Traitor to the Throne (Rebel of the Sands, #2)(34)

Izman sprawled out below me.

It was like nothing I’d ever seen. A flat, blue-tiled roof with a gushing fountain on it leaned close enough to its neighbour to whisper city secrets. Beyond that, yellow flowers tumbled down sun-baked walls that were competing for space in the shade of their neighbours. Purple canopies crowned another house, and a golden dome pressed against minarets that jutted up like spears challenging the sky.

Jin said once that I couldn’t understand how big Izman really was. If I ever saw him alive again, I might even be glad enough to admit that he’d been right.

It looked like a jumble of rooftops that went all the way to the end of the world. Only I knew that wasn’t right. Somewhere out there was the desert I’d come from. I reached for it with my mind. For the sand and grit. But I couldn’t feel anything. The desert had been ruthlessly polished out of here. I’d have to reach beyond the palace walls for that.

I gauged the distance between the top of the wall and the balcony.

I could probably make that jump on a good day. The throbbing pain in my body reminded me today was not a good day. But all it would take was one leap of faith, and I could be in the city. If I made it. If not, I would be a broken body in the garden below. Which still might be better than getting stuck here.

No. I was going to live to see Shazad again, like she’d asked me to promise. I was going to live to see Ahmed on the throne. And I was going to live to make Jin explain just why he thought he could kiss me after leaving me.

I’d have to go through the door. Only I wasn’t about to try to walk through it like I was a guest instead of a prisoner. There would be a guard outside, no doubt about it.

There were no weapons in the room, but there was a glass jar filled with dried flowers. I picked it up off its shelf and positioned myself with my back flat against the door. And then let it go. It shattered on the colourful tiles.

That ought to get someone’s attention.

I dropped to my knees, ignoring the screaming pain in my body, as I searched through the glass for the biggest shard. It had worked; I could hear footsteps through the door, someone coming to investigate. My hand closed around a piece of glass the size of my thumb, shattered to a sharp point. I curled my hand around it just tight enough not to draw blood, staying in my crouch, back flat to the wall by the door – ready for whoever came through. It had worked in Saramotai and I didn’t believe the Sultan’s guards were any brighter than Malik’s.

The door swung open. I stayed low, heart pounding. All I saw was a flash of pale grey fabric before I moved. I slashed towards the back of the knees. It sliced through thin linen, gouging straight for the soft flesh underneath.

Instead, the glass scraped noisily off something hard.

A wound gaped in the fabric of the trousers where my makeshift weapon had struck, revealing gleaming bronze joints underneath.

For a second all I could think of was Noorsham in the bronze armour designed to control him. Heavy words in his Last County accent echoing around inside a hollow shell. But the voice that came now was a different one.

‘Careful!’ It sounded familiar, although it wasn’t talking to me. I tipped my head back slowly, looking up at the man staring down at me dispassionately. ‘She’s armed.’

I thought I was ready for whatever I was facing here. I was dead wrong. Because in the doorway, with a new slice in his clothes, carefully parted hair stuck to his forehead, was Tamid.

The world tilted out from under me even as a guard in uniform stepped around him, weapon drawn. He grabbed me, ripping my meagre glass weapon out of my hand. It was already stained red from where I had opened my palm with it, gripping it in shock.

I didn’t even feel it. I didn’t even fight as the guard wrenched me back to the middle of the room, forcing me against the cold marble slab where I’d woken up.

I twisted in his grasp. Not to escape. But because I couldn’t stand to lose sight of Tamid.

Tamid who I’d grown up with. Tamid who, after my mother died, had been the only person in all of Dustwalk I’d cared about. Tamid who’d been my only friend for years. Who I’d last seen bleeding out in the sand while I rode away on the back of a Buraqi with Jin.

You’re dead. The words shot from my brain to my mouth and stopped short. The untruth couldn’t get any farther. Because he wasn’t dead. He was alive and stubbornly collecting the broken glass from the floor. Like he didn’t even know me. Only the slight furrow between his brows betrayed that he was focusing far too hard for such a simple task. Avoiding looking at me at all costs.

He wasn’t using a crutch, I realised. Last time I’d seen Tamid, Prince Naguib had put a bullet straight through his twisted knee when I wouldn’t give him the answers he wanted. I’d seen Tamid fall to his side, screaming. My fault. I’d seen men take lesser injuries than that and lose a leg, but here he was standing on two. I heard a small click as he moved, metal on metal, like the repeating system in a revolver. Through his torn trouser leg I saw what looked like a joint made out of brass. My heart lurched. One flesh-and-blood leg and one metallic leg.

‘What should I do with her?’ the soldier asked.

‘Tie it down to the table.’ Tamid picked up the last piece of glass. He’d called me it. Like I was less than a friend he’d chosen to turn into an enemy. Like I was less than human.

The soldier’s hands pressed painfully into my bandaged skin as he tried to hold me. I cried out without meaning to. The noise startled Tamid into looking at me.