The girl crept forward, keeping her gaze carefully on the floor while bearing a large tin tray. “Breakfast, my lady.”
Nahri wasn’t hungry but couldn’t resist a peek at the tray. What came out of the palace kitchens amazed her just as much as the contents of her wardrobe. Any food she wanted, in any quantity, at any time. Upon this morning’s tray was a steaming stack of fluffy flatbreads sprinkled with sesame seeds, a bowl of blushing apricots, and several of the ground pistachio pastries with cardamom cream she liked. The scent of minty green tea rose from the copper kettle.
“Thank you,” Nahri said and motioned toward the sheer curtains leading to the garden. “You can leave it out there.”
She slid out of bed and wrapped a soft shawl around her bare shoulders. Her fingers brushed the small weight at her hip, as they did at least a dozen times a day. Dara’s dagger. He’d given it to her before he’d gone off on his stupid, suicidal mission to hunt the ifrit.
She closed her eyes, fighting the ache in her chest. The thought of her easily provoked Afshin, surrounded by djinn soldiers, seeking out the same ifrit who’d nearly killed them was enough to catch her breath.
No, she told herself. Don’t even start. Fretting over Dara would help neither of them; the Afshin was more than capable of taking care of himself, and Nahri didn’t need any distractions. Especially not today.
“Shall I comb your hair, my lady?” her servant piped up, pulling her from her thoughts.
“What? No . . . it’s fine like this,” Nahri said distractedly as she brushed her messy curls off her shoulders and crossed the room for a glass of water.
The girl raced her to the jug. “Your robes, then?” she asked as she poured a glass. “I’ve had the ceremonial Nahid garments cleaned and pressed—”
“No,” Nahri cut in, more sharply than she’d intended. The girl shrank back as if she’d been slapped, and Nahri winced at the fear in her face. She hadn’t meant to scare her. “I’m sorry. Look . . .” Nahri wracked her mind for the girl’s name, but she had been so bombarded by new information each day, it eluded her. “Could I have a few minutes to myself?”
The girl blinked like a frightened kitten. “No. I-I mean . . . I cannot leave, Banu Nahida,” she pleaded in a tiny whisper. “I am to be available—”
“I can take care of Banu Nahri this morning, Dunoor.” A calm, measured voice spoke up from the garden.
The shafit girl bowed and was gone, fleeing before the speaker parted the curtains. Nahri raised her eyes to the ceiling. “You’d think I ran around lighting people on fire and poisoning their tea,” she complained. “I don’t understand why people here are so afraid of me.”
Nisreen entered the chamber without a sound. The older woman moved like a ghost. “Your mother enjoyed a rather . . . fearsome reputation.”
“Yes, but she was a true Nahid,” Nahri countered. “Not some lost shafit who can’t conjure up a flame.” She joined Nisreen on the pavilion overlooking the gardens. The white marble flushed pink in the rosy dawn light, and a pair of tiny birds twittered and splashed in the fountain.
“It’s only been a couple of weeks, Nahri. Give yourself time.” Nisreen gave her a sardonic smile. “Soon you’ll be capable of conjuring up enough flames to burn down the infirmary. And you’re not a shafit, no matter your appearance. The king said so himself.”
“Well, I’m glad he’s so certain,” Nahri muttered. Ghassan had done his part in their deal, publicly declaring Nahri to be Manizheh’s long-lost, pureblooded daughter, claiming her human appearance was the result of a marid curse.
Yet Nahri herself was still not convinced. With every passing day in Daevabad, she became more attuned to the differences between purebloods and shafit. The air grew warm around the elegant purebloods; they breathed deeper, their hearts beat more slowly, and their luminous skin gave off a smoky odor that stung her nose. She could not help but compare the iron scent of her red blood; the salty taste of her sweat; the slower, more awkward way her body moved. She certainly felt shafit.
“You should eat something,” Nisreen said lightly. “You have an important day ahead of you.”
Nahri picked up a pastry and turned it over in her hands before putting it back down, feeling nauseated. “Important” was an understatement. Today was the first day Nahri was going to treat a patient. “I’m sure I can just as easily kill someone on an empty stomach.”
Nisreen gave her a look. Her mother’s former aide was one hundred and fifty years old—a number she offered with the air of someone discussing the weather—but her sharp black eyes seemed ageless.
“You’re not going to kill anyone,” Nisreen said evenly. She said everything with such confidence. Nisreen struck Nahri as one of the most steadily capable people she’d ever met, a woman who’d not only easily thwarted Zaynab’s attempt to embarrass Nahri, but had also handled over a century’s worth of God only knew what sort of magical maladies. “It’s a simple procedure,” she added.
“Extracting a fire salamander from someone’s body is simple?” Nahri shuddered. “I still don’t understand why you chose this as my first assignment. I don’t see why I even have a first assignment. Physicians train for years in the human world, and I’m expected to just go out and start cutting magical reptiles out of people after listening to you lecture for a few—”
“We do things differently here,” Nisreen interrupted. She pushed a cup of hot tea in Nahri’s hands and motioned her back inside the room. “Take some tea. And sit,” she added, pointing to a chair. “You cannot see the public looking like that.”
Nahri obeyed, and Nisreen retrieved a comb from a nearby chest and started on Nahri’s hair, raking it down her scalp to separate the braids. Nahri closed her eyes, enjoying the feel of the comb’s sharp teeth and the expert tugging of Nisreen’s fingers.
I wonder if my mother ever braided my hair.
The tiny thought bubbled up, a crack in the armor Nahri had settled over that part of herself. It was a foolish notion; from the sound of things, Nahri had no sooner been born than her mother had been killed. Manizheh never had the chance to braid Nahri’s hair, nor witness her first steps; she hadn’t lived long enough to teach her daughter Nahid magic, nor listen to her complain about arrogant, handsome men eager to rush after danger.
Nahri’s throat tightened. In many ways it had been easier to assume her parents neglectful bastards who’d abandoned her. She might not remember her mother, but the thought of the woman who birthed her being viciously murdered was not something easily ignored.
Nor was the fact that her unknown father might still be in Daevabad. Nahri could only imagine the gossip swirling about that, but Nisreen had warned her that her father was a subject best avoided. The king was apparently not pleased to have learned of Manizheh’s indiscretion.
Nisreen finished her fourth braid, weaving a sprig of sweet basil into the ends. “What’s that for?” Nahri asked, eager for a distraction from her dark thoughts.
“Luck.” Nisreen smiled, looking slightly self-conscious. “It’s something my people used to do for girls back home.”
“Back home?”
Nisreen nodded. “I’m from Anshunur originally. A village on the southern coast of Daevastana. My parents were priests; our ancestors ran the temple there for centuries.”
“Really?” Nahri sat up, intrigued. After Dara, it was strange to be around someone who spoke so openly about their background. “So what brought you to Daevabad?”
The older woman seemed to hesitate, her fingers trembling upon Nahri’s braid. “The Nahids, actually,” she said softly. When Nahri frowned in confusion, Nisreen explained. “My parents were killed by djinn raiders when I was young. I was badly injured, so the survivors brought me to Daevabad. Your mother healed me, and then she and her brother took me in.”
Nahri was horrified. “I’m sorry,” she blurted out. “I had no idea.”
Nisreen shrugged though Nahri spotted a flicker of grief in her dark eyes. “It’s all righ
t. It’s not uncommon. People bring offerings to their temples; they’re wealthy targets.” She stood. “And I had a good life with the Nahids. I found a lot of satisfaction working in the infirmary. Though on the topic of our faith . . .” Nisreen crossed the room, heading for the neglected fire altar across the room. “I see you’ve let your altar go out again.”
Nahri winced. “It’s been a few days since I refilled the oil.”
“Nahri, we’ve discussed this.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Upon her arrival, the Daevas had gifted Nahri with Manizheh’s personal fire altar, a guilt-inducing piece of metal and water, restored and polished to perfection. The altar was about half her height, a silver basin filled with water kept at a constant simmer by the tiny glass oil lamps bobbing upon its surface. A pile of cedar sticks smoldered on the small cupola that rose from the basin’s center.
Nisreen refilled the lamps from a silver pitcher nearby and plucked a cedar stick from the consecrated tools meant to maintain the altar. She used it to relight the flames and then beckoned Nahri closer.
“You should try to take better care of this,” Nisreen admonished, though her voice stayed gentle. “Our faith is an important part of our culture. You’re worried about treating a patient? Then why not touch the same tools your grandparents once did? Kneel and pray as your mother would have before attempting a new procedure.” She motioned for Nahri to bow her head. “Take strength from the one connection to your family you still have.”
Nahri sighed but allowed Nisreen to mark her forehead with ash. She probably could use all the luck she could get today.
About half the size of the enormous audience chamber, the infirmary was a spartan room of plain whitewashed walls, a blue stone floor, and a lofty domed ceiling made entirely of tempered glass that let in sunlight. One wall was given over to apothecary ingredients, hundreds of glass and copper shelves of varying sizes. Another section of the room was her workplace: a scattering of low tables crowded with tools and failed pharmaceutical attempts, and a heavy sandblasted glass desk in one corner surrounded by bookshelves and a large fire pit.
The other side of the room was meant for patients and typically curtained off. But today the curtain was drawn back to reveal an empty couch and a small table. Nisreen swooped past with a tray of supplies. “They should be here any moment. I’ve already prepared the elixir.”
“And you still think this is a smart idea?” Nahri swallowed, anxious. “I’ve not had the best luck with my abilities so far.”
That was an understatement. Nahri had assumed being a healer to the djinn would be similar to being a healer among humans, her time spent correcting broken bones, birthing babies, and stitching up wounds. As it turned out, the djinn didn’t need much help with those sorts of ailments—purebloods anyway. Instead, they needed a Nahid when it got . . . complicated. And what was complicated?
Stripes were common in infants born during the darkest hour of the night. The bite of a simurgh—firebirds the djinn enjoyed racing—would cause one to slowly burn up from the inside. Sweating silver droplets was a constant irritation in the spring. It was possible to accidentally create an evil duplicate, to transform one’s hands into flowers, to be hexed with hallucinations, or to be turned into an apple—an incredibly grave insult to one’s honor.
The cures were little better. The leaves from the very tops of cypress trees—and only the very tops—could be boiled into a solution that when blown upon by a Nahid opened up the lungs. A ground pearl mixed with just the right amount of turmeric could help an infertile woman conceive, but the resulting infant would smell a bit salty and be terribly sensitive to shellfish. And it wasn’t just the illnesses and their associated cures that sounded unbelievable, but the endless list of situations that seemed entirely unrelated to health.
“It’s a long shot, but sometimes a two-week dose of hemlock, dove’s tail, and garlic—taken every sunrise outdoors—can cure a nasty case of chronic unluckiness,” Nisreen told her last week.
Nahri remembered her stunned disbelief. “Hemlock is poisonous. And how is being unlucky an illness?”
The science behind it all made little sense. Nisreen went on and on about the four humors that made up the djinn body and the importance of keeping them balanced. Fire and air were to exactly even each other out at twice the amount of blood and four times the amount of bile. To become unbalanced could cause a wasting disease, insanity, feathers . . .
“Feathers?” Nahri had repeated incredulously.
“Too much air,” Nisreen had explained. “Obviously.”
And though Nahri was trying, it was all too much to take in, day after day, hour after hour. Since arriving at the palace, she had yet to leave the wing that housed her quarters and the infirmary; she wasn’t sure she was even permitted to leave, and when Nahri asked if she could learn to read—as she’d dreamed of doing for years—the older woman had gotten strangely cagey, muttering something about the Nahid texts being forbidden before promptly changing the subject. Besides her terrified servants and Nisreen, Nahri had no other company. Zaynab had politely invited her for tea twice, but Nahri turned her down—she didn’t intend to consume liquids near that girl again. But she was an extrovert, used to chatting with clients and roaming all over Cairo. The isolation and single-minded focus of her training had her ready to burst.
And she sensed her frustration was curbing her abilities. Nisreen repeated what Dara had already told her: blood and intent were vital in magic. Many of the medicines Nahri studied simply wouldn’t work without a believing Nahid to produce them. You couldn’t stir a potion, grind a powder, or even lay your hands upon a patient without a firm trust in what you were doing. And Nahri didn’t have that.
And then yesterday Nisreen had announced—rather abruptly—that they were changing tactics. The king wanted to see her heal someone, and Nisreen agreed, believing that if Nahri was given the chance to treat a few carefully selected patients, the theories would make more sense to her. Nahri thought that sounded like a great way to slowly reduce Daevabad’s population, but it didn’t seem as if she had much say in the matter.
There was a knock at the door. Nisreen eyed her. “You’ll be fine. Have faith.”
Her patient was an older woman, accompanied by a man who looked like her son. When Nisreen greeted them in Divasti, Nahri sighed with relief, hoping her own people would be more sympathetic to her inexperience. Nisreen led the woman to the bed and helped her remove a long midnight-colored chador. Underneath, the woman’s steel gray hair was arranged in an elaborately braided nest. Gold embroidery winked from her dark crimson gown, and large clusters of rubies hung from each ear. She pursed her painted lips and gave Nisreen a distinctly unimpressed look while her son—dressed in similar finery—hovered nervously over her.
Nahri took a deep breath and then walked over, pressing her palms together like she’d seen others of her tribe do. “Peace be upon you.”
The man pressed his own hands together and fell into a low bow. “It is the greatest honor, Banu Nahida,” he said in a hushed voice. “May the fires burn brightly for you. I pray the Creator blesses you with the longest of lives and the merriest of children and—”
“Oh, calm yourself, Firouz,” the old woman interrupted. She considered Nahri with skeptical black eyes. “You’re Banu Manizheh’s daughter?” she sniffed. “Awfully human looking.”
“Madar!” Firouz hissed, clearly embarrassed. “Be polite. I told you about the curse, remember?”
He’s the gullible one, Nahri decided, and then she cringed, a little ashamed to have thought it. These people were patients, not marks.
“Hmm.” The woman must have picked up on Nahri’s attitude. Her eyes glittered like a crow’s. “So you can fix me?”
Nahri plucked a wicked-looking silver scalpel off the tray and twirled it in her fingers. “Insha’Allah.”
“She certainly can.” Nisreen slid smoothly between them. “It’s a simple task.” She pulled Nahri off to where she�
��d already prepared the elixir. “Watch your tone,” she warned. “And don’t speak that Geziriyya-sounding human tongue in here. Her family is a powerful one.”
“Ah, then by all means, let’s experiment on her.”
“It’s a simple procedure,” Nisreen assured for the hundredth time. “We’ve gone over this. Have her drink the elixir, look for the salamander, and extract it. You are the Banu Nahida; it should be as obvious to you as a black spot on the eye.”
Simple. Nahri’s hands were trembling, but she sighed and took the elixir from Nisreen. The silver cup warmed in her hands, and the amber liquid started to steam. She crossed back to the old woman and handed it to her, watching as she took a sip.
Her patient made a face. “This is really quite awful. Do you have anything to cut the bitterness? A sweet, perhaps?”
Nahri raised her eyebrows. “Was the salamander coated in honey when you swallowed it?”
The woman looked insulted. “I did not swallow it. I was hexed. Probably by my neighbor Rika. You know the one, Firouz? Rika with her pathetic rosebushes and that loud daughter with the Sahrayn husband?” She scowled. “Their whole family should have been tossed out of the Daeva Quarter when she married that turban-wearing pirate.”
“I can’t imagine why she would want to hex you,” Nahri said lightly.
“Intention,” Nisreen whispered as she came around with a tray of instruments.
Nahri rolled her eyes. “Lie back,” she told the woman.
Nisreen handed her a silver bulb that tapered into a glistening sharp point. “Remember, just a light touch with this. It will immediately paralyze the salamander so you can extract it.”
“That’s assuming I can even . . . whoa!” Nahri gasped as a lump the size of her fist suddenly rose up under the woman’s left forearm, ballooning out her thin skin until it looked ready to burst. It wiggled and then raced up the woman’s arm to vanish under her shoulder.
The City of Brass Page 31