The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy #2) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,87

to the ground, half the men had reached for their weapons.

“Hah! It worked!” A grinning Agnivanshi man with a singed mustache joined them. “Peace be upon you, my king and princes! How do you like my creation?”

Nahri watched hands slowly move away from dagger hilts. And then she clapped in delight when she realized what the man meant. The simurgh wasn’t a simurgh, not really. It was a composite, constructed from what appeared to be a dizzying array of sweets in every color of creation.

The chef looked inordinately proud of himself. “A little different, I know … but what is the purpose of Navasatem if not to celebrate the sweetness of relief from Suleiman’s servitude?”

Even the king looked dazzled. “I’ll grant you points for creativity,” Ghassan offered. He glanced at Ali. “What say you?”

Ali had risen to his feet to better examine the simurgh. “A stunning enchantment,” he confessed. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“You’ve never tasted anything like this either,” the chef said smoothly. He tapped the simurgh’s glass eye and it fell neatly into his hands, a waiting platter. He made a swift selection and then bowed as it was passed toward the prince.

Ali smiled, biting into crumbly pastry covered in silver foil. Appreciation lit his face. “That is delicious,” he admitted.

The Agnivanshi chef shot a triumphant look at his competitors as Ali took a sip from his goblet and then tried another sweet. But this time, he frowned, reaching for his throat. He hooked his fingers around the collar of his dishdasha, tugging at the stiff fabric.

“You’ll excuse me,” he said. “I think I just …” He reached for his cup and then stumbled, knocking it over.

Ghassan straightened up, a look Nahri had never seen in his eyes. “Alizayd?”

Coughing, Ali didn’t answer. His other hand went to his throat, and as the confusion in his expression turned to panic, his eyes met Nahri’s again through the tent panel.

There was no anger there, no accusation. Just pained regret that sent a wave of cold dread through her before Ali even fell to his knees.

He gasped, and with the sound, Nahri was back on the boat, back in that horrible night five years ago. Dara had gasped like that, a hushed sound of true fear—an emotion she hadn’t thought her Afshin could feel—as he fell to his knees. His beautiful eyes had met hers and then he’d gasped, his body crumbling into dust as she screamed.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Hatset fly to her feet. “Alizayd!”

And then it was chaos.

Ali collapsed, choking and clawing at his throat. Hatset burst through the tent, propriety abandoned as she raced to her son’s side. Zaynab screamed, but before she could lunge forward, a pair of female guards descended, nearly knocking Nahri aside in their effort to pull the princess to safety. The Royal Guard was doing the same on the men’s side, soldiers hustling a stunned Muntadhir back. The Qaid drew his zulfiqar and then actually grabbed Ghassan, locking him in a tight, protective grip.

No one stopped Hatset. Well, one of the guards tried, and she smashed the heavy goblet she was holding into his face, then dropped at Ali’s side, shouting his name.

Nahri didn’t move. She could see Dara’s tear-streaked face before hers. “Come with me. We’ll leave, travel the world.”

His ashes on her hands. His ashes on the wet robe of his killer.

Everything seemed to go very still; the screams of the crowd faded, the thud of running feet fell away. A man was dying before her. It was a scene she knew well from the infirmary, one of desperate family members and scrambling aides. Nahri had learned not to hesitate, learned to shut her emotions off. She was a healer, a Nahid. The doctor she always wanted to be.

And in her dreams—her foolish dreams of being an apprentice to the great physicians in Istanbul, of taking her place in one of Cairo’s famed hospitals—in those dreams, she was not the kind of doctor to sit and watch a man die.

She jumped to her feet.

She was halfway to Ali, close enough to see the shimmering silver vapors escaping the gashes he’d clawed in his skin, when Suleiman’s seal crashed down upon her.

Nahri swooned, fighting for air herself, weak and bewildered by the sudden clash of incomprehensible languages. She spotted the seal glowing on Ghassan’s face and then Hatset whirled on her, brandishing the goblet. Nahri froze.

Ali started screaming.

Blood blossomed from his mouth, from his throat and neck,