I didn’t know what to say to that. Part of me wanted to tell him that he could take that oath and cram it in a very particular place, but another part of me remembered the way he had chased the monsters from my bedchamber, the way he had taught me to feed Sultana after she’d hatched, and it wanted nothing more than for me to forgive him, for things to go back to the way they’d been all those years ago, before anyone had realized what a disgusting creature I was.
But maybe none of it mattered. If I wanted to survive, I couldn’t afford to turn down good zahhak riders. I couldn’t afford to turn away good military commanders. And Sikander was both of those things. More than that, I’d never known him to lie, or to take a false oath. Whatever else I could say about him, he was honest and loyal to a fault. Sometimes that meant beating a child because his sovereign ordered it. But here it meant that he really would obey me, that he really would protect my life with his own, because he’d said he would. And if I was going to take command of a province in the midst of an open rebellion, with war looming on the horizon, I would need a man whose word I could trust, whose loyalty was unquestioned. I had one already in Arjun. And while Sikander and Arjun were as different from each other as night from day, they were alike in that one regard. They were honest and loyal to a fault.
“You’re sure you won’t need him against Virajendra, Father?” I asked, half hoping I might still be rid of him, even if I could see the benefits he might bring.
My father shrugged. “I have plenty of good generals. His service will mean more here.”
I saw then the reason for my father’s irritation with me. I may have seen Sikander as a tyrant and a thug, my father’s chief torturer where I was concerned, but from my father’s perspective, he was gifting me with his best friend and his most trusted soldier. He was trying, in his own way, to protect me. He may have couched that in politics and military strategy, but as he’d pointed out, he had plenty of good generals. He only had one who could be trusted not to murder me and take Zindh for himself.
“Thank you.” I’d never imagined I’d say those two words to my father, but if I didn’t show him that I acknowledged what he was doing, that I understood him, then we truly would never have anything between us but hate. One of us had to take the first step toward reconciliation, and I knew that it wasn’t going to be him. Although, maybe that’s what Zindh was to him. Maybe his idea of reconciliation was leaving me alone in a ruined province to sink or swim on my own merits. When I looked at it from that perspective, I saw that it was all I’d ever really wanted from him anyway—the chance to prove myself in his eyes.
My father cleared his throat to avoid saying “you’re welcome.” He gave me the same gruff nod he’d always used when confronted with the risk of accidentally showing some small sign of affection for me. “Well, Virajendra isn’t going to wait for me to get my men in position before they launch their attacks.”
He started to step toward his waiting men, but I reached out and took his hand to stop him. The feeling of my soft palm against his rough knuckles startled him. He stared down at me, his expression hovering somewhere between confusion and disgust, but I looked him squarely in the eyes and said, “I’m not going to fail. Zindh will hold. You’ll see.”
“I suppose I will,” he agreed, but he didn’t sound convinced. He jerked his hand free of mine and walked swiftly to the stables, where one of my five hundred guardsmen was holding Malikah by her reins. The old thunder zahhak looked just like I remembered her, just like she had on all those flights so many years ago. Her tail pumped excitedly at my father’s approach, and she pressed her snout to his cheek in greeting. He stroked her scales with a fondness he hadn’t shown me since that horrible day ten years before, and then he swung into the saddle, strapping himself in before trotting Malikah out into the midst of his men.
I watched as the sixteen thunder zahhaks formed up in two neat ranks behind Malikah, as she raced forward, running along the limestone path that led to the edge of Shikarpur’s sheerest cliff. One by one, the zahhaks flung themselves over the edge, beating back the air with their wings, dust swirling around the tips of their primary feathers. I stood there, straining my eyes to watch the dark blue animals soaring in the gathering twilight, until there was nothing to see but empty sky.
He hadn’t said good-bye, but then I hadn’t really expected him to. At least the last words that had passed between us hadn’t been shouted in anger. I didn’t know if that was a good sign, or if I was just stupidly clinging to the fragments of a relationship that no longer existed, but I couldn’t stop myself from hoping. No one wants to be despised by her parents, and no child wants to despise her father.
CHAPTER 4
She’s really mine?” Sakshi asked, stroking the thunder zahhak’s scales with tears in her eyes.
I nodded, my heart swelling with pride. My father had left us with the four thunder zahhaks I’d stolen from Javed Khorasani. With Sikander’s mount, and Arjun’s and Arvind’s fire zahhaks, that gave me seven in total, a formidable enough force, even if I lacked the
