Akhtar’s eyes narrowed. Calculating.
“He can do this,” Jihan said, “because I procured him Lady Arwa’s assistance.”
“Is she a witch, then, sister?” Akhtar asked. “A heretic in widow’s clothing?”
“She has Amrithi blood,” said Jihan. “It makes her useful. And she dearly wants to be of use. Don’t you, Lady Arwa?”
“Yes, my lady,” said Arwa. “Anything for the sake of the Empire.”
“Barbarian blood. Wonderful. My brother spills it, and I bring it into my household.” For all the harshness of his words, Akhtar’s tone had finally softened. “You think you can find the Maha’s knowledge, Zahir? Truly?”
“Yes.”
“Yes,my lord.”
Zahir raised his head. His eyes were red, his skin flushed, but he looked at Akhtar with a stare that was quietly, clinically eviscerating. It was a look that could flay a man’s soul from his skin andstudyit, with terrible, dispassionate care.
“Yes,” he said. “My lord.”
Akhtar’s hand made a fist.
“You are still a dog that should have been drowned with its mother,” he said softly. “You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes, my lord,” said Zahir. “I know.”
“No matter what Parviz believes, the spirits, the unnatural ill luck—they remain a threat to all we have,” Jihan said, forcibly drawing Akhtar’s attention back to her. “One Zahir’s work can put right.”
“I know,” Akhtar said. An exhalation. “I know. So get on with it. Fix it.”
“As my brother wills.” She bowed her head. Turned to go. “Come, Arwa.”
Arwa turned and followed her, looking back once at Zahir. His own hand was still around his reddened throat, as if he held his own death and life both in the palm of his hand.
She had thought, once, that he had a nature like a keen blade. She had not considered that he lived his entire life on a knife edge. It would take so little to see him dead: a shift in the familial balance of power; failure in his work; an expression on his face that foolishly revealed the glittering sharpness of his mind.
She touched her own fingers to her throat. Her pulse was river-fast; she could not hold it.
His eyes met her own.
Go, his gaze said.Go now.
She did not want to leave him.
But she turned away from him regardless, doing as she had been bid, the image of him imprinted on her eyelids.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
She sought out Gulshera.
The widows often rested at midday, and perhaps as a result of the tense, subdued mood of the women’s quarters, not a single one of the elders was present in the communal spaces of their wing. Arwa went directly to her own chamber.
Arwa entered her room and found Gulshera there waiting for her. She was not even sitting on the bed, but standing at attention, coiled with energy, head tilted forward, pale eyes hooded.
“Tell me everything,” she said.
Arwa shook her head.
“You told me that we can’t discuss him. Lord Zahir.” There was an edge of malice to her words. She knew it. Gulshera had avoided her, denied her company and a confidante, for the sake of keeping a promise to the princess. And Arwa could not blame her for that—she knew an imperial daughter had infinitely more power and value than either of them possessed—and yet the viciousness bubbled in her regardless.
