He only smiled. “It doesn’t matter who you are. I can see by your skin that we’ve lost a common enemy,” he said. “We divide ourselves when we ought to be making friends and allies, but tonight, we all celebrate together. Daivyakt or vasudhakt, young or old, tonight, we are all friends. I’m sure that when the dawn comes and a new oppressor is chosen to rule us, we’ll go back to fighting our own. But tonight, you’re my friend.”
“A pretty speech,” Hasan quipped. The other man spoke like a politician. In a way, he reminded Hasan of Zeyar, but without the edge. He wondered how his brother viewed this latest development. Quickly, he shook his head.I have no brother but Paranjay.He glanced back down at Poppy. “What if they didn’t choose a new oppressor?” he asked. “What if we chose someone else?”
The stranger glanced over at the newspaper. “If you’re talking about the girl, then I’m afraid I disagree. Though she looks like us, she was raised like them. She’s a tigress in sheep’s clothing, nothing more. What does she know about our struggles?”
“She’s capable of learning,” Hasan said. “She’s willing to listen.”
“And you know that how?”
Hasan struggled with an answer, then sighed. “Because I’m the Jackal,” he admitted, “and she was once my prisoner. I saw for myself how she was willing to learn.”
The other man was quiet, studying Hasan again, this time with a sober gaze that allowed him to see what he’d missed before: Hasan’s height and solid weight, the mark of a privileged childhood, his scarred knuckles, his pristine clothing.
“Who will she listen to?” he finally asked. “Maybe she’s willing to learn. But we have no representation in the viceroy’s office.”
“Then we’ll be the representation,” Hasan suggested. “What’s your name?”
The other man evaluated Hasan before answering. “Arun. Arun Dhamakha.”
“Arun,” he repeated. “Think about it?—we don’t have to go back to fighting each other tomorrow. We could form a council of our own?—a delegation, maybe?—and advocate for ourselves. We’ve never been able to do it before, because no one would listen. But Po?—Miss Sutherland would.”
“I never thought the Jackal would be an idealist!” Arun grinned. “Somehow, I thought you’d be more... nihilistic.”
“A lot of things have happened recently that I could have never imagined,” he said. “This is just one more impossible thing that’s now possible.”
“Even if she’s willing to listen, the odds of her being actually chosen are low,” Arun said. “They’d reject her for the same reason we want her?—because she could be sympathetic to us.”
“Then we don’t give them a choice.” Hasan gestured around vaguely. “Look at the way they sent all the police to the bridge tonight. They fear us. There are more of us than them, and they know it. Every tyrant needs his subjects, but no people need a tyrant.”
Arun didn’t answer, finishing his kathi roll instead. Then, he said, “If you sober up and you still feel optimistic, Jackal, come and find me. We’ll talk about it then.”
From his breast pocket, he took out a stub of a pencil and wrote his address on a grease-free corner of his newspaper wrapper. He tore it free, gave it to Hasan, and stood.
“Good night, Jackal.” Arun smiled wryly. “I hope, when the dawn ends, we choose to stay friends.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Silence for a Voice
Poppy couldn’t get her hands clean. No matter how much she washed them, no matter how clean they appeared, they felt sticky, soaked in blood that wasn’t hers but was the source of her pain nonetheless.
The family doctor diagnosed her with shock. He told her mother that she was merely numb.
She was not numb. She was trapped. Trapped inthatmoment. It was like being held underwater, in a deep bath. She could see the light coming through the surface, could hear voices and see shadows move as people continued to live their lives around her. But she was stuck in those last moments of her father’s life, so much so that they might as well have been the last of her own.
The scent of gunpowder and copper still choked her. Blood still seeped through cotton, staining her fingers, smearing against the soft, wispy strands of her father’s hair as she stroked it, trying to comfort a soul that had already left. The taste of salt and metal lingered on her tongue and in the back of her throat, raw from screaming, burning from swallowing her own tears. Her ears still rang from the shot, from the screaming that ensued.
She did not know how much time had passed while she was like that, trapped in her underwater world. But one morning, her mother came and pulled the plug, bringing her back to the real world to face a nasty surprise.
“Get dressed,” she ordered, her face ashen. “The marquess is here.”
• • •
Lord William Montrose was the second-last person in the world whom Poppy wanted to see. He stood in the parlor, dressed in mourning attire. Her fingers curled, itching to tear the black fabric from him. He had no right to mourn, not when it was his monstrous son who had done this.
“Your Grace,” Lord Montrose said. “Miss Sutherland, allow me to express my deepest condolences at your loss.”
Poppy’s nails bit into her palms, but she kept her jaw clenched tightly shut.
