The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy #2) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,204

her of something she might have used to cut purses back in Cairo. For a moment, she thought longingly of Dara’s blade back in her room.

I wish I’d had a few more knife-throwing lessons with him, she thought. Not to mention that the legendary Afshin would have probably made for a better partner in a palace under siege than her visibly skittish husband.

She took a deep breath. “Anything else?”

Zaynab shook her head. “We’ll sound the alarm in the Geziri Quarter and then head to the Citadel to alert Ali. He can lead the Royal Guard back. Warn every Geziri you see in the palace, and tell them to do the same.”

Nahri swallowed. It could be hours before Ali returned with the Guard. She and Muntadhir would be on their own—facing God only knew what—until then.

“You can do this,” Zaynab said. “You have to.” She hugged her brother. “Fight, Dhiru. There will be time for grief, but right now, you’re our king, and Daevabad comes first.” Her voice grew fierce. “I’ll be back with your Qaid.”

Muntadhir gave a jerky nod. “God be with you.” He glanced at Aqisa. “Please keep my sister safe.” He nodded toward the pavilion. “Take the stairs we came from. There’s a passage close by that leads to the stables.”

Zaynab and Aqisa left swiftly. “Are you ready?” Nahri asked when she and Muntadhir were alone.

He laughed as he strapped a wicked-looking sword to his waist. “Not in the slightest. You?”

“God, no.” Nahri grabbed another needle-sharp dagger and flipped it into her sleeve. “Let’s go die.”

Ali floated peacefully in warm darkness, wrapped tight in the embrace of the water. It smelled of salt and mud, of life, gently teasing and tugging at his clothes. A pebbly soft tendril stroked his cheek while another twined around his ankle.

A throbbing at the back of his head slowly brought him to the present. Dazed, Ali opened his eyes. Darkness surrounded him. He was submerged in water so deep and so clouded by muddy silt that he could barely see. Memories came to him in pieces. The watery beast. The Citadel’s tower tumbling through the air …

The lake. He was in Daevabad’s lake.

Sheer panic tore through him. He thrashed, trying desperately to free himself from whatever held him. His robe, he realized, blindly fumbling. The crumbled remains of some sort of brick wall had pinned it to the lake bed. Ali wrenched it off, kicking madly for the surface. The smell of ash and blood grew thicker on the water, but he ignored it, fighting past floating debris.

He finally broke through. He gasped for breath, pain surging through him.

The lake was in chaos.

Ali might as well have emerged onto a scene from the darkest circle of hell. Screams filled the air, cries for help, for mercy, in all the djinn languages he knew. Layered over them were moans, feral, hungry sounds that Ali couldn’t place.

Oh, God … and the water. It wasn’t just debris that surrounded him, it was bodies. Hundreds of djinn soldiers, floating dead in their uniforms. And when Ali saw the reason, he cried out, tears springing to his eyes.

Daevabad’s Citadel—the proud symbol of Zaydi al Qahtani’s rebellion, of the Geziri tribe, Ali’s home for nearly two decades—had been destroyed.

Its once mighty tower had been ripped from its moorings and dragged into the lake, only a crumbled hump remaining above the water. Jagged gashes, as if from the claws of some massive creature, had raked through the remaining buildings, through the soldiers’ barracks and across the training yards, making furrows so deep that the lake had filled them. The rest of the complex was on fire. Ali could see skeletal figures moving against the smoke.

Tears ran silently down his cheeks. “No,” he whispered. This was a nightmare, another awful vision from the marid. “Stop this!”

Nothing happened. Ali took in the sight of the bodies again. Djinn murdered by the marid’s curse did not remain floating upon the water; they were torn apart and swallowed by its depths, never to be seen again.

The curse on the lake was gone.

“I see someone!”

Ali turned toward the voice to spot a makeshift boat, one of the carved wooden doors of the tower, making its way toward him, crewed by a pair of Ayaanle soldiers wielding broken beams as oars.

“We’ve got you, brother,” one of the soldiers said, hauling him aboard. His golden eyes went wide when he glanced at Ali. “Aye, praise God … it’s the prince!”

“Bring him over!” Ali heard another man