Page 27 of A Filling of Fables and Firelight

“Rana!” The merchant, a large man with a booming voice and a long, dark beard to match, held his arms out wide in greeting. “I knew today was going to be a good market day. I told my wife, ‘There is something in the sparkle of the sunshine today, Nasrin. This is going to be a day of great blessing.’ And here you are! My favorite customer.”

She smiled widely. “Good morning, Khalil. It’s lovely to see you. Do you remember my friend, Aida?”

“Do I remember?” Khalil pressed his hands to his chest and threw them out again. “Do I remember? She is the bride and beloved of my second favorite customer. Of course I remember. And I also recognize this rascal.” He pointed to Jasper with a wink. “This boy and his tiger, always on the move but never too busy to stop and say hello.”

Jasper grinned.

“What can I help you find today?” he continued. “I have some new silks that came in just last week with beautiful colors and patterns on all of them. Or perhaps you might be interested in this.” Khalil lifted a bolt of sea-foam green fabric and laid it on the counter. “This comes straight from Helyos—no other merchant is selling this right now. Light as linen, but soft. And look at how it drapes!” He lifted a corner and let it fall over his arm to demonstrate.

“It’s beautiful,” Rana said diplomatically, fingering the fabric but not yet committing to Khalil’s enthusiastic sales pitch.

Aida joined her. “The weave is rather loose. Do you think it will be hard to work with?”

Khalil shrugged. “For some, maybe. But our Rana here is brilliant with a needle. She will not find it difficult to use at all.”

Rana smiled, won over by his praise. “I’ll take three yards, and two of that honey-colored silk.”

“Excellent!” Khalil took out a pair of large silver shears and began cutting her fabric. A commotion behind them drew Rana’s attention.

Yasmin, dressed in the blue linen dress that Rana had made for her, was engaged in a heated argument with the fruit seller they had recently passed. Her face was turning red, and she waved her arms as she spoke, causing the gold bangles on her wrists to jingle together like a dinner bell calling the attention of everyone in the vicinity.

Aida tsked. “What on earth is she trying to do?”

“I believe she’s trying to convince Amar that he shouldn’t charge her for the piece of fruit that she took from his stand because she was only sampling it.” Rana shook her head, letting out a short, disbelieving huff. “I still don’t understand why they sent Inara home instead of her.”

“She knows how to play the game.”

“Ah, the Queen’s Contest, yes?” Khalil handed Rana two neatly wrapped bundles as he joined their conversation. “I’ve seen several of the girls here this morning. The ones in the blue dresses, right? Some of your handiwork?”

She nodded. “Though the whole point was supposed to be that they blend in, so I can’t say that I was very successful.”

“No, no. I only notice because I have an eye for such things. Other than the loud one over there, the others seem to have had a rather enjoyable market day.”

Rana’s eyes skimmed over the crowd, searching for other glimpses of blue as she reached for the small purse inside her skirt pocket. Laila was interacting with a flower seller, her face the most open and animated Rana had ever seen. Nour was sitting outside a small tea house, sharing her shaded table with a young woman wearing a chubby-faced baby in a sling. She thought she spotted Aliyah’s back moving through the dense crowd, but there were too many people to tell for sure.

“Oh look,” Aida remarked brightly as Rana handed Khalil his payment. “Kamaran is here.”

“What?” Rana’s traitorous eyes followed Aida’s line of sight before she could catch herself. Her gaze collided with Kamaran’s as he stood under the canopied awning of a bakery with his chief vizier at his side. Even from far away, she could see that the smile he wore didn’t reach his eyes, which were weighed down by dark circles. She was the first to break the connection as she dragged her attention back to Aida.

“We should go say hello.” Her friend had already taken a step in his direction.

“Oh, yes!” Khalil agreed. “And please extend my warmest greetings to His Majesty as well.”

Before Rana could argue, Aida had waved farewell to the cloth merchant and was pulling her along, taking advantage of the crowd that parted around them to give space to the tiger at their heels. “You can say hello if you want, but I don’t think having both of us approach him is a good idea.”

“Why not?” Jasper asked.

“Yes, why not?” Aida echoed. “You’ve already seen him, and he’s seen that you saw him. It would be rude to just ignore him now.”

“I…I might have said some awful things to him the last time we were together.” Rana flinched at the memory of the harsh words she had thrown at him. Even worse was the bitter, hopeless way he had accepted them, as if he had only been waiting for her to realize how undeserving and useless he was. The horrible things he had said about himself were too specific and came too readily for them not to have been words that he had heard before, either from himself or from others, and the sick, guilty feeling in her stomach only grew worse when she considered that she herself had expressed similar opinions about him.

Jasper snapped his fingers. “So that’s why he’s suddenly started making it to all of his meetings on time!”

“He’s what?” Rana’s head whipped to the side to face him.

“Yeah,” Jasper continued, as if it were all the answer she needed. “He doesn’t say much, just mostly listens and sketches things in the margins of the agendas. But he’s there, and that’s more than you could say about the last few months. Whatever you said to him apparently hit a mark.”

She shook her head slowly. “I doubt it has anything to do with me. Maybe he’s just trying to avoid Yasmin.”