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Maram whirled, pressing her back to the door. "Who is there?"
A figure stepped out of the shadows, then bowed. "I did not mean to frighten you."
The light coming through the windows hit him, and stole Maram's breath in the same moment.
"Are you going to kill me, too, like you killed Hasan?" she demanded of the blue man.
"He commanded me to protect you," the man said. As she watched, he shrank, until he was almost the size of an ordinary man. "Hasan deserved his fate."
She didn't argue. She, more than anyone, knew what Hasan was capable of. Perhaps the blue man was right.
The blue man swallowed. "You look just like her. Only more beautiful. How is that even possible?"
Maram knew only one woman who looked like her. "How do you know my mother?" she demanded, looking him in the eye for the first time. Only then did she falter, for recognition came as a shock. "Wait, Amani?"
He bowed his head. "I am."
"What are you doing here?"
"I am the slave of the lamp, which your betrothed kindly brought back to the city."
"Aladdin?"
Amani smiled faintly. "So that is his name. We were never properly introduced, and the enslavement spell on me is so strong I'm not sure I could call him anything but my master, anyway. He is a good man, a rare thing in these times, though I hope you will not be disappointed to discover that he is not a prince."
Maram wet her lips. "I already know. I met him before he left the city and found...wait, did you say a lamp?" She lifted her gaze to the alcove where Aladdin had placed his lucky lamp, but now the alcove was empty. "Where is it? He will be terribly disappointed that it is gone."
"Gwandoya the magician carries it with him, close to his heart. He is my master now, not Aladdin, though I wish it were otherwise. Gwandoya's desires run darker than Aladdin's simple tastes, and I fear what dark purpose he will use me for."
"Use you?" Maram ran through what Amani had told her, as well as her father, about his punishment for being the queen's lover. "Wait, you are a djinn, the servant of the lamp. No, the slave of the lamp, and your master is...the man who ordered you to kill Hasan."
Amani nodded. "I let him believe Hasan was your husband. I'm not sure he can tell the difference between him and Aladdin. The man is clearly mad."
"Where are we?"
"I am not sure what country this is, but we are many miles south from your home, far from any city."
Maram slumped. "So there is nowhere to escape to, even if the gates were not guarded by lions."
"The only way you will ever go home is if you persuade Gwandoya to order me to transport you or the palace back to your city." Amani smiled sadly. "If you have any of your mother's wiles to match her beauty, then I am sure you know how to make a man do whatever you wish."
Amani had known her as a child, so he had no idea how many men she'd seduced, all for her father's benefit and the good of the kingdom. What was one more, if it meant going home to Aladdin?
It would be a betrayal of Aladdin, and the freedom he had won for her. She had promised herself to him, and to let any other man touch her...Maram shivered. No, she could not even feign pleasure in any man's touch but his. Aladdin was the only man she wanted now, and she would not betray him with another, even if it meant their wedding would be delayed. She would return to him, somehow. There had to be a way. A way that did not involve seducing a madman.
THIRTY
"Have you seen the palace that was here yesterday?" Aladdin asked. "It was here, but now it's gone." When the man shook his head, Aladdin tried another passerby. "Did you see anything here last night?"
People shook their heads and moved away from him, eyeing him suspiciously as they passed on the other side of the road.
Aladdin couldn't really blame them. After all, if he'd been confronted by a desperate man asking if he'd seen his palace, Aladdin might have thought him a madman, too. And it wasn't the palace he cared about as much as Maram. If Hasan had hurt her...he didn't know what he'd do.
He kept his head down as he ambled through the bazaar, not wanting to look at all the things he'd thought about buying for Maram.
"Aladdin? Is it really you?"
It took a moment for the sound of his name being called to penetrate through Aladdin's wretchedness, and it took another long moment before he raised his head to focus on the man calling. "Berk?"
