We Hunt the Flame (Sands of Arawiya #1)(89)

“If I hadn’t intervened, he could have wet his pants. Do you see any streams we can get him cleaned up in? Neither can I.”

Men can be such beautiful trash, Yasmine said in her head with a sigh.

“You care for him,” Zafira said, pushing for a reaction.

He raised an eyebrow and studied her before stomping ahead. Wasn’t she supposed to lead?

“I do not,” he said matter-of-factly when she caught up. There was an undertone of warning to his voice. “But careful, Huntress—I’m beginning to think you do.”

The others reached them before she could protest his choice of words.

Benyamin yawned loudly and stretched like a cat, ignoring the prince as if he hadn’t torn him apart. As if hyenas hadn’t shifted into men before their eyes.

“When I’m back in Alderamin, I’m going to say hello to my beloved and maybe my sister, and then I’ll take a very, very long nap. The longest one Arawiya has ever seen,” the safi proclaimed.

“Say hello for me, too,” Altair said. “To the calipha-to-be, not your beloved.”

“My sister does not want your hello,” Benyamin said with a scowl.

“I’m going to visit my father and gloat,” Kifah said, and Zafira knew she hadn’t imagined the bitterness in her tone. “Then I’ll celebrate with the biggest lamb the calipha’s kitchens can find.”

Altair hummed in agreement. “Akhh, have that lamb marinated to perfection with ras el-hanout. Roasted potatoes garnished with basil. Qahwa in the evening with date biscuits.”

“What’s ras el-hanout?” Zafira asked.

“The mother of all spice mixes. It hails from Pelusia,” Kifah replied, “but the Sarasin bastards stole it.”

“You can’t steal something that grows out of the ground. That’s like saying we stole sand,” Altair retorted.

Kifah shrugged.

“I’m going to take my falcon on a hunt. Poor thing probably misses me.” The general looked at Zafira. “What about you, Huntress? What will you do back in Demenhur? Without the Arz, you can finally stop hunting.”

Her step faltered. She hadn’t made that connection, that simple realization. Taking down the Arz that killed her father meant there would no longer be the Arz that made her her.

Skies.

She would no longer be the Demenhune Hunter. She wouldn’t be anyone. Something clawed up her chest. What was Zafira bint Iskandar, if not the Hunter?

Benyamin touched her sleeve.

“This is your chance for the Hunter and Zafira to become one,” he said softly. Her cloak weighed heavily in her bag. “Meld them. Become yourself. The Huntress. The girl who freed magic from the darkness and so freed herself.”

The Huntress. She bit her lip.

But the safi did not understand that freedom was sometimes a burden of its own.



* * *



The others settled into the silence of reminiscence. No one asked Nasir what he planned to do when he returned, making him realize he had never thought beyond this journey. He had no naps or rich meals to look forward to. When he returned to his father, he could not gloat.

He would only await his next summons.

He lived for his orders. For the mistake he made in not heeding them.

No, there was nothing for Nasir after Sharr. Nothing but tears and corpses and the next bleak sunrise.





CHAPTER 59


Zafira woke to the ground swaying beneath her and birds screeching in the distance. Sunlight burned her eyelids and a breeze brushed her skin.

Frowning, she opened her eyes and nearly scrambled off a plank. Her bare hands snagged on splintering wood. Breathe, Zafira. Then assess.

She was on a fishing boat. A dhow. The sails billowed in a breeze that teased her tongue with salt, a blood-red diamond centered on the beige cloth.

Ululations broke the hush of the azure waves, and Zafira swiveled to a fisherman reeling in a net full of thrashing fish. They slipped and slid, their slaps atop the polished wood a soundless scream for salvation. She had never seen live fish before, but she pitied them, for their suffering ended with suffocation rather than a hunter’s clean cut.

There were five shirtless men on board, plummy brown skin glistening with sweat, heads bound with sienna turbans. What was it with Arawiyan men and their shirts? They wore rough-cloth sirwal, muscled arms ten times larger than hers; they’d even put Altair to shame.

None of them looked at her—one stepped over the plank she sat on without a glance her way. It reminded her of the Silver Witch’s phantom sailors, and an icy finger trailed her spine.

“Yaa, land!” a fisherman cried. The others echoed his jubilation.

The land they’d sighted drew closer with every beat of her heart. Until it was there. Here. Before her.

And her heart clenched at the magnificence of it all.

Faceted domes gleamed in a gold that warred with the sun; diamond-tipped spires and minarets speared the cloud-dusted sky. The domes nestled buildings of creamy stone, doors welcoming, windows open. Some were connected with ropes in bursts of color, clothes left to dry upon them wrinkled and stiff. Date trees dotted the landscape, reddish clusters of fruit tucked amid the fanning leaves.

People roamed the streets, dressed in an array of colorful gowns and thobes, some with tunics atop sirwal, turbans or scarves embellishing their heads. Some guided grinning camels carrying rolls of cloth. There were people of every shade—the deep brown of Pelusia, the pale of Demenhur, the copper and olive of Sarasin—though the majority were shades of the desert, gleaming with the heat of the sun.