We Free the Stars (Sands of Arawiya 2)

Unlike the five caliphates, Sultan’s Keep did not have a royal minaret that once housed magic, only an endless sea of spires grasping for the skies, reaching for something they could never find. The top of this minaret was the highest point overlooking the palace and the surrounding vicinity. A breathtaking sight when the moon was at her brightest, as she was now.

He used to come here, before. A fresh burn on his back and blood from his bitten tongue dripping down his mouth. When his mother would cry and his father would grip the poker, gray eyes far too ancient for a mortal man. He used to come here before that, too, with a man he called Baba who would hold his hand and look at him with pride.

Nasir had known love then. He could still remember the way it filled his chest to near bursting.

It was why, as soon as Nasir spotted the telltale form from his window, he had hurried to Zafira, for it was either that or relive his memories as shadows bled from his fingers. He was home, at last, the place he never wanted to be, but when she was near the darkness receded, curious wisps slipping from his hands like the final puffs of steam from a cooling dallah.

When she was near, he had more to focus on. The notch between her brows, the tilted tuck of her lower lip beneath her gnawing teeth. The brush of moonlight on the angles of her face.

“I can’t believe I have to make the trip back after this,” she muttered, and he added the lilt of her voice to his list.

We can stay here, he almost said like some sort of hapless fool ignoring reality.

Nasir used the scalloped edging to pull himself up, brittle limestone clinging to his palms. The minaret’s balcony was overshadowed by a jutting eave, so the best view was from above it, on the small, sloping roof. He helped her up.

And the breeze stole her gasp.

The clear sky unfolded in shades of purple peppered with silver stars. Sconces lit the overarching angles of the palace, setting the sprawling structure alight in gold-and-orange magnificence, shadows playing across the intricate carvings.

His home. His cage of gossamer and glory.

Curved around the palace, like the crook of a mother’s arm, was the Great Library, paned windows dark and glinting, protectors of the endless enlightenment within. Every ounce of Arawiya’s history, and every last scrap of papyrus worth anything at all, was stored inside. A sanctum for those like the Lion who hoarded knowledge as a miser with coin. Nasir was no hoarder of knowledge, but those shelves had been a haven once. Escapes wrought into the bound sheaves of papyrus. Minds were meant to be kept as sharp as swords, his mother had said, and so he would spend as much of his day reading as he would training, guilty that he enjoyed it.

The surrounding houses boasted domes of copper and obsidian, facets greedily gorging on the moon’s abundance. Arches were bathed in a battle of light and shadow, the rare lantern swaying sleepily. Sand dunes dotted the land, hollows lit blue, the occasional bedouin campsite ablaze like fallen stars.

“It’s beautiful,” she murmured, and standing here beside her, he agreed. The moon crowned her in starlight and cloaked her in magic. The stars faded in envy of her radiance. There truly was nothing—no one—more beautiful.

So why, then, was he filled with a sudden and harrowing sorrow?

“I’m sorry,” he said again, “about your mother.”

The words fell from him without warning, guilt gnawing at his caged heart.

She quirked her lips. “I thought of going back to look for her, but it’s obvious—”

“You can’t,” he said before she could finish. She grew still, a hunter in the wild, and his heart took command of itself, pounding between his ribs as if he were racing across rooftops. “You can’t leave.”

“Why not?” she asked carefully, and he dully realized what she’d been saying: But it’s obvious she’s dead. She had thought of going back. She wasn’t actually going to. Rimaal, and now her question hung between them, demanding an answer.

There were a thousand and one ways to answer, and so he chose the words he favored least. “We need to restore the hearts.”

She scoffed, because that was not the answer she wanted, either. The breeze toyed with her hair, and he wanted to tuck the wayward strands behind her ear. His fingers closed into a fist.

“I’m not going to leave. Not until we find Altair. Not until magic returns and the Lion is dead,” she said. “My sister is here, and my friend is safe. I’ve got no one else.”

You have me, he wanted to say.

She turned her head, as if she heard his unspoken words. The moonlight gave him glimpses of the emotions shifting in her eyes. Anger. Sorrow. Pain. It was the yearning that gave him hope. The obstinance that filled him with dread.

“My village is gone, my life upended.” She barked a laugh. “My mother’s dead, and I didn’t shed a single tear. That’s how heartless I’ve become.”

No. Nasir knew what it was like to be heartless, to steal souls and leave behind orphans and widows and demolished futures. Yet he had cried when his mother died her ruse of a death. He’d felt so much pain that he was surprised at the silence it had left behind, a deafening quiet that broke only when Zafira was near.

“Five years,” she said softly. “She hadn’t left our house in five years, but she suddenly found the strength to venture outside when death was certain.”

When one killed as much as he did, no single mission stood out among the rest. Nasir didn’t have the capacity to feel guilt or remorse for the killing of that woman or that son or that lover. It was a collective reminder marked by his every inhale: He breathed while someone else did not. He exhaled while another never would.

Until this.