The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy #2) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,140

I say,” Issa cut in. “Blood must be offered to call upon them.”

Ali was horrified. “Ustadh Issa, neither Nahri nor I knew anything of this. I’ve never been to the Nile. And I never desired any contact with the marid, let alone sacrificed someone to them!”

“He fell in the lake, Ustadh,” Hatset explained. “It was an accident. He said the marid tortured him into giving up his name, and then they used him to kill the Afshin.”

Ali whirled on her. “Amma—”

She waved him down. “We need to know.”

Issa was staring at Ali in shock. “A marid used you to kill another djinn? They possessed you? But that makes no sense … possession is an acolyte’s last act.”

Revulsion swept him. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s a pact,” Issa replied. “A partnership … though not a particularly balanced one. If a marid accepts your sacrifice, you’re brought under its protection. And they’ll give you almost anything you could desire during your mortal life. But in the end? The acolyte owes their lifeblood. And the marid possess them to take it.” His eyes swept over Ali. “You don’t survive such a thing.”

Ali went entirely cold. “I am no marid’s acolyte.” The word left his lips with a savage denial. “I am a believer in God. I would never commit the blasphemy you’re suggesting. And I certainly never made any sacrifice,” he added, growing heated even as his mother placed a hand on his shoulder. “Those demons tortured me and forced me to hallucinate the deaths of everyone I loved!”

Issa inclined his head, studying Ali as though he were some sort of equation. “But you did give them your name?”

Ali’s shoulders slumped. Not for the first time, he cursed the moment he’d broken under the water. “Yes.”

“Then that might have been all they needed—they’re clever creatures and God knows they’ve had centuries to learn how to twist the rules.” Issa tapped his chin, looking perplexed. “But I don’t understand why. Plotting the murder of a Daeva—a lesser being—would be risky, even if they used a fellow djinn to do it.”

Hatset frowned. “Do they have a quarrel that you know of with the Daevas?”

“It’s said the marid cursed the lake after a falling-out with the Nahid Council,” Issa replied. “But that must have been over two thousand years ago. As far as I know, they haven’t been seen in Daevabad since.”

Ali’s skin tingled. That, he knew, was not at all true. In the aftermath of his possession, Ali had said the same thing to his father and had been quietly told the marid had indeed been seen—at the side of Zaydi al Qahtani’s Ayaanle allies.

But he held his tongue. He’d sworn to his father, sworn on their tribe and his blood, not to reveal that information. Even the slightest whisper that his ancestors had conspired with the marid to overthrow the Nahids would rock the foundations of their rule. Zaydi al Qahtani had taken a throne even he believed God had originally granted to the Anahid and her descendants; his reasons and his methods for doing so had to remain above reproach. And if Hatset and Issa didn’t already know, Ali wasn’t saying anything.

“How do I get rid of it?” he asked brusquely.

Issa stared at him. “Get rid of what?”

“My connection with the marid. These … whispers in my head,” Ali rushed on, feeling his control start to fray. “My abilities. I want it all gone.”

“Your abilities?” the scholar repeated in astonishment. “What abilities?”

Ali abruptly let go of the magic he’d been holding back. Water burst from his hands, a fog swirling around his feet. “This,” he exhaled.

The scholar scurried back. “Oh,” he whispered. “That.” He blinked rapidly. “That is new.”

“No,” Hatset said. “It’s not.” She gave Ali an apologetic look as he whirled around. “A slight—a very slight—affinity with water magic runs in our family. It shows up occasionally in our children and usually vanishes by the time they’re in their teens. And it’s nothing like what you’ve told me you can do,” she added when Ali’s eyes went wide. “A toddler having a tantrum might upset a water pitcher from across the room. Zaynab used to spin little water spouts in drinking cups when she didn’t think I was watching her.”

Ali gasped. “Zaynab? Zaynab has these abilities?”

“Not anymore,” Hatset said firmly. “She was very young at the time. She probably doesn’t even remember them. I would punish her terribly when I caught her.” His mother shook her head, looking grim. “I was so