Nahid beauty locked away in the palace, an evil Afshin set to ruin her, an irritable prince exiled to the land of his forefathers …”
Ali’s temper finally snapped as he reached for the tent flap. “I am not irritable. And you’re the one spinning most of those tales!”
Lubayd only laughed again. “Go on inside and see what your sister sent you.” He glanced at Aqisa, holding up the dish. “Hungry?”
“Very.”
Shaking his head, Ali kicked off his sandals and ducked inside his tent. It was small yet cozy, with ample space for the bed cushion one of Lubayd’s cousins had mercifully lengthened to Ali’s “ludicrous” height. In fact, everything in the room was a gift. He’d arrived in Bir Nabat with only his weapons and the bloodstained dishdasha on his back, and his belongings were a record of his years here: the extra robe and sandals that were the first things he’d scavenged from an abandoned human caravan, the Qur’an that Sheikh Jiyad had given him when Ali started teaching, the pages and pages of notes and drawings he’d taken while observing various irrigation works.
And something new: a sealed copper tube the length of his forearm and wide as a fist, resting upon his neatly folded cushion. One end had been dipped in jet black wax, a familiar signature carved around its perimeter.
With a smile, Ali picked up the tube, peeling off the wax to reveal the blade-sharp pattern it had been protecting. A blood seal, one that ensured none but a blood relation of Zaynab’s would be able to open it. It was the most they could do to protect their privacy … not that it mattered. The man most likely to have their communication intercepted was their own father and he could easily use his own blood to read their messages. Likely he did.
Ali pressed his arm against the edge. The scroll top smoked away the moment the blades drew blood, and Ali tilted it, emptying the contents onto his cushion.
A bar of gold, a copper armband, and a letter, several pages in length. Attached to the armband was a small note in Zaynab’s elegant hand.
For the headaches you keep complaining about. Take good care of this, little brother. The Nahid horribly overcharged me for it.
Ali fingered the armband, eying the gold bar and the letter. God preserve you, Zaynab. Bir Nabat might be recovering, but it was still a hard place and that gold would go a long way here. He only hoped sending it hadn’t gotten his sister in any trouble. He’d written her multiple times trying to warn her off providing him with supplies, and she’d ignored him, flouting his advice as thoroughly as she defied their father’s unofficial decree that no Geziri was to aid him. Zaynab was probably the only one who could get away with such a thing; Ghassan had always been softhearted when it came to his daughter.
He fell on his bed cushion, rolling onto his stomach to read the letter, Zaynab’s familiar script and barbed observations like a warm hug. He missed his sister terribly; theirs was a relationship he’d been too young and self-righteous to appreciate until now, when it was reduced to the occasional letter. Ali would never see Zaynab again. He wouldn’t sit by the canal on a sunny day to share coffee and family gossip, nor be proudly at her side when she married. He’d never meet her future children, the nieces and nephews he would have spoiled and taught to spar in another life.
He also knew it could be worse. Ali thanked God every day he’d landed with the djinn of Bir Nabat rather than in the hands of any of the dozens who’d tried to kill him since. But the ache when he thought of his family never quite went entirely away.
Then maybe you should start building one here. Ali rolled onto his back, basking in the warmth of the sun glowing against the tent. In the distance, he could hear children laughing and birds chirping. Bushra’s quiet interest played across his mind, and alone in his tent, Ali would not deny it sent a slight thrill through his body. Daevabad seemed a world away, his father apparently content to forget him. Would it truly be so terrible to allow himself to settle more permanently here, to quietly seize the kind of domestic life he would have never been allowed as Muntadhir’s Qaid?
Dread crept over him. Yes, it seemed to answer, swallowing the simple fantasies running through his mind’s eye. For in Ali’s experience, dreaming of a better future had only ever led to destruction.
Well, one thing was clear: her Daeva elders did not share Nahri’s enthusiasm about the Nahid hospital.
Nisreen stared at her. “You slipped away from your guards? Again? Do you have any idea what Ghassan will do if he finds out?”
“Zaynab made me do it!” Nahri defended herself. Then—realizing it was perhaps a little ungrateful to blame her sister-in-law for an outing she rather enjoyed—she quickly added, “She said she takes such walks often and hasn’t been caught yet. And she promised to take the blame if we were.”
Kartir looked openly alarmed. The grand priest was normally more indulgent of Nahri’s … unorthodox ways, but this latest misadventure seemed to have shaken his calm. “And you trust her?” he asked, his wiry brows knitting in worry.
“On this, yes.” Nahri’s relationship with her sister-in-law was a prickly one, but she recognized a woman eager for a little bit of freedom when she saw one. “Now will the two of you stop fretting over everything? This is exciting! Can you imagine it? A Nahid hospital?”
Kartir and Nisreen shared a look. It was quick, but there was no denying the way the priest’s cheeks flushed in guilt.
Nahri was instantly suspicious. “You already know of this place? Why wouldn’t you tell me?”
Kartir sighed. “Because what happened to that hospital is neither pleasant nor wise to discuss. I doubt anyone besides the king and a few devoted Daevabadi historians even know anything about it.”
Nahri frowned at the vague words. “Then how do you two?”
“Because Banu Manizheh learned of its existence—and of its fate,” Nisreen said quietly. “She was always poring over her family’s old books. She told us.”
“What do you mean, ‘its fate’?” When neither replied, Nahri’s impatience got the better of her. “Suleiman’s eye, must everything be a seceret here? I learned more from Razu in five minutes than I have from the two of you in five years!”
“Razu? Baga Rustam’s Razu?” Relief lit Kartir’s face. “Thank the Creator. I feared the worst when her tavern was burned.”
Nahri felt a pang of sorrow for the kind gambler who’d welcomed her so warmly. “I’m the Banu Nahida. I should have known ifrit slaves were being hunted down.”
Nisreen and Kartir exchanged another glance. “We thought it best,” Nisreen said finally. “You were still so deep in grief over Dara, and I didn’t want to burden you with the fate of his fellows.”
Nahri flinched at Dara’s name; she could not deny she had fallen apart in the weeks after his death. “It still wasn’t a decision you should have made on my behalf.” She eyed them. “I cannot be Banu Nahida in the Temple and infirmary and then be treated like a child when it comes to political matters you believe upsetting.”
“Political
