The City of Brass (The Daevabad Trilogy #1) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,54

hesitated but couldn’t contain her curiosity. “And the rest of your family?”

“Dead as well.” He gave her a sharp look, his emerald eyes bright. “There’s no one but me.”

“I can relate,” she said softly.

“Indeed. I suppose you can.” A goblet suddenly materialized in her hand. “Drink with me, then,” he commanded, raising his goblet in her direction. “You’ll choke if you don’t wash down that food. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone eat so quickly.”

He was changing the subject, and they both knew it. Nahri shrugged, taking a sip of the wine. “You’d do the same if you grew up like me. Sometimes I didn’t know when I’d eat next.”

“I could tell.” He snorted. “You didn’t look much thicker than the ghouls when I first found you. Curse the manna all you like, at least it filled you out some.”

Nahri lifted an eyebrow. “‘Filled me out some’?” she repeated.

Dara was immediately flustered. “I-I didn’t mean in a bad way. Just that, you know . . .” He made a vague sweeping motion toward her body and then blushed, perhaps realizing such a gesture didn’t help. “Never mind,” he muttered, dropping his embarrassed gaze.

Oh, I know, believe me. For all Dara supposedly abhorred the shafit, Nahri had caught him staring at her more than once, and their dagger-throwing lesson hadn’t been the first time his hand had lingered upon her a bit too long.

She kept her gaze on him, studying the broad line of his shoulders and watching as he played nervously with his goblet, still avoiding her eyes. His fingers trembled on the stem, and for a moment Nahri could not help but wonder if they would do the same upon her skin.

Because things are not tumultuous enough between us without adding that to the mix. Before her mind could go any further, Nahri changed the subject again to one she knew would thoroughly ruin the mood. “So tell me about these Qahtanis.”

Dara startled. “What?”

“These djinn you keep insulting, the ones who supposedly fought my ancestors.” She took a sip of her wine. “Tell me about them.”

Dara made a face as if he’d eaten something sour. One objective achieved. “Must we really do this now? It’s late—”

She shook a finger at him. “Don’t make me go looking for another ghoul to threaten you into talking.”

He didn’t smile at the joke, instead looking more troubled. “It’s not a pleasant tale, Nahri.”

“All the more reason to get it over with.”

He took a sip of wine, a long sip, as if he needed a dose of courage. “I told you before that Suleiman was a clever man. Before his curse, all daevas were the same. We looked similar, spoke a single language, practiced identical rites.” Dara beckoned at their fire, and its tendrils of smoke rushed toward his hands like an eager lover. “When Suleiman freed us, he scattered us across the world he knew, changing our tongues and appearances to mirror the humans in our new lands.”

Dara spread his hands. The smoke flattened and condensed to form a thick map in the sky before her, Suleiman’s temple at the center. As she watched, blazing pinpricks of light spun out from the temple across the world, falling to the ground like meteorites and bouncing back as fully formed people.

“He divided us into six tribes.” Dara pointed at a pale woman weighing jade coins at the eastern edge of the map, China perhaps. “The Tukharistanis.” He gestured south at a bejeweled dancer twirling in the Indian subcontinent. “The Agnivanshi.” A tiny rider burst out of the smoke, galloping across southern Arabia and brandishing a fiery sword. Dara pursed his lips and with a snap of his fingers lopped off its head. “The Geziri.” To the south of Egypt, a golden-eyed scholar tossed a brilliant teal scarf over his shoulder as he scanned a scroll. Dara nodded at him. “The Ayaanle,” he said and then pointed to a fire-haired man mending a boat on the Moroccan coast. “The Sahrayn.”

“What about your people?”

“Our people,” he corrected and gestured toward the flat plains of what looked like Persia to her, or perhaps Afghanistan. “Daevastana,” he said warmly. “The land of the Daevas.”

She frowned. “Your tribe took the original name of the entire daeva race as your own?”

Dara shrugged. “We were in charge.”

He studied the map. The smoky figures silently shouted and gesticulated at each other. “It was said to be a violent, terrifying time. Most people embraced their new tribes, clinging together for survival and forming