The bell over the door jingled. I waited for Rory to poke his head from the back room. When a minute passed without the click of Rory’s cane, I rounded the counter and pushed the curtain aside.
“Go away,” he said without turning around. Rory sat perched on two upturned crates, three bowls on the table and the bucket of frogs at his feet. I wrinkled my nose at the odor. Dania’s dusty bones, I was too late. He never worked with the frogs during the day, when the stench of blood and sour alcohol wafted through the rest of the shop. Not unless his distaste for humanity overwhelmed his common sense.
“Now, Rory,” I began, infusing my voice with patience I didn’t have. Of all the weeks for him to throw a fit, he had to choose the week of the waleema? “I think you should—” Before I could continue, a basket hit my chest. Rory didn’t look up from the bowls.
“I need more ingredients,” he barked. “Not your opinion.”
I glared at the side of his head. “The last time I went into Essam in a skirt, the rash on my thigh took a week to fade.” I would prefer cleaning my teeth with a lizard’s tail over selling to dozens of strangers, but unlike Rory, I did not have the luxury of pitching expensive tantrums. “I’ll mind the shop myself. You can stay back here.”
Rory ignored me, flipping a limp frog onto its back. Unbelievable. I snatched the basket. There was no piercing his thick skull when he fell into these moods. Outside, the main road bustled as those who’d arrived ahead of the waleema explored Mahair’s limited offerings. So many visitors with pockets begging to be emptied. Cursing Rory under my breath, I picked up my skirt and turned toward the woods.
“Stop! Jasadi!”
The scream knifed through the din of the main road.
I froze. My legs tensed, preparing for a hard and brutal run. I bent my elbows at the crook, bunching the muscles at my shoulders. A second more, and I would have been a blur of fabric disappearing into the woods. A second more, and I wouldn’t have seen the baker’s father thrown into the dirt.
The crowd surged behind me. Arms pressed against mine, bumping and elbowing for a view of the Nizahl soldiers standing over the flour-dusted man in his seventies. It wasn’t me they had caught. It was him.
A Nizahl soldier with a chest shaped like an ale barrel loomed over the scrawny old man. Adel, I thought. His name was Adel. He always put extra sesame on my bread rolls.
“You are accused of the possession and active use of magic. You will be taken to Nizahl, where your kingdom of origin will be confirmed. If the investigation brands you a Jasadi, you will stand trial in our Supreme’s fair and just courts.”
“Please, I—I have lived here for forty years. I’ve lived in Omal almost my entire life. I raised my family here. My magic is nothing, barely a drop!”
“You admit you have magic. You admit you are a Jasadi.”
“I was only born in Jasad,” he wept. “Decades before the war.”
“I saw him use his magic!” the woman who’d screamed shouted. I didn’t recognize her. She must be one of the visitors. “He touched a burned loaf of bread, and it repaired itself.”
My cuffs tightened around my wrists. Fool—why would he use his magic within sight of others? Careless, so needlessly careless!
“He un-burned bread? That was his crime?” a furious, gruff voice said. Yuli. He must have known Adel for years. Maybe even hired his sons to work on his farms. “Adel is one of us.”
He is not one of them. He is one of yours, Hanim hissed. Do something, Essiya. Save him!
I remained motionless. Interfering would only result in two deaths instead of one. I couldn’t help him. I did not owe him my life simply because he was born a Jasadi and I was born the Jasad Heir. He should have been more careful.
“Come with us.” The shorter Nizahl soldier hoisted Adel to his feet, ignoring his cries at the crushing grip on his arm. “You can state your claims to the tribunal.”
“Stop! You’re hurting him!” Yuli’s shout mixed with others. A strange thought crossed my mind, threatening to tilt the ground beneath me.
What if they had all already known?
If Adel had lived here before the war, he might have told people he was a Jasadi. Easily, without fear, in the halcyon days before his identity and birthplace could summon the bells of death. In a village as small as this, someone must have noticed his magic. Adel’s family owned the bakery. They operated it for decades. Could it be possible Mahair had collectively decided not to report Adel despite the severe penalties of knowingly harboring a Jasadi?
Panic filled Adel’s blanching face. He shook, forcing the soldier’s grip tighter. I saw it coming before it happened.
Be smart, I wanted to beg him. Hold steady, Adel. Do not let the panic win.
“No!” Adel screamed. The air tightened, flowing toward the quaking Jasadi. Like the band of a slingshot, Adel’s magic pulled itself taut. Silver and gold swirled in his eyes. In the quivering moment where Adel’s magic was pointed and poised, I glanced at the soldiers. They knew it was coming. They were eager for it.
Adel’s magic exploded.
The crowd shrieked as the soldiers were flung to the ground. Adel heaved, staring at them with uncertain eyes.
Had I not been fixed to the spot, I might have yanked at my hair. Why wasn’t he running?!
Adel sprinted toward the woods. If he made it past the wall and beyond the raven-marked trees before the soldiers could catch him, he might have the slightest chance of escaping.
He is a soft man. He will not survive in the woods. If the soldiers do not catch him, a different predator will, Hanim said. I could feel her disappointment as if she stood right beside me.
The question of Adel’s survival skills would never be answered. The barrel-chested Nizahl soldier drew to his feet and pulled a short blade from his hip. Adel was running in a straight line. The soldier reared his arm back.
I closed my eyes.
Look! Hanim shouted. At the very least, they are owed the right to be seen.
I looked. I looked as the knife buried itself between Adel’s shoulder blades. I looked as the old baker crashed forward, mere feet from the wall. And I looked while the shorter Nizahl soldier caught up to Adel and buried the Jasadi beneath a storm of vicious blows and kicks. The wet, fleshy thumps were harder for some onlookers to bear than the snapping bones. When again the soldier stood, an empty-eyed pulp lay where Adel once had.
A sob broke out. The visitor who had pointed the finger at Adel avoided the sight of his carcass, maintaining her defiance.
At the edge of the crowd, I saw Rory. He was staring at Adel. White-knuckled hands gripped his cane. Was Rory’s shock because of disgust? Was it grief?