Page 127 of The Jasad Crown

“So I did.” Lips painted berry red parted in a smile. “You have an excellent memory. I do, too.”

Vaida’s grip on the shawl tightened, drawing Sefa another step closer. “I kept waiting for you to betray me. To lie or cheat or even complain about the other servants. But you couldn’t make it easy for me, could you?”

Sefa’s confusion ripened into pure bewilderment. “Make what easy, Sultana?”

A light perfume overwhelmed Sefa as Vaida yanked the shawl again, bringing Sefa close as she bent to murmur in her ear. “Irecognized you from the very first minute you walked into this room, Sefa. Or do you prefer Sayali?”

Sefa’s blood ran cold. She tried to recoil, but Vaida had the ends of the shawl in a choke hold, trapping Sefa against her.

“The other rulers wouldn’t have known you. Felix and Sorn can barely recognize the shape of the nose at the end of their face. Your glamor at the Victor’s Ball was excellent. It hid your true form well.” Vaida’s breath ghosted over the top of Sefa’s hair, and Sefa trembled as the Sultana rested her forehead against hers. “Don’t blame yourself. If Arin had thought there was a chance you would cross my path in that glamor, he might have warned you I can see through them as well as he can. I am the descendant of Baira. Did you think there was any illusion powerful enough to fool me?”

Vaida had known. She had known who Sefa was the entire time.

Just as terror threatened to stop her heart, a startling wave of peace crested over Sefa. Why was she surprised? She should have known better than to make herself a pawn on this twisted royal board. Their schemes weren’t her, and they never would be.

“You didn’t kill me, but you were never planning to let me go,” Sefa realized. Vaida had taken her along to the meeting in the alley because she’d known Sefa was never leaving the Ivory Palace alive. Her secret would be safe, and her own vanity would be fed. “You struck a false bargain to keep me around as a contingency in case you didn’t find the Mirayah.”

Vaida laughed. “I had so hoped you would understand. Ah, the Mirayah. I have been searching for years, Sefa. Expanding my borders into Essam mile by mile, recruiting and executing so many incompetent Jasadi men who made me false promises about finding it. And then Bausit found Kera, and Kera found me the Mirayah. He picked up a trail near Mahair, of all places. He chased the Mirayah to its next location.”

Had someone in Mahair gotten swept into the Mirayah?

A slim shoulder rose beneath Vaida’s lacy gown. “If Kera had failed, I would have needed a way to prove Nizahl broke the Zinish Accords. The daughter of Nizahl’s late High Counselor infiltrating my palace and posing as my attendant? Spying on me on the Commander’s orders? It might have been enough.”

“Stepdaughter.”

“Pardon?”

“I was not his daughter,” Sefa said thinly. Vaida gave her a look like Sefa had done a somersault in the middle of a funeral.

“The distinction wouldn’t have mattered. Posing under a false identity to enter my service while you had ties to the Supreme? It would have galvanized most of my nobles to whip open those gaudy purses of theirs,” Vaida said. “The other kingdoms would have had no choice but to throw their support behind me.”

Another question resolved itself in the mist of Sefa’s dawning comprehension. The visits to the nobles, the trips around Lukub—Vaida had been parading her around to ensure everyone saw how closely embedded Sefa was to the Sultana. When the time came to screamspy, there would be countless noble witnesses.

“Arin of Nizahl is a frustrating man,” Vaida said, giving Sefa her back as she strode to the window. “When we were seven, I tore apart his chambers as a jest—flung around his clothes, spilled ink on his maps, set fire to his drawings. Nothing serious. You must understand, he wasimpossibleto crack. He wouldn’t anger if Sorn insulted him, wouldn’t react when Felix followed him around like a stray cat. I wanted to know what it would take to finally crack the ice around that baffling, beautiful boy, but alas. He walked in, took one look at what I had done, and said, ‘I have more maps in the antechamber if you run out of things to burn,’ before he left. Awaleen below, I wanted toscream.”

Vaida leaned against the window, observing the frenzy of activity beyond the obelisk. “Then one day, a Jasadi girl destroys a wing ofthe Citadel. And when I taunt him about her, Arin of Nizahl nearly kills me. He would have done it, too—I saw it in his eyes. He would have dropped my body at his feet and stepped over it without a second thought.”

She traced a shape in the thin layer of frost coating the window. The candles cast twisting shapes over her body. “It was euphoria. After all these years, I was proven right. The calm, calculated Commander is just as vicious as I am—just as destructive over what belongs to him.”

With all her strength, Sefa lifted the chair and slammed it against the side of Vaida’s head.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

SEFA

The Sultana’s head hit the window with a sickening crack. She collapsed, the long tail of her gown cushioning her fall.

Thank the Awaleen for Vaida’s unbelievable self-absorption.

Sefa dropped to the ground and checked Vaida’s pulse. The Sultana groaned, twitching, and Sefa released a breath of relief. She picked up Vaida’s hand and with the thickest handkerchief she’d been able to sew, she yanked at the ring.

A blaze of agony scorched Sefa’s fingers, just as strong as it had been the first time she tried to pick up this accursed ring. She pulled the second handkerchief from her pocket and stuffed it between her teeth.

The ring wouldn’t come off. Sefa’s fingers spasmed, and she momentarily paused her efforts to muffle her screams in her elbow as invisible fire chewed through her arm.

All she needed to do was fling the ring out of the window and get out of the palace long enough to bury it in the gardens before Vaida roused and alerted the guards. Even if she just managed to hurl the ring out of the window, it might be enough to delay the Sultana until Arin stopped her or figured out the exact nature of her plans for the Mirayah.

Except the tombs-damned ringwouldn’t come off.

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