He was surprised to see a triumphant smile on her face. Bright and honest and lovely. And then she laughed, and the sound made his stomach flop. “And you’re a good storyteller,” she said. “Though I do question the accuracy of that first tale you shared, about the King of Fire and the starry-eyed human.”
Mazen flushed. “I had to think of something on the spot. Qadir seemed to like it.”
“Hmph,” Qadir said.
Loulie’s smile vanished at the mention of the ifrit. Mazen immediately regretted bringing him up, but there was nothing he could do to bring back her smile. Though he tried to engage her in conversation many times as they were walking back to the inn, she no longer seemed in the mood for idle chatter.
He was able to ask her only one last thing before she and Qadir retired for the night: whether she would come and tell stories with him tomorrow.
The merchant considered. “You have more poignant family stories up your sleeve?”
Mazen’s heart lifted. “No, but I’d like to think I know a few more lucrative ones.”
She smiled vaguely. “Tomorrow, then.”
Mazen smiled at her back as she turned away. “Tomorrow,” he echoed.
But when tomorrow arrived, there was only Aisha, shaking him awake and insisting they grab iftar. After a meal of bread and za’atar, Mazen asked her where the merchant had gone. “Off with Qadir,” she said with a shrug. “Apparently, there are rumors of treasure up on the cliffs. The merchant went to see if it was sellable.”
Evidently, he couldn’t hide his disappointment, because Aisha said, “The merchant told me about your storytelling adventures. Never fear. I will be your manager today.”
“Don’t you have things to steal?”
“Of course. But I can make time to watch you work.” Her eyes sparkled with something like amusement. “I didn’t even know you were capable of it.”
As it turned out, “working” was a far cry from what Mazen did. Mostly, he sat there staring sullenly out into the souk, wondering how he was going to bring people to his space without a magic fire. It was harder to convince an audience to listen to stories in the heat of the day, harder to keep them interested when they had work and the surrounding merchants spoke so loudly they all but drowned out his thoughts. What he had to offer was hardly as enticing—or material—as the appetizing foods and eye-catching accessories being peddled around the souk.
Aisha looked severely unimpressed by him. Mazen did his best to ignore her until she sat down in front of him and said, “Tell me the story of the Queen of Dunes.” Her lips were curved in that telltale way that told him it was not just Aisha sitting before him.
He hesitated. “The human version?”
“No, tell me your version. The one with the dune and the army of ghouls.”
Mazen startled. Yesterday, he had shared a part of his family’s history, but he had never thought to tell his stories. They hadn’t been the most heroic adventures, but he supposed he’d lived through them, hadn’t he?
And so, in a grandiose voice that carried across the alleys, he told her the story of Yousef the Adventurer, who had stumbled into the lair of the Queen of Dunes, the terrifying jinn king who commanded armies of ghouls.
“And so Yousef found himself in a glorious corridor! One that shone from floor to ceiling with beautiful mosaics. It seemed like something out of a dream. But alas! It was a place of nightmares…”
He did not remember when the crowd gathered, only that he started hearing gasps and murmurs, and when he looked up, there was a group of marketgoers. His story became more exuberant in the presence of an audience.
“And he ran!” cried Mazen. “He ran and ran and ran as the sand crashed down around him and the ruins collapsed. Yalla! screamed his inner voice. Yalla, yalla!”
And the children began to chant with him, clapping their hands and crying, “Yalla, Yousef! Yalla, yalla!”
“And then—” Mazen held out his hands, and the children quieted. He leaned forward and, in a much softer voice, said, “Yousef escaped. And do you know what he held in his hand?”
“The queen’s crown?” Aisha looked like she was trying not to laugh.
Mazen released a grievous sigh. “Nothing!” He splayed his fingers, revealing his empty palm. His audience was distraught. The story ended on a note of uncertainty, with the promise that the Queen of Dunes was still out there.
He told more stories based off his own adventures after that, stories he proudly dubbed “The Tales of Yousef.” And, just as Loulie had, Aisha asked for donations. She was not as adept at playing the crowd, but with a deceptively gentle smile she gathered enough coin for a few meals.
For an hour or so, things went smoothly. They had secured a captive audience, and Mazen had no shortage of stories to offer them.
But then there was a charge in the air, and a sudden chaos overtook the souk, enveloping the space so quickly there was no time to understand it. One moment all was calm, and the next, there was shouting from flustered, panicked marketgoers as a young boy sprinted down the thoroughfare, screaming at the top of his lungs.
He was nothing but a blur, a flash of color that darted in and out of Mazen’s vision. Some of the audience members surged forward to investigate while others drew back with anxious mutters. Aisha brushed past them all to the front of the crowd. Mazen rose and followed, breath trapped in his lungs as he stared at the quickly emptying square.
“Please!” the running boy shouted. He glanced around desperately at the nervous onlookers. “Please, help me! I—”
Something flashed through the air and hit the boy in the back. His words collapsed into a gasp as he crumpled to the ground. Mazen stared, uncomprehending, at the arrow protruding from the child’s back. His confusion only deepened when he saw silver blood pooling on the ground. A jinn. He stared numbly. A jinn child?
The souk was so quiet Mazen didn’t dare breathe. When he tried to inch closer to the road, Aisha grabbed the hem of his tunic and pulled him back. There was a warning in her eyes. Mazen looked again at the boy, then at the witnesses hiding in alleys and peering out windows. The crowd was frozen in shock or fear. No one approached the boy.
That was, until a lone man strolled down the thoroughfare. He walked until he reached the dying jinn, then plucked the arrow from his back as easily as if he were plucking a rose from a garden. He sliced the boy’s throat before he could scream.
“Nothing to worry about!” the killer called in a singsong voice. “The monster is dead.”
He slung the body over his shoulder and turned to walk back. The souk came alive at his proclamation, suddenly filled with a cacophony of voices as marketgoers piled onto the streets to watch the murderer stride off with the boy. Mazen felt the inexplicable urge to hide as the killer passed—then stopped to look at them. He had bright, shiny teeth and eyes dark as buttons. “Aisha! Beautiful, poisonous Aisha! I knew I saw a familiar face. How have you been? It’s been months since we spoke.”
“Tawil.” Aisha’s voice was stiff, cold.
Tawil laughed, an infuriatingly loud sound that made Mazen’s blood boil. “Only you would give a fellow thief such a cold reception, bint Louas.” His smile faded when he saw Mazen. “It seems we have much to discuss. Wait for me, eh? I have a corpse to bleed.”
The smile returned as he walked away, as the marketgoers thanked him for ridding Ghiban of a filthy jinn. Blessed thief, they called him. Savior. Hero.
“Killer,” Aisha murmured. Her eyes—both brown and black—shimmered with rage.
54
LOULIE
The compass led them to a rocky incline a two-hour hike from Ghiban. Loulie climbed up steep pathways littered with gravel and red dust, meandered along crooked trails, and inched past drops running with rushing water.
It was not the most perilous journey she’d ever made, but it was easily the most difficult on account of the pain that shot through her injured ankles with every step. By the time they were near the top, her legs trembled and sweat coated her forehead and neck.