Rahma met his practical expression with an unimpressed one. She shifted to face him fully. “Your attitude about the whole thing is what first made me pay attention.”
“What attitude?”
“Oh, you know. Little things. The dread that creeps into your voice when you realize it’s time to do it again. The way you were eating less so I could have enough but our food stores didn’t shrink as fast as they should.”
A growing heat burned at As’ad’s cheeks. She had noticed that?
“The fact that youdon’tkeep a full army of trained rats—which would be pretty easy for you—to cause real damage to the villages—”
He held up a hand. “If I left a trail of destruction like that, the sultan’s men would find me in a heartbeat.”
She pointed a finger at him, then shook it. “It’s in the way you can justify all of your actions and make them sound selfish.”
As’ad pulled his arms around his legs to ward off a chill that didn’t come from the evening air. “I don’t think I need to hear any more reasons.”
Rahma studied him for a quiet moment, then pushed herself to her feet and brushed her hands off. “Goodnight, Fireside Piper.”
He watched her walk to the tent, then turned back to the dwindling fire.
“Oh,” she called. “If you’re looking for Alzali, she’s in here.”
“Thanks for letting me know.” It seemed her steady campaign to win his rats’ hearts was beginning to see results.
As’ad foolishly started thinking he was off the hook when they made it through breakfast and almost a full hour of walking the next morning before Rahma reintroduced the topic.
“So,” she announced. “I was working on it all last night.”
“You’re awfully chipper for someone who didn’t sleep,” he teased dryly.
“Of course I slept.” She shot him a look of confusion, then moved on. “Currently, you use the illusion for deception.But”—she emphasized the word with both hands—“couldn’t you use it for entertainment?”
As’ad hated to wipe the growing smile off her face, but he had to ask, “Who in their right mind would be entertained by a plague of rats?”
Rahma threw her hands in the air with a huff. “It doesn’t have to berats! What else can you create?”
His mind blanked. “Uhh . . .”
“You mean you’ve never tried anything else? Ever?!”
“Well, you know,” he scrambled to defend himself against her incredulity. “The first time I made the illusion, I was looking at a real rat. I kinda wished for another one, and there it was!”
“Hmm,” Rahma tapped her chin as she walked. “Can it only duplicate things that you’re looking at? No,” she declared with an outflung hand before he could get a word in. “Your swarm has rats with colors and markings that aren’t part of your six.”
He drummed his thumbs against the cart poles as he considered that.
“And I’ve seen you give them pretty sophisticated instructions through that pipe. So I’m sure the magic isn’t limited to what rats can do in nature.” She patted the air by his face. “I don’t mean to say you make them fly or anything, but that single-minded focus they exhibit just doesn’t track with real rats.”
As’ad ran over his usual process in his head and came to the conclusion that he could get the illusions to do other things, if he wanted. “I bet I could make ’em dance or something.”
“So then the question reverts back to whether or not you can do more than rats,” she mused, seeming not to have heard him. She halted abruptly and grabbed one of the poles. “Here. Trade places with me.”
He acquiesced to her command without thinking. “Wait,” he said after she was in position, “why?”
She grunted with the effort of starting the cart, then took a couple of less toilsome steps as it gained momentum. “Oh.” She stopped. “It would be easier to grab the pipe if the cart isn’t moving.”
“Why am I getting it?”
Rahma wrinkled her nose at him. “C’mon, Misguided Piper. How else are you going to experiment?”
