Rahma pulled Suha to the side for a discussion that looked intense, though As’ad couldn’t make out the words.
Their guide reached into a pocket and retrieved a small item. She held it out, away from the group, and whispered something else As’ad couldn’t interpret. Not unlike when his illusions came into being, a dark, door-shaped hole appeared among the trees.
Suha hugged Rahma fiercely, then walked to the wagon and picked up one of the sleeping youngsters. She looked at Adva, who nodded; then she moved through the impossible doorway.
The oldest boys herded the other walkers in the same direction. One by one, they vanished until the only child left was the last sleeper in the cart. Adva delicately scooped the little one into her arms and stepped forward. She paused at the gateway.
“This is your final chance to join me.”
Tears stood in Rahma’s eyes as she pursed her lips and shook her head.
“No, thank you,” As’ad informed the woman as he grabbed Rahma’s hand.
Adva studied the pair for a moment, then departed without another word. The black rectangle disappeared seconds later.
Rahma turned into As’ad’s chest and sobbed, “You were right. Suha didn’t want to be rescued. She wanted a new adventure.”
He held her as she cried, running a soothing hand up and down her back. When her tears slowed, he said, “I’m sure you will see her again someday. And you were right first. Shedidwant to be rescued from Hadia.”
“Ooh, that woman!” Rahma growled into his shoulder. Then she started shaking for a different reason.
Surprised at her laughter, As’ad gently pushed her back so he could see her face. “What’s so funny?”
“Hadia is going to be soooomadwhen she finds out she has nowhere to sell stolen people anymore.”
The pair concluded that the patch of woods they found themselves in was as good a camp as any. The trees provided a nice windbreak, but the temperature had dropped beyond pleasant. Rahma used the cold to convince As’ad that they should sleep side-by-side and use the tent canvases as extra blankets because it would be warmer than setting them up. He was too fatigued to protest.
When the midday sun filtering through the trees finally woke As’ad, he lay next to the bundle of blankets that he was pretty sure still contained Rahma—though he couldn’t see any of her—and ruminated over the last few days. None of Pozik’s guards had seen him or Rahma; he trusted that they were safe from reprisal.
Then he thought about the last month or so. Then the months before that. His life had always had a clear before and after. He used to define his experiences as before the orphanage and after. Or before Aladdin and after. Now it was abundantly obvious that everything could be slotted into Before Rahma and After Rahma.
There was no way he could return to his original plan of moving the con to Bavenpier and forgetting about Rahma. Nor could he ask her to join him in his criminal lifestyle. She expected honesty and would hold him to it. Her ideas about using the pipe for entertainment purposes had merit, but he couldn’t do that anywhere in Sharamil; the whole country would figure out what he had done. And he couldn’t ask her to leave her family to make a new life with him.
Glumly, As’ad extricated himself from his bedroll and the tent canvases. Determined to let Rahma sleep as long as she needed, he quietly apologized to the rats that woke when he began digging around the handcart for breakfast supplies. They accepted his delayed offering of food and soon resettled in their nests.
Starting a cook fire a little ways from the trees, As’ad chuckled to himself at the memory of their second real conversation. He didn’t count the words they had exchanged in Nahr, since that was mostly an interrogation on her part. The first conversation, having been comprised of accusations and more questions, probably didn’t count, either. So the encounter at the tree she had unwittingly turned into a bonfire was likely therealfirst conversation.
Too bad there would benoconversations soon.
Before he could work himself into a full snit of crankiness, Rahma appeared looking adorably rumpled, though she had evidently taken the time to tame her hair. She accepted the food he handed her and polished it off as if she hadn’t eaten in days. Given the chaos of their time in Jabal, mealtime had fallen a bit to the wayside.
The beauty sitting next to him set her empty dish to the side, clasped her hands in her lap, and turned to look at him with an inquisitive air. “What’s bothering you this morning?”
As’ad didn’t feel up to the task of dodging her pleasant persistence, but he tried anyway. “Nothing,” he lied with a shrug.
She leaned closer. “Are you feeling let down after yesterday’s excitement? That’s common, I hear.”
He wanted to know where she had heard that, or from whom. “I’m relieved it’s over. Who told—?”
Rahma narrowed her eyes and talked through his question. “Is it that you are facing a crisis about what direction your life should take now?”
His jaw dropped. “What? How—?”
Pleased to have hit her mark, she settled back. “It’s obvious. You never like scamming people to begin with, and now you’ve run out of places in Sharamil to use the rat con. You have learned how to use the pipe for other things, but you can’t do any of them here because word will get out and you’ll find yourself in prison.”
Listening to her voice the conclusions he had come to earlier that day was surreal. And she kept going.
“I’m also pretty certain that you have become fond of me.”
