Conqueror's Blood (Gunmetal Gods Book 2)

by Zamil Akhtar

  “He bought it,” I said. “Didn’t question me. Ozar truly believes the Koa spice lane is his.”

  “Well done, little fawn.”

  I made a fist. “I told you not to call me that.”

  “My beloved. How’s that?” His false grin revealed perfect, glossy teeth. He’d once pontificated about how I ought to use teeth-cleaning twigs from the arak tree at least three times a day. Seemed they did work.

  “What kind of man uses his beloved for his illicit schemes?”

  He stepped closer — I barely reached his chest, which was broader than mirror armor. He’d clearly been out in the sun; his perfume-mixed sweat was at once overwhelming and intoxicating.

  “If you’re to be my wife, we’ll be scheming illicitly till the dust of the earth washes over us. The foremost lesson I learned from my mother and father, so best get used to it.”

  I didn’t know if I could. The thought of Ozar being arrested because of me made me feel so…unclean.

  “Did you really use your father’s stamp? When they arrest Ozar, he’s going to tell your father that I gave him that parchment!”

  “No one expects a little fawn to bare teeth, so you’ll be seen as an unwitting accomplice, at worst. Besides, I’ve been dealing with my father for twenty-five years. Very successfully, might I add.”

  “The Grand Vizier isn’t known for his clemency — far from it. Can’t you see I’m worried?”

  The praying women turned to look. I’d been too loud in this hallowed place.

  Hadrith came to my ear with sweet and heavy breaths. “O’ little fa…my beloved. Trust is the bedrock upon which love grows. Ours will bloom into a wondrous cypress, stretching toward heaven itself.” His tongue was almost in my ear when he said, “I’ll have another task for you soon, my loveliest.”

  At that, he left me. After doing something so wrong, I wanted to take another bath. And yet, I burned to know what he wanted me to do next. Whatever it was, I couldn’t stop now.

  I did take another bath, my third one today. This time, I made sure no one was around, so I could cry. The eunuchs at the door must’ve heard, but a woman bawling in the harem bath was nothing new.

  I even prayed. First, to Saint Rizva, begging her to forgive me for using her shrine for such sordid business. But the child within, awoken after so long because of my brother’s arrival, felt sinful for praying to a saint, so I prayed to Father Chisti. Or was he Saint Chisti? Ugh, what did it matter? He was the founder of our faith, regardless of which path you walked. The straight path or the path of heretics — which was which?

  Mother, baby Betil, Father, Cihan — the child in me ached. Memories played. Why always these painful ones? Like the time my father didn’t return after a battle with an infidel Rubadi tribe — I would sit on his bed, smelling his sheets, even drinking his awful salt tea. My mother was almost forced into remarrying the new khagan, whom my father promptly decapitated when he returned, eight moons later. In all that time, I never ceased praying to Father Chisti and the Children so we could be a family again.

  As I remembered such things, tears burned down my cheeks, heated by the steam that smothered the air. But the memories always left me cold and shivering. I needed more heat. More fire.

  I fetched more coals for the steam from a bag in the back of the chamber. While piling the coals on the burning tray, one tumbled off the edge and fell on the damp floor behind the tray. Black water ran toward my feet. Sickening. I pushed the tray to the side to pick up the coal.

  Across the wall, behind the tray, was a red handprint. No, a blood handprint. What the hell?

  I brushed my wet hand against it, but it didn’t drip. The blood was caked onto the tile. Ugh, were the eunuchs not taking care of this place? Well, someone ought to. I grabbed my towel, wet it from the puddle on the floor, and rubbed the handprint. Harder and rougher, as if I were cleaning my horse. But when I pulled the towel away, the fabric was perfectly yellow and star-patterned, and the bloodstain remained undisturbed.

  As I stared at it, whispers floated into the steamy air. But as far as I knew, I was alone in the bath. I pushed my hand toward the blood print. It fit…perfectly, as if it were my own hand that bled it onto the warm tile.

  What the fuck?

  Whispers. Just outside my steam room. I peeked outside — no one there. Was I going mad?

  I pushed the coal tray back, blocking the blood print from sight. Had someone…bled in this room?

  Died in this room?

  2

  Zedra

  Extinction. Fractures within fractures, breaking the whole. A river dilutes into streams that lead into an ocean. Salt and seaweed muddle the sweet water, erasing its purity. A firm root and a tall stem decay into wispy branches, and then—

  “My dear, you haven’t touched your eggplant soup.” Tamaz’s butter-oil voice broke my anxious thoughts.

  My gaze returned outward. Just Tamaz and I, at a low table in his supper chamber, surrounded by serving girls, beardless boys, and braided eunuchs. I’d only been here once before; with its bare, sand-brick walls and floor covered with the square-patterned rugs of some sand tribe, it seemed the dining room of an ascetic sheikh, not the glorious Shah of Alanya.

  “Apologies, Your Glory,” I said, bending my neck. “Truth is, I haven’t lost all the heft from carrying the child.”

  Now he glared at me, nostrils flaring and mouth hanging. The king of the land looked like an irate farmer — no turban, hair unkempt, caftan a mud-brown. “Zedra, you are as lovely as a red tulip plucked from the holy soil of Zelthuriya.”

  How classical. Perhaps he ought to drag his dais to Laughter Square. “I’m afraid younger eyes are a bit more…discerning.”

  “Had Kyars said something unkind before he departed?” Thunder rang in his voice. “That lout. I thought war would make him a man and—”

  I shook my head. “No, Your Glory. The Crown Prince has been nothing but kind. Some of his other women, though…oh, I shouldn’t gossip.”

  “Hmph. Jealousy. Not much else to it. Let them say what they will. The truth is, you are the mother of the future shah. You could be bulging as a laden camel or thin as prayer beads, and you’d still be the sultana of this harem.”

  A beardless boy placed more softbread onto our floor table. The irony: neither I nor the Shah ate much. Every day, servants carted the palace leftovers to the poor living in the Alleys of Mud. I imagined a rag-wearing family sitting within mud walls, gorging on the eggplant soup and softbread. Good — they deserved it more than we.

  “I fasted today, in honor of Saint Nora’s ascension,” the Shah said, “and strangely, I’ve no appetite. You know, my father passed at my age — peace be upon his soul. The dreaded gout. Nothing better than fasting, the Philosophers say, to keep gout away.”

  I’d seen men die from gout — all oafs who could devour a lamb in a single sitting. No, Tamaz would not die that way.

  “I heard a rumor,” I said, broaching the topic that really mattered. Even the mother of the shah-to-be had to ask weeks ago for this intimate supper. I feared the Shah would disdain to meet, given the Sylgiz arrival — who’d come days earlier than I’d wanted — though thankfully, the Shah kept true to his schedule. “Is it true someone beheaded three Sylgiz traders and that their khagan seethes for vengeance?”

  Tamaz sipped his water and stared straight in silence, then said, “I supposed, with the entire Majlis apprised of the happenings, that everyone would find out eventually — but news has spread faster than I expected. Believe me, I’ve dealt with all manner of khagans — they come for one raging reason or another, but always leave with their horses dragging chests of gold. And in that, we’re not lacking.”

  “But I also heard they blame you. That there was a royal message, stamped by you, with the heads of the dead. This year, there’s already been an attempt on your life. That assassin was Path of the Children, too, was he not? I fear what these heretics are plotting for you…Father.”

  Tamaz l
oved when I called him that. He told me once that he’d sorely desired a daughter, and Lat had blessed him with three, though all had been cursed to die in childhood. Well, that wasn’t entirely true — he didn’t tell me. I overheard him lamenting with the gholam commander, Pasha Kato.

  “We all must die, dear Zedra. I pray Lat forgive me for what my hands have wrought. When I became Shah, I believed I would be better than my father. That I’d follow the Recitals of Chisti — word and spirit — in all I did. But only Saint Chisti carried both holiness and kingship with equal weight. For the rest of us, forgiveness is the only salvation, so we must not cease begging for it. ‘Forgive if you wish to be forgiven,’ a recital that I live by.”

  That was why the people loved him. How many death sentences had he commuted this year alone? Dramatic moments: just when the executioner was about to swing, the Shah would appear and hold up his hand. Cheers and ululating and thigh-clapping followed — true, the people desired justice, but they loved mercy. The Shah was as clever as he was pious, for certain. You didn’t rule for two decades, otherwise. Of all three reigning House Seluqal shahs from the kingdoms of Sirm, Kashan, and Alanya, Tamaz’s was the longest, most peaceful, and richest reign.

  And that only made my task harder. “You are so wise, Father.”

  “Comes with the gray hair, my dear.”

  Oh, I knew that well enough. “Will you recall the gholam?”

  He huffed — seemed he didn’t want politics at dinner. But I had to press.

  “Are you so keen to see Kyars?” he asked.

  “I miss him dearly and worry what those Ethosian pirates may do.” Tamaz would be more pliable with that framing, surely.

  “My dear, never forget that Kyars smashed a fully stocked and armored Crucian army at the Syr Darya last year. If not for him, Micah the Metal and Imperator Heraclius would’ve wiped our ungrateful cousins up north from history. What is a smattering of infidel pirates, compared to that?”

  Meaning: I will not be recalling the gholam. Perfect. “You’re right. Of course. He’ll be back before the cold winds blow down from the End…from the Waste.”

  “We can’t let pirates winter in our seaside towns and forts, cutting off trade with Ejaz, Sirm, Dycondi. Kyars and twenty thousand gholam will show them an Alanyan recompense for their crimes. By the coming of the desert chill, you and Kyars will be cuddling amid a coal-burning fire, surely.”

  A sickening thought, for which I suppressed a shudder. Nonetheless, winter remained moons away, and so my window seemed wide enough. “A wonderful thought.”

  I kept silent after that, allowing the Shah to grab a morsel of softbread. He chewed it for an eternity and gulped deep. Then he tossed the remaining piece of bread on a brass plate. His saliva moistened the part where he’d bitten.

  “It’s been a wonderful supper,” he said, “but with age comes an early rise and an even earlier bedtime. And before I sleep, I would stand in vigil before Lat and her saints, so that this kingdom I tend may remain blessed and at peace.”

  “I, too, will pray. For your good health, for peace, and for my beloved Kyars’ victory.”

  As Tamaz stood and stretched, I reached over and grabbed the piece of bread he’d bitten, then slipped it into my sleeve. I looked around at the beardless boys, serving girls, and eunuchs, hoping none had noticed. They all stared straight in silence. Good.

  As I walked toward my room, I thought about the Philosopher who’d engineered the Sand Palace. Last week, I borrowed his biography from the Tower of Wisdom so I could break from my serious reading with something pleasurable. He lived about five hundred years ago, just after Temur the Wrathful carved a blood trail through half the earth. Born in Tinbuq, the seat of the once Golden Kingdom of Himyar to the southwest, the man came to Alanya with nothing but a dream. He imagined a vast construct, made of baked clay and mud and sand, that stretched the breadth and width of the highest hill in the city.

  And he imagined it to be opulent: today, encrusted jewels lined the walls of the halls. Hanging lamps encased in platinum, carpets of angora silk so soft you could safely wrap a baby in them, lenses that caught the moonlight so that entire rooms would glow silver — I could go on and on. Tamaz’s sanctimonious asceticism hadn’t poisoned the other Seluqals, who outweighed his simplicity with their indulgence. My beloved Kyars being the worst among them.

  “Make way for Sultana Mirima!” a eunuch called.

  I stood to the side in the hallway, bowed my head, and hoped the Shah’s sister wouldn’t notice me. Unfortunately, I’d worn a stunning blue and gold dress for my supper with the Shah, which resembled sunrays striking a river. The woman adored fashion. More than that, she loved to show her superiority over us concubines.

  As expected, Mirima stopped her prance in front of me. She gazed at my dress, then caressed the brocade on my forearm with the back of her ring-studded hand.

  “Who made this?” she said in a lofty tone.

  I raised my head. “Sultana, it was a gift from His Eminence, Grand Vizier Barkam.”

  She opened her mouth as if to retch. “He buys a size too small on purpose. A walking scandal, that man.”

  True, and ironically, Barkam was one of the few men whose words I could stomach. Something about his obvious perversity rang sincere.

  I kept silent, hoping Mirima would move on. But her gaze stayed on me like the midday sun.

  “What do you do all day, Zedra?”

  Oh dear, not an open question. Bait, coming from this woman. The black dye in her hair disguised the gray so well, and whatever soaps and creams she lathered hid wrinkles and pockmarks. A decent mask that gave her back ten years. But mine was better.

  “Today, I went into the city,” I said, hoping to escape whatever trap she was setting, “with Cyra, my dearest friend.” Mirima loved Cyra. The older men and women here seemed to. “We inquired as to the feelings of the people concerning the siege.” I’d given my best answer, though I expected her to smell the lie.

  “And what do the people say about the siege?” How bitterly she intoned people. Her disdain for them blinded her to my obvious deception. Good.

  “Like here in the palace, opinion is divided. Some see it as serious and others as a trifle.” Everyone knew that, though. Better to give obvious answers and reassure them that I’m dull.

  “Fools. It is whatever we make of it. If we wanted it done, we’d end it today. Obviously, there’s some benefit to having these Sylgiz savages on our side.” By Lat, she used we and our so confidently. A trait I respected somewhat.

  “I agree.” I glanced up and down her thick, flowery gown. How to end this agonizing conversation? “To be truthful, I was so scared. When I looked out from the balcony at the yurts and horsemen filling the horizon, I so wanted Kyars to be here to hold me.”

  Sympathy glimmered in Mirima’s gaze as she put her hand on my shoulder. “My dear, you are like an unplucked flower that knows not the vagaries of the wind.” Decent verse. Another thing to respect, despite how wrong it was. “So young. So fragile. But you need not fear a thing. My brother is the greatest king alive.” She thrust her fist in the air. “Unshakable, unbreakable. A khagan from the Waste is but a fly on an elephant’s ass.”

  I giggled. Didn’t expect such language from her. “You’re right, dear sultana. Thank you for reassuring me. I hope the years will make me braver.”

  She finally went on her way. To be honest, that conversation wasn’t as terrible as I’d expected. Still, best to keep them short; Mirima was more perceptive than her brother, and I worried one day she’d see through me.

  Back in my room, I took my son from the wet nurse and cradled him close. A sweet warmth flowed through me, as if I were one with the world.

  “He’s feeding joyously,” the wet nurse, a dark-skinned woman from Himyar, said. I smiled and thanked her.

  I gushed as Seluq fidgeted. Yes, that was what the Shah named him. Apparently, Seluq the Dawn had come to him in a dream the night my baby was born. I didn’
t recall the details, but there was some nonsense about the sun and birds and fish. Kyars loved the name, too. As for myself, I couldn’t imagine a worse man to name my son after, but I had no say.

  “You may go,” I said to the wet nurse.

  I kissed my son’s scalp and inhaled his fresh, life-giving scent. He giggled. I laid him in his crib and marveled at his beauty. But the beauty of a baby to his mother can’t be described. It is like fanaa, like unity with god herself.

  Words once spoken by my uncle and father-in-law echoed in my mind: “Don’t raise your children the way your parents raised you. They were born for a different time.” It couldn’t be truer with my son and me; I’d have to raise him for this time, this place, this mission.

  I moved toward the balcony, which gave me an encompassing view of Qandbajar, its ancient quarters, the double-layered walls, and the yurts beyond. A stillness ruled the night — no breeze, barely any birds chirping.

  A comfort to just stare at the world and not have to think. Grind and grind your mind toward whatever purpose you sought. A comfort I couldn’t claim because too much remained to be done. And only I was left to do it: carrying the truth on my shoulders, the survival of Lat’s beloved Children, and, ultimately, the fate of mankind. The world held up by one old woman.

  “Father Chisti,” I prayed, “bless your daughter with your strength, your righteousness, your victory.”

  I wiped a tear from my cheek. Holding up the world hurt. Carrying the pain of the lost, the dead, the annihilated only numbed me so much. It was these silent moments that I couldn’t endure, that I’d rather fill with anything: banal poetry, tawdry gossip, strolls through the pleasure gardens.

  Or, best of all, my mission.

  I often obsessed over one question: who was the most powerful man in Alanya? The obvious answer was Shah Tamaz, but thrones veil those behind them. A more astute answer was Grand Vizier Barkam because his hands plucked the strings. But that too was wrong. Neither Barkam nor the Shah held the minds of the people, and without them, a kingdom was nothing but ordered mud and stone. Then it was Grand Mufti of Alanya and Grand Sheikh of the Order of Saint Jamshid, Khizr Khaz, who tended the souls of all Alanyans…but if forced to choose one man to save my life, it wouldn’t be him.