“There’s no need to be afraid,” he’d said softly, then, “Be an obedient daughter. Pray and serve, and all will be well.”
Now, Mehr looked at her father, Governor of Irinah, leader of men, and thought of how he’d looked when the guard had handed him the scroll marked with the two entwined seals; how helpless he had appeared in that moment, despite his raised throne, his armed guards, his glittering palace. Everything he had was a reflection of imperial benevolence. Everything he loved could be snatched away from him in a moment—with nothing but a few words and a simple piece of paper.
“They insisted on a chaperoned meeting as soon as possible,” said her father. “I could say nothing to dissuade them.”
“When?” Mehr asked.
“Tomorrow morning.”
Mehr leaned back against the wall. She felt dizzy. Her father stayed where he was, standing erect with his hands clasped behind him and his gaze fixed on the middle distance.
“They made a mistake, making such a grand gesture before so many courtiers,” he said, almost to himself. “The nobility will be displeased. No matter what pretty words they may use, the mystics are perilously close to defying our laws of faith. To risk the freedom of a noblewoman to choose her marriage, to risk her sacred choice …” He shook his head, unseeing. “The Emperor will not be happy when his nobles threaten to revolt.”
Perilously closeto defying the laws of faith was not the same as breaking them in truth, and threatening to revolt was not the same as actually doing so. That much was clear to Mehr. If the mystics had openly demanded that Mehr give up her right to choose her own husband, she was sure her father would have defied them openly in return. The angry whispers of the nobles might have bloomed into rebellion. A noblewoman’s right to choose her husband was far too sacred to be stolen, and if the mystics had attempted to do so, it would have been an insult not only to her father’s honor, but to the honor of all the nobility who held their women precious.
But the mystics had framed the marriage as an honor, a blessing from both the Maha and the Emperor. Their pretty words had left Mehr with a mirage of choice, and left the nobles with their honor bruised but not broken. There would be no rebellion from them.
“I hope you know this is not what I wanted for you,” her father said.
Mehr said nothing. Her father’s jaw clenched.
“I have arranged for a group of my most trusted men to accompany you across the border tonight,” he continued. “Maryam has family in Hara who will keep you safe. You will need to prepare swiftly—take only what you absolutely require.”
There was a beat of silence. “Do you have any questions for me, Mehr?”
Mehr looked at her father. He looked older, she thought. Just a short time in the company of the mystics had aged him. There were lines of tension etched into his forehead and around his eyes. His knuckles were white with tension. Desperation had stretched his strength thin. She wondered if it had thinned his good sense too. She was sure he hadn’t consulted Maryam. For all her faults, Maryam was no fool. She would never willingly defy the Emperor.
“Only one,” she said. “What will happen to you if you send me away?”
Her father finally looked at her. Mehr continued.
“The woman called herself one of the Empire’s own mystics. Amystic, Father. A servant of the Maha himself. What will happen to you if you disobey the Emperor and the Maha? What will happen to Arwa and Maryam?”
“You are my daughter,” he said simply. “You’re under my protection. I won’t allow them to have you.”
Arwa is your daughter too, she thought. And for all that Mehr hated her, Maryam was his wife. If he sent Mehr away, they would face the Emperor’s justice.
And the Emperor, Mehr knew, was not known for his mercy.
“This is unwise, Father,” she said.
Her father turned his eyes on her. His expression was full of a terrible, blinding helplessness that made Mehr’s stomach lurch.
“I am your elder,” he said, his voice trembling with barely leashed feeling. “It is not up to you to decide when I am being unwise.”
Mehr lowered her head. The rage she’d felt when Maryam had grabbed her was still there, simmering under her skin. It rose in her now, burning away her fear and leaving her mind sharp as a keen blade.
She couldn’t compel him to be wise. Her father had never made wise decisions out of love. If he had been wise, he would never have fallen in love with her mother. He would never have had Mehr or Arwa. He would never have kept them, raised them, or allowed Mehr to keep her mother’s rites. He knew the place the Amrithi occupied in the Empire. By loving an Amrithi woman and raising half-Amrithi daughters, he’d risked losing everything.
He knew that the mystics, as representatives of the Maha, keepers of the soul of the Empire, were dangerous. He knew the Emperor was even more dangerous still. But he would risk everything to fight them, because right now he could see nothing beyond the haze of love and hatred and guilt clouding his mind. Perhaps later he’d feel regret. But his guilt would do his family no good.
The mystics hadn’t dressed like powerful people. But she had seen the way the courtiers flinched away from them and the proud assurance in the female mystic’s voice and bearing. Mehr knew deep in her bones that no matter where he sent her, if they wanted her, they would find her.
Mehr understood, too, the great cost of defiance. Maryam had educated her in that. But the stakes in a rebellion against the Maha and Emperor were infinitely higher than the ones in Mehr’s small, bloody wars with her stepmother. If her father defied the Emperor—if even a fraction of the nobility joined him—the numbers of people who would suffer for his choice would be unimaginable. She thought of those veiled wives, those women who shared their husbands’ burdens, who had listened to the female mystic speak in terrified silence. She thought of their children, and their servants, and the people who relied on their patronage. She thought of the fabric of the Empire; the way it was woven of ever so fragile human lives.
Mehr couldn’t allow her father to try to save her. Not when the cost was so high. Not when there was nothing to be won.
She straightened up. Still dizzy, she pressed her feet hard against the floor, grounding herself. She had to think of this as a rite, and give it all the due reverence she would give her dances.
