I walk to No-Name-Emperor and he takes my cheeks into his hands. His voice sweeps through the past, mangling into the present. ‘What did I tell you about loss, daughter?’
‘Loss is acceptable to a good strategist as long as it’s never a concession in the greater war. To deceive the enemy, one must become them at all costs.’
From the vestiges of the past, he leans into the shell of my ear, uttering orders I’ve longed to hear. ‘Yes, thereisno victory without pain. The pain only ends when a winner is determined.’
‘Now I understand,’ I murmur. He taught me that no fear makes you arrogant. Too much fear makes you a slave, a puppet to the whispers of a master who longs to control you. But a good amount of fear will become your wisdom because fear means you hold a stake in a battle. Fear can save you. I fear this city more than anyone, and with that, I understand its stakes well.
Wrongly, I thought I needed no allies, that I could preserve the part of me that is Zahr-zad while living alongside Sajamistanis. From the way the scholars single me out, allies are all that will save me.
I face No-Name-Emperor, his features similar to Scholar Mufasa. They merge together, one my father, the other a scholar, but both myteacher. I could learn to love the scholar too –I will be a good pupil– for a mere semblance of his satisfaction.
In fact, I smile,it’s a labour of love. Scholar Mufasa must only be harsh because he longs for me to succeed; his style of cruelty is his fashion of teaching as a patriarch.
I will claw my way to the top. It’s exactly what was done with the poison: I felt the pain at first, but, achingly slowly, I built tolerance.
17
I have a plan: collect information on the captain. The next day, when the heavens above are the barest candlelight of dawn, I go to Little Paradise gardens, climbing up the citrus trees to train, while I mull over my objective.
Halfway into my stances, a tall girl shoves someone into the gardens.
‘Leave me be!’ A cry resounds through the air, almost awakening the slumbering karkadann bulls.
I glance below to see a familiar-looking pazktab girl, her fingers digging into the arm of a boy – the same boy I’d saved from an attack months ago. She has wide jade eyes, a necklace of buffalo bones tight around her collar, and dark hair braided with raven feathers into two spheres on her head. She looks fifteen or sixteen years at most.
‘Did you bring it?’ The girl kicks at the boy’s satchel, loose barberries and apples strewing about.
‘Yes! Leave me be, Arezu!’
Your success here is determined by alliances, rukh, Overseer Yabghu had advised me, and, seeing the boy, it shines a great deal of light on to my dilemma.
I leap down from the branch. The boy’s eyes meet mine over the girl’s – Arezu’s – shoulder, lighting up in recognition. Before she can react, I clench her by the collar, turning her. My leather-sandalled foot connects with her torso, sending her flying into the bramble.
‘Be gone,’ I warn her.
‘What the Hells.’ She staggers to her knees and spits phlegm at my feet, but when I step closer, she runs off. Then I turn on the simpering boy.
‘I’ve saved you twice now.’
I watch in bewilderment as he throws himself at my feet.
‘You are most generous, even for an Azadnian,’ he says. ‘I promise to never spit on nor spoil your meals again.’
My mouth gapes open. ‘It’s been you? You’ve been putting beetles and scorpions and sand in my food—’
‘And my spit. Forgive me. The other pazktab students do it too. It wasn’t my idea!’
I work my jaw. ‘Now you owe me another debt.’
‘Debt? Me?’ He glances around.
‘How old are you?’
‘Thirteen.’
‘What is your name?’ I ask impatiently.
‘Sohrab.’
