Empire of Sand Read online

  There was a tray of pastries and a jug of spiced wine in the arms of a servant at Maryam’s side. Maryam allowed the servant to pour her a drink and set some of the pastries in front of her as she continued to stare down at Mehr with a look that could have curdled milk.

  Maryam sampled the wine. Everything else she left untouched. Mehr and the servants waited in complete silence.

  “I thought we had an understanding, Mehr,” Maryam said finally. “Arwa’s upbringing is my responsibility.”

  “I know that, Mother.”

  “Not yours. Mine.”

  “I understand perfectly,” Mehr said.

  “Then why,” Maryam said, eyes narrowed, “did you go to the nursery last night?”

  “Because Arwa needed me,” Mehr replied calmly. “It was a small thing, Mother. Nothing of consequence.”

  “How easily you tell lies,” said Maryam. A look of absolute bitterness flitted across her features. “I know what you did. Filling her head with heathen madness is not a small thing, Mehr, and I won’t stand for it. I have worked so very hard to ensure that Arwa is better than her mother’s low blood. I have raised her with all the care I would have shown a child of my own flesh, if I had been so blessed. And I have done well, Mehr. She is good.”

  “She is,” Mehr said softly. This, at least, they could agree upon.

  “Because I have made her good,” Maryam said sharply. “Because I have raised her and molded her, and taught her to be grateful that she is a noblewoman of the Ambhan Empire.” Unlike you, Maryam did not say. She had no need to. “Did you know, Mehr, that every night before she sleeps, she kneels by me at my altar to worship the Emperor and Maha and give thanks to the mystics for their prayers? No? Of course not.” Her voice was a blade. “You know nothing about her, because she does not belong to you. She is mine.”

  Maryam paused, then, to make a faint gesture at one of her servants. The servant filled her glass to the brim with a murmured apology. Maryam waved her away, her gaze still fixed on Mehr.

  “Tonight, no doubt, Arwa will ask me about your blood and your knife and your shadow monsters, and I will have to shame her for believing your heathen lies. She will be grieved, and that will be your doing.”

  Mehr bowed her head. She was not ashamed, not of what she had done, but the thought of Arwa suffering because of Mehr’s foolishness … Oh, it pained her.

  Silence fell, and as the quiet deepened around them, Mehr realized that Maryam was waiting for her to apologize. An apology would not be the end of it, of course. No matter what Mehr said, Maryam would continue to vent her fury. Mehr had faced Maryam’s anger often enough before to know that.

  If she apologized now, if she groveled and pleaded, Maryam’s fury would settle—eventually. The punishment she would inflict on Mehr would be lighter. Mehr had played the part of the remorseful child often enough in the past to know that.

  But the memory of the daiva’s prayer-bright eyes—and Arwa’s tears—wouldn’t leave her be. She couldn’t do it. Today, with dreamfire rising and a storm hovering on the horizon, she couldn’t allow Maryam to belittle everything she held holy.

  “They aren’t monsters,” Mehr said quietly. So quietly. In the silence of the Hall, her voice carried far enough.

  The air grew tense. Along the walls, Maryam’s attendants went very, very still.

  “Is that all you can say?” Maryam asked. “I give you the chance to apologize, and all you see fit to do is offer me more nonsense?”

  “Not nonsense. Just the truth, Mother.” And because it wasn’t all she could say, because she had already fanned Maryam’s fury into a wildfire and groveling was no longer an option, she went doggedly on. “They are the Gods’ first children. They’re ancient, elemental, sacred—”

  “Do you want me to believe your bloodletting is sacred too?” demanded Maryam.

  “It is,” Mehr said, and watched Maryam’s beautiful face twist in revulsion.

  Maryam visibly restrained herself, drawing in a deep breath, straightening in her seat. When she spoke, her voice was tight and controlled.

  “Your father may allow you to indulge in your mother’s heathen customs, but you will not inflict them on Arwa.” Maryam touched the seal hung around her throat. Inscribed with the Governor’s genealogy in ancient Ambhan script, it marked Maryam as his other half, his partner in all of life’s duties, his bride and his property. It was a reminder of the power Maryam had that Mehr did not. “When I married Suren I vowed to raise you both as proper Ambhan women. I wanted to help you rise above your roots—both of you. But I knew from that moment I first set eyes on you that your mother had already rotted you with her barbarian ways.” Maryam leaned forward, intent. “I have failed to save you, Mehr, but I won’t fail Arwa. I won’t allow you to drag her down with you. Is that clear?”

  “Very,” Mehr said. “I won’t disobey you, Mother.”

  “If only I could believe you,” said Maryam.

  Maryam took another sip of her drink. She watched Mehr over the rim of the glass, her eyes sharp. She was ready to pass judgment.

  “No more contact, I think,” she announced. “When you’ve shown me you understand how to obey your parents, Mehr—as a true Ambhan daughter should—you’ll be allowed to visit Arwa again.”

  Mehr felt her own rage rising. This was why she should have groveled. This was why she should have held her pride in check. Wielding truth had unpleasant and unavoidable consequences.

  “I have the utmost respect for you, Mother,” Mehr said. Lie. “But if Arwa needs me, I won’t turn away from her.” A beat. “She’s my blood, after all.”

  Maryam flinched as if she’d been struck. Mehr felt an ugly rush of satisfaction tangled with shame. Maryam could claim Arwa as her own as often as she liked. It would not change the truth. Maryam had never borne the child she’d so longed for. As the years had passed, it had become clear there would be no little Ambhan daughters carved in Maryam’s image, and no sons to carry on the family name. There would only ever be another woman’s child to raise and mold into her own as best as she could. For all Maryam’s efforts, Arwa would never be the child she truly craved.

  “You value blood ties far more than you should,” Maryam said. “Blood wasn’t enough to make your birth mother stay, after all, was it? No.” Her voice trembled. She swallowed and held her head high. “Like it or not, we are family. And you will obey me, as is your duty.”

  A wound for a wound. Mehr supposed there was some fairness in that. She sucked in a breath and held on to the iron in her spine, refusing to relent or apologize.

  Maryam’s mouth thinned.

  “Leave us,” she said to her attendants.

  The servants filed out obediently. At the wave of Maryam’s hand, the guards closed the doors.

  “Stand up,” Maryam said. She stood herself, smoothly adjusting the heavy weight of the silk shawl draped over her shoulders. She stepped down from the dais.

  Mehr stood as Maryam walked over to her. “Why did you send the servants away?” she asked.

  “Because some things aren’t for their ears,” Maryam said. Her skirts, diaphanous layers of netting and embroidered cloth, whispered against the floor. Closer now, Mehr could see the tension lining her face, the way her hands bit into the slippery weight of her shawl.

  “You didn’t bring me here for privacy,” Mehr pointed out. “You brought me here to humiliate me.”

  “How bold you are,” said Maryam, venom in her voice. “Things change, Mehr.”

  Crossing the last bit of distance between them, Maryam roughly took hold of Mehr’s chin. She stared up into Mehr’s eyes without blinking.

  “Look at you,” Maryam said softly. “Every year you grow more rebellious. You think I don’t see the look in your eyes? I know what you are, Mehr. I’ve accepted that trying to improve you is a pointless task, but perhaps you’ll pay me some heed when I tell you this: Your stubbornness is putting us all at risk, especially Arwa.”

  Mehr could feel
the sharp bite of her stepmother’s nails. She didn’t try to pull away. She told herself the pain was nothing.

  “You don’t understand politics,” Maryam went on. “And why should you? Your father has kept you sheltered, as is right and proper. But I am your father’s other half. I share his burdens, and I know too much. I cannot allow you to continue blundering about in ignorance, harming us all.” She lowered her voice. “The Emperor, praise his name, has sent messages to his nobles across the Empire. He believes their efforts to drive heathens out of the Empire have been … lacking. He has asked them to search out your mother’s people in earnest and force them to the edges of society, where they rightly belong.” Maryam was still holding Mehr in her grip, nail to flesh, keeping her pinned fast. “Mehr, by the Emperor’s grace, you were born an Ambhan woman, and the walls of your father’s household shelter you from their sight and from harm. But even you are not so well hidden that your heathen rituals may not draw … attention.”

  Mehr’s mind was full of noise. Her jaw ached.

  “Why has the Emperor’s hatred grown so suddenly?” she whispered, forcing the words out through the grip of Maryam’s hand.

  “It isn’t for us to question the Emperor,” Maryam said sharply.

  Mehr bit down on her tongue to hold back an audible wince of pain as Maryam’s nails dug in deeper.

  “No one has to know about the taint in your sister’s lineage,” Maryam said. “She is already my child in all the ways that matter. If you stop reminding the world of your heathen background, your father and I may be able to arrange good marriage prospects for her. Arwa could have the life she deserves. Or not. It’s up to you, Mehr.”

  Finally Maryam released her. Mehr resisted the urge to touch her face.

  “May I go?” she asked.

  “You may go and think on what I’ve told you,” Maryam said. “But be warned. If you don’t make the right decision, I will have to convince your father to stop indulging you.” Her eyes were flinty. “No more dancing. No more heathen rites. His guilt won’t control him forever, Mehr.”

  You can try, thought Mehr. This time she chose to be wiser, and held her tongue even as her heart hurt in her chest. Maryam made a dismissive gesture with one hand, and Mehr turned without offering her even the semblance of a respectful farewell. She swept through the doors, not bothering to hide the red marks on her face. Let the servants say what they liked. She’d had enough of her stepmother and her games to last a lifetime. Now all she wanted was to be alone.

  Over the next few days Mehr got exactly what she’d wished for. The servants gave her a wide berth, mindful of the fact that Mehr was at odds with her stepmother. No one wanted to face Maryam’s displeasure by showing Mehr any favor. Arwa was kept away from her just like Maryam had promised. Mehr spent most of her time in her own chambers, waiting for the bruises on her face to fade and watching the horizon.

  The daiva had been a herald of a storm. Mehr had been right about that. Every day the storm rolled in closer, building in waves against the sky. She watched the dreamfire glowing against the horizon, its deep ruby and amethyst flames flickering white at the edges. This was the first storm to reach Jah Irinah in a decade, and it should have been a privilege to witness it.

  And yet, all Mehr could think of was Maryam’s sharp words and Lalita’s gentle warning. She couldn’t help it. The memory of Maryam’s nails tightening on Mehr’s jaw tangled together with the memory of Lalita’s voice as she warned Mehr to be careful, leaving a strange, painful dread in Mehr’s heart.

  The Emperor was looking for her mother’s people. The Emperor wanted his nobles to drive out her mother’s people in earnest. People like Mehr.

  Like Arwa.

  Mehr worshipped the Emperor and the Maha, the Great One who had founded his bloodline, when it was expected of her, of course: on the Emperor’s birthday, on the anniversary of the Empire’s founding, or whenever Maryam demanded it. But she had no altar in her chambers, and no particular love of the Emperor in her heart. Her mother had hated him, in her own quiet way. She had refused, when Mehr was small, to worship him at all. I will never pray for him, her mother had said, with a black look in her eyes that Mehr had never forgotten. He has no right to an Amrithi’s prayers.

  As a child, Mehr had not understood the weight of blood and history that lay behind her mother’s hatred. It was Lalita who later taught Mehr how the Maha, the first Emperor, had conquered Irinah and raised his temple upon its back. She told Mehr that the Amrithi had rebelled with the help of the daiva. When the daiva had begun to weaken, fading, the Empire had crushed the Amrithi with terrible swiftness. The Amrithi had been reviled for their resistance ever since.

  Every time Mehr thought of the Emperor, she remembered that history and felt an echo of the darkness she’d seen in her mother’s eyes inside her own heart. She thought, too, of the way noblewomen would look at her when they visited her father’s palace, and the things the servants would whisper when they thought Mehr could not hear them. That one stinks of her mother’s blood. She’s not really Ambhan. Look at her face. Look at how she behaves.

  They believed, just as the Emperor did, that there was no place for heathens in the Empire. If Ambhans were the highest of the high, blessed by the Emperor’s grace, obedient to the laws of an orderly and civilized culture, then Amrithi were the lowest of the races: barbarians, faithless wanderers, who had no respect for contracts or Ambhan law. The people of the Empire’s other provinces—even the Irin, for all their superstitious respect for the daiva—belonged to the Empire in a way the Amrithi never could.

  To be visibly Amrithi was to be outcast. Amrithi had no real place in the Empire. Mehr had no place. And if the Emperor’s hate for her mother’s kind had truly sharpened into a deeper and more active loathing, then Maryam was right to be afraid. Mehr had put them all at risk, simply by being who she was.

  The Amrithi were hunted by the nobility and hounded to the edges of society, forced to live far beyond the borders of Irinah’s towns and villages, where they could not taint the Empire or its citizens with their alien culture or their heathen rites. Some survived as Lalita did, by hiding their heritage and building new lives. So far, Mehr had been protected by her father’s position and by the walls and veils that defined her life as a sheltered noblewoman. But if the Emperor was encouraging his nobles to persecute Amrithi more aggressively, if their eyes were beginning to seek out her mother’s people in vicious earnest …

  Well. Mehr would do whatever she had to in order to keep Arwa safe.

  Lalita had found a way to hide her heritage and thrive, taking on a Chand name and practicing Amrithi rites only in secret, behind closed doors. Mehr could do the same if she had to. She would. For her sister’s sake, she would do a great deal. But she had fought very hard to hold on to her heritage, and she would not discard it or make herself small without good reason.

  She would need to speak to Lalita and ask her exactly what was happening in the city and in the Empire beyond it. She would bribe the servants who could be bribed, and listen for whispers not intended for her ears. She would arm herself with the knowledge she needed to protect herself and her family.

  But first, she’d dance the Rite of Dreaming. That, at least, she refused to sacrifice. She’d hungered for it for far, far too long to give it up now.

  Her memories of the last storm to reach the city were vague. She had been nine years old, and her mother had taken her out onto the roof to watch the dreamfire fall. Her mother had lifted her up—she’d been so strong!—and shown her the clouds of lights ghosting across the desert sky.

  She’d told Mehr stories about the desert: how it was a special and holy place, the place where the Gods had gone and laid down their bodies for their long rest. In sleep, their dreams were the force that kept the world whole, and shaped the earth’s balance, its many cycles of birth and death, suffering and joy, rise and ruin.

  She’d told Mehr what the Amrithi believed: that the dreamfire was their immort
al dreams manifest, a sign of their power at work on the land where they slept. When the Gods dream, Mehr, they make and unmake the universe. Dreamfire is the light of their souls—see how beautiful it is, my dove? The dreamfire is pure creation.

  Her mother had lowered her down then, and demonstrated the first simple stance in the Rite of Dreaming: hands held aloft, palms cupped together, body bowed and sharp like the arc of a falling star. With her palms cupped against the sky, it had looked as if the dreamfire were pouring into her hands like water.

  Her mother had watched Mehr’s delighted awe and smiled.

  There, you see, she’d said. Mehr still remembered the huskiness of her mother’s voice, how soft it had been. When you’re grown, we will dance the Rite of Dreaming together. We’ll dance with the Gods, you and I.

  And Mehr had looked at the dreamfire, traced it with her hungry eyes, and begun to dream of the moment when she would dance with the dreamfire too, as an Amrithi woman grown. In all the years since, the dream had not faded. Instead it had grown inside her, deepening its roots in her soul.

  She would dance the rite as an Amrithi. Just this once. She had earned this, at least. She thought of the way it would feel to lift her arms again and hold dreamfire in her hands. There were no words for how that would feel. Only pure, uncharted emotion, bigger than sky.

  In preparation for the storm—and because she clearly needed something to distract herself from the pointless, twisting worry in her chest—Mehr decided to organize everything she would need when the dreamfire finally fell. Apart from her dagger, she kept her few Amrithi possessions in a wooden chest tucked away with the rest of her clothing, where it was unlikely to attract her stepmother’s attention.

  Mehr removed the heavy chest from storage on her own, placing it by her divan. Inside the chest, preserved and fragranced by bundles of dried herbs, lay Mehr’s garb for the rites. She lifted each item out reverently.