“Istarya,” says Aladdin. “Far to the south.”
“Ah, yes, of course.” Jalil nods, but his eyes are still clouded with confusion. He beckons to a boy standing nearby with an armful of scrolls, and the boy hastens forward. Jalil selects a scroll and unfurls it, his brow knitting. “Istarya . . . Istarya . . . you must forgive me, Your Highness. My memory is so weak of late.”
I step forward and grasp the edge of the map, smiling at the minister. “If I may, my lord?”
While he is distracted, his eyes on me, the last drop of magic from Aladdin’s wish leaks from my thumb and trails across the parchment, turning to ink.
“Here it is,” I say, pointing.
Jalil looks down and blinks, his gaze settling on the tiny island at the bottom of the map. “Ah! Of course. Well, allow me to escort you to His Majesty’s throne, for he is eager to meet you.”
“Lead on, old man!” Aladdin slaps the minister on the shoulder, then, noting the stunned faces around him, coughs and attempts a bow. “I mean, um, thank you, my lord.”
The hallway to the throne room is tasteful but ornate, sculpted into a series of fantastic arches, each carved with detailed vines and leaves and supported by blood-colored marble columns. Tall windows between the arches let in sunlight that makes the stone bright with colors and patterns, revealing the delicate white veins of the deep red marble, as if the columns are made of exposed muscle.
The king’s throne room is set in the center of the palace, like the hub of an enormous wheel. We pause outside tall doors of polished teak wood carved with grapevines. On either side, stone lions as tall as three men stretch their mouths in unending silent roars, their sightless eyes glaring down at us.
The doors are opened by stoic guards with peaked helmets, and we walk into the grandest room I’ve yet seen in Parthenia. The chamber is enormous, divided into three long, narrow sections by the double rows of stone pillars that march from one end to the other, supporting a roof that vaults upward into three massive domes. Pigeons circle the space above, cutting through beams of light that pour through square holes in the ceiling, filling the air with the sounds of wings beating air, their shadows flickering across the columns. On the walls, enormous carvings depict detailed battle sequences, some of them recalling Amulen history I witnessed myself, such as the sacking of Berus and the surrender of King Madarash of the Baltoshi Islands.
My eyes fall on a bas-relief that chills me: It is of you, Habiba, standing atop Mount Tissia, Neruby burning in the background. You are on your knees, looking pious and tragic, as an ugly jinni with horns, wings, and claws crouches on your back and prepares to tear out your throat. I think that one is supposed to be me. Below the relief are carved the words “The Fall of Roshana the Wise.”
I turn my eyes away and do not look at any more of the carvings.
On a throne set on a high dais in the center of the room, flanked by tall stone gryphons painted to look startlingly real, sits the man who inherited your great legacy. Surrounded by the majesty of this grand hall and dwarfed by his stone gryphons, the king of the Amulens is small and sickly, slouched in his throne beneath heavy leopard-skin stoles. His complexion is pale, almost translucent, and his hands tremble. The yellow tinge in his eyes betrays the source of his condition: simmon smoke.
The mighty Amulens are ruled by a drug addict.
Caspida stands to one side of the throne, her hand perched on her father’s shoulder, as if she is pouring her own strength into him. She looks quite transformed from the girl who spat and sparred in the Rings the night before, though her eyes are a bit tired. She wears a gown of pale gold, with sheer red silk draped over her shoulders. Tassels hung from the hem of her dress brush the tops of her sandals, which are studded with gemstones. She regards Aladdin’s glamoured face without a hint of recognition; her eyes are cool and appraising, and a little suspicious.
I sense a flutter of panic from Aladdin at the sight of Caspida, but he calms when my glamour holds and recognition does not flare in her eyes.
As Jalil and Aladdin approach the throne, I hang back in the shadows of the pillars and watch closely. Guards stand at the base of each column, so still they might be statues themselves, and they don’t stop me from walking along the wall beneath the friezes. Other servants move in the shadows, and nobles gather in groups of four and five, talking in hushed whispers while regarding Aladdin with open curiosity. I blend in with them, a shadow myself, within full hearing and view of the dais.