The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy #2) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,64

crept into his voice. “And stay away from Zaynab. I know she’s been helping you. That ends. I will kill you myself before I let you drag my little sister into one of your messes.”

Ali recoiled, struck speechless by the open hate in his brother’s face. He hadn’t expected Muntadhir to greet him with open arms, but this …

It was of course at that moment that the door opened again, and their father entered the courtyard.

Training and a lifetime of being scolded to respect his elders had Ali bowing before he even realized what he was doing, his hand moving from his heart to his brow.

But he caught himself before he let a certain word slip. “My king,” he greeted Ghassan solemnly. “Peace be upon you.”

“And upon you peace, my child,” Ghassan replied.

Ali straightened up, taking in the sight of his father as he approached. Ghassan had aged far more than Ali expected. Stress lines bored deep around the king’s eyes, echoing the gaunt shadows under his cheeks. A heaviness seemed to have settled on his shoulders, making him appear, if not frail, at least older. He suddenly seemed like a man who’d lived two centuries, a king who’d seen and done far too much.

Ghassan stared back, gazing at Ali with open relief. He stepped closer, and Ali dropped to one knee, reaching out to take his father’s hand and press it to his brow. It wasn’t a thing the Qahtanis did in private, but Ali suddenly found himself retreating into formality, wanting the distance that ceremony and ritual provided. “May God preserve your reign,” he murmured.

He stood and stepped back, but Ghassan grabbed his wrist. “Stay, boy. Let me look at you a moment longer.”

Aware of Muntadhir watching them, Ali tried not to cringe. But when his father touched his face, he could not help but stiffen.

Ghassan must have noticed; there was a brief moment of hurt in his lined eyes, gone in the next instant. “You can sit, Alizayd,” he said softly. “I know you’ve had a long journey.”

Ali sat, crossing his legs underneath him. His heart was racing. “I pray you can forgive my sudden return, my king,” he rushed on. “Bir Nabat could not sustain the Ayaanle caravan, and when that wretched trader abandoned it, I had little choice. I was the only man who could handle the untreated salt.”

“You could have butchered the animals for food and stolen the cargo,” Muntadhir suggested casually. “The djinn of Bir Nabat are raiders like the rest of the north, no?”

“No,” Ali said, matching his brother’s even tone. “We are farmers, and it was a small fortune due to the Treasury. I didn’t want the village to land in any trouble.”

Ghassan raised a hand. “No explanation is necessary, Alizayd. I suspected your mother’s people would cook up some trick eventually to get you back here.”

Muntadhir looked at his father in disbelief. “And you really think he played no part in this, Abba?”

“He looks ready to leap from his cushion and jump on the first carpet that will whisk him back to the desert. So no, I do not think he played any part.” He poured a cup of wine. “He also sent me a letter from every caravanserai between here and Am Gezira suggesting different ways he could avoid this very encounter.”

Ali flushed. “I wanted to be thorough.”

“Then let us be thorough.” Ghassan motioned to the long-healed scar high upon Ali’s cheekbone—the spot where the marid had carved Suleiman’s seal into his skin. “That looks worse.”

“I took my khanjar to it before I reached Am Gezira,” Ali explained. “I didn’t want anyone recognizing it.”

Muntadhir blanched, and even his father looked slightly taken aback. “That wasn’t necessary, Alizayd.”

“Being exiled made me no less loyal to maintaining our family’s secrets,” Ali replied. “I wished to be discreet.”

“Discreet?” His brother scoffed. “Alizayd the Afshin-slayer? The hero out battling muwaswas and turning Am Gezira green while his relatives laze about Daevabad’s palace? That’s what you consider discreet?”

“It was just one muwaswas,” Ali defended, recalling the incident with the rampaging magical sandfish quite well. “And I’m hardly turning Am Gezira green. It’s simple irrigation work, searching for springs and digging canals and wells.”

“And I wonder, how did you find those springs, Alizayd?” his father mused idly. “Those springs locals had never managed to discover themselves?”

Ali hesitated, but there was no lie his father would believe. “I have myself under control. What happened in the infirmary … I haven’t been like that in years.”

Ghassan looked