We Free the Stars (Sands of Arawiya 2)

My love, my life, my soul, the words meant, but their meanings went deeper than that.

Habibi was for friends and love that was real enough.

Hayati was when love became an all-encompassing thing. Deeper and deeper, until one became the other’s life.

Roohi was when a soul twined with its match and loved with the force of a thousand suns. When it slipped beneath the heart and tangled in the very fibers of an existence.

That was what Baba and Umm had, once. What a young Zafira had wanted, until the love her parents shared shattered them both, scattering shards of their souls into the desolation of the earth.

She had thought of them last night beneath the stars, beside a boy with unkempt hair and a question in his gray, gray eyes. She had finally seen the sprawling palace that belonged to the sultan, the lights suspended by intellect, something far more magical than magic could ever be, and yet—

It paled beside him, her prince.

“Are you all right?”

Skies. Did he have to sit so close? The harsha in his hand was perfectly halved. She had noticed that about him. The way he hung his clothes behind a chair when she was content with piling them in a heap. The way he broke his bread into neat pieces before lifting it to his mouth, whether it was manakish or flatbread or harsha.

“Never better,” Zafira said, and Lana made a sound that was dangerously close to a snort.

“He looks like he’d rather eat you instead,” Kifah whispered in her ear and rolled her eyes when Zafira shrank away. “It was a joke, Huntress.”

The front doors flew open, and Zafira clutched her satchel as Seif marched inside. Aya dropped Lana’s hand and quickly moved the dish of pickled lamb from view. Apparently, the cold-blooded safi didn’t approve of eating lamb, or even hunting animals for that matter.

He slammed something down on the side table, and Aya paled at the sight of it. Zafira squinted—it was a tiny bottle, empty, but for a smear of crimson. Blood?

“We’ve found nothing. No ships in the harbor, no sign of the Lion whatsoever. We’ve been at work all night.” Seif paced and shot a glare at Nasir. “While you were off—”

“Careful, safi,” Nasir said, voice low. “Running your mouth can be dangerous, and immortals are dying like flies.”

Aya’s wide eyes were curious. “Where were you? You were not to leave the house.”

“Surveying the vicinity from the city’s highest point.”

If only I could lie so easily, Zafira thought. Then again, it wasn’t entirely a lie.

Seif scoffed. “With her?”

“Are you implying that women cannot climb?” Nasir leveled him with a look before Zafira could lash out.

Seif’s frustration manifested in a growl, and from the ghost of a grin on Nasir’s face, Zafira could tell he finally understood why Altair treated the art of infuriation like it was his sole purpose in life. Lana struggled to hide a laugh.

“He may not be here yet,” Kifah said, “but that doesn’t negate the inevitable.”

He comes for us. The safin are unaware.

“The Lion of the Night,” Lana whispered, and Seif shot Aya a look that said We should have left her in the snow. Zafira decided then and there that Seif would be the last person she would ever protect and the first she would feed to a dandan.

Kifah studied Lana. “And it’ll be chaos on the streets as the news spreads across Arawiya.”

Chaos already clung to the air, in the dust that stirred as the people rioted, in the taxes that suffocated.

“Yet Sarasin will be fine,” Seif muttered.

“How?” Zafira asked, annoyed. “Who will protect its people?” The Sarasins had suffered ever since their caliph had been assassinated. The caliphate had always been a dark place—literally, too, with its dark sands and sooty skies—but once the throne had been emptied in cold blood by order of the sultan and the armies taken under his control, the uncertainty had strung tension tight and fearsome.

Seif ignored her. Typical.

Aya rose. “An established mortal by the name of Muzaffar. He was well-known in merchant circles, but while you were on Sharr, he began making a name for himself among the common folk, too. Placating them, providing for them. His men keep the peace, and that is more than many can ask for.”