The second she would not yet dare name.
As the carpet continued its slow rise, the warmth flooded through Shahrzad’s body, into her arms and legs, through the very tips of her fingers. It tingled in her nose and pulsed along the ridges of her ears.
Power.
Of a kind she’d never known before.
When she looked down again, she was high above the silver sands. As high as the highest turret of Taleqan.
The fear remained, but it was soon surpassed by that other as-yet-unnamed emotion.
Before she even had a chance to consider it, she knew with an innate kind of certainty how to direct the carpet, as a fish born in water knows how to swim.
“Let it take you where your heart longs to be.”
Home. To Khalid.
Shahrzad gripped the carpet tight with determination. “No. Take me to Musa Zaragoza,” she whispered. The prickling warmth around her heart blazed brightly, then seared through the rest of her, tearing another cry from her lips.
Along with an unexpected smile.
The carpet swooped in a lazy arc, rising even higher. To the height of the highest parapet of Rey. As soon as it turned, it took off into a light-studded sky. The world below her disappeared in a rush of flickering fire.
Fear lost its battle.
Exhilaration won.
Shahrzad laughed into the night, a current of air at her feet. She rose onto her knees. Let her arms spread wide in the wind. Let the whistling chill wash over and past her, but not through her. Never through her.
Never for a moment did she think the carpet would let her fall.
She was the water in the tumbler, swirling and dancing to a music she alone could hear.
And up here—higher than she’d ever thought she could be—the wind blew alongside her, while all else vanished in a blur.
Still, there was no fear.
For up here, Shahrzad chased the wind.
The ground did not exist. Nor did the sky.
Here, she was truly boundless.
Fear would never overtake her again.
THE BOY BY THE SEA
SHAHRZAD FLEW OVER THE DESERT, TOWARD A mountain range.
When she saw the sea sparkling on the horizon, her eyes widened in shock.
She’d traveled an astonishing distance in a rather short amount of time.
The magic carpet began to slow as it neared a low promontory overlooking a pale strip of sand. The moon still hung high in the sky, its shifting light glancing over receding waves. A lace of foam collected along the shore. Shahrzad took a deep breath. The air was thick and heavy, filled with the tang of salt. As the carpet circled above the cliff, a pillared structure with a dome of brindled stone emerged from behind a wall of grey rock. Marble columns capped by tongues of fire stood sentry at the corners. A wide set of stairs descended to a rectangular pool of water near the edge of the promontory.
The magic carpet floated alongside the pool, poised just above a smooth stone rise. Shahrzad eased a bare foot off the woolen surface.
And the carpet landed with a careful whuff.
She donned her sandals and made a slow scan of her surroundings.
The pool was enclosed on two sides by rows of cusped arches. Between those arches were marble statues of men and women pouring gilded streams of water or wielding strange contraptions Shahrzad had never seen before. One was an orb filled with what appeared to be swirls of fire—or perhaps it was wind? Another looked to be spinning a vortex made of . . . sand?
Burning incense rose from squat copper pots flanking the pool. Blue-grey smoke seeped into the air above them, the scent of peppery-sweet myrrh strong. Set against the tan stone was a mosaic border of bright blue lapis lazuli.
Shahrzad rolled up the rug with care. She strapped it to her back using her shahmina before taking a tentative step forward.
The pillared structure seemed to be a temple. Given the hour, it was no shock to see very few signs of life around her. Still, Shahrzad kept a hand near her dagger as she passed the pool and its copper pots of smoking incense, walking cautiously toward the wide set of stairs ahead.
Her gait did not falter when a familiar figure appeared at the top of the staircase.
He was quite tall and dressed in a cloak that fell to his feet in a chaos of colors. Leather mankalahs were wrapped around each wrist. His head was completely shorn of hair, and his deep brown eyes glowed like beacons of warm light.
“I was wondering when you would visit me.” Musa Zaragoza grinned down at her, his smile bright. He held out his hands to her, signaling her up the stairs. A boy and a girl near her age materialized from behind the fire-capped columns to Musa’s right. The girl raised a trio of tapers in a rosewood holder, the wax dripping in creamy rivulets beside her wrist.
Both the boy and the girl were armed with short, hooked swords at their left hips.
Shahrzad halted near the bottom step. Without a second thought, she reached for her dagger.