“Why did you shout at him just then?” She tilts her head to one side, an eyebrow raised. “You were smiling at him before.”
Was I smiling? I don’t know … I didn’t even feel my mouth move.
“Was he mean to you? Did he do something bad? Because you shouldn’t shout at him otherwise,” the girl says seriously. “You’ll get him into trouble.”
It gives me pause that a girl so young—and so royal—would care about someone like Cavas, a person she has probably been told time and again is beneath her.
“You know him?” I ask, avoiding her questions.
She lets out a laugh that is simultaneously airy and mocking. “Of course I know Cavas. He takes care of my pony, Dhoop. He also never laughs at me when I fall off the saddle.” Her eyes narrow at me. “I don’t know you.”
Excellent. I’ve never felt this intimidated by a person half my size. I swallow back the fear and force a smile.
“Are you sure, Rajkumari? Perhaps you haven’t seen me. You’ve been so busy with your dolls and Dhoop this week!” Surely even princesses play with dolls. Don’t they?
The princess frowns, a hint of doubt on her little face. Before she can respond, though, I hear laughter in the distance.
Her dark eyes widen. “Hide!” she says.
“What? Why?”
But she’s already running, so quick on her feet that I wonder if she has wings on them, and disappears behind a tall hedge by Rani Mahal, leaving me standing in place, openmouthed.
Seconds later, the source of the laughter appears in front of me, three men dressed in the sort of clothes I’ve only seen in paintings: knee-length white-and-gold angrakhas tied at the right shoulder and white hunting breeches stuffed into tall red boots caked with mud. Indradhanush glints on their bows and the feathered arrows of their nearly empty quivers, the weapons hanging from gilded waistbelts. Only one of the men looks relatively clean. Unlike the first two, who have let their hair flow free along with their laughter, his turban is still rigidly tied in place, gold tipping his angular cheeks. I can tell he’s younger than the other two—probably around eighteen or nineteen years old—his face growing sour as another joke is made at his expense.
The princes like to hunt.
I make an attempt to slip away, hastily covering my head and face with my dupatta. But I know, even before I take the first step, that they’ve already seen me.
“There it is!” A voice calls out. “You, there! Serving girl!”
I pause and turn, watching as the tallest and most handsome of the princes gestures to the dead bird lying behind me. “Bring that here!”
I stiffen, not wanting to cause a scene by disobeying a royal, yet unwilling to touch the dead bird. The turbaned prince looks annoyed, but the smirks on the faces of the other two remind me of some of the novices in Javeribad—the ones who enjoyed seeing others punished. A voice that sounds like mine, yet not quite, emerges from my mouth: “Isn’t that the gamekeeper’s job? To carry your kills?”
A flash of anger lights up the tall prince’s eyes. He moves closer, so slowly that for a moment I don’t realize he’s moving. “What did you say, girl?”
The other princes follow, even though I can tell that the turbaned one is more reluctant. Up close, I see they all have identical eyes—pale yellow, like the firestones glinting on the small hoops piercing their lobes.
“Go on.” The tall prince makes a puckering sound with his lips, like an air kiss for a pet. “Go get the bird before I get angry.”
“I am not your servant, Rajkumar,” I say. I can hear a voice in my head screaming—another Gul who is cursing my folly. “I work for Rani Amba.”
“I work for Rani Amba,” his companion mocks in a falsetto. The two men laugh as if it’s the funniest thing they’ve ever heard. “Stupid witch.”
If we were in Javeribad right now, I would have taken one of the tall prince’s own arrows and run it through him.
“Is this how the royals treat those who serve them? Where is your honor and respect, Rajkumar?” I demand instead, invoking the Code of Asha.
In response, the tallest prince’s hand cracks across my jaw, making my teeth rattle. He sneers at me, and I wonder how I could have ever thought him good-looking. “First of all, I am no ordinary princeling that you can get away with calling me Rajkumar. I am the yuvraj—the heir apparent to Ambar’s throne. When you talk to me again, you will address me accordingly, the way respect and royal titles demand. As for honor? You think you can use my own mother’s lectures on me, serving girl? You are not a rajkumari or some jumped-up minister’s daughter I need to watch myself around. Your honor is of no consequence to me.”
“Let it go, Sonar,” the turbaned prince cuts in impatiently. “Father’s waiting for us, remember?”
“Shut up, Amar,” the crown prince—Sonar—says. “Father can wait.”
The turbaned prince shoots me a look that is both angry and pitying. Sonar’s hand reaches out, wrenching my dupatta off my head. Instinctively, I grab the cloth, my knuckles turning pale.
The prince standing next to Sonar laughs. “Oh look! She’s going to put up a fight!”
Sonar laughs as well, his perfect white teeth gleaming, his grip on my dupatta almost lazy. He knows he can rip the cloth from my hands with a single pull. Another step forward and he will reach for my other clothes, tearing into the sleeve of my blouse, revealing the birthmark I’ve taken such pains to hide.
No. My heart thuds beneath my ribs. No.
Light erupts from my hands, hitting Sonar with a boom. His eyes widen, and he staggers back, nearly falling over his own feet. The three princes stare at me in astonishment. A calm feeling settles over
