Traitor to the Throne (Rebel of the Sands, #2)(61)

It wasn’t until I was settled that I realised he had called me by my name. Not little Demdji.

I had his attention now. I just prayed I didn’t have enough for him to start calling me the Blue-Eyed Bandit.





Chapter 24

The duck I’d killed was served dressed in candied oranges and pomegranates, on a platter the colour of Hala’s skin, my arrow still through its neck. I wondered if that was part of the lesson. When a bullet disappeared inside flesh, you could almost forget it. The arrow wasn’t that kind.

The council had gone on well past the sunset, as translators worked frantically, translating Gallan and Albish and Xichian and Gamanix. My head was churning with everything I’d heard in that room, turning it over and over like a prayer until I knew it by heart. I was going to try my damned hardest not to forget a word of it before I could get the news out to Shazad. One wrong detail, one point misremembered, and I could cost thousands of lives. I tried to sift out anything useless with every rotation through my head, leaving only what I could use.

The Sultan was going to march troops to take back Saramotai. If negotiations were successful, the city would go back to the Gallans’ hands. A direct access point back into the desert and into Amonpour. Amonpour was allied with the Albish. There was an Albish camp on the border that would be in their path. They would march in three days. The Sultan was going to march troops to take back Saramotai …

‘You seem distracted.’ The Sultan interrupted my thoughts as he settled across from me.

‘Your rooms are just about the same size as the whole town where I grew up.’ It was a quick jab, meant to distract him, lest he think to order me to tell him what I was thinking about. I’m considering everything I’m going to tell the Rebellion about your plans.

Truth be told, his rooms were the size you’d expect for the ruler of the whole desert. I was brought in only as far as the antechamber, but I could see more doors leading off to a bedchamber with a thick red carpet, and into private baths on another side. The walls in the receiving chamber were gold and white mosaics that reflected the light of the oil lamps around us so well I almost thought it was still day. Except that above us a huge glass dome gave a clear view of the sky. And to one side a balcony overlooked the sheer drop down the cliffs to the sea.

‘Dustwalk.’ He seemed to pull the name from the far reaches of his mind. ‘Tell me about it.’ It was an order. Whether he meant it to be or not.

‘It’s a small town at the end of the desert. I grew up there.’ It was the truth and it was obedience to his order. Even if it wasn’t what he was after. One wrong word about Dustwalk and I might give away everything. ‘I’d rather not talk about it.’

For all the size of the room, the table we were seated at was small enough that, if he’d wanted to, he could’ve reached across it and slit my throat with the long knife he was toying with.

I didn’t like being around the Sultan any longer than I had to. Not when he had so much power over me. Not when all it would take was one false word for him to find out who I was. Besides, it was after dark. Which meant I was already late to meet Sam by the Weeping Wall. I hadn’t told him about my plan to get out of the harem, seeing as I had no way of being sure I’d succeed or not. I sure hadn’t been expecting the plan to succeed so well that it would end with me sitting across from the Sultan. For once I had a whole lot more to tell Sam than he had to tell me. I just had to get back in time to meet him. And before I accidentally revealed the whole Rebellion to the Sultan.

He was watching me now. As if wondering whether to push the point of my hometown or release me from the order. But I was beginning to understand how the Sultan worked. If I gave him some truth, some weakness, on my own, he’d stop circling me. ‘I hated that godforsaken dead-end town.’ I gave him that admission. ‘Please don’t make me talk about it.’

He considered me slowly. ‘You hated everything about it?’

I was about to tell him yes, but it wouldn’t get past my tongue. Tamid, I realised. That was holding me back. I worried at one of the scars healing on my arm, feeling the little piece of metal shift underneath. I ought to hate him now. But I didn’t know if I could hate him back then. ‘No,’ I said finally. ‘Not everything.’

I thought he would press me. But he just nodded. ‘Help yourself to the food.’ Another order I couldn’t disobey. I had to make him order me to leave. I couldn’t last a whole dinner with the Sultan pulling little truths out of me one by one.

‘Why am I here?’ I started to spear the oranges off the duck one by one, putting them onto my plate. ‘You’ve got a whole garden full of wives and daughters – you could pluck one of them out to eat with you if you’re lonely.’

I knew I was crossing into dangerous territory now. But if I was going to get expelled back to the relative safety of the harem in time to meet Sam, I couldn’t mince my words. But the Sultan just sighed in resignation as he knocked my fork aside and started to carve a knife through the brown crackling flesh. ‘Perhaps I just enjoy your company.’

‘I don’t believe you.’ I watched the knife work its way through the skin, cutting a perfect round circle off the bone.

‘You’re right, perhaps enjoy is a strong word.’ He placed the meat carefully onto my plate for me. ‘I find you interesting. Now’ – the Sultan drew back – ‘eat something.’