The girl’s eyes narrowed at his mention of the sultan. He couldn’t tell if she was angry at the sultan as well, or…Well, technically, it was worth your head to say anything bad about the sultan or his household. That never stopped anyone in the Quarter of the Street Rats. There might not have been meat, bread, or water—but there was an endless supply of insults.
He thought she was about to say something, but the girl pressed her lips together with thoughtful finality.
“Come on,” Aladdin said, jumping up and giving her his hand, trying to lighten the mood. “It’s not all bad. We’ve got complete freedom of the streets…and trust me, if you grew up here, you’d never have to worry about walking by yourself anywhere. People would be afraid of you.”
This time she accepted his hand, maybe because her thoughts were elsewhere. Her skin was soft and her nails short but perfect. Aladdin gave her hand a little squeeze before regretfully letting it go and helping her up the next ladder.
“You said…‘we,’” she said slowly. “So…you consider yourself one of these…Street Rats?”
“Everyone else does,” he said, a little darkly. “But…yeah. I mean, I’m poor, I grew up here, they were my friends and family…but I’m not really part of them. Not anymore. Like I said, I just steal to eat. When they can, they steal for profit. I want something better out of my life. That…is their life. Not that they have a choice,” he added quickly. “It’s not like anyone is handing out bread or work.”
“It sounds very complicated,” the girl said. It didn’t sound like a platitude.
“I didn’t think it was,” Aladdin said, pausing to reflect. “I’m not. I’m…just me. Part-time thief and bane of the fruit market.”
“I think maybe there’s more to you than meets the eye.”
She had a tiny wicked smile on her face and had obviously been watching the way he climbed. A strange warmth rushed through him; it was like he couldn’t decide whether to blush or show off. He chose neither, turning around to quickly throw himself up and over the edge of the roof. Then he reached down and helped her up.
She tripped over her robe as she came over the side, a strange thing from a girl who seemed otherwise so utterly graceful. Aladdin caught her before she hit the ground—or, in this case, the roof. She fell into him, pressing her torso against his as she grabbed around his shoulders for support.
The heat of her skin burned through her robes and he felt the softness of her body. She smelled better than anything in the Quarter of the Street Rats—better than anything Aladdin could remember ever having smelled. Better even than the tiny vial of rose attar he’d once stolen for his mother—which she’d made him return.
When she stood up, she didn’t stand away from him. Instead, she kept close and looked up into his face, apparently just as entranced as he was.
Aladdin felt like falling to the ground himself.
“I…” the girl said.
He made himself focus on how they would get to the next rooftop; the poles that were usually up there to support clay urns drying in the sun were right where he had left them. Of course. He busied himself with reaching for one.
“I never thanked you for saving me from that man,” the girl finished weakly, managing not to sound too flustered.
“Oh, forget about it,” Aladdin said, meaning it. “You looked like someone who needed help as soon as you entered the market.”
With the skill of someone who had long lived on his toes, Aladdin ran to the edge of the building and pole-vaulted to the next one.
“Was I that obvious?” the girl asked ironically.
Aladdin grinned. There was something wonderful about a girl who didn’t take herself too seriously.
“You do sort of stand out,” he admitted.
She brightened at his unintentional compliment, eyes glowing prettily.
“Uh, I mean, you don’t seem to understand how dangerous Agrabah can be,” Aladdin corrected himself, running a hand through his hair self-consciously. He looked around for a plank he could lay down between the rooftops for her to walk across.
But before he could think of some way of changing the subject—or staying on this one—the girl had found a pole of her own and leapt nimbly across to him. Far, far more gracefully than he had. Her robes swirled around her as she landed like a queen of the djinn alighting on the golden sands of the desert.
“I learn pretty quickly,” she said with mock haughtiness.
Aladdin was once again speechless. What sort of rich girl was this? One who could leap like a mountain goat and play crazy at a moment’s notice? Who had never seen poverty before and now, confronted with it, thought about it quietly rather than making rash statements? Who didn’t care that Aladdin was a thief, except when he applied different standards to her?
He was a loner, not a hermit; he had known other girls. Morgiana the Shadow, Abanbanu the tailor’s daughter, Nefret with the strange green eyes, who came from the desert when the moon was new to trade trinkets from faraway lands.
None of them was like this girl.
“Come on,” he said, holding out his hand. She took it, as he somehow knew she would. “It’s this way.”
The girl grinned in delight as he took her over boards brittle with dry rot and loose stones worn down in the middle by countless feet centuries earlier. They entered a tower through a keyhole-shaped window that must have had bright mosaics around it at one time; everything shiny or worth anything at all had been scavenged decades before. Not even rats lived in this high, desolate place anymore.
Well, two did. Two Street Rats, if one counted Abu.
“Watch your head,” Aladdin said, making sure she ducked under a gigantic timber that slanted crazily from the center of the tower to the side.
“You…live…here?”
She didn’t say it with disgust. She was…surprised? Impressed?
Aladdin had never thought he would be bringing a girl back to his place who would actually like it.
They reached the landing he had chosen to call home. His mother had tried to keep their little hut as welcoming and homey as possible; he honored her memory by trying to do the same now. There were a few threadbare old rugs, some once-colorful cloths he had draped over the uglier, broken bits of stonework and used as curtains. There were even a few pillows for sleeping on and a couple of urns for water and, well, just decoration.
“Yup! Just me and Abu. We come and go as we please.”
“That sounds wonderful,” the girl said with a sigh.
“Well, it’s not much, but it’s got a great view.”
With a dramatic flourish of his arm, he swept back the curtain, knowing how impressed she would be.
Directly in front of them was the palace, a mile away but looming so large it seemed like they could reach out and touch it. At least a dozen of its golden onion-shaped domes were visible, glowing like suns. The giant formal gates and portcullis glowed lucky royal blue, like the sky. The road seemed to lead right from Aladdin’s tower through the city to the palace, pushing pesky houses and buildings to either side. Nobody obstructed the road. It had to be kept clear for caravans and deliveries and parades and the horses, litters, and wagons of visiting royalty.