Like its occupant, the room appeared cold and uninviting—unlikely to offer the slightest hint of clarity.
This chamber is like a prison, once removed.
She sighed to herself, and the sound susurrated back at her from the heights of the vaulted ceiling. Shahrzad paced around the perimeter of the room, her bare footsteps leaving imprints on the shining black onyx. Then, like a whisper of a suggestion, they vanished without a trace.
The single lamp in the chamber’s center looked eerie and forlorn. It failed to provide enough light, rendering its flickering shadows more baleful than beautiful against the cool white alabaster.
It was a sad place to call a refuge, with just as unyielding an aspect as its master.
The more Shahrzad gazed at the chamber, the more she realized, and the less she understood. Everything had a specific place in this room—a designated order to its existence. The only things out of place were she and the bloodstained strips of linen at the edge of the platformed bed. Any evidence of life—or lingering emotions—did not belong.
Shahrzad strode to the bed and discarded the bloodied linen. Then she gathered the unused strips, along with the small container of salve Khalid had removed from the ebony chest upon their arrival. Its immense cabinet door was still ajar. Shahrzad walked toward it with the clean linen and the tub of salve in her arms. She tugged on one of the bronze rings and peered inside. As with the room, its shelves were meticulous in their construction and organization. Two were lined with books in descending height order, and another was stacked with scrolls bound by wax seals. A shelf at eye level contained an assortment of jars in various shapes and sizes. The empty space for the container of salve was evident, and Shahrzad replaced it, along with the strips of unused linen, in their clearly demarcated positions.
As she began to shut the door, her eyes fell on a leather sleeve filled with sheets of parchment, wedged like an afterthought between two massive tomes on a shelf high above her.
It seemed out of place. Just like her.
A small part of her knew she should leave it be. This was not her room. These were not her things.
But . . . it called to her. This collection of afterthoughts whispered her name, as if from behind a locked door with a forbidden key. Shahrzad stared up at the sleeve of leather.
As with Tala and her bluebearded husband’s ring of keys, the parchment pleaded for attention.
And, like Tala, she could not ignore it.
She had to know.
Shahrzad stood on her toes and tugged on the leather sleeve with both hands. It slid from between the tomes, and she clutched it to her chest for a nervous beat before kneeling against the black onyx. Cold fear skittered down her back as she raised the fold. The sheaf of parchment was inverted and illegible, so she grabbed the stack and upended it with care.
The first thing she noticed at the bottom was Khalid’s formal signature, composed in clear, neat script. When her eyes skimmed across the rest of the page, she rapidly discerned it was a letter—
A letter of apology, addressed to a family in Rey.
Shahrzad turned to the next piece of parchment.
It was another letter of apology. Written to another family.
As she leafed through the stack of parchment, her eyes began to swim in realization. In recognition.
These were letters of apology to the families of the girls murdered at dawn by a callous hand and a silk cord.
Each was dated. Each acknowledged Khalid’s sole responsibility. None offered any justification for the death. No excuse.
He merely apologized. In a manner so open and full of feeling that it left her throat dry and her chest aching.
It was clear they were written with no intention of being delivered. Khalid’s words were far too personal and introspective to indicate he ever meant for any eyes to see them apart from his own. But his unabashed self-loathing cut into Shahrzad with the effectiveness of a newly honed knife.
He wrote of staring into frightened faces and tearful eyes, with the abject knowledge he was robbing families of their joy. Stealing their hearts’ blood from them, as though he had the right. As if anyone had the right.
Your child is not a notion or a whim. Your child is your greatest treasure. And you should never forgive me for what I’ve done. As I will never forgive myself.
Know that she was not afraid. When she gazed at the face of the monster sanctioning her death, she did not quail. Would that I had half her courage and a quarter of her spirit.
Last night, Roya asked for a santur. Her playing drew every guard in the corridor to her door, and I stood in the garden and listened, like the cold, unfeeling bastard I am. It was the most beautiful music I have ever heard in my life. A music that rendered all thereafter dull and colorless in its memory.
Tears began streaming down Shahrzad’s face. She turned the pages faster.
Until she found the one addressed to the family of Reza bin-Latief.
How does one begin to apologize for robbing the world of light? Words seem strangely insufficient in such a case, and yet I fall to their uselessness in my own inadequacy. Please know I will never forget Shiva. For the brief moment she stared into the face of a monster, she deigned to smile and forgive. In that smile, I sensed a strength and a depth of understanding I could never hope to fathom. It tore at what professes to be my soul. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. A thousand, thousand times. At your knees, and it will never be enough.
Shahrzad sobbed, and the sound rang out in the chamber. The parchment shook in her hands.
Khalid was responsible. Whatever the excuse, whatever the reason—he was the one. He had killed Shiva.