THE DAY PASSESIN A BLUR.
Sulifer meets with members of the council. There are many hushed conversations in the shadows of the corridors. I don’t listen. I withdraw utterly into myself, cowering in my lamp, the darkness around me filled with whispers.
This is your fault.
You failed him.
You’ve killed him.
I don’t try to block out the words, because I know they are true. This is the price of Aladdin’s second wish, the wishIconvinced him to make. The price of every lie is that the truth will always come out. I knew that, I knew it, and yet I still led him into it. And for what? Where is Zhian? Where is my freedom? Why am I still bound to my lamp? Like a smith with a lump of twisted metal, I begin forging my fear into anger. Sooner or later, Sulifer will have to call me from the lamp. When he does, I don’t know what I’ll do,Habiba. But I have to dosomething. I can’t just let them execute Aladdin.
Later that night, when Sulifer is alone in his rooms, poring over a map on his desk, a knock sounds at the door, and Darian enters. I stir from my black fog to listen.
“Well?” Sulifer rises from his desk. “Where is Caspida?”
Darian hesitates a moment, then says softly, “She’s gone. We scoured the palace, but there wasn’t a sign of her or her girls. We believe they fled into the lower city, and the guards will be searching all night.”
Without a word, Sulifer steps forward and backhands him, sending Darian reeling into the wall. He freezes there, his back to his father, clutching the stones as if trying to melt into them.
“Failure,” hisses the vizier. His entire being transforms, as if he has shed his mask of composure to reveal the true man beneath. “I give you every chance in the world to make something of yourself, and you bring me failure!”
“I found the lamp!” says Darian defensively, turning around.
Sulifer grabs the front of his coat and backhands him repeatedly. “Do not talk back to me, boy! You failed to bring the lamp to me the first time. You failed to wed the princess. You failed to bring her to me.” With each statement his blows grow harder, until blood spurts from Darian’s nose. Only then does his father release him, and Darian stumbles away, holding his sleeve to his face.
“Well?” Sulifer snarls.
A bit dazed, Darian drops to his knees and lowers his head. “Thank you, Father,” he says miserably.
“Thank you forwhat?”
“For disciplining me in my youth. I hear and receive your admonishment.” The words are rote, flat. He has said themmany times, I suspect, and the feeling has long been sucked out of them.
“Get up,” says Sulifer in disgust. “I can’t stand to look at you, groveling like a peasant.”
Darian rises silently, wiping his nose, as his father draws out the lamp. I cower inside, pulling in my senses, letting the room go dark. I want no part of this. I wish I were back in the cave. I wish Sulifer would call me forth and make his wishes and be done with me. What is he waiting for?
“Where is the thief?” Sulifer growls.
“In the dungeon, like you asked,” replies Darian softly.
“Good,” Sulifer grunts, his fingers drumming the side of the lamp. The sound is deafening, reverberating through me. “The boy shows more initiative and strength than you ever have.”
“Let me have an hour with him. We’ll see how hisstrengthholds out,” says Darian bitterly.
“Don’t be base. We do not act out of such petty pursuits as revenge, as if we were common rabble. Now leave me and go search for Caspida. Look everywhere—she’s a sly one, like her mother was. Donotfail me again.”
“But—”
“Leave.”The vizier’s voice sinks to a sibilant whisper, and Darian slinks away.
Once his son is gone, Sulifer devotes his full attention to the lamp. He leans against a pillar and turns it over, like a man flirting before going in for a kiss, desire and triumph rolling off him in stifling waves.
“I have you at last,” he sighs. “Let us meet face to face.”
He rubs the lamp, slow and measured. I have no choice but to respond.
I pour from the lamp in a thin stream, spiraling and coiling my way to the floor, where I gather like a fine mist. I shift to cobra and rise, eyes glowering, until I am high as his waist, and then I shift again to girl, scales turning to skin, tail into legs, hood into hair. Black silk studded with diamond flecks drapes over my form, and I feel a weight on my hip, where Aladdin’s ring rests in a hidden pocket. I dress myself with the night and stare at him with eyes as dark and hollow as the spaces between the stars.
