“I will take over your plans for them.” The sultan spoke in a cold voice that brooked no disagreement. A muscle feathered in Omar’s face as he clenched his jaw. But Loulie would not be cowed. It was bad enough she was being blackmailed, and now she was being forced to journey with the King of the Forty Thieves? With a jinn killer?
“I do not need another bodyguard.”
The sultan shook his head. “This is not up for negotiation.”
“You do not trust me?”
The sultan scoffed. “Trust a conniving merchant woman? I think not.” He leaned forward. “Do not forget, al-Nazari: you are a criminal. I could throw you in the Bowels. I could take away your freedom and put a noose around your neck.”
Loulie was trembling. With fear. With anger. Because she knew the sultan did not lie. She had not yet been born when he’d killed his wives in cold blood, but she’d heard the tales. And she’d seen him sentence people to imprisonment in the Bowels for lesser crimes.
She had never felt so helpless.
The sultan leaned back, a faint smirk on his lips. “A word of warning: do not think you can steal the lamp. The jinn is my ancestor’s prisoner. You will not be able to use its magic.”
Cocky bastard. She bit down on her tongue before it shaped the words.
“Yuba,” Mazen cut in weakly. “Amir threw the lamp into the Sandsea because its power blinded him. I do not think it wise to—”
“Silence, boy.” The words had the force of a slap, and the prince went mute beside her. “It is not power that corrupts, but intent,” the sultan continued. “And my intentions are pure as they come.”
“Oh?” Loulie forced herself to look up, right into the sultan’s eyes. What could a murderer possibly want with a jinn servant?
“The jinn have been a plague on our land for years. The hunts are inefficient. The jinn still exist, and we cannot dig them out from the Sandsea, no. But we must eliminate them. I will not let them steal my family from me.” His eyes flickered to Mazen, who glanced away, face ashen. “With this magic, I will have the power to end them.”
Oh. Loulie clenched her hands in her lap, willing them to stop shaking.
“Defeat magic with magic,” Hakim said softly. “A jinn against jinn.”
Loulie was having trouble breathing. Qadir, she thought. He would kill Qadir.
“Not just a jinn, but one of the seven kings,” the sultan affirmed. He leveled his stoic gaze on Loulie. “Do you see, al-Nazari? This is a just quest.”
It will lead to a massacre.
“What will it be?” The sultan’s dark eyes bored into her. “Will you find the relic and become a hero? Or will you flee like a criminal and perish in the desert, with no one there to mourn you?”
Loulie had avoided politics to escape this exact scenario: being a pawn in someone else’s game. She was a wanderer, not a mercenary. Yet here she sat, at the edge of a precipice with danger on either side. And for the first time in her life, she was forced to cave.
“I accept your request.” She looked down, ashamed. “I will find your lamp.”
She did not see the look of triumph on the sultan’s face; she did not want to. The sultan insisted she remain at the palace. He would need to discuss specifics with her over the following days and would help her prepare for her journey.
Loulie was barely listening. She thought about Prince Omar, who would be shadowing her like a vulture, and Qadir, who would have no choice but to remain in his human form while they traveled. She thought of their trek through the desert, and of the cities and oases they would need to pass through. But mostly, she thought of the Sandsea and of the relic inside. The relic she was somehow meant to collect.
By the time she was dismissed, the forest seemed hostile. Everywhere Loulie looked, she saw silver blood gleaming on the leaves and glittering like dew on the grass and windows.
Behind her, the sultan and his sons had started speaking about something else.
“Did you find the thing I told you to look for?”
“I have searched the whole diwan, my sultan,” Omar said. “It is not here.”
“You are certain?”
A beat of silence. “Yes.”
Loulie walked out without absorbing the words. She had no time for the present, not when the future was much more likely to get her—and Qadir—killed.
She forced air into her lungs. I will not let that happen. She lifted her head as she exited the room. I am Loulie al-Nazari, the Midnight Merchant, and I am the master of my own fate.
14
MAZEN
Before the incident with the shadow jinn, Mazen had never been afraid of the dark. Now he could not fall asleep without burning a kerosene lamp. It did not fully banish his fear—how could it when the very existence of light caused shadows to form?—but the light was a welcome sight when he woke from his nightmares. They were always the same: Omar stalked toward him in the diwan, knife raised.
Sometimes, when Mazen was being stabbed, he remembered things—silver blood on the lips of a dead man; assassins in black riding through the desert; Omar, smiling, with silver blood on his cheeks.
He always awoke in a cold sweat, blankets thrown off as he struggled to breathe. You are here, he would remind himself. You are you. But though the words comforted him when he was awake, they did not fend off the nightmares.
Sometimes Mazen would glance at the walls and see the jinn’s white-eyed shadow grinning at him. Inconsequential, it murmured. And then when he blinked, the shadow would be gone. He could only pray his sleep-addled mind was playing tricks on him.
By the third day of the merchant’s stay, Mazen was exhausted. He felt weary and wrung out, a feeling exacerbated by the pain from his wound. He was grateful, at least, that the sting had abated to a dull throb. Still, it took a great effort to force himself up for the morning meal. He’d been trying to make the sultan see reason for days, and he was not going to stop now.
He was groggy-eyed but determined as he carefully changed and exited his room. He was passing through the garden when he paused, noticing the Midnight Merchant crouched down in a bed of white roses. She was glaring at the sun as if it had personally offended her.
Mazen thought she was beautiful.
You really should stop thinking that about a criminal, his inner voice chided.
But he couldn’t help it. Here was the Midnight Merchant, the most elusive legend in Madinne! A story brought to life. And she had saved him twice. The fact only endeared her to him more. The merchant, unfortunately, did not share the sentiment.
The minute she saw him, her frown deepened. “Sayyidi.”
“Midnight Merchant. Will you be joining us for the morning meal?”
She tilted her chin. “No.”
He wasn’t surprised; the sultan had forced her to attend many events in the two days she’d been here. She had clearly hated every moment of her stay.
Mazen tried a smile. “Ah.” An awkward silence ensued. The merchant turned away first. He cleared his throat. “Nice day, isn’t it?”
“Hardly. It’s impossible to enjoy the day when you’re busy dreading the future.”
Mazen swallowed. “I’m sorry.” The apology tumbled from his lips before he could think it. “About the quest, my father, the shadow jinn…”
The merchant looked up, a peculiar expression on her face. “Why are you sorry about the jinn?”
Because my brother left her alive and she hurt you. Me. Both of us.
When he didn’t respond, the merchant changed the subject. “So, am I to call you Prince Mazen, then? Or…?” Her brows lifted.
“Mazen. Yousef is another identity for another time.” He shuffled on his feet, considering—then he tried a question. “But you knew it wasn’t my real name, didn’t you? It was why you followed me.”
The only evidence of the merchant’s surprise was a slow, careful blink. “A jinn made it her prerogative to hunt you down. I knew you were more than a simple scribe.” The words hung between them, a silent accusation.
But then, he had not been the only one lying. “And you?” he said. “What should I call you?” Loulie or Layla?
The merchant’s lips quirked. “Loulie. Layla is another identity for another time.”