The Forbidden Wish (9 page)

Aladdin's hand clenches his wine cup, his face paling dangerously.

Don't speak
, I beg him silently.
Don't let him bait you
.

The other men, sensing the spiking tension between the two princes, suddenly seem extremely interested in the food on their plates, but their eyes dart up furtively from Aladdin to Darian.

“Dear cousin, back at last?” says a voice, neatly severing the tension between the two boys.

The men all turn to Caspida, who steps around the screen dividing the room. Darian rises to meet her, taking her hand and bowing over it.

“Prince Rahzad, have you met my betrothed?” Darian pulls her close, his fingers playing with the ends of her hair.

Aladdin rises and bows. “Princess. I am honored.”

“She's the most beautiful woman in the city,” says Darian. “Perhaps even the world. When we're married, maybe I'll take her on a grand tour of the nations, to compare her to their beauties. What do you say, my love?”

Caspida's face is serene as porcelain, but her eyes glitter when she smiles at Darian. “Alas, the last time we went sailing, my dear cousin was overcome with seasickness and stayed below deck.”

Darian's face goes still. “You forget yourself, my love. Go back to the women. It's not proper for you to share bread with the men.”

She holds his gaze for a moment, and I wonder if her composure will break and she will strike him. But instead she turns and nods to Aladdin, then bids the others good evening and glides back to the women's side, where her handmaidens are watching silently through the screen.

With a laugh, Darian sits and holds up his cup for more tea. “Women! They think it so romantic to break the rules. But what are we if we don't hold to tradition, am I right?”

The men laugh and nod in agreement, but Aladdin stares hard at the prince.

“I've heard of the wonders of this city all my life,” Aladdin says. “I read about your kings and queens and generals. Can't recall hearing of you, though. What did you say your name was?”

Darian frowns. “Darian. Son of Sulifer.”

“Oh, right. And who's he again?”

“The vizier of all Parthenia, the commander of the Amulen military,
and
brother of the king.” Darian's fingers tighten around
his teacup. When he sets it down, it clinks loudly. “Perhaps you Istaryans need to update your histories.”

Aladdin shrugs. “Oh, right. Him. Yes, I do remember reading something about your vizier. Of course, after meeting him, I'm sure our historians must have been mistaken.”

Silence falls. Darian, cold as winter, says through his teeth, “Oh, do explain.”

“It's nothing, really. Just something about how he's been trying to rebuild the Amulen Empire. Sends grandfathers and children out to row his warships, but that he's lost every battle he's attempted.” Aladdin smiles. “I'm sure it's all a misunderstanding. Surely he's not
that
stupid.”

Oh, gods save us.

“
What
did you say?” Darian rises quickly to his feet.

Everyone is staring openly in astonishment, and on the other side of the screen, Caspida presses a fist to her lips, her eyes creasing in a wince. I sense Aladdin's muscles tensing, his anger spiking, his thoughts moving from anger to violence—time to break this party up.

With a wild honk, I launch myself upward, my large wings ponderously belaboring the air, and burst into the circle. My tail and feet overturn dishes and wine goblets, sending men yelling and cursing. I land in front of Aladdin and spread my tail feathers in a marvelous display—really, I've outdone myself with this form—and hop this way and that, wings flapping, avian throat screeching and honking. Caspida, laughing, disappears with her handmaidens, and a host of servants appear from the shadows where they have been lurking. They wave their arms and try to drive me out, and out I go, folding my wings and tail and honking at them as if
they're
the ones interrupting. Out of the hall and into the courtyard
they chase me, while others remain to help clean off the astonished and irate noblemen, including Aladdin. I lose them in the darkness and double back, shifting into a black cat to blend silently into the shadows.

The dinner is over. Darian is fussing at the servants, the nobles are dispersing, and Aladdin is lingering by a column, looking sullen. I run to him and bat his foot.

“Get away, cat,” he says. I hiss in reply and arch my back, and he does a double take. “Oh. It's you.”

He follows me into the courtyard and around a small pavilion, where we are alone. There, I transform into a human, once again in plain servants' clothing.

“Hungry?” he asks. “I got something . . . hang on.” From his pocket he pulls out a wadded napkin full of dates, bread, and meat, all mashed into one indiscernible mound. He holds it out.

“Thanks, but . . . that's disgusting.”

He sighs and returns the mush of food back to his pocket. “Old habit, I guess. When you grow up never knowing where your next meal will come from . . . Did you see him? That bastard Darian was there. I could have throttled him, but there was this bird. Went crazy, smashed right into our dinner.”

“Brainless creatures,” I mutter.

“The men or the peacocks?” says a voice. “It would be a close bet.”

Aladdin and I turn to see Caspida approaching, her face flickering with orange light from the brazier blazing above. Her handmaidens are nowhere to be seen, but when I stretch out with my sixth sense, I feel them lurking in the shadows, watchful and silent.

“Princess,” Aladdin says breathlessly, his eyes clearing a little.

“Prince,” she replies smoothly. “Walk with me?”

He steps forward eagerly, leaving me to trail behind. With his
hands clasped behind his back, his pace a bit unsteady, Aladdin allows the princess to lead him up a stair and onto a north-facing portico that looks out to the hills above Parthenia. With the city behind us, the stars are brilliant as diamonds strewn on black silk. A few lights burn in the cedars that grow below them, signs of farms and outposts scattered across the hinterlands.

“Your arrival has caused a stir among my people,” Caspida says at last. Her gown, cut from glittering teal silk, drags behind her, and the light of the lanterns hung from the portico's arches glints off the elaborate jeweled necklace resting on her collarbone. She is every bit the princess, and beside her Aladdin is . . . every bit the prince. Taller than Caspida by several inches, he walks with his head tilted, so he can look in her eyes while she speaks. “It has been some time since anyone of importance has visited Parthenia. We are not quite the great influence we once were in this world, and I'm afraid many of the larger southern cities find us odd and backward. You might find yourself something of a curiosity to my court.”

“Like a trained monkey,” says Aladdin.

Her lips curl at the corners in amusement. “Once, we received princes and kings and queens from all across the world. Parthenia was a center of learning and art, renowned for its open doors and tolerant court. But our feud with the jinn has weakened us, and it is all we can do to maintain our own borders. Being shut off for so long has made my people suspicious and prejudiced. We fear those we once welcomed, and see jinn lurking in every shadow.”

She pauses and leans over the railing, staring out at the horizon. “I don't mean to sound pessimistic. I just want you to understand the mood in my court.”

Aladdin, his back to the view, watches Caspida instead. “Why are you telling me this?”

She smiles humorlessly. “So you don't think us all backward and prejudiced. There are some in this court who would have us reach out, to rekindle our old alliances and rally support against Ambadya. If we all stood against the jinn together, we might succeed. Too long have the nations of our world cowered before these monsters and their whims.”

“Some . . . meaning you?”

Caspida looks down at her hands, idly fingering the bangles around her wrist. “The eastern kingdoms don't think women are fit to rule, did you know that? There are even those in Parthenia who think I should be set aside in favor of my uncle or my cousin Darian. They think our enemies will not take us seriously if a woman is on the throne.”

“Let them. And while they're busy laughing, you'll be busy ruling. Being underestimated isn't flattering—but it's an advantage.” He shrugs. “I've been underestimated all my life and have found it a cloak as useful as invisibility.”

Caspida turns her face toward him, her eyes probing his. “You are cunning, Rahzad rai Asnam. Are you a student of war?”

Aladdin laughs. “I take it you didn't get a look at my ship, or you wouldn't ask.”

“So what are you then?” She takes a step toward him, lifting her face to study him closely. “A scholar? An artist?”

“More like a dreamer.”

“It must be nice, to afford dreams.”

“Don't you dream?”

“Dreams won't protect the city from jinn. Dreams won't feed my people. Dreams won't . . .” She presses her lips together.

Aladdin, in a gentler voice, asks, “Princess, if you could wish for anything in the world, what would you wish for?”

She studies him for a long moment, as if unsure whether he is teasing or serious. Then she gives a little sigh and says, “You shouldn't picks fights with Darian. He's more dangerous than he looks.”

“Do you love him?”

She draws back, startled at the frank question and the directness of Aladdin's gaze. For a moment, she only stares at him in evaluation, her cheeks flushing. Then she turns away, her chin lifting. “Good evening, Prince Rahzad. I hope you find your stay here most comfortable.”

With that, she disappears inside, leaving him to beat his head against a stone pillar.

“Smoky,” he groans, “this isn't going to be easy, is it?”

Amusement tugs at my lips. “Not a chance, thief.”

A
S SOON AS
A
L
ADDIN IS ASLEEP,
I slip out the door and shift into a cat, then run through the halls, ears perked and whiskers twitching. The palace is quiet at night, the corridors dark except for the moonlight that pours through the tall arched windows. Crickets chirp in the many courtyards, and I pass the peacocks roosting in a small grove of lemon trees. I listen at every door, and move on when I don't find what I'm looking for.

I'm almost at the edge of the lamp's magical perimeter when I finally hear Darian's voice.

The door to his room is shut, but that doesn't deter me. I shift into a spider and crawl beneath it, then scurry up the wall, staying in the shadows. Taking the form of a spider is difficult—so many legs to manage, and staring through all those eyes makes me dizzy. So when I reach the ceiling, I transform into a bat and hang upside down, my toes clinging to a groove in the wall.

Darian and Sulifer are in the midst of a heated argument.
They're both breathing heavily, and a bowl lies shattered on the floor. The rooms are larger and more resplendent than Aladdin's, and save for the broken pottery, immaculately tidy.

“. . . and by a
common thief
, no less!” Sulifer is saying. His voice is low and dangerous, his eyes slits. Gone is the formal, composed vizier we met in the throne room nearly ten days ago.

“He must have had help from the inside,” Darian replies in a muffled tone. He's leaning against a table, his shoulders hunched and his face hidden from my view. “And once he had the lamp, how was I to stop him? He had the jinni at his side, and he made a wish! I could have
died
. All I got was this.”

Darian digs into a pocket, producing the ring Aladdin had been wearing when he found me. Sulifer takes it and grasps it tight.

“Why did it speak to the thief and not to me or to you?”

Darian's retort is bitter. “I don't know, Father. I'm not an expert on these things. I never wanted any part in it at all!”

Sulifer raises a hand, and the prince flinches, but then the vizier pauses. “You said you heard him make a wish.
What
, exactly, did he say?”

“He wished to go home.”

“He's here. In the city,” Sulifer muses. “Why didn't you say that first, you idiot? All we have to do is send the Tytoshi charmers out with their flutes. That should enchant the creature out of hiding, and it will lead us to the boy.”

“Do you really think it's
the
jinni?” asks Darian. “The same one who betrayed Queen Roshana and started this war?”

“The maarid we captured told us the lamp contained the most powerful jinni of all. What other monster could it be?” Sulifer's eyes turn distant and greedy. “They say it created a garden for Roshana made entirely of jewels, a wealth greater than any in the
world.” He scowls at his son. “I don't suppose you found any sign of
that
on your misbegotten foray into the desert?”

“As soon as the thief escaped I turned around and rode straight back here, as you well know,” Darian snaps. “I didn't have time to dig around old ruins. Anyway, I don't know why you're so obsessed with this one jinni. We have a hundred others bottled up below, waiting to be used.”

I tense, my bat ears stretched wide.

“Those jinn are feral and uncontrollable.” Sulifer rolls the ring between his fingers, his lip curled in disgust. “The minute you let one out, it will turn on you. They have no compulsion on them to grant wishes, no loyalty to their masters. Only one of the old lamp jinn will do, and there are very few of those left. No, I
will
get my hands on this one, and when I do, our people will finally retake their place in this world. No more cowering behind these walls. We will undo the curse Roshana's foolishness left on us and extend our empire once more. First thing tomorrow, have Vigo begin playing his flute throughout the city.”

Darian just looks up at his father with burning eyes before turning away. “I've been riding for days. I'm exhausted.”

But Sulifer goes on as if Darian had never spoken. “If the thief is still here, he's probably lying low, waiting to see what we will do. I'll smoke him out and put his head on a pike, just like his rabble-rousing parents. Report to me after you've dispatched the charmer. I won't tolerate any more incompetence from you.”

Without another word, Sulifer storms from the room, slamming the door behind him.

Darian leans against the wall, then slides down to the floor, his eyes shutting. He lets out a long sigh before dropping his face into his hands.

I shift quietly to gray smoke and curl across the ceiling, down the wall, and under the door before he can look up again.

Sulifer's footsteps are still echoing in the hallway, and I shift to cat form and dart after him, but I get only ten steps before the lamp jerks me backward, dissolving me into smoke, and I can only rage in silence as I rush through the hallway, beneath Aladdin's door, and down the spout.

Zhian is here, somewhere.
Below
, Darian said. I've seen staircases leading down to lower levels of the palace, but have been unable to follow them. I have to find a way to draw Aladdin down there, giving me a chance to find where Sulifer keeps the bottled jinn.

I don't have much time left. A week and more has already passed, and the moon is a quarter full.

I swirl around in the lamp, thinking hard. Everything's falling into place now. Nardukha sent a maarid to the city to be captured, so it could tell Sulifer about the ring to lead him to me. But the ring didn't seem to work for Sulifer or Darian. Why, then, did it speak to Aladdin? Who created it, and why? Again and again I find myself back at the same questions.

I curl and think in my lamp, slow, lazy smoke, waiting for morning so that Aladdin can let me out again.

•   •   •

“Where do you go at night?”

Startled, I blink at Aladdin. “What?”

“Every night you slip out. You think I don't notice. You're gone for hours, and sometimes you come rushing back, all smoke, into your lamp.”

We're sitting beneath a small canvas shade at the edge of a chaugan field. Horses gallop about on the grass, their riders leaning
down with their mallets to whack a small ball from one end of the pitch to the other. Nobles look on from their shade along the sides, like we do, spending more time gossiping and drinking than watching the game. It's been a long time since I last saw chougan played, and that was the day it was invented by the Blood King of Danien. The rules seem much the same all these centuries later, except that original match was played not with wooden balls but the severed heads of the king's enemies.

I much prefer the modern version.

Aladdin and I are temporarily alone. Visitors come and go, mostly curious nobles—and a good many of them young, female, and coy. Aladdin lounges like a king, a tray of fruit at one hand, a flagon of expensive wine at the other. I stand behind him, ready to wait on his every whim, though so far I've met all his requests with scowls.

Aladdin twists around in his seat to stare at me, clearly not letting me get out of answering.

“I like to roam,” I say with a shrug. “My kind are more active at night, you know.”

He raises his eyebrows as if he hasn't considered that, then turns back around to watch the game.

“The Rings are so much more exciting than this,” he says, yawning. “I ought to take a few of these rich boys down to town one of these nights, show them some real entertainment.”

“That would be a bad idea. Spending too much time around those familiar with you will weaken the glamour hiding your true identity.”

He sighs and pulls a few grapes from the tray beside him, but instead of eating them, he just rolls them in his hand. His eyes are locked not on the game but on the pavilion erected on the other side
of the field. Darian sits here, with his friends, Caspida at his side. The prince and princess don't talk or even look at each other; he chats with his boys, and she sits stiffly, her eyes roaming the crowd.

Sulifer appears at the far end of the field, surrounded by ministers and military officers who vie for his attention. Aladdin's eyes follow the vizier, and one by one, he squeezes the grapes in his hand until they pop. Shadows haunt his eyes, and he grinds his jaw so hard I fear he will break a tooth.

“Why do you not hate the jinn?” I ask, diverting his attention.

Aladdin turns, the anger in his face dissipating. “Hate the jinn?”

“Every other person here would just as soon strike off my head as say hello if they knew what I was.”

He runs a hand through his hair. “I don't know. Didn't really have to deal with jinn, staying inside the city all my life. And anyway, how could I hate you? Without you, I wouldn't be here.”

He might hate me if he knew I'm using him, manipulating him, leading him into danger and worse, all for my own selfish reasons. What would he say if he knew the truth? Perhaps I should tell it to him. Perhaps I need to see the hate in his eyes, to stifle the lightness in my stomach whenever I look at him. But the truth turns to smoke in my throat, and I choke it down.

“Prince Rahzad!” a sunny voice calls out, and Vigo saunters over, twirling something in his hand. My teeth clench when I realize what it is—a jinn-charming flute, identical to Nessa's. “Enjoying the game?”

Aladdin grins and stands up, shaking hands with the Tytoshi. “It's a damn bore.”

Vigo's head tips back, and he lets out a booming laugh. “I
couldn't agree more, friend! These Amulens will watch it for hours a day! What about in Istarya? What do you do for sport in this fabled island kingdom we hear so little about?”

Aladdin waves a hand. “Oh, you know. Lots of water stuff. Wrestling sharks and things. And in Tytos?”

“Wouldn't know. Haven't been there since I was a boy. I'm heading down to the city to do some work.” He taps his flute to his forehead. “Want to come along? Playing this thing all day gets damn tedious, but afterward, there are some fun girls I could introduce you to. That is, if, uh . . .” He glances at me.

Aladdin does too, and he catches the look in my eyes. He turns back to Vigo. “Thanks, man, but I've already promised to play dice later.”

“Right, sure.” Vigo grins and raises his eyebrows at me, then slaps Aladdin on the shoulder. “Enjoy yourself, man!”

He heads off, and I let out the long breath I'd been holding.

“Well?” Aladdin turns to me. “What's wrong? Why didn't you want to go?”

“I—” Taken aback, I flounder a bit. “You told him no, just because I didn't want to go?”

“We're in this together, aren't we, Smoky?” He gives me a crooked, bemused smile.

“But . . . you're the Lampholder. Whatever you say goes. I don't have a choice.”

He laughs, and I frown at him in surprise. “You think it's funny?” I ask.

“No! Sorry. I should probably say how awful it is you have to go wherever I want, but . . . When I look at you, I see a jinni who's not afraid to tell me what she thinks. Who isn't afraid to disagree with
me. If I make a wish, you could use it to crush me. You've done it before, haven't you? Ruined your masters with their own wishes?”

I lift a shoulder in begrudging agreement.

“I don't think you're as helpless as you want people to think.”

“What does that mean?”

Aladdin stares at me for a long moment, then says softly, “When I was little, and the guards would come around and beat my father until he paid them off, my grandmother used to take me onto the roof of our house so I didn't have to watch. I asked her why my father resisted the guards when they always won in the end. Why didn't he just save himself the pain and pay them what they wanted? She told me that sometimes, you can't choose what happens to you, but you can choose who you become because of it. That's why my father fought back. He knew in the end, it wouldn't change anything. But he wouldn't let the circumstances control who he was.” His eyes turn stormy. “I always thought there's no freedom in fighting back—just death. What's the point of fighting for a lost cause? You're like my father. You fight back.”

“And you think I'm a fool for it?”

“No. I think . . . you're brave.”

“Brave?” I choke out a laugh. “Are you forgetting who I am? Or why your people hide inside these walls, fearing the jinn? I am the—what do your songs say?—the Fair Betrayer. Tell me, O Master, what is brave about betraying someone you love?”

“Love?”

I freeze, wondering how I could have been so foolish as to let the word slip. But it's too late now. I glare at Aladdin, as if it were his fault, as if he'd tricked me into unveiling my secret.

“Forget about it,” I mutter.

“What happened that day? Did you really betray that queen and start this war?”

“Yes, I did.” Though not in the way he imagines. I loved you, Habiba, and in doing so, I betrayed you. The rules were clear, the cost inevitable. Even so, I was arrogant, thinking myself so clever to befriend a human and dream of peace between our races. I thought I was above the law that held all jinn captive, imagined I could bridge the chasm that had separated man and jinn since the dawn of this world. But I learned my lesson, at the cost of you, your people, your city. And the consequences of my foolishness are still echoing through the centuries.

I slip behind Aladdin, retreating from any further prying on his part. Soon, I will have rescued Zhian, and Nardukha will grant me my freedom.

And once I am free to run, not even the shadows of the past will be able to catch me.