The mirror spun. Slowly. Lazily. It flashed silver as it met Shahrzad’s face, before catching Khalid’s reflection. Then the mirror’s dark side passed, whirling around in another play of light and shadow.
Shahrzad blinked. When she glanced to her right, she noticed Khalid’s brow had furrowed in concentration. As though the mirror had become a complex riddle he intended to solve.
Isuke’s voice faded to a languid drone. “Thus, if you wish to determine an appropriate counterpoint for this curse, you must delve beneath its surface.”
I don’t . . . understand.
The revolving mirror caught Shahrzad’s attention once more. Flashing before making another slow turn. Light and dark. Shahrzad, then Khalid. Again. And again.
Shahrzad grew dizzy. The scent of lemons and mint filled her nostrils and spread into her chest. Her eyelids began to droop. A heaviness slid around her like a second skin, as though she were on the verge of falling asleep. Or drifting in that space between dreams, where she was aware of what was happening around her, but had no control over it.
In that moment of suspended weightlessness, an unwanted presence entered her mind.
It was as though a hooded figure had ambled into the haze of her bedchamber, rummaging through her things like a thief in the night. When it failed to find what it was looking for, it turned in her direction.
Shahrzad gasped.
It did not have a face. Where there should have been features was instead a blank oval of ivory, like a polished eggshell. The faceless intruder glided toward her, then led her into a misty corridor, glancing through open doors to its left and right.
The rooms within were filled with Shahrzad’s memories. All the times she’d fought with Shiva or Irsa. Made a point to return Rahim’s good-natured grumbling. Listened to her mother recite stories. Disappeared for a stolen embrace with Tariq. Read books alongside her father. Cried alone in her room.
The intruder dwelt on some of the moments she’d shared with Khalid. Many of the nights she’d told him tales by lamplight. Contended with him over matters of the heart, while tearing bread into tiny pieces. All the times she’d kissed him—in darkened alleys and behind veils of shimmering gossamer. The interloper lingered for a spell on their first kiss in the souk.
As though it had come to the same understanding as they had in that instant.
Her intruder soon developed a keen interest in any memory of her father. It watched without eyes as Jahandar presented Shahrzad with the single budding rose from his garden, the afternoon she’d first come to the palace at Rey. It leaned in closer—eager—while Jahandar coaxed the rose to life, only to bring it past death with an unwitting turn of his wrist.
After that, the intruder searched with purpose through the misty hallways for Jahandar al-Khayzuran. Soon, it came across the memory of the day before, when Shahrzad had pressed her father for information on what had transpired the night of the storm in Rey.
On what Jahandar had done to his hands. To his hair. To Irsa’s horse.
To the very storm itself.
His eyes aflame, Jahandar had shown her the book he’d kept pressed to his chest all this time. He’d removed a black key from around his neck.
And unlocked the tome . . .
To shine a slow-spreading silver light upon his face.
From beyond the white haze, the faceless intruder reached a cold hand to tightly clench Shahrzad’s wrist.
Tightly enough to draw pain.
Shahrzad stifled a cry.
“Aunt Isuke!” Artan thundered. “That’s enough!”
The sound of broken glass scattered the weightless drift in Shahrzad’s mind, bringing everything back into stuttering focus.
Her eyes flashed open. She was brought out of a world of hazy white smoke.
The first thing she noticed was the imprint of a hand on her wrist. Red and throbbing and real. Shahrzad blinked hard. When she glanced up, her heart plummeted into her stomach.
Both Khalid and Artan were on their feet.
Khalid’s sword had been hurled across the room. It was embedded in a far wall at an odd angle, its jeweled hilt still shuddering from impact.
Isuke’s ominous mirror was in pieces around them.
Shahrzad knew Khalid had shattered it. Somehow, he had managed to break whatever control the sorceress had over him and had destroyed her mirror in an attempt to stop her. In response, the sorceress had flung Khalid’s sword far out of reach.
Now Artan stood between Khalid and his aunt.
He did nothing while his aunt stole into my mind. Where do Artan Temujin’s loyalties lie?
She initially thought Artan had stepped between Khalid and his aunt to prevent Khalid from attacking her.
But Shahrzad realized she might have been mistaken. Artan seemed inclined to side with them, not with his aunt. His back was to Khalid, and only a fool would turn his back on his enemy. Artan was not a fool. At this moment, his expression revealed a complicated mixture of resolve and remorse. As though Artan knew he had erred.
So Artan had not stepped before Khalid to stop him; he had stepped before him to save him.
He had chosen to side with a boy he barely knew over his own family.
But why?
Shahrzad’s gaze drifted to the sorceress seated across from her.
It’s clear Isuke meant to rob me of my thoughts. To what purpose?
The sorceress remained with her back as straight as an arrow and her hands upon the table. Unapologetic.
“You promised,” Artan said, his voice laden with accusation. “You promised it would be nothing more than a search for the book. You prom—”
“I did not make any promises.” Isuke’s reply bordered on serene, despite its biting undertone. “You did. In any case, the girl is not hurt.”
“You’re lying,” Khalid replied in a savage whisper. “She cried out.”
“I’m not hurt. I was . . . startled,” Shahrzad said. “But I demand to know—”
“Your demands are of little consequence to me,” Isuke interrupted. “But the book your father has—he cannot be allowed to keep it.”
Confusion settled across Shahrzad’s brow. “I don’t understand. Is it the reason my father—”
“Your father’s wounds will heal in time. But he has unleashed something much more destructive on your world.” The only change in the sorceress’s affect was a shift in eye color, from flint to obsidian, then back again. “If you destroy the book for me, I will lift the curse from the boy you love so dearly. I will render its debt repaid.”
Though Shahrzad longed to ask all the questions collecting in her mind, she chose the most pressing one. “Why must the book be destroyed?”
Shahrzad had to know the sorceress’s reasons, for she did not trust her motivations. Nor did she have any intention of trusting someone who knew everything about her and had yet to offer anything in return.
Isuke paused in consideration of her. “That book offers nothing but tragedy to its bearer. You should be proud to bring about its demise.”
“Forgive me, but that’s not an answer,” Shahrzad said in equally cutting fashion. “What does this book have to do with you?”
“My reasons should not matter so long as you achieve your goals, but I will say this: the book involves Artan’s parents. When you destroy it, you will free him of their debts.”
“These debts—of what sort are they?” Khalid said, looking Artan’s way.
“That book has brought about untold suffering and destruction. Death in its most grievous form,” Isuke answered, her eyes flashing. “When it was gifted to a foolish king many years ago, we thought it had been lost and were glad of it. Now I would have it gone, once and for all.”
Her mind brimming with suspicion, Shahrzad studied the birdlike woman across from her. “If you now know where the book is, why would you not destroy it yourself?”
Isuke almost smiled. “As I learned from entering your thoughts, you are not as big a fool as I first surmised.”
“No.” Artan laughed, though he did not sound the least bit amused. “She is not.”
“I cannot destroy this book,” Isuke confessed. “Nor can any member of my family. It is a book fashioned from the magic running through our veins. Blood freely given must be what destroys it. But it cannot be our blood.”