He’s usually here by now.
Unwilling and incapable of leaving her fate in the hands of others, she walked to the doors and pulled one open.
The Rajput turned in place, his hand resting on the hilt of his talwar.
Shahrzad felt the fear leech its way onto her heart . . . felt it tug at the corners of her eyes and mouth.
“Do you—do you know if . . .” she tried.
She gritted her teeth.
“Is he coming?” she asked.
The Rajput merely stared down at her, a lethal statue of muscle and menace.
“Can you tell me where he is?” she demanded, the tenor of her voice clearly trying to compensate for her waning courage.
At this, Shahrzad saw the tiniest flicker of a response in his dark-as-night gaze.
Pity?
He . . . pities me?
She slammed the door shut and leaned against it, her chest starting to heave.
No.
She stifled a sob.
Enough. That’s enough.
Shahrzad stood upright and walked, with her head high, to the bed. She fell back onto the silken pillows, her eyes still trained on the doors.
“He’ll come,” she said into the darkness.
I know it.
As she clung to this last thread of hope, two words kept resonating in her mind, taunting her . . . plaguing her with a meaning she should not see.
These two words from a boy who was less than nothing.
These two words that gave her the will to fight off the demons:
My queen.
• • •
The groan of the doors opening brought Shahrzad out of a restless half sleep.
And the light of pure dawn streaming through the wooden screens shot her to her feet.
Standing at the threshold were four soldiers.
Shahrzad straightened her rumpled clothing and cleared her throat.
“Is it not customary to knock first?”
They all looked past her without answering. Their eyes bore an air of grim detachment.
Shahrzad clasped her hands behind her back, forcing herself to stand up straight. “What are you doing here?”
Without a word, the soldier in front stepped into the room and moved toward Shahrzad, still looking to a spot beyond her . . .
As though she had ceased to exist.
Her heart. Her heart.
“I asked you a question!”
The soldier took hold of her shoulder. When Shahrzad reached up to smack his hand away, he trapped her wrist and grasped tightly.
“Don’t—touch me!”
The soldier nodded to his subordinates, and another grim-faced dragoon seized her by the arm.
The blood flew through her body, soaring on a mixture of terror and rage.
“Stop!”
They began to drag her from the room.
When she tried to wrench free and kick at them, they merely lifted her off the floor as though she were trussed-up game, caught for sport.
“Where is the caliph?” she cried.
Stop! Do not beg.
“I want to speak to the caliph!”
Not a single one of the soldiers even paused to glance at her.
“Listen to me!” she screamed. “Please!”
They continued half carrying, half dragging her struggling form down the marble halls of the palace.
The servants they passed averted their gazes.
They all knew. Just as the soldiers knew.
There was nothing to see.
It was then Shahrzad realized the inescapable truth.
She was nothing. She meant nothing.
To the soldiers. To the servants.
She stopped struggling. She raised her head.
And pressed her lips tightly together.
Baba and Irsa.
Shiva . . . and Tariq.
She meant something to them. And she would not disgrace their memory of her by making a scene.
Her failure was disgrace enough.
As the soldiers pushed open the doors into the dawn and Shahrzad saw her death before her, it was this last thought that thrust its final weight upon her, breaking the dam.
Shiva.
Silent tears streamed down her face, unchecked.
“Let go of me,” she rasped. “I won’t run.”
The three soldiers looked to the first. After a wordless conversation, they placed Shahrzad on her bare feet.
The grey granite pavestones felt cool to the touch, the warm rays not having seeped into their gritty surface yet. The grass on either side was blue from the silver light of an early morning sun.
For a moment, Shahrzad considered stooping to run her hands through it.
One last time.
They filed to a covered alcove, where another soldier and an older woman stood waiting. In the woman’s hand was a long piece of white linen, fluttering in an all-but-dead breeze.
A shroud.
And in the soldier’s hand . . .
A single stretch of silk cord.
The tears continued their final trek down her face, but Shahrzad refused to utter a sound. She stepped to the soldier. His arms were thick and burly.
I hope it will be quick.
Without a word, she turned around.
“I’m sorry.” He whispered so softly it might have been the wind.
Startled by his kindness, she almost looked back at her would-be murderer.
“Thank you.” An absolution.
He lifted her hair, gently, and brought the dark waves over her head—a veil, shielding her from the nameless witnesses.
The ones who already refused to see her.
The silk cord felt so soft at her throat, at first. Such an elegant way to die.
Shiva died this way.
The thought that Shiva died like this, surrounded by people who saw nothing, made the tears flow harder. Shahrzad gasped, and the cord tightened.