How?
My hands trembled as I undid the twine still holding them together and pulled the pages out. A stiff piece of paper fell out, sturdier than the parchment, with Husnain’s writing on it.
May these words be suspended in your thoughts all your life.
Once more, my vision blurred with tears. I thought I’d lost everything, every connection to my family and my past and the people and things I loved. Husnain’s handwriting was like a beacon after a long and dark night.
“Bright-feathered and cloaked it came to her, and inclined its head,” I recited in Kushaila. “And fixed to her crown a star, gold as the sun. And it said, kneel for the Grace of the Most High.”
I felt the words shoot through me like lightning. I loved the stories of Massinia more than any other. She’d been the daughter of a Tazalghit queen and as a child was kidnapped by slavers. Massinia had suffered under the weight of her bondage before finding a way to escape. They’d branded her and beat and claimed her. But she’d freed herself and Dihya had eventually delivered her, newly marked with His touch, to her mother and her family.
Later, the tesleet that first delivered her, Azoul, returned to her with the Word of Dihya which she transcribed first into her skin, and later into the Book. Her message united the Tazalghit tribes for the first time in their history.
In the courtyard, dim, false moonlight filtered in through the dome above, and the air was filled with a stream of orbs, glowing like a sea of dying stars. Every now and then one glowed brighter than all the others and emitted a soft, childlike hum. They filled this part of the palace, the only source of light at night. Coupled with the discovery of my brother’s gift, they felt like a sign, like hope.
I prayed, fervently, for another sign, anything, to reveal my purpose in being here. I couldn’t give up hope and I wouldn’t. But I wanted to believe—had to believe—that there was a reason I was here, that there was meaning to this sudden change in fate.
The crown of Dihya had been stripped from me, my face changed, my body broken. But I was not a slave and I was not a spare. I was my mother’s daughter, and I would survive and endure. I would find my way back home.
7
Nadine did not sit behind her desk today. Nor did she wait for me to unveil myself, but took it upon herself to tug at the face covering. I fixed my gaze to a spot over her shoulder while she turned my face this way and that.
“Well,” she said at last. “You certainly look like her.”
I said nothing.
“How biddable you now seem. Come,” she said. “You may sit with me.”
There were two chairs at the table, and a breakfast spread. I hesitated.
“My lady?” I said.
“You must learn to sit with your betters if you are to emulate Her Royal Highness,” she said.
“Yes, my lady.”
Her gaze was critical as I took my seat. “Do you understand the stakes of what you’ve been commanded to do? There is no room for error.”
I watched her pour tea. “I do, my lady.”
“We shall see,” she said, then gestured at the food between us. “Eat.”
I reached for a piece of bread, but before I touched it, Nadine rapped the back of my hands with a knife. I snatched my hand back in pain.
“I see we must begin from the first.” She sneered. “You are not in a village. We do not eat with our hands.”
“It’s bread,” I said helplessly.
“You will ask for things to be passed to you,” she said. “If not, you will use a fork. Am I understood?”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Again.”
So the morning went. By the time the sun was up, my hands had dozens of purple bruises, and I’d eaten nowhere near my fill. Nadine did not care. She had the table cleared and walked to the center of the courtyard.
“Now,” she said, sitting in her usual high-backed chair. “You shall walk to and fro on this walkway.”
I stared from where I was sitting.
“Are you deaf, girl?”
I hastened to my feet. “No, my lady.”
I’d taken three steps when something sharp snapped against my ankles. I stopped and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath.
“You are not a village girl,” Nadine said when I opened my eyes. “You are no longer prey. I should see neither fear nor hesitation.”
No longer prey, she said, as if I hadn’t been exactly that from the moment of my arrival. “I don’t understand.”
“Walk with a straight back”—she snapped the thin whip at my back—“with your shoulders and head high”—another snap at my neck. “Again.”
And again and again.
* * *
With my physical transformation complete, Nadine doubled down on my training. In the days that followed, I spent my mornings being tested by Nadine or being taught to dance by a droid, then retreated to my quarters in the afternoon to study. I spent hours frantically memorizing names and facts and histories. After lunch I met Nadine again for behavioral lessons. More often than not, Maram attended these sessions.
This morning, it appeared, I wasn’t worth either of their attention. Perhaps Nadine was too impatient to deal with me and my painfully slow progress. In any case, I was being trained by nothing more than a droid.
“Let us begin,” it said, “with the old families of the Ziyaana. Recite.”
“There are five great houses who have resided in the Ziyaana for four hundred years,” I began.
It rapped a hand against the wall. “No,” it said. “As Her Highness. We have no interest in your knowledge; only in how well you can imitate.”
I swallowed around an angry reply. I had been at these lessons for two weeks now, and I still could not affect the haughty tone the princess used, despite my life depending on it. Despite everything I felt no closer to being a stand-in for Maram. I lacked something that resided so deeply in the princess—her arrogance and pride rendered her voice as it was. I had none of that—and I didn’t even know where to begin pretending that I did.
I straightened my shoulders, lifted my chin, and continued. The sun was high in the sky, and I could see the heat wavering in the air outside the palace dome. Most of the Ziyaana was taking its midday slumber.
“There are four houses,” I began again. “Ziyad, of whom I am a direct descendant. Pledged to them are Agadaan, Ouij, and Fars. There are the Banu Salih, of whom my fiancé is the last. Pledged to them are Mellas and Azru.”
The droid rapped against the wall again, a horrific tic-tic-tic that reminded me of spiders rushing their way across the floor.
“You have failed to meet her vocal register,” it said.
“I don’t know what that means,” I snapped, finally giving in to anger.
A giggle rent its way through the air. It made my whole body stiffen in fear.
Maram carried her bejeweled slippers in one hand. Her dark hair spilled around her shoulders, a gorgeous torrent of curls threaded with gold. Today she wore a deep blue gown, and, like her hair, it too was threaded with gold. Between the two of us, I realized with a churn of envy, she was the more beautiful. Logically, I knew we were now identical. But round-cheeked, flushed with delight, the corner of her mouth turned up just so, she seemed leaps and bounds above me.