CHAPTER 11
Arie
AHANDHELD MIRROR.Aset of silver spoons. A lavish settee.
I stood in the middle of the town square in a crowd of people watching the auction.
Each item the auctioneer’s lackeys held up passed slower than a seven-course dinner. Or at least that’s what it felt like.
He yelled over the crowd, speaking so fast I struggled to follow, pointing here and there at bids only he seemed to see.
I sighed, fanning myself with a large leaf I’d found. It felt like I was being gradually cooked by the sun.
A dozen men stood guarding the prizes of the day, and the crowd pressed in closer, making us a mess of sweaty bodies pressed together.
Not a single timepiece so far.
At least none that I was aware of. I’d accidentally bid on the first piece of the morning when I’d brushed my hair from my face, so now I kept my hands carefully below my neck to avoid the same mistake. The tension building in my muscles mixed with the anxiety and overwhelming number of thoughts in such a confined space, was forming what promised to be a spectacularly awful headache.
I glanced around the square yet again. Standing in the midst of a crowd of people, I searched for any sign of a Jinni, but of course, I wasn’t entirely sure what I was looking for. Neither were any of the men in the crew, though they were spread out across the square nonetheless, eyes peeled for a sighting. Pale skin and blue eyes. Such small things would be so easy to miss in this mass of sweaty people.
I watched the men circulate through the crowd. Kadin kept a close eye on me. He was trusting me to bid for their little group today, so he needed to calm down and give me some space. Between him, his men, and the hum of so many in the crowd, I could hardly think straight, much less make out his thoughts. But from his expression, he clearly wasn’t convinced I would come through today. I made a face at him.
He only raised his brows at me and hid a smile in response.
The heat of the sun made me so tired, I almost missed the next item when the auctioneer held it up. It was small, no more than the size of my palm, and rose slightly taller than it was wide. Beautiful gold metal designs framed the thin base and stem, billowing out into a round bulb the size of both my fists put together. Thick green glass with a perfectly shaped opening at the top. It would glow a mellow, warm-green light when lit.
An oil lamp.
My instincts responded to the lamp. Oil lamps only stayed lit if they had oil. If you filled them to different markers, you would get different amounts of time before it burnt out.
Which meant that, in a way, itmarked time.
I bid on it impulsively, raising my palm leaf high.
Kadin frowned at me, looking like he might break his cover and come over to rebuke me in person.
But I simply raised a brow at him, as if to say,Think about it.
His frown softened, turning puzzled.
I continued to bid, even as the amount rose higher and higher. I may have been sheltered in our castle, but even I knew when the price grew steep.
It made sense, considering the lamp’s base was made of gold and the delicately blown glass looked detailed and ornate, making it very valuable indeed.
