. “Just answer me because I really must leave now. I’ll understand if you won’t.”
I expected him to ask more questions, to argue, or worse, arrest me, but he just ran beside me. “It can lead out to different parts of the city, but the fastest way down is the train. If you take a right before the vault, then another, you can follow the tunnel right to its stop outside the palace.”
Brimming with disbelief, I breathed raggedly. “Thank you!”
He made no response.
Upon arriving at my old quarters, I burst in and came to a stuttering halt.
Sitting on her old bed between her luggage, Cora wiggled her fingers at me. “Leaving without me?”
I shut the door in Ayman’s face, flattening against it. “What are you doing here?”
“Figured you’d split after the king’s tantrum. And I’m taking his behavior at lunch as my long-awaited dismissal. I had a feeling you’d escape through the trapdoor under Cherine’s bed—before you ask, yes, I saw you use it—and I thought we could leave together.” She stretched her neck. “What you got there? Loot?”
I showed her the inside of my bag.
Her face warped in an unimpressed scowl. “That’s the infamous lamp? I expected better craftsmanship, maybe some opals and rubies.”
“There’s nothing in it either. I’m starting to think I was wrong about the genie thing.”
“It’s better if you are.” She jumped off the bed, heaving up her bags. “Let’s go before they notice it’s gone.”
“Wait, are you just leaving or are you coming with me?”
“Coming with you then leaving. You need a hand with what you’re dealing with.”
Touched beyond words, my mouth wobbled. “Really?”
“Yes, really.” She raised a balled fist. “Tell me I get to punch something today, please.”
Though she was joking, knowing what she was capable of helped ease my worries.
I was really going to miss her.
But I had to warn her first. “It’s not a mindless ghoul we’re going to face, Cora. Nariman is probably as dangerous as Marzeya.”
She only shrugged. “All the more reason you need my help.”
I exhaled, giving her a thankful smile. “Let’s go then.”
Ayman slammed the door open, stood blocking it with spread arms. Behind him, still in her white silk nightgown, stood Fairuza!
“She followed us here,” he said, apologetic. “Do I let her pass?”
Swallowing, I waved her in.
Ducking under his arm, she rushed to me. “Are you leaving?” When I nodded, she exclaimed, “Why?”
Facing her now, I remembered our test at the courthouse, with the two widows fighting over the child. One wanted him to maintain her way of life and the other let him go for his own safety and stability. But this was far more complicated. By letting Cyrus go, I let him keep his life and future, giving him a chance to keep her alive.
It would be like I’d never been here to upset their plans and expectations. I hoped.
“Because you’re the only option for Cyrus the king will consider,” I said, throat tight. “You have a chance now.”
“But I really don’t.” Fairuza wrapped shaking arms around her middle, hair falling out of its loose bun, a dark, glossy frame for her pale, haunted face. “He won’t ever love me. Even if it’s possible, it won’t be in time to break the curse.”
“You can still try.” My vision swam, blurring her before me. “You have to.”
“Ada, I…” she trailed off, mouth agape as she came closer and set her hands on my arms and her head on my shoulder in a light, tense embrace. “I’m sorry I was so horrible to you.”
I sniffled, hugging her back. “It doesn’t matter now.”
Shaking her head against my shoulder with a sob, she pulled back.
As she walked to the door, she gave me a small, sad smile. “Goodbye, Ada.”
Hearing her say my name for the first time was a foreign feeling. Perhaps I was becoming a person worthy of remembering to her. Someone I hoped she lived long enough to remember.
“I’ll show you the way,” Ayman said as he went beneath what used to be Cherine’s bed. My jaw dropped as I heard him removing the loose tile then calling out, “Let’s go.”
Cora nudged me forwards. “How did you get him to help you out?”
The trade-off had been introducing him to Cherine, who’d come to fear him and dream of him on that bed. What Cora had witnessed going disastrously wrong.
And yet, he was still helping me.
Spiraling in worsening guilt, I slid in first, and then we climbed down after him.
I was ready for the drop this time, only stumbled but didn’t fall flat on my face like that first time. Cora managed it easily, landing solidly on her feet.
Ayman looked as awful as I felt as we followed him through the tunnel. I wanted to console him, or to tell him he’d chosen the worst possible candidate for his affections in Cherine, or that she might still come around after she calmed down. But in that acute time of hurt, it would be like pouring acid into his wounds.
When we went in deep enough to find the magical blue-green fire torches, I slowed down to look behind me, my heart squeezing so tightly it felt it was imploding.
I never got to say goodbye to Cyrus.
Just like I never had to my mother or Bonnie.
As the wave of desolation crashed on me, only one thing mitigated my misery.
That I was doing this so I wouldn’t have to say goodbye to Bonnie. And so that Cyrus would one day become the best king Cahraman had ever known.
Cora pulled me behind her, snatching me out of my wretched thoughts as Ayman led us deeper inside the mountain, on a path that would finally take me out of the palace.
The palace that had been both a cage that fostered my sorrow and desperation and a trove of friendship and love.
A love I’d now lost forever.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
My mind finally stalled when we boarded the train.
Ayman, who’d discarded his armor at the tunnels, wore the hood of his cloak low to avoid attention and Cora had kicked off her shoes, bare toes finally free to wiggle among the bristles of the carpet. I was crumpled in the corner of my window seat, watching Sunstone Palace leave my sight and the distant, glittering details of the city below become larger and clearer as we spiraled towards it.
By the time the train reached its final station at the city walls, my eyes felt worn out and friable from the outpour of anguish. I rubbed at them, breaking off lashes, feeling as if my puffy lids might crumble and come off on my fingers, too.
The train stopped with a scraping screech of metal and aggravated puffs of steam. A horn brayed through the air, telling us to disembark.
Ayman moved first. He carried Cora’s bags out as she helped me up and we followed him down and out, wading through the growing crowd on the platform.
She squeezed me against her side in a one-armed hug. “It will be over soon.”
Letting myself lean on her, I gathered all my remaining strength. I needed to be in control to face Nariman, and to enact my plan.
It would work. There was no reason for it not to. This time, I wouldn’t even consider the worst. This time I was winning.
“It will,” I said firmly, to myself more than to her.
“That’s good then. ُYou’ll get your family, then we can both go home.
I caught her arm. “You can come with us for a visit on the way back if you’d like.”
A look of affection lit her usually dispassionate face.
I impulsively hugged her, and after a moment of surprise, she hugged me back as fervently.
“Please do come, I don’t want to lose you too now,” I choked against her shoulder as Ayman came back to hurry us out.
We followed him across the threshold of the city gates.
Ayman pointed to a caravan, much like the one that had carried me into the city what felt like a lifetime ago.