ALIZEH NEARLY ROCKED BACKWARD IN astonishment. She couldn’t fathom how news of Cyrus’s proposal had traveled so quickly to Ardunia, though she could imagine no other reason Hazan might’ve encountered such gossip.
“No,” she said softly, eyes still round with wonder. “I’ve not consented to marry him.”
“Hells,” Hazan said on an exhale, the harsh word a contrast to his obvious relief. “I can’t tell you how gratified I am to hear it.”
“But – Hazan, I must tell you” – she placed a hand on his arm and he stiffened – “I’ve been giving his proposal serious consideration…. Cyrus has offered me his kingdom in exchange –”
“No,” he said, brightening with alarm. He tossed a furtive glance at Kamran’s approaching figure. “I beg you, do not consider it – It would be a mistake, Your Majesty –”
“What would be a mistake?”
Alizeh turned slowly toward the voice, steadying herself under the prince’s imposing stare. She bristled with uncertain energy; she didn’t know what to make of him, not now that she knew he harbored some wish to hurt her. He, on the other hand, remained implacable – just until he took
inventory of her face and slackened in shock. His voice, when he spoke, was all the more lethal for its softness.
“Your throat,” he said. “Your cheek – You are injured –”
“I’m quite well,” she countered, not understanding her own impulse to lie. It was just that her head was so muddled and his mood so changeable that she felt at a great disadvantage. Alizeh disliked the way he towered over her, and she wanted space from his heated eyes, wanted a moment
alone with her thoughts in the wake of these upsetting revelations. She attempted to lever herself into a standing position but lost steam in the effort, the unfinished action causing the unfastened flaps of her cloak to gape open.
Hazan swore loudly at the reveal of her bloodied dress, the epithet so off-color it shocked her – but it was Kamran who spoke, whose voice shook her with its fury.
“What happened?” he demanded. “What has that bastard done to you?”
Hazan, unfortunately, was no calmer. “Is this why you were on the ground? Were you in fact unconscious?”
“I don’t –” she tried to say.
“Why is it you bear every indication of abuse?”
Alizeh shook her head, and a sharp pain pierced the back of her skull. She was dizzy and dehydrated, and her limbs were trembling, she realized, with much more than unease.
“Pray do not upset yourselves,” she said breathlessly. She looked around, assessing the situation through new eyes. “Heavens, I wonder why we haven’t yet been swarmed by palace staff. Or intercepted by the Queen Mother herself.”
“Oh, the servants are all watching, miss,” Omid piped in from afar. “Their faces are pressed against every window.” He waved at someone in the distance, and a faint chorus of giggles were issued in response.
“How nice,” said Alizeh, forcing a smile. “More gossip.” Kamran’s eyes were shrewd. “What do you mean?”
She was spared responding to this when Hazan cut in. “Your Majesty,” he said, “where is the king?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” she said, and pressed the back of her hand to her forehead, which had broken out in a light, cold sweat. She felt nauseous. “But I promise you, the situation is not as it appears. He is no
true danger to me –”
“I beg you do not make excuses for him in the interest of our protection.
It is good of you to be concerned for our welfare, but you need not worry that we will prevail over such a brute.”
“You must understand,” said Alizeh wearily. “You, of all people, Hazan.
This” – she gestured to her stained gown – “is not my blood.”
“No – of course,” came Hazan’s stilted reply, his eyes sweeping over the endless spatter of red. “But the cut at your throat –”
“I know.” She sighed, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes. “It all appears rather badly, doesn’t it?”
“It appears you’ve been physically harmed by the Tulanian king,” said Hazan, who struggled now to moderate his voice. “Is this true?”
Alizeh winced. “Technically, yes.” Again Hazan swore loudly.
“But it’s not as bad as it –” she started to say, before thinking better of it. “That is, to be fair, we both did harm to each other – In fact, I might’ve done worse to him if only afforded the opportunity.”
“You mean you were involved in an altercation?” Kamran now. “With the southern king?”
“And did you aim to kill him, Your Majesty? Were you attempting to flee the castle?”
“No,” Alizeh said, then hesitated. The throb at the base of her skull was making it difficult to think. “Well, yes. I mean, naturally, at first, I tried several times to kill him –”
“Wait.”
At the tortured sound of Kamran’s voice, Alizeh looked up. She found him staring at her with a pained expression, something between anger and anguish.
“Forgive me,” he said, “it’s only that I need to understand – If you tried to kill him – Are you saying it’s possible you didn’t leave with him
voluntarily?”
The question was so strange, Alizeh fell silent.
“Leave with him voluntarily?” she finally echoed, a notch forming between her brows. “You mean did I leave Ardunia voluntarily with the king of Tulan?”
Kamran nodded.
“Of course not,” she said, flinching as if physically stunned. The accusation was so insulting it lit like a firework in the tinder of her dry
mind, supplying her a badly needed surge of adrenaline. “How could you ask such a question? I didn’t even know who he was – He tricked me into coming here –”
“I told you!” came a chipper voice. Miss Huda was on tiptoe, holding a hand in the air like an overeager student. “I told you, sire, that she didn’t
know who he was!”
“Quiet,” came Deen’s loud whisper, shushing the young woman as he tugged down her hand. “Does this strike you as the time for gloating?”
“Yes, well, I did tell him, though, didn’t I?” Miss Huda crossed her arms. “I tried to tell you all –”
“I believed you, miss,” said Omid urgently. “I never doubted.”
“No, you didn’t,” came Miss Huda’s surprisingly tender reply. “You are the dearest boy.”
Alizeh’s thoughts were in chaos.
It had never occurred to her that anyone might question her reasons for tearing off into the night on the back of a Tulanian dragon. She’d been in
the grasp of powerful magic, had screamed fearfully for her life for all to hear. That any person with a reasonable mind would attach a malicious explanation to her actions was baffling. She’d defended Kamran from Cyrus
- had risked her life to protect him from the southern king’s final, fatal blow
- and still he’d doubted her intentions?
Knowing her own heart as she did, it seemed cruel to Alizeh that her good deeds had gone so quickly uncredited, that at the first chance to recast her in a poor light, Kamran had seized upon the opportunity. It made her
realize how little she and Kamran knew each other – how tenuous was the bond between them. Only someone with a shallow understanding of her character could be so easily persuaded to malign her, and it was fortunate, then, that the guileless shock now printed upon her face was clear enough to all.
“I did not doubt you, Your Majesty,” said Hazan softly.
She drew a breath, sparing Hazan a look of affection before turning to Kamran. “But you,” she said to the prince. “You thought I ran off with him after – after all he did? You thought me capable of playing a role in the
atrocities of that evening?” Despite her own injured feelings, her heart couldn’t help but soften at the dawning horror in his eyes. After all he’d endured – what he must’ve thought of her. How he must’ve suffered.
“Oh, Kamran,” she said. “How could you think that?” Then, more quietly: “How tortured you must’ve been to think that.”
He absorbed her words with a stillness so complete it worried her, thawing only to close his eyes, to swallow. He appeared suddenly ashen with shame. Kamran was quiet a long moment, unmoving save the rapid rise and fall of his chest, and when he opened his eyes again there was a
rage burning in the depths of his gaze, an inferno of fury that threatened to burn him down with it.
“I’ll kill him,” he said softly. “I’ll gut him open and tear out his organs, and I’ll make certain he lives long enough to endure the torture. When I’m done with him, he’ll be begging for death. He will die, and he will die of his own agony.” Kamran reached out an unsteady hand to touch her, his fingers skimming the tender bruise on her cheek. “You may depend upon it.”
Alizeh shook her head in a sharp motion. “No,” she said, stunned. “Kamran – you can’t kill him –”
“It’s what he deserves.”
“No, it’s – well, yes” – she frowned – “I suppose there might be some argument for –”
She broke off with a gasp.
The fine hairs at the nape of her neck had risen in awareness, her skin seeming to tighten over bone. She knew he’d arrived before she’d even laid eyes on him, and in the time it took her to turn her head in his direction, Kamran had already notched an arrow in his bow.
“No,” she breathed.
She finally caught sight of Cyrus in the distance, the lithe lines of him appearing like an apparition through a veil of mist. He struck her then as almost unreal; billows of morning fog had gathered around him, his coppery hair gleaming like a wicked halo in the gloom. He was following a narrow flagstone path along the edge of the cliff, having abandoned in his wake an unopened steel chest – one that recalled another from her arrival in Tulan, when Cyrus had taken time to feed and water his dragon. Now, she wondered what he’d been doing, where he’d been all night, whether he’d slept at all – but her questions were silenced when their gazes locked in place. He was too far to perceive clearly; she could not have seen the hell and turmoil trapped in his eyes, his features strained with exhaustion; but
she saw the change in his body as he registered, in real time, that something was wrong.
He fairly electrified.
Cyrus moved quickly, appearing altogether indifferent to the presence of his uninvited aggressors, and if he had an opinion on the matter of the arrow aimed in his direction, he gave no indication. As he drew closer, it became
obvious that he focused on Alizeh to the exclusion of all else, his body taut with restraint even as he moved resolutely toward her. He tried to hide a
flare of panic as he studied the unnatural curl of her limbs on the ground – but she knew the moment he discerned the bruise on her face, for his eyes widened with undisguised alarm and he all but ran to her, now bolting down the narrow path at a dangerous speed.
“Stand down,” came Hazan’s sharp voice, cutting through the haze of her mind. “This isn’t the moment.”
Alizeh spun toward him, her heart in her throat, only to realize he was speaking to Kamran – who was carefully readjusting his aim, following Cyrus’s movements.
“That is not for you to decide,” said the prince.
“If you kill him now,” Hazan responded angrily, “you are committing to war between our empires, which you know would be a mistake. There are any number of witnesses pressing their faces against the windows, and it is all but certain that one of the servants has alerted the royal guard – we are no doubt only moments from being intercepted, and we’ll all be sentenced to death. You’ll have little hope of salvation from the Ardunian side, especially as Zahhak seeks to destroy you. I implore you to think this through –”
“Enough,” the prince bit back, sparing only a violent glance for his comrade. “If you think I will fumble an opportunity to exact revenge when it is within my grasp, you sorely misunderstand me –”
“I’m asking you only to wait, you fool! Your actions would incriminate us all – you put the child at risk – the young miss –”
“I warned them not to come,” came his dark reply. “I told them I wouldn’t be responsible if they got themselves killed –”
Oh, this couldn’t be happening.
Alizeh struggled to her feet; she felt as if the world were softly melting around her, as if she were trapped in a distorted dream. She saw the horror caught in triplicate on the faces of Deen, Miss Huda, and Omid; she saw the unflinching fury in Kamran’s eyes, the resignation in the set of Hazan’s jaw. It was wrong, all wrong. Cyrus couldn’t die. Not now. Not yet.
Heavens, she thought. Not ever.
She felt suddenly like she might scream at the prospect, her feelings on the matter so tangled they’d built a nest in her chest. Her own emotional
chaos notwithstanding, Alizeh had every practical reason to keep Cyrus alive, too. She hadn’t even realized how much she’d come to rely on him until just that moment. No matter her many protests and prevarications, Alizeh had begun planning her life around the prospect of marrying the southern king – and of taking over Tulan. Only hours ago she’d finally stepped into the light, holding forth with thousands of Jinn who were counting on her to address them again soon. If Kamran killed their king – if he sent Tulan into turmoil and cemented the prospect of war –
What would happen to her people?
With no empire, no crown, and no resources, Alizeh would have no choice but to flee, yet again, abandoning her flock just hours after she’d
promised to lead them. All this flashed through her mind with breathtaking speed; she knew it futile even to attempt conveying these thoughts to Kamran, who had every right to want Cyrus dead. She could acknowledge this: she could acknowledge Cyrus’s unforgivable crimes against Ardunia and its prince. She could acknowledge that he deserved retribution for these offenses. She could acknowledge that her reasons for keeping Cyrus alive were entirely selfish. It made no difference.
She didn’t want him to die.
Oh, if only she had her own land, if she could find her own magic – she’d leave both these empires and their heirs behind, for Kamran and Cyrus had proven nothing but trouble. But without resources – without
horses or supplies – the necessary journey into the Arya mountains could
take months on foot. And even if she were to survive the trek, she couldn’t do it alone. Five people had to be willing to die for her before the
mountains parted with their magic.
Overwhelmed, Alizeh felt tears prick her eyes.
After all these years – and all this recent mayhem – the pieces of her life had finally, painstakingly, begun to fall into place. Now everything felt
impossible once again.
She had to stop Kamran.
Much as she understood his pain, she couldn’t stand aside and let him kill Cyrus and implicate the others in his murder. But something was the
matter with her – with her head, her lungs, her bones. She couldn’t understand why she was so tired or clumsy, and when she tried to move too fast, she swayed, as if the ground had surged beneath her. She felt the brace of Hazan’s arms come around her even as she wheeled away blindly. She had no plan; she only knew she had to go to him, get between them
somehow –
“Alizeh!”
Her head shot up at the sound of Cyrus’s voice. He was still a dozen feet away, still following the path along the edge of the bluff, but he was close enough now that they could see each other properly. She met his wild eyes with panic of her own, absorbing his anguish just in time to witness the first arrow pierce clean through his leg.
She screamed.
