It was the fireflies that gave them away.
Were it not for the cheerful insects bobbing alongside their owners, Alizeh might not have been able to discern the difference between Clay and Jinn residents, who swarmed about town with an ordinariness unseen even in Ardunia. Back home, Jinn were legally free to go about their days as they wished, but they lived always with a caution that defined all aspects of their existence. They kept their heads down, spoke little, didn’t mix much with Clay, and retreated to their own circles whenever possible.
For reasons unknown, Jinn seemed happier here.
Nevertheless, Alizeh felt the rise of a familiar apprehension in her chest—something she’d felt many times in her life, and that suggested she was being followed. She and Cyrus had only resumed walking for a minute now, and already she was noticing more and more eyes in her direction. She glanced around nervously, likely giving herself away in the process, but it couldn’t be helped. Someone was there.
“Cyrus,” she said quietly.
“No—I don’t want to argue about it,” he said, gesticulating with his unfinished bread. “It’s my business to know the consumption habits of my own citizens, and I swear to you, Jinn eat all the time—”
“Cyrus,” she hissed, tugging on his arm.
“What?” He turned to look at her, and in an instant his frustration gave way to concern. This reaction was in and of itself something to wonder about, though perhaps some other time.
“What is it?” he said, stopping abruptly. “What’s wrong?”
She ducked her head and whispered, “Is it too late to put an illusion on me?”
Cyrus’s concern morphed into alarm. Immediately he looked up and down the street, then searched higher, scanning the sky. She realized he was looking for assailants.
“I don’t think anyone is trying to kill me,” she said lightly, trying for a bit of levity. “But I do think someone is following us.”
He swore under his breath.
Earlier, Cyrus had used magic to render an illusion around himself; as a result, people who saw him registered only a forgettable face, one they instantly put out of their minds. He’d explained that it was the only way he could walk freely about Tulan, for he’d once caused a riot even heavily obscured in a mask and hooded cloak. “It’s my bloody hair,” he’d muttered with no small amount of bitterness. “This color is a curse.”
He’d insisted upon drawing an illusion about her face as well, but Alizeh had adamantly refused. She didn’t trust Cyrus enough to allow him to use magic on her, andfor obvious reasons: the last time she’d trusted one of his enchantments to protect her, she’d been unceremoniously dragged up into the air, dropped onto the back of a dragon, and delivered directly into the devil’s trap.
No magic, she’d maintained.
While all of Ardunia’s nobles had seen something of her face—and her undergarments, apparently—she’d since fled, and entered a completely different empire. It’d seemed unlikely that anyone in Tulan would know who she was. Cyrus had relented begrudgingly, though only because she’d agreed to wear a rather large hat, which she’d pulled low over her eyes.
A useless hat, apparently.
“If someone is already watching,” Cyrus said, still furtively scanning the street, “they’ll see the illusion take effect, which means they might yet be able to track you. First, we need to go somewhere relatively deserted. Did you see where this person went?”
Alizeh shook her head and then, as surreptitiously as was physically possible, glanced over her shoulder.
There was a young woman there.
She was wearing a bright red dress, standing stock-still in the middle of the avenue, staring at Alizeh with wide, unblinking eyes.
“She’s just there,” Alizeh whispered. “Right behind us.”
Cyrus echoed her earlier movement, glancing cautiously over his shoulder, but then he turned all the way around, making no secret of his search.
He frowned.
“What lady?” he said, not bothering to lower his voice. “There’s no one here.”
“You don’t see her?”
“I don’t see anyone,” he said. “Maybe it only seemed like she was following us.”
Feeling a sense of relief, Alizeh sighed. “Yes,” she said, pivoting to survey the street. “Maybe she—”
Alizeh had lifted the brim of her hat as she turned, hoping for a better look, when the young woman fell, without warning, to her knees. She pointed a shaking finger at Alizeh and screamed. Shescreamed, crying out so violently Alizeh was excoriated by the sound, by the weight of it, the wildness. She couldn’t move even as she trembled, as her face paled.
