“No one else touches her,” Zakai growled.
“There is sometimes an offer for you. Mostly it is for the both of you together.”
“Never,” Zakai spit out, my eyes widening from the other side of the window at the venom in his tone.
“Very well, but you only get older by the year. Unlike the others here, your value is in your beauty and all beauty fades. If you were wise, you would capitalize on it.”
“How much longer?” Zakai demanded, ignoring Haziq’s statement. “How much longer until our debt is paid in full? Until you’ll fly us out of this desert?”
“Well, the math is complicated. Here, let me show you the tallies. I could explain it all to you, line by line, if you understood the numbers.”
I heard the sound of a piece of paper ripping and Haziq’s burst of laughter. “Or not,” he said, a chuckle remaining in his voice.
“Explain what we owe you in time,” Zakai said.
“I cannot do that without knowing the price each of your performances will bring in the future. The guests pay accordingly. Sometimes they are impressed . . . interested and excited, and sometimes they are not. Think of Karys. She’s a happy girl. She loves her home. Would you expose her to hunger and suffering? You remember what that feels like, don’t you, boy?”
“She’s naïve,” he said, and I drew back in hurt. Zakai sighed as if he’d felt the wound he’d inflicted on me even from the other side of a wall, and despite not knowing of my presence. “Karys is . . . Karys.” What did that mean? I wasn’t certain but the words hurt me all the same. I didn’t like the feeling that Zakai kept secrets from me. I leaned in as he murmured something that ended with, “. . . more by the day.”
“There is nothing else for you other than Sundara,” Haziq said, his voice clearer as the wind died down momentarily. “You were once nothing but a lice-ridden sewer rat. Take what I give you and be grateful for it. If you care for Karys, if you want to keep her safe, you will heed my words.”
I pressed farther toward the window, but the wind had kicked up, sand beginning to circle and whirl, and their words were beginning to be snatched by the quickening gusts.
“Six moons time. And then we both start walking,” Zakai threatened.
“You’ll die if you do,” was Haziq’s response.
I heard Zakai’s footsteps moving toward the door and turned to flee so he wouldn’t know I’d been listening, but not before I heard him say, “We’re already dying. At least that way we’ll die free.”
CHAPTER THREE
The sandstorm kept the customers away and for that reason I was grateful to the wind. That night, when I climbed into bed, Zakai was already there, staring up at the ceiling, his arms bent behind his head.
I turned onto my stomach and went up on my elbows, lifting a hand to smooth the crease between the dark slashes that were his brows. His expression softened, his eyes meeting mine. “You’re angry,” I noted.
He sighed, looking away. “I had a fight with Haziq.”
I didn’t mention that I’d heard it, instead asking, “About leaving?” For it was always the topic when it came to his bitterness toward Haziq, his dissatisfaction with the life we led.
He grunted softly. “He’ll never let us leave, not as long as we’re earning enough to make him rich.”
I thought of the viewing rooms, all the greedy eyes on us, and wondered how much those men paid to be there. “We have all the luxuries we want,” I whispered, nodding to the linen blanket half covering his toned brown chest, and the pillows surrounding us, “fine bedding, delicious food to eat, a strong roof to protect us from the elements.” My eyes went to the window, shut against the sand boiling into clouds of dust outside. For a moment we both listened. It was a gentle storm tonight, though worse than Haziq had thought it would be.
On other days, the sand stirred wildly, coming alive, twisting around our bodies so that it felt like it might strip the flesh right from our bones. We became blind then, lowering our heads against the miniscule grains that together, formed a white army too powerful to fight.
“Luxuries,” Zakai repeated, his voice weary.
“Yes,” I said.
He turned his head, considering me. “The luxuries are nice, little star. But they’re not everything.”
I bit at my lip. “I know,” I answered, because I did. We were trapped on Sundara, I understood that. We were beholden, but I wasn’t sure who benefitted the most. We were fed. Protected. We weren’t out there alone in the sand. We had each other, and perhaps more than most. I made the best of it because what other choice did I have? What else was there? “Forastan holds many more miseries though, we know that from our memories, and from the fact that those who travel back, are never heard from again.” Several times a family member had left Sundara after paying their debt, promising to figure out a way to make contact, to send word that they’d made it somewhere safe, send a drawing of where that was, for we couldn’t read letters, but nothing had ever arrived.
“Maybe Haziq destroys them,” Zakai said.
“But why?”
His eyes slid away. “Because he’s a snake.”
“Yes, he is. But . . . he’s not all bad. He makes us perform. But he lets us choose our limits,” I said, thinking of what he’d said to Zakai earlier about customers making offers for one or both of us. Haziq had bodyguards who roamed the property and made sure the customers didn’t do things they shouldn’t. He could have forced us to do anything had that been his desire. “He must do the same for the others.” I had never spoken to Bertha, or Spider, or anyone else, even the ones who had come and gone, about our performances. It was an unspoken agreement on Sundara that allowed us all not to think about it when it wasn’t happening, but none of them were bruised or forced. They seemed resigned to their debts, if not eager to repay them. Whatever they were giving to Sundara, Haziq had given to them first.
After a minute, Zakai spoke. “I heard Haziq talking to one of the customers once. He said his sister was forced to work for a man who sold her to others when she was just a child and that it broke his mother’s heart. He said it’s why he doesn’t allow us to be purchased.”
I tilted my head. “He still considers us children?”
Zakai shrugged. “Not me maybe, but you.”
My eyes roamed his face. Zakai sometimes made references to being older than I was. I didn’t know for sure if that was true, though the hair on his body had sprouted before mine, and his voice had grown deeper several years before I first bled. I lifted my hand, running my knuckle over the rough texture of his cheek, so different than the feel of my own, and yet just as familiar.
He rolled toward me, propping himself on his arm and staring at me. “Is love a luxury, do you think, little star?”
I thought about that. “Yes,” I said, thinking of the other performers at Sundara. They put up with each other, some even felt some affection for one another, I thought, thinking specifically of Bertha and Spider. But their love didn’t burn hot and bright like ours. Even now, in the bed we’d shared for so many years, I could feel my body grow soft and wet as Zakai’s dark eyes moved from my face to my breasts, pressed against the mat we slept on. From his gaze alone, I became excited, my breath quickening, my nipples tightening painfully, the only relief, his mouth. I wanted him. I always wanted him.