It was still ostentatiously decorated—gaudy, golden statues, pillars lined with jewels, and detailed carvings finer than the lace edging our dupattas. This palace was the former king’s design, but when Vahid had taken over with his djinn magic, he had added to the spectacle of it all. Anyone who stepped inside would know his power. The palace was a weapon of its own—the kind that invoked fear and awe. I glanced over at Noor, silent beside me, her eyes sweeping the high ceiling and widening at the large open-air courtyard at the center.
“This place is as big as a city,” she whispered as we walked through the tightly curated garden in the bright afternoon sun. She brushed a finger across a cluster of dark pink roses. “I had no idea Vahid lived like this. Souma’s house was very fine. But Souma’s didn’t compare to this.”
“Don’t let it fool you,” I whispered back. “It’s all an act. Souma held Vahid’s true power—the one you and I now have. Vahid would be nothing without djinn magic. We’ve just seen proof of that. Without zoraat, he’d still be a farmer eking out a living in the south.”
Anam received us in a sitting area I had sat in often before.
It was a simple room to take tea, if simple meant that the ceilings were still lined with gold, and the cool tiles were an elaborate floral motif of orange, indigo, and fuchsia.
“Sanaya, I heard what happened—are you well?” Anam lookedfrom Noor to me and back again. “The protestors are getting more daring.”
“Yes, the emperor’s soldiers managed to… subdue them with zoraat.” I swallowed the words like they were poison, but still stretched my mouth into a smile. “Thankfully.”
I could still smell their burned hair on my clothes.
“What a beautiful room,” I said with false pleasantness, attempting to change the subject as I breathed through my mouth.
“I’m glad you love it. It isn’t mine, obviously, but I love sitting here. It’s rare that I get to have visitors.” She laughed a little, though the sound was sad, as if she had just realized the truth of her words.
Mazin had yet to join us, and I kept casting a glance to the doorway. I folded my hands on my lap to keep them from moving and focused on Anam.
Don’t get too caught up in this,I reminded myself for the hundredth time. If I lost myself, I would lose everything.
“You are a ward of the emperor’s.” It wasn’t a question, but she took it as such.
“Yes, he took us in when we were children. We had nowhere else to go. I owe him everything.” She crossed her arms over her lap, her voice still light, despite the heavy subject.
“What happened to your parents?” My voice sounded harsh in the midafternoon heat.
Noor raised a brow from behind Anam. I rolled my eyes and tempered my tone, making my expression gentler. “My apologies if I overstep, it’s just such a unique situation—the emperor raising you.”
Anam’s gaze shadowed.
“They died when I was a baby. I never really knew them. And neither did the emperor. He had been riding through our village during the fighting with the king and spied my brother with a baby. He decided to take us in. We are lucky the emperor found us when he did.”
Lucky.
Maz hadn’t told his sister how their parents died. Not how theyhadreallydied. She only knew the version Vahid told her. I smothered my shock and tucked that information away for later.
“The emperor must be a generous man.” My smile felt like a hideous grimace. Every moment I had to hide my true feelings about Vahid, about Mazin, about any of them, it became more impossible.
Anam barked out such an abrupt stream of laughter that I jumped back.
“Oh! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh as I did. It’s just that you are the first and only person who would ever describe him as generous.”
“And how would you describe him?” This was starting to sound like an interrogation but I wanted to know how Anam truly saw the emperor. Was she putting on an act? Did she resent this gilded cage?
“He is like a father to Mazin and me. He hadn’t any children. But he raised us in the palace with every luxury we could want. He gave my brother a powerful position at his side. He didn’t have to do any of that.”
He wanted to buy your loyalty.
I nearly said the words aloud but stopped. There was something that she wasn’t saying. Something just beyond the edges of her sentences that felt darker, truer. Anam knew more than she was letting on.
“But others might say he is… a merciless ruler.”
A snort sounded from Noor’s direction, and I willed the smile on my face to stay unmoving, and my eyes to stay trained on Anam’s face.
Yes, we just witnessed the extent of his mercilessness.
