Some of the crew immediately moved about the ship, reefing the sails while the captain shouted, “To the sand! Quickly!”
The ship shuddered as it came to a full stop. The crew and the Maidens wasted no time. Two dozen souls dropped from the sides of the ship and headed for the prow, lining up to pull at two great ropes anchored beneath the bowsprit. The sand carried on the air was so thick the ship looked as though it were being swallowed by an efrit. The sand beneath Çeda’s feet grew soft at times, forcing her to churn her legs or get pulled down. The dunes were shifting as she watched. If they allowed the Javelin to be caught in a trough for more than a few minutes, the runners would be overwhelmed, effectively grounding the ship until the sand passed. Some ships were half buried and took days to dig out. Other ships had been overwhelmed entirely, dragged down and lost to the swells of shifting sand, only to be revealed years or decades later when the wind hollowed the dunes in that part of the desert once more.
“Heave! Ho!” a crewman shouted. “Heave! Ho!”
And heave Çeda did. There was something about a storm so bad as this, and the thought of being lost in it, dragged beneath the grasping surface, that made her desperate to see them free. She could see the same look in the crew, and Emre. Even Sümeya looked like she regretted her decision to press on, but there was nothing for it now.
Inch by inch they towed the ship, dozens pulling, three crewmen at the end of each of the two ropes stabbing a great towing spear into the sand and levering backward to help free the skimwood runners.
When they finally pulled the ship out of the slip-sand, only the mainsail was still unfurled, and only halfway, so that they wouldn’t lose control when the towing had done its work. Even so, the ship gained speed quickly. Two by two, everyone who’d jumped down ran alongside the ship and climbed up rope ladders to the deck.
Three more times that day the Javelin became stuck, but none so bad as that first. By the time night was nearing, the storm had finally begun to die down. They found no good rocky ground to moor near, but the captain, surveying the way ahead, declared it safe enough to stop for the night so long as the guards were careful to watch for the shifting dunes.
Çeda breathed a silent prayer for how quickly the day had passed. It meant she hadn’t had to face Sümeya. Or Emre. Not directly, in any case. Not alone.
As she and the other Blade Maidens settled down for the night in their cabin at the fore of the ship, though, she finally had a chance to think about what Sümeya had said the night before. It nagged at her, so much so that, even though she’d rarely felt so exhausted, she woke in the hours before dawn.
All of the Maidens except Yndris were light sleepers, but none woke as Çeda pulled her blankets back and stood. The wind scoured the ship, the shrill sound masking the creak of the floorboards as she crept toward the door. She left as quietly as she could and treaded her way along the passageway to the stern, where Emre’s cabin was situated just next to the captain’s. The door was unlocked. She slipped inside with little more than a soft click and a groan of the deck boards to find him sitting up in his bunk, eyes wide in the golden light of the small candle by his bedside. She’d surprised him, but he relaxed as she entered and closed the door behind her.
His cabin was small, but there was enough space for her to kneel next to his bed. He turned over in his bunk so that he faced her. Though the air coming through the porthole was cool, he wore no shirt, and from the waist down was covered only by a thin sheet.
“You always were warm as a bloody ox,” she whispered.
“And you were always cold as well water,” he shot back.
They both smiled.
His scent filled the cabin. By the gods, how she’d missed it, and so many of the small things about how they used to live with one another. Their thrown-together meals. Walking to the bazaar to share a loaf of Tehla’s bread. The songs they’d sing as the musicians in the neighborhood played. All of it gone now, perhaps never to return. Part of her wished to relive those days with him, but instead she put her hands in her lap and said, “We need to talk.”
“Çeda, I’m sorry.”
She waved his concern away, knowing he was talking about his night with Melis. “That isn’t why I’ve come.”
“It was a joke and it was cruel and—”
Her next words caught in her throat. “A joke?”
“When I was talking with Melis and Kameyl the other day, they saw how you were watching us. Kameyl joked that one of them should take me off to the desert, if only to . . .”
“If only to what?”
“She said she could see it in you. In us. That we wanted to be together. I laughed and said you’d left those days behind, but Melis insisted we should find out one way or the other. She’d ask me to go with her and thought you’d object and take me yourself. Kameyl laughed and said no, that you’d stew in your stubbornness for an age before saying a word against it.”
For a moment, Çeda could only stare. They’d been laughing at me. Even Emre. “And what did you think?”
He shrugged, suddenly very interested in a stray thread on his woolen blanket. “I thought—”
“Never mind. It doesn’t matter. That isn’t why I’ve come.”
“I hoped you would object,” he blurted, “but I knew Kameyl was right. I still shouldn’t have done it, though. It was cruel. We stayed only a short while, and then came back, but you’d already left with Sümeya.”
Gods, am I so transparent? “Think nothing of it.”
Emre took her hand as he had along the Trough. “Nothing happened.”
“I don’t care.”
“I mean it. Nothing happened.” He stroked her knuckles with his thumb. It felt good, but also wrong.
“Emre, stop apologizing.”
“I’m not.” Even in the dim light, she could see the color in his cheeks. “Well, I am, but—”
“Emre, this isn’t why I’ve come.” She snatched her hand back. “This is important.”
He blinked. Licked his lips, clearly embarrassed. But then the look was gone, as if their conversation had never happened. She knew he was good at masking his feelings, but she was surprised to see him do it so quickly, and so very effectively, with her.
“You’re right,” he said. “What is it?”
“Last night,” she began, “Sümeya revealed something to me.” She continued, telling him everything, from their swordplay to Sümeya’s confessions about Nayyan to Sümeya’s advances. Surprisingly, the fact that she and Sümeya had kissed was not the hardest thing to speak of. It was the struggle between herself and the asir, how close Sümeya had been to dying, how tragic it was to send the asir away despite Çeda’s promises to help them. But she moved beyond it and returned to the night’s biggest revelation. Nayyan. “Sümeya said an assassin’s blade took Nayyan from her side. She implied Nayyan is now posing as one of the Kings.”
Eyes distant, Emre took a moment to digest it all. “Could it be? Ahya?”
Çeda nodded. “She killed one of them. I’m sure of it.”
Emre glanced up as the deck creaked under a fierce gust of wind. He spoke very softly now. “A King dead I could believe. But to then disguise a Maiden as one of them? It makes no sense. Everyone would know.”
“The gifts of the gods protect them, Emre. You think it impossible that they could conceal her nature?”
Emre shrugged. “I suppose it’s possible. Which King, though?”
“I met all of them in the Sun Palace just before accepting my blade from King Husamettín. None of them had been wearing a veil or mask. So it could be any of them. But in truth that isn’t what’s bothering me. It’s the other mysteries of that night and the night that came before it. My mother was so fateful. She told Dardzada she’d gone to find the silver trove.” Before Emre could ask, she continued. “The poems, Emre. Tulathan read one for each of the Kings o
n the night of Beht Ihman. She hoped to find them that night.”
“Do you think it’s real?”
“I don’t know. I need to think on it more, ask Zaïde about it when we return. What interests me more is that she returned at all. Why? And why was she so concerned with finding a place for me to stay?”
“You said it yourself. She escaped, but thought they might find Ahya and you together. She went to remove suspicion, to save you.”
“But Emre, she was allowed to do it.” She’d been worrying at this mystery since leaving Dardzada’s, but now that she was able to voice it aloud, to finally speak with someone about it, more and more ideas were rushing toward her. “Who would have done so, Emre? Who would have let a woman leave when she clearly meant the Kings harm?”
“Perhaps they didn’t know. It might have been your father, whichever King he was. Maybe he loved Ahya. Perhaps she was caught and he couldn’t bring himself to kill her, so he let her go.”
“That’s rather convenient. The very next night a King is killed and a Maiden put in his place?”
“Then what?”
“Ihsan,” Çeda said, staring at the hull planks. “The Honey-tongued King. He might have found her. Gods, he might have laid a trap for her, spreading lies about the silver trove to see who would come to find it. He might have whispered his honeyed words in her ear and told her to return.”
“But he wouldn’t have done that unless—”
Çeda looked at him and saw in his eyes that they’d come to the same conclusion. “Unless he wanted her to kill a King. He might have chosen Azad himself.”
“Goezhen’s sweet kiss, Çeda, could it be?”
Çeda shrugged. “Why not? They are men, and men scrabble and scratch and claw, even those who wear crowns. Especially men who wear crowns. Men who’ve lived for centuries, building grudges and burying hatred along the way. What I’m really wondering is whether he knew about me.”
Emre considered this. “It seems likely, doesn’t it? If he had a chance to speak to Ahya for any length of time, what are the chances he wouldn’t have asked about it?”
“And if he knew about me, he likely allowed my entry into the Maidens as well. There’s a chance he knew about Külaşan. Or hoped for it, at least.”
“Do you think he foresaw you becoming a Maiden?”
Çeda’s mind raced. “Who can tell? Perhaps King Yusam is in league with him. And why not? If one could plot to overthrow the other Kings, why can’t two? It seems unlikely that Ihsan, even with his gifts, could stand on his own. He’d need allies, and what better ally than Yusam?”
“And your hand is assigned to Yusam. Have you seen them talking?”
“No, but they wouldn’t be so foolish as to speak in front of us.”
“Gods, Çeda, he might aid us, for a time at least.”
“Ihsan aid us? As well make a bargain with a black laugher, Emre.”
“The enemy of my enemy.”
“Is in the end no friend at all. Not truly.” But then she remembered Zaïde’s confession in the savaşam, that she had the ear of one of the Kings, that he might offer his protection. Could it be Ihsan? Could Zaïde be in league with him? It made sense . . .
“What is it?” Emre asked, noticing her hesitation.
The thoughts were too half formed. She needed time to reflect, so she said, “You’re right. Let me think on this awhile. Ihsan could be a valuable piece on the board.”
The entire ship creaked from stem to stern, a strong gust of wind, pressing, howling. A river of fine amber dust drifted down by the candle’s flame, creating a diffused glow that dissipated a moment later. She prepared to stand, but stopped when Emre said, “You could stay awhile.”
She thought of his kiss along the Spear with the House of Kings watching them from atop Tauriyat. And then she thought of him walking away with Melis. She believed what he’d said, that he regretted it, yet still she couldn’t get the image of him leaving the fireside, hand in hand with Melis, out of her head. “The sun will be coming up soon.”
“Can you come again tomorrow?”
She shook her head. The shrill whine of the wind turned to a hollow moan. “Tomorrow we’ll be in Ishmantep. I’ll find my way here on our return.”
When she left, she was surprised to find the most difficult thing wasn’t leaving; it was the realization that parting had been easier than she’d expected. Part of it was the sting of Kameyl being right—why hadn’t she fought for Emre?—but another was the knowledge that she and Emre were on entirely different paths.
She stood there awhile after she’d closed the door, wondering if she should go back, stay with him awhile. But after a moment’s hesitation, she turned and headed for the Maidens’ cabin.
Chapter 50
THE DAY FOLLOWING THE TERRIBLE SANDSTORM, the Javelin continued sailing toward Ishmantep. It was sunny but unseasonably cold, as if Thaash’s anger had finally been spent and all that was left was cold brooding. Ahead of the ship, far off the starboard side, Çeda could see one of the asirim. Kerim, she reminded herself. He has a name. From this distance he looked like a black beetle scuttling over sand. A moment later he was gone, lost behind the far side of a dune.
The other came a moment later, moving like a hound on the hunt. The two of them were in deep pain, as the asirim always were. The pain fed their murderous thoughts. They ached to rend flesh, to sink long nails into the heart of another, if only to feel a heart beat as theirs once did. They could do none of these things, however. Not without leave, for the power of the gods compelled them, bound as they were to Kameyl until she released them or the Jackal King took them from her control. At the very thought, Kerim wailed. The sound rose above the incessant shush of the ship’s skis, making the hair at the nape of Çeda’s neck stand on end. How can I sit and watch them suffer? she thought. Why not free them here and now? She would die if she did so—the Kings would certainly sense it—which was a sound reason not to, but just then the knowledge was a cloak that did little to warm her.
On the foredeck Sümeya stood by Yndris’s side, pointing to the left of a hill that looked like the hunchback curve of a black laugher’s silhouette. “There lies Ridgeback, with Ishmantep just beyond.” Only a few more minutes’ sailing and they saw a caravanserai resolve above the wavering horizon. Like Sharakhai, Ishmantep had outgrown its defenses. A smattering of homes and a patchwork of green fields and farmsteads carpeted the terrain below high stone walls. There were trees—lemon or fig, most likely—and fields of onions, garlic, and turnips. There were even rows of grapes unless Çeda missed her guess. Within the walls, mudbrick buildings were built beside larger ones made of stone the color of a dusty rose. Years ago, before joining Sümeya’s hand, Melis had been assigned to Ishmantep under a Maiden named Dilara. Thanks to her drilling, Çeda could already pick out the small keep for the lord of Ishmantep, the trade houses, the auction block, the stables, the barracks. At the center of it all stood a large, square building with masts from at least two dozen ships surrounding it—the caravanserai proper, the first building built and the heart of trade and commerce in this corner of the desert. Emre stepped up to the foredeck, a thing Sümeya noted but said nothing against.
“It’s funny,” he said to no one in particular, “in Sharakhai, ships dock at the edges of the city, but here they sit inside the walls, the center of everyone’s attention.”
Which only seems proper, Çeda thought. In the caravanserais, life is sustained as much by the endless stream of sandships as the water from its wells.
“It’s larger than I would have guessed,” Emre went on.
“Ishmantep was a city once,” Melis replied.
Indeed, it was the largest of the caravanserais along the northern trail leading to Malasan—the Spice Road, as it was often called—a region that grew some of the most fragrant spices found anywhere in the world. In the distance, on either s
ide of Ishmantep, two of the Great Desert’s mountain ranges closed in, their foothills rounding the terrain before giving way to a tumble of black, jagged monoliths. To the left, north of Ishmantep, were the Taloran Mountains, with Mount Arasal visible in the foreground, the very mountain that fed Sharakhai’s great aqueduct. And to the right, southward, was a spur of the Kholomundi Range, the Black Teeth of Iri, the unending string of mountains that walled the Shangazi to the south and east.
“Hundreds of years ago,” Melis went on, “in the weeks leading up to Beht Ihman, the desert tribes were marching toward Sharakhai but paused when they came to Ishmantep. The city was four times the size you see before you now, and well armed. But the tribes’ host was numerous indeed. They gained the walls and took the young city, slaughtering every man, woman, and child they found before burning the buildings to the ground. That is what we fight for.”
Sümeya turned to look at the Maidens, and Emre as well. “Lord Aziz has lasted two decades as the governor of Ishmantep, rising from a lowly stableboy who worked those very stalls to the man he is now. The Kings have even allowed him to buy land, a thing nearly unheard of for those without royal blood. He is wily. He has the ear of the Kings, especially Beşir, who granted him the land. He is well protected, so you’ll wait for a signal from me or Kameyl before you act. And by the gods’ sweet breath, you’ll treat everyone with respect until we have reason to act otherwise. Do you understand?”
Ishmantep was special among the caravanserais. Most were little more than a cluster of stone or mudbrick buildings where ships could stop to gain access to water and rest for the night. Ishmantep, however, was one where ships coming from the north or east could bypass Sharakhai as long as a tariff was paid for doing so. Most caravans preferred to sell their goods in Sharakhai to the highest bidder, and to buy from the wealth of goods offered at the auction blocks and the spice markets and the bazaar, but there were trade routes that had been set up generations or even centuries ago—shipments between kings and queens and khans of distant lands. Such established trade meant much to the Kings, which in turn gave the master of certain caravanserais power. They were trusted men and women. Rich men and women. Which in turn meant they had to watch their step with Lord Aziz or risk the wrath of the Kings who supported him.
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