Muntadhir pursed his lips. “And the Ayaanle?”
“No one has heard anything from the Ayaanle.”
“Then that should concern you more than the rest.”
Dara waited, but when Muntadhir didn’t explain, he threw up his hands. “That is it?”
Muntadhir gave him an incredulous look. “You could not have broken Daevabad more if you’d literally picked the city up and shaken it. This place is a pile of kindling, and my father spent his entire reign stamping out smoke before it could become flame, only for you and Manizheh to come and dump an ocean of oil over it and light a thousand bonfires. And that was before magic vanished. What did you expect?”
“That you might help me fix it.”
The emir drew himself up, all humor vanishing. “I’m not going to help you. Kaveh and Manizheh murdered my father and a thousand other Geziris. Your plan, whose failure you’re mourning, was intended to annihilate my people. I found you trying to enslave my brother. Everything went sideways, and now I am to assist you? Never. If I have found a glimmer of pleasure in all this, it is the assurance that you will destroy yourselves just as spectacularly.”
Fire burned through his blood, and Dara struggled to check it. Immediately he thought of Zaynab—Muntadhir wore his fear for his sister so openly that it was an easy threat.
But he’d promised Kartir—he’d promised himself—that he would find another way.
He eyed the other man. “You are supposed to be the pragmatic one, are you not? If you truly love this city, help me. Please,” Dara added when the emir snorted. “Djinn, I know you hate me. You’ve every right to. But trust that I know too well what happens when cities fall, and Daevabad—our Daevabad—is on the brink. This needn’t end with us all slaughtering one another. Help me save your people.”
“You’re the greatest threat to my people.” But when Dara gave him a pleading look, Muntadhir let out an irritated sound of defeat. “God, I wish you’d just strangled me. Taking my chances with the afterlife would have been better than this.”
Dara’s spirits fell. “It is nice.”
Muntadhir gave him a bewildered look. “Are you speaking from personal experience?” When Dara opened his mouth, Muntadhir held up a hand. “Never mind, I don’t want to know.” He rose to his feet, taking a long sip of his wine. “These overtures to the other tribes … tell me about them.”
“I burned a section of land in each quarter, and warned them to submit and send tribute immediately.”
“That was your overture?”
“Ah, yes, because your father was such a peaceful man.”
“My father made sure his rewards were more inviting than his threats—and he had centuries of stability and a standing army to back them up, not just a mad Afshin and an even madder Nahid with ifrit friends. You need to make joining your side at least somewhat tempting. Most people just want safety for their families, food on the table, and a roof overhead. Give them that, and they’ll look away from plenty. Give them nothing but violence, and they’ll join with the idealists calling for your head.”
Dara stared at him. “You really are your father’s son.”
Muntadhir shrugged, but Dara did not miss the tremble of his hands—the words had struck no matter how he pretended otherwise. “So, you’ve thoroughly isolated and bullied the other tribes. How do things stand with the Daevas?”
“The Daevas are on our side, of course.”
“Oh?”
“Granted, Kartir and some of the priests are not pleased by the violence nor the presence of the ifrit, and I have not had much success recruiting new soldiers—”
“I’m going to stop you there.” Muntadhir gave Dara a shrewd look, the pearly scar dividing his brow where he’d been scourged glinting in the sun. “The Daevas in this city aren’t fools. They’re survivors, and you are an outsider who has visited violence upon them twice.”
Dara bristled. “I’m no outsider. I have been fighting for my people since—”
“You are an outsider,” Muntadhir said firmly. “You are foreign to this century, Manizheh is foreign to the struggles of daily life in the quarter, and Kaveh grew up on a country estate where he likely saw a djinn once a year. You are all outsiders to Daevabad’s Daevas, and you rushed in to save them—I assume without actually consulting any of them, yes? You want my advice? Make sure you have the support of your own people before reaching out to the other tribes. That was how we ruled.”
“Your brother mounted a successful insurrection among the Geziris the same night we attacked.”
“Which is why he stood a very good chance of taking my father down. It is those we are closest to who have an opportunity to observe our weaknesses best, and I take it your Manizheh has surrounded herself with Daevas.”
Regardless of how strained his relationship with Manizheh was, a protective instinct raced down Dara’s spine. “What do you suggest?”
“Reach out to your tribe’s nobles. The Daeva noble houses are among the oldest and most respected in our world. More important—for now—is that they control most of the arable land outside the city walls and at least half the trade.”
Dara grimaced. Kaveh had also said something about the Daeva nobles, hadn’t he? “We seized much of the land outside the city right after the conquest. We wanted to secure the harvest,
