“Get rid of your ifrit, fire worshipper. And hand over your Afshin. He’ll be the one held responsible for the massacre and executed accordingly. Then we’ll return your warrior and open negotiations.”
Dara’s stomach dropped. Again, they wanted him to take the blame for the decision of a Nahid.
Manizheh stood up. “It was I who killed your king,” she declared, venom in every word. “And it was I who would have seen my city emptied of your people, a future that sounds more promising with each minute you remain in my presence. Tell your so-called princess that. Tell her the day my Afshin is in your company, it won’t be tears of victory you’re weeping.”
“A shame,” the warrior replied, looking at Dara again. “Your soldier spoke so fiercely in your defense.” She turned away, striding through the doors as if she didn’t have an arrow locked on her neck.
Dara lowered his bow. “You didn’t give me up.”
Manizheh glared at him. “Of course I didn’t give you up! Though I appreciate learning just how much you trust me.”
“They have Irtemiz,” he whispered. “I thought she was dead. I thought they all were.”
“She is just as likely dead,” Manizheh warned. “That sand fly was testing you, and you blundered right into it.”
Dara shook his head. “She is one of mine. I have a duty to try and get her back.”
“You certainly do not.” Manizheh’s eyes were wide with disbelief. “By the Creator, theirs isn’t even a clever trap. They’re trying to divide us—to get rid of you.” She must have seen the rebellion brewing in his face. “Afshin, this is not a matter on which there is any negotiation. I mourn the girl, I do, but there are thousands of Daeva girls like Irtemiz who’ll be at risk if you’re killed.”
“But it isn’t right that she suffer in my place. This is maddening, Banu Nahida. I cannot go after Irtemiz, I cannot go after Nahri—”
“It has only been two weeks, Dara. You must be patient. Give us time to secure the city, for the djinn to turn over Nahri and Alizayd as they’ve been warned. There is no other way. They are waiting for us to stumble, to make a mistake.”
“But—”
“Am I interrupting something?”
At the sound of Aeshma’s coy, mocking voice, Dara abruptly lost the battle he was waging with his emotions. Thunder cracked across the throne room, the air growing hot.
“What do you want?” he hissed.
“To relieve the Banu Nahida of your ever-pleasant company.” Aeshma turned his attention to Manizheh, bowing slightly. “You are ready?”
Manizheh sighed. “Yes.” She glanced at Dara. “I will find a way to send proof of Muntadhir’s life,” she assured him. “Hopefully that will convince this princess to spare Irtemiz, especially since she has already given up her other Daeva hostages—a mistake I will not be making on our part. You are not to engage with them further, understand?”
Dara grunted assent, still glowering at the ifrit. “What does Aeshma want with you?”
Manizheh’s eyes dimmed. “It’s complicated.” She turned to follow the ifrit but then stopped, glancing back once more. “And, Afshin?”
“Yes?”
Manizheh nodded toward the direction in which the Geziri warrior had departed. “Start training more women.”
That he agreed to more readily. “Understood.” Dara watched her leave with Aeshma, not missing how she’d dodged his question.
Fine. Manizheh wanted to keep her secrets?
She wasn’t the only one who had them. And there was one in particular Dara had been aching to try again.
12
DARA
“I just don’t understand why you had to be so mean,” Ali complained, setting down a basket of oranges next to a sack of dried beans. “Surely there are ways of commerce that don’t involve insulting everyone around you.”
Nahri handed him a tin of dates. “I didn’t say anything untrue.”
“You said his mother must have dropped him on his head as an infant!”
“Did you hear his asking price? And for this?” Nahri gestured at their new acquisition: a small, ramshackle felucca that looked like someone had tried to dress up a larger version of the hand canoes Ali had seen children zooming about the waterfront on. “He should be happy we’re taking it off his hands.” She shoved a box in his arms. “That’s the last of our supplies.”
Ali inhaled, smelling sugar and aniseed. “I don’t remember buying this.”
“A sweet-seller looked at me too long, so I relieved him of his goods.”
The meaning behind her words took a moment to land, and then he groaned. “This is going to end with us in prison, isn’t it?”
“You wanted to leave Cairo. No better motivation than being chased.”
A cough drew his attention. Yaqub was making his way down the bank, his arms wrapped around an enormous basket.
“Healing herbs,” he explained, wheezing. “Some tonics, gauze, and a good supply of anything you might need should either of you fall sick or get injured.”
“That wasn’t necessary,” Nahri protested. “You’ve already done enough.”
“Let someone help you, for the love of God, child,” the apothecarist said, shoving the basket in her arms. He eyed their boat with open concern. “Is the sail supposed to look like that?”
“Of course.” Nahri passed the basket to Ali. “Haven’t you heard? My friend here is an expert sailor. Ali, tell Yaqub why the sail looks like that.”
Yaqub’s questioning gaze slid to him. Ali fought to appear knowledgeable. “It’s … resting.”
“Resting?”
“Yes,” he lied. “It rests and then it … it goes.” Ali attempted to make a sailing motion with his hand.
The apothecarist turned back to Nahri. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay?”
She sighed. “I’m sorry, old friend. I wish I could, but we have people relying on us back home.”
We could have a life here together, a good one. Ali fumbled the knot he’d started to untie, a stab of uncertainty going through him. He wondered if Nahri had known just how tempted he’d been. How deep the vision of them, together—Nahri taking care of patients, Ali handling the books—had struck.
But Daevabad came first. His father’s mantra, the duty that strangled them. Even Nahri had
