Gifting Fire by Alina Boyden (read my book .TXT) 📕

sorry I didn’t stop him from entering your chambers or touching you, your highness, but I thought it would make things worse,” he said.

“You were probably right,” I replied, though that didn’t make me feel any better. But if Karim was going to make it a habit to roam this part of the palace, then whether or not he touched me was the least of my worries. Sikander couldn’t stop my husband-to-be from kissing me. But he could stop Karim from doing other things.

“I want your men posted outside my sister Lakshmi’s door from now on,” I told him, noting the way his eyes widened with alarm. “She has caught Karim’s eye, and she is eleven years old—the same age I was when Karim attacked me.”

Sikander’s face flushed crimson with rage. Had he not remembered how old I had been? Or perhaps he had never conceived of me as being as small and helpless and naive as Lakshmi. He stood there, frozen in place, staring at me, his mouth half-open, his hand gripping the hilt of his talwar so tightly that his knuckles had turned white. So the regret wasn’t false. That was something.

“Sikander, whatever strife there has been between us, I want your word that you won’t let him hurt my little sister,” I said.

“You have it, your highness,” he replied. “I will have men posted outside her door day and night, and I will not permit any man to enter her chambers for any reason. I swear it.”

“Thank you,” I told him, and I meant it. It was a huge relief to know that Karim would have to fight his way into Lakshmi’s bedchamber if he wanted to hurt her. I didn’t think he would do that; it would create too much trouble, even in a household where he had all the power. No, rapists like him thrived in environments where their behavior went unchallenged, where people made excuses for them and swept their misdeeds under the rug.

“Your highness.” Sikander bowed stiffly, and left the room. I heard him issuing new orders in the hallway, though his words were too muffled to make out.

With Lakshmi’s security taken care of, at least insofar as I was able, I decided it was time to get out of bed and get dressed, lest Karim return in a fouler temper. I threw aside my silk sheet and stood up, stretching out my arms and legs, just as Hina and two of her celas came striding into the room, already fully dressed in ajrak skirts and long blouses, carrying wooden boxes of clothes and jewels like proper handmaidens.

“It was never my intention for you to serve me in your own home, Hina,” I said, my cheeks heating as I realized that I was occupying her favorite bedchamber, and she had arrived to wait on me hand and foot.

“I knew what I was volunteering for, your highness,” Hina replied. “And anyway, I wouldn’t trade places with you for all the gems in your father’s palace.” Her eyes drifted back toward the corridor, back to where Karim had been, and I caught her implication at once.

I shuddered involuntarily as I remembered Karim’s kiss on my cheek. God, I wanted to take the longest bath in the world. I wanted to scrub my skin until it bled to get the feeling of him off of it, but I didn’t have time for that. I had to face Karim and his parents at breakfast.

“We’ll need an excuse to fly our zahhaks today, your highness,” Hina informed me in a low voice as she and her celas began dressing me in my thunder zahhak–inspired peshwaz, with its matching jewelry. “If you are to be our messenger, I want to point out the havelis of the most trustworthy emirs of Kadiro. They will have zahhaks, and will be willing to use them to carry our messages.”

I nodded, as that made perfect sense. I would need to get a sense of the city’s layout if I was going to sneak through it at night, make contact with one of the emirs, send the messages, and get back to the palace safely. It was ridiculous, that I could so easily secure my own freedom by simply disappearing as I had that night four years ago in Nizam, but that my sisters, and my zahhak, and my place in the world held me back from doing it. So, I could slip away from the palace at night, but I would have to return before morning, lest everyone I loved suffer in my stead.

“There’s something you should see, your highness,” Hina said as her celas put the finishing touches on my makeup and my jewelry.

“What’s that?” I asked.

She motioned to the patio, and I followed her out, our presence startling the fish zahhaks from their perches. They let out shrill cries and beat the air back with their indigo wings, looking for all the world like miniature river zahhaks as they raced away from the palace, skimming the water with their belly scales. But as my eyes followed their movements, they caught sight of the fish zahhaks’ much larger cousins.

A pair of fire zahhaks were flying several hundred feet above us, making a lazy circuit of the lagoon. Their yellow underparts made them vanish into the rising sun, only to reappear a few moments later as a splash of fiery color against the blue backdrop of the morning sky. As they banked into their turn, I got a better look at the crimson, flame-orange, and even purplish hues of their neck and back scales, my eyes squinting to try to make out a familiar pattern. Were they Registani animals? Was it Arjun and Arvind? My heart soared at the possibility, though I knew it would cause me nothing but trouble if they had arrived here alone, without an army or an aerial armada to support them.

“Do you recognize them?” I asked Hina.

She shook her head. “I was thinking that you might. Are they