Princess of Smoke (2020 Reissue) Read online

  I hurried after him. “Maybe we could–”

  He threw up a hand to silence me without even turning. “No, Zadie. No more of your hare-brained schemes. That’s what got us into this mess in the first place. We’re doing things my way now.”

  “No one else can know about this,” Kassim said as he swept back into Lalana’s chambers.

  The second I was inside, he clicked the door closed and stood in front of it like a prison guard. The room felt uncomfortably warm.

  Lalana sat on the edge of the bed, one long arm draped around Mehri’s shoulders. The handmaid looked up with red-rimmed eyes, sniffling quietly.

  Lalana’s eyes widened a fraction as she looked at me. I shook my head slightly.

  “Here’s what’s going to happen.” Kassim locked the door behind him, and Mehri let out a small squeal. “Everyone up.” He motioned for Lalana and Mehri to stand. “Follow me.”

  “Where are we going, Kassim?” Lalana asked, eyeing the locked door warily.

  Kassim strode to the other side of the room, dappled light dancing across his face as he moved in front of the latticed, marble screen concealing Lalana’s bedroom. He paused beside a lute hanging from the wall and slid his hand into an urn sitting on top of a plinth. Something in the distance clanked to life. The wall before us slid backward, revealing a narrow passageway.

  Mehri gasped, but I didn’t bat an eyelid. After my time chasing the spirit disguised as Prince Cao through the palace, I knew the whole place was threaded with secret passageways.

  “Stay close,” Kassim instructed, lighting one of the decorative lanterns. He held it aloft. The intricate filigree threw patterns above his head and along the marble walls as he slipped into the shadowy tunnel.

  Away from the warmth of Lalana’s chambers, the cool, musty air sent shivers running up my arms.

  Kassim walked in front, holding the lantern above his head, and the rest of us followed close behind him. “Steps!” he barked back, making Mehri jump.

  I glanced up. The last passageway I followed had led up to the tower where Chimaeus had trapped Safiyya’s suitors. The thought wasn’t comforting.

  After several minutes of walking down narrow passageways, interspersed with long stints climbing narrow, winding steps, the faint light of day appeared above us.

  As we emerged into the bright light, we were greeted with a muffled grunt, followed by a slap, then the sound of wood creaking. It smelled of parchment, ink, and a heady mix of herbs I couldn’t place. Downy feathers drifted through the air, and birds shrieked from their perch by the windows, joining the grunts we’d heard from the stairwell.

  What is this place? And just what are we interrupting?

  A woman’s moan floated through the air. Lalana and I exchanged wide-eyed glances as the sultan held out an arm, motioning for us to stop.

  I ducked my head underneath his arm as Namir was thrown backward onto a desk, scattering the neat scrolls and ink pots stacked there. The spymaster rolled to one side, tearing down one of the maps hanging from the wall as someone flew at him, pinning down his arms.

  I instinctively reached for the ring on my hand before I remembered it was gone.

  But Namir didn’t need my help.

  He wrapped his legs around his assailant, throwing her to one side as he rolled from the table in a smooth motion, before grabbing her in a tight hold as he stood and whirled around to face us.

  “What’s she doing here?” Kassim growled.

  My heart lifted a little at the sight of Aliyah struggling to escape Namir’s clutches. As the spymaster looked up at his sultan, Aliyah elbowed him in the ribs and whirled away, out of his reach.

  “Cheap shot.” Namir clutched at his side, wincing. “You know they’re still sore from Hidu.”

  Aliyah shrugged and perched delicately on the edge of a table, one knee hugged to her chest, the other leg swinging free. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, but she showed no other signs that her tussle with Namir had tired her out.

  “What’s going on here?” Kassim demanded.

  Namir opened his mouth to reply, but Aliyah interrupted. “Well, hello again, your magnificence,” she replied cheerfully, twirling a dagger in greeting. “It’s nothing to worry about. Just a harmless scuffle between peers. If I wanted your precious spymaster dead, he’d be cold and I’d be long gone.”

  Kassim glared between the two of them. “Leave us, thief. Our royal business doesn’t concern you.”

  “Oh, royal business. Why didn’t you say so? You didn’t seem to mind when I helped interrogate the assassin yesterday.” She cocked her head. “While I’m not here for payment for my past services, you should know I’ve been keeping a tally, and you’ve racked up quite the bill.” She picked her fingernails with the tip of her dagger.

  “Aliyah,” Namir warned.

  The thief ignored his tone. “Actually, before things got…physical, I was making a report to your so-called spymaster.” She whacked the back of her hand against Namir’s arm. He glared at her. “Nobody’s seen hide nor hair of your crazy vizier in Kisrabah since yesterday.” She nodded toward me. “If she’s hiding, it’s not in the city.”

  Lalana moved to my side as Aliyah spoke. The thief queen blinked as she noticed her for the first time, then spotted Mehri dithering behind us. Her brows slowly rose as she looked from the visibly agitated sultan back to me, the questions dancing in her almond eyes answering themselves.

  “Oh, hey, Lalana.” Aliyah dropped my sister’s name casually.

  “Hey, Ali,” Lalana replied, her voice soft.

  “Wait. She knows?” Kassim roared, taking a step toward Namir and gripping him by his shirt laces. “Am I the last person in Astaran to find out Princess Lalana is still alive?”

  “W-what?” Namir’s eyes bulged at the news. “I-I had no idea, Kassim.”

  “Well, clearly.” Kassim dropped his grip on his spymaster in disgust. “Because if you’d had any idea, I wouldn’t have had to find out for myself that my betrothed’s sister has been alive this whole time, married to some merchant.”

  “Ambar. His name was Ambar,” Lalana said firmly.

  “And somehow,” Kassim continued to rant, “not only has Zadie been lying to me this whole time, but apparently, half of Kisrabah’s seedy underbelly found out before my own spymaster.”

  The messenger birds squawked at the raised voices, and the spymaster gaped, staring between me and Lalana like we were one person with two heads.

  Aliyah watched the exchange eagerly, a lazy smile spreading across her face. “Perhaps, sultan, if you’re after a more reliable service, you should recruit a new spymaster. While I consider myself anti-establishment, I could be convinced…for a price. I’ve known about Lalana for days. And I’ve been carrying letters between her husband and Z for weeks.”

  Kassim shot me a look, and I motioned for Aliyah to stop talking.

  “Kassim, I’m sorry,” said Namir, thankfully distracting him. “All of my sources believed the eldest Khirideshi princess had–”

  “I’m standing right here, you know. And I have a name.” Lalana’s voice was mild, but her expression was enough to stop Namir in his tracks and bring color to his cheeks.

  “Lalana.” Kassim turned to face her. “Who else knows who you are?”

  Lalana tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Only the people in this room.”

  “Is that true?” Kassim directed his question at Aliyah.

  “I’ve only told my second, Lisha. I’m very discreet, you see.” She looked pointedly at Namir.

  Kassim ignored Aliyah, turning back to Lalana with a gaze so intense I half wanted to pull my sister away from him. “What do you like doing, Lalana?” he asked. “Riding, reading, and studying like your sister?”

  I frowned. What did Lalana’s interests matter now?

  Lalana gave a pretty, lilting laugh, at ease despite the sudden questioning. “Oh spirits, no. I prefer painting, dancing, and singing.”

  “So, the sor
t of things most noblewomen enjoy?” Kassim confirmed, scrubbing a hand over his chin.

  Lalana nodded. “I suppose so.”

  “If you had the chance, would you want to live as a princess again?”

  Lalana’s eyes widened and I swallowed hard.

  It was a cruel question. It was impossible for Lalana to become a princess again. She’d given up that life.

  The sultan toyed with the golden buttons on his shirt, his expression distant. He turned back to his spymaster. “We’ve yet to make an official announcement about the vizier to the people of Kisrabah, correct?”

  Namir nodded, the picture of composure once more, although sweat beaded on his forehead. “But plenty of people were present for the assassination attempt at the festival.” He grasped a piece of parchment from where it had been knocked to the floor in his fight with Aliyah. “I was about to release a statement informing all Astarians the ex-Royal Vizier is a traitor to the kingdom and they should stay alert.”

  Kassim faced my sister, his broad shoulders dwarfing her slender frame. She tilted her chin up to meet his intense stare.

  “Then I see no reason we can’t use this to our advantage. We can come up with a cover story to tie your reappearance with Hepzibah’s disappearance.” Kassim sounded as if he were suggesting an afternoon stroll through the gardens, not lying to a whole kingdom in order to bring my sister back from the dead.

  Aliyah hissed in a breath. “You’re suggesting we tell everyone the vizier had Lalana all this time? That she’d kidnapped her and locked her away in a tower?”

  Kassim nodded, still looking at Lalana.

  The thief queen laughed. “Princess locked in a tower? A bit trite, isn’t it?”

  “It could work.” Namir’s voice was smooth and thoughtful. “The vizier hired the assassin to kill Zadie, which suggests her motives were to stop the alliance between Khiridesh and Astaran. If that’s the case, she could have easily been the reason Khiridesh lost their eldest princess in the first place.”

  Lalana turned her honey eyes to me, her face questioning. My lips parted to answer, but my whirling thoughts rendered me speechless. Kassim’s idea was a good one. The vizier was an enemy of the kingdom, and she clearly hadn’t wanted our marriage to proceed. There was no reason she couldn’t have kidnapped Lalana, too. It was the perfect way to get my sister back properly, without having to hide her true identity.

  So why was unease burrowing in the pit of my stomach? I wiped my clammy palms on my robes, looking between Kassim and Lalana once more as I realized the source of my anxiety.

  If Lalana chose to become a princess again, she would be Kassim’s rightful betrothed once more...

  “Zadie?” Lalana prompted. She wrung her hands together.

  “It’s up to you, Lalana,” I replied, my voice tight. “It’s believable. If you want to become a princess again, the vizier isn’t here to refute the claim. Even if she were, now that she’s a known enemy of Astaran, no one would believe her anyway.”

  “Lalana.” There was a note of urgency in Kassim’s deep voice. “You need to decide now. Your parents arrive tomorrow for the wedding.”

  I tried to ignore the way my heart suddenly pounded against my ribcage as Kassim referred to the wedding, not our wedding..

  “Well, personally, I think it’s all pretty shady.” Aliyah leapt down from the table and strode to the window. “Good luck with it, L. If you decide to leave the princess life behind, you’re welcome to sign up as the forty-first thief in my gang.”

  She flicked her gaze to Namir. “Until next time, spymaster.”

  She leapt onto the window ledge. Holding the edge of the window, the thief queen swung herself out, licked her finger, and held it to the air in a gesture reminiscent of a certain pirate king.

  “The weather’s about to turn. A storm’s coming in, royals. I hope you’re ready for it,” she said, her face momentarily serious, before she grinned and dropped like a stone from the tower window.

  My stomach plummeted, Lalana and Mehri screamed, and Namir raced to the window, his palms pressed against the frame as he leaned out, craning his neck after the thief.

  A flash of glittering blues and yellows flew past the window, and relief flooded through me. The magic carpet. Had Aliyah kept it after winning it back from Bahar? At least that explained how the thief queen got in and out of the palace so easily.

  Everyone paused, watching the carpet until it was no more than a speck in the bright blue sky.

  “Yes.”

  I spun around at Lalana’s steady voice.

  “If there’s a chance, I want to be a princess again.” She flashed me a smile I couldn’t return.

  Kassim nodded. “Then welcome back, princess.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Hold still.” Jevera pulled back my braid, scraping a jeweled hairpin across my scalp and securing it so tightly it gave me an instant headache. I bit back my complaint, instead twisting the golden rings around my fingers nervously. It still felt strange to be missing Tarak’s ring, but I had left that finger bare.

  Hot shafts of apricot-colored light striped the floor of the antechamber where we were getting ready to receive my parents. Elian’s guards had spotted them approaching the city limits.

  To my left, two servants attended to Kassim, one adjusting his deep orange turban, another fastening an intricate golden belt around his hips. As usual, he was impeccably dressed.

  This was the first time we’d been together since our discussion in Namir’s tower yesterday. Kassim had found excuses to stay busy with preparations for our guests and the wedding, so I’d spent the rest of the day with my sister. Lalana was giddy with excitement we were together again. She’d mentioned nothing of Kassim, the betrothal, or the impending nuptials tomorrow.

  And neither had he.

  “Stop chewing your lip,” Jevera tutted, standing on tiptoes to anoint my lips with a sweet balm tinted a dark rose color to match my gown. “And stop fidgeting, or it’ll smudge.”

  I kept still. Jevera was in a bad mood.

  “First, Mehri begs off helping, complaining of a mystery illness,” she muttered under her breath as she worked. “So now I have to get you ready to greet the Khirideshi royals all by myself. And I still have to put the final touches to your wedding gown before tomorrow. Which I’ll have to do with your boorish new bodyguard staring at me. She refuses to leave your chambers, you know?”

  “You mean Lisha?” I asked, and I felt the lip paint smear down my chin.

  Jevera made an exasperated sound. “Yes, her,” she said crossly, rubbing at my lips and chin before reapplying the balm with a glare. “She claims Namir has enlisted her to protect you, but anyone can see she’s not one of his.”

  I wanted to ask Jevera exactly how she knew Lisha wasn’t one of Namir’s spies, but thought better of smudging my lip paint once more. Perhaps Jevera worked for Namir. Now that I thought about it, if the spymaster wanted to keep an eye on me, assigning one of his spies as my handmaid would be the perfect way to do it.

  “If she’s staring, perhaps she just likes you,” I replied, my voice sounding odd and stilted as I tried not to close my lips and smudge Jevera’s hard work.

  “Hmph. Unlikely,” Jevera replied, but her cheeks colored slightly.

  Before she could protest further, Kassim’s voice rang out through the marble antechamber. “Leave us.”

  Instantly, the two servants attending him dipped their heads and retreated. Jevera, looking furious at being made to finish her work before she was ready, packed away her case of cosmetics with several huffs before giving a brief curtsey in the sultan’s direction. The doors slammed closed behind her.

  I looked down at my jeweled slippers, scuffing them against the smooth, stone floor. I could feel Kassim’s gaze on me.

  “How shall we tell your parents Lalana is still alive?” he asked, his voice even. “Do you want to tell them?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Zadie?”
>
  The air was heavy with a cloying floral scent from the rose-filled urns decorating the room. I glanced at Kassim to see his brow furrowed. He wasn’t going to like this.

  I forced a smile onto my face, as if I had good news. “They already know.”

  “What?”

  I flinched at his anger. “It was their idea to tell you Lalana was dead so you might marry me instead.” My words were choked. I never thought I would be telling Kassim these things.

  My knees suddenly felt weak, and I moved to sink onto one of the nearby divans. My dress creased around me.

  Kassim let out a low breath. “So the whole Khirideshi court was in on this lie?”

  “No! Not the whole court. Only my parents.”

  “And you.”

  “And me,” I conceded.

  Kassim tore the turban from his head, flinging it across the room where the jewels clattered against the floor. He pushed dark hair away from his brow as he stormed through the beaded curtains leading out to the balcony.

  Tears pricked at my eyes once more. There was a time I wouldn’t have cared if I’d angered Kassim. If anything, I relished challenging him. But now… He was so close to being my husband, and I’d lost him.

  I stood on shaky legs and followed him, the beads hissing as I pushed through them. Beyond the thick walls of the palace, the air rippled with heat. The sultan leaned forward on the far end of the balcony, resting his forearms against the marble as he surveyed his city beyond.

  I joined him, leaving a gap between us, the stone searing against my arms. Despite the heat, thick clouds gathered in the distance. I had thought Aliyah meant a metaphorical storm when she’d left us earlier, but clearly there was rain on the horizon.

  “I suppose you can marry Lalana now.” My whole body seemed to deflate as the words left me.

  The golden line of the horizon and gathering clouds blurred as tears flooded my vision.

  “Why would I do that?”

  My heart sank. “You don’t want the alliance with Khiridesh anymore?” I forced myself to face the sultan, blinking away tears. “I know my parents lied to you, but politically, the match is still–”