Back in the Demenhune palace, Zafira stared at the ceiling of her room. After having experienced the unhindered magic of Sharr and dum sihr, the doled-out dosage of the royal minarets left Zafira wanting. She fisted her hands in her sheets, cursing the hearts, cursing the Sisters. Why was magic not giving her the joy it had on the royal minaret? Why was she so … empty?
Be mine, wholly and utterly. She tucked her blanket beneath her chin, ignoring the dampness of her pillow. Resorting to bitterness was good, if it meant less crying.
The door cracked open, and she cursed her numbed state for forgetting to lock it. The torchlight lit Yasmine’s silhouette.
“Zafira?”
“I’m sleeping.”
Yasmine didn’t care. “What did you do?”
At some point in the past two months, she had carved out half of her heart and given it to him. That was what she had done.
“You’ve been crying ever since you came back,” she said sadly. Of course it was Zafira who had managed to make her even more sad than she was. “I saw a vision just now. At least, I think it was a vision. I was in the palace again, looking for someone. I had a knife, so it could have been a dream. Zafira? Is it magic? Did you lose it? Why are you—”
A wild laugh tore out of her. Zafira had magic, all right. Her heart was a compass once more, and it was pulling her in a direction she didn’t heed.
“I came home, that’s why. I came home because Sarasin isn’t,” Zafira said simply.
Understanding dawned in Yasmine’s eyes. “We have no home.”
Zafira looked at her sharply. “Our home is in the western villages, and we’re going back tomorrow.”
Yasmine’s head snapped up. “For what? Neither of us have anything left there. Not our homes, not our families. Nothing, Zafira. Deen is gone, Misk is gone. Why would I want to live in a place that will haunt me for the rest of my life? The palace healers offered to tutor Lana, and I’m going to stay, too.”
Zafira stared at her.
“You’re running away from him, aren’t you? That’s what this is about. Lana told me. You run from the things that scare you.”
Zafira scoffed. “And yet I marched into the Arz every daama day. I trekked to Sharr. I faced the Lion of the Night.”
“Because you’re not afraid of the dark, or of evil, or of harm. You fear change and what it signifies.”
“This isn’t like your stories,” Zafira said angrily. “I can’t wear the crown of calipha and suddenly command an entire caliphate. I’m supposed to help the caliph’s daughter secure her throne.”
She owed that to Qismah, and more, after what she had done to her father.
“And you can do both. You won’t have to rule over Sarasin,” Yasmine said, sitting beside her. “He will.”
“So I’ll take care of his palace. Fold his clothes. Sit pretty.
Care for—”
They were lies, and she knew it. He would ensure she was nothing but his equal. She could do for Sarasin as she’d done for her village, only tenfold. Care not just for a handful of houses but for an entire caliphate. She’d seen it when she’d spoken to Muzaffar.
That wasn’t what she feared.
Yasmine touched her hand. “I don’t know him the way you do, but I was there. I saw how he looks at you. If he’s the darkness, then you’re his moon, and the moon wasn’t made to be caged. It’s a beacon to behold, a relic to revere. To be loved.”
Zafira didn’t realize the tears were falling until Yasmine brushed them away. She never knew she could hurt so much. Want so much. Lose so much.
Yasmine whispered, “He will give you what Deen could not.”
“I don’t need a man to complete me.”
“No,” Yasmine agreed with a sad smile. “We never do. Your happiness completes you. And if he is what makes you happy, why would you throw him away?”
Zafira closed her eyes. She wanted him. She wanted him so badly she could not breathe, she could not think, she could not be. Which was precisely why she should stay away, wasn’t it?
The Jawarat regarded her from her bedside table. It was the embodiment of memories and magic and the reason for all the wrongs she had done. Wrongs she would have continued, had he not been there for her. Had he not believed in her, understood her, the way no one else had.
Loving him was a knife to her throat, thorns around her heart. The fragility of life in the clasping of their hands.
Outside, a bird trilled as Demenhur awakened to a new world. One Misk would never see.
Her whisper was soft. Raw. “What if I lose him?” She had nearly lost him once.
“The way I lost the one I loved?” Yasmine asked. She cupped Zafira’s face. “I will forever regret every word I didn’t say and every moment I spent not holding his hand. The
questions I never got to ask. The understanding we did not have. But I will never, ever regret marrying him.” She pressed her brow to Zafira’s. “Knowing you can lose something is what makes it more precious.”
