“Who was that?” Altair asked when Nasir returned to his side, wiping his blade free of black blood. “I only saw her hair. I’ve never seen a shade so brilliant.”
“Misk is dead,” Nasir replied. He didn’t particularly feel for the man, but the death had shaken something in him. It was the sight of Zafira’s friend and the hollow in her eyes, the shatter of her soul that bled into her sobs.
Moreover, it was how acutely Zafira felt Yasmine’s pain. A knife to his skin.
Altair turned to Nasir, barely reacting when a rebel barreled against his shoulder. “Dead?”
“That was his wife.”
“She’s here?” Altair asked, quieted by woe.
Nasir’s tone matched his, knowing he would hear despite the din. “She saw it happen.”
“Sultan’s teeth.”
Kifah shoved her way between them, eyebrows raised, spear dripping blood. “Oi. What’s going on?”
“Misk is dead.”
“Oh.” A flash of amusement crossed her face. “I never did like the man.”
Nasir pressed his lips thin. And he thought he was callous in the face of death.
“You know,” Altair mused, goaded by Nasir’s look. “I think this is my first time charging into battle without a plan. I don’t think I’ve ever felt anything so … thrilling.”
“It’s an ambush,” Kifah deadpanned, the gold tip of her spear flashing with each turn.
“I’m going to kill you,” Nasir growled.
“Please join the line, princeling,” Altair said gently. “What of your power?” Kifah asked.
He arced his scimitar. “I don’t much feel like burning anyone to a crisp right now.”
Nasir shoved him away from an oncoming stave, fixing him with scrutiny. “This has nothing to do with morality, does it?”
Altair didn’t answer for the longest moment. In that time, Nasir killed three ifrit and got a hole burned in his sleeve, and Zafira had joined them, and they still hadn’t progressed much farther from the house. The plan hadn’t meant to proceed this way: They were supposed to be at the palace when the fire began.
But Altair’s falcon had failed to deliver the note, and Nasir, who had left Demenhur before the plan’s final run-through, had only been able to guess at timings when he’d told his mother.
“I’ve had magic for as long as Arawiya didn’t. Do you know what that feels like? To live every day with the knowledge that you might be the reason the kingdom suffers?”
Nasir did know that feeling—to an extent.
“I didn’t know our mother was a Sister of Old,” Altair continued. “I didn’t know I hadn’t stolen magic from Arawiya. So I never practiced. And on the occasion that I did, I’d return to the palace and learn you had another burn on your back. Light burns, doesn’t it? I thought you were paying for my wrongs.” He scoffed. “My mother’s perfect son.”
In the exhale of the sun’s last breath, Altair’s blue gaze burned amber like his father’s.
Zafira stilled. “What was that?”
The ground trembled again and sinewy wings stretched across the horizon. Elder ifrit. Preceding them, in rows and rows more numerous and orderly than ifrit: men. Sarasin soldiers.
Hope spiraled once more, and Nasir felt it. This was what Altair meant about wars banking on the sentiment. Archers and magic didn’t turn the tides—hope did. This was what the Lion had so often wanted to quell, using his father’s voice to flay him, inside and out.
But what the Lion didn’t understand, what Nasir never understood until now, was this: Hope never dies.
Hope was the beast that could never be slain, the light that blazed in every harrowing dark. A person without hope is a body without a soul, his mother murmured in his heart.
“We may die,” Nasir said suddenly.
Altair looked at him sharply, and so did everyone else. Rimaal, he was Arawiya’s future sultan, and if he couldn’t inspire a few dozens, how could he sway an entire kingdom?
“I know death as well as I know the lines of my palm. He rides for us today. We can flee and let these streets run red with our cowardice, or we can die with swords in our hands and zeal in our hearts. Be a force eternalized in history.”
Nasir paused, his breaths coming hard and fast as murmurs passed among the men. What did the greats do with their hands when they spouted speeches?
“We are all that stands between Arawiya and an age of darkness. An assembly of forty from different walks of life.” His eyes flicked to Zafira’s and away. “An archer without a bow. A general without an army. A warrior without allegiance. Villagers without homes.”
The wind echoed his call, charged the air with its howl.
“And you,” Altair added, his tone mellowed by what Nasir realized was respect. “A king without a throne.”
How Nasir felt about his brother’s words made them no less true. He looked from one man to the next and breathed a heavy exhale.
“That throne is ours. It is not only the Lion whom we must slay and an army we must end, but a horizon that promises no future. A darkness that promises no relief.”
The murmurs had risen to a buzz now.
“If we don’t fight for our kin and kingdom, who will?”
The buzz became a roar. Fists rose in agreement, cheers echoing. For the first time in his life, Nasir gave himself up to an illusion, to the trick of hope in which their handful of fighters were suddenly tenfold more. Altair held his gaze and dipped his chin in a gesture that meant more to Nasir than he had ever imagined.
“Big words from my brother who wasn’t made for battle.” Nasir gave him a lazy shrug. “I’m the future sultan.”
Altair laughed, and it was almost easy to forget they were counting the moments until their deaths.
Almost.
