“Haven’t you wondered why your mother lied to you about your curse? It’s because she’s the one who did this to you.”
“You’re lying,” Soraya said. “You said the pariks did this to me.”
“At your mother’s request. She brought you to the pariks wrapped in a blanket of stars and asked for this curse. Are you curious to know how it’s done? It’s the blood of a div that made you poisonous. If a human bathes in blood from a div’s heart, that human takes on properties of that div. You must have had only a few drops.”
Soraya tried to soak in the words like they were rain and she was parched earth, so little did she know about her own history. And yet, each word was a tiny stab, further confirmation that she shared a link to demons. “My mother would have no reason to want such a thing.”
“Go ask her why,” Parvaneh said at once, an urgent note in her voice.
Soraya shook her head, which was throbbing in pain. “I shouldn’t have come back here. Neither of us can help the other now.” She turned to go.
“Soraya, wait!” Parvaneh called. “This belongs to you.” She reached her arm through the bars, holding out something dark. Soraya stepped closer, but she was too afraid to reach out with bare hands.
Understanding the source of her hesitation, Parvaneh said, “Don’t be afraid. Take it. I’ll be careful enough for both of us.”
Soraya slowly lifted her hand, reaching through the shadows until she felt the soft, familiar fabric of her glove. She took hold of it, remembering that if Parvaneh was the reason she had killed, she was also the reason she had been able to save herself and Azad.
Parvaneh didn’t let go of it. Her mouth was a thin line, tense with unspoken words, her eyes burning with some unknown fire. But then she shook her head and let the glove slip out of her fingers. “There’s much you don’t know, much I can’t tell you,” she said. “But trust me when I say that if I were you, I wouldn’t shed my armor for the sake of a kind word or a gentle touch. That’s my advice to you, from one monster to another.”
She retreated back into the shadows then without any word of farewell, as if certain that Soraya would return again.
12
The next morning—the morning of the wedding—Soraya’s mother arrived along with her breakfast. Tahmineh was already dressed for the wedding in a gown of purple silk, her hair braided with jewels, and next to her, Soraya felt haggard and unkempt. She’d slept for maybe an hour at most, and those brief snatches of sleep had come with terrible dreams. In a way, she was glad she wasn’t attending the ceremony.
Her mother took one worried look at her and carried the tray of food to the low table in the room. “I thought it would be nice to sit together this morning,” she said as she and Soraya settled on cushions across from each other at the table. “I know I haven’t had as much time to spend with you this year because of the wedding, and I’m very sorry for that. But after today, I’ll make up for it.”
Soraya put a date in her mouth so she wouldn’t have to respond. It wasn’t true, of course. Even after the wedding, Tahmineh would want to help Laleh settle into her new role as shahbanu, and in a few months, they would all move on from Golvahar without her.
Perhaps Tahmineh expected Soraya to be sullen today; she continued talking, filling her in on court gossip without expecting Soraya to say much in return. This suited Soraya; all she could think about was Parvaneh’s claim that Tahmineh was responsible for her curse, and she was afraid that if she spoke, the question would come tumbling out.
Soraya was fairly sure that Tahmineh had lied about the details of the curse, but she had never imagined that Tahmineh had wanted her daughter cursed. There was no logical reason for it. Soraya was a constant threat to their dynasty. She would be much more valuable to her family if she could appear at court or marry well or simply not be a terrible secret they needed to hide. Parvaneh’s accusation didn’t make sense.
Go ask her why, Parvaneh had commanded, as if doing so would be as simple as posing the question. But Soraya knew that a question like that would be the same as an accusation, and to accuse her mother—to accuse the shah’s mother—of associating with divs and meddling in forbidden magic was disrespectful at best and borderline treasonous at worst.
And what if Parvaneh is wrong? Soraya thought. What if she ruined her relationship with her mother for nothing? Already, she felt a gulf far wider than the table between her and Tahmineh—a gulf large enough to fit the dungeon and the dakhmeh, the yatu’s body lying at the bottom of it. What if there was a loneliness even deeper than the one she felt now?
When Tahmineh finally stood to leave, Soraya couldn’t help feeling relieved. “I need to check in on the bride and make sure she’ll be ready,” Tahmineh said. She tried to sound as if it were an obligation, but Soraya heard the pride and excitement in her mother’s voice. This was the kind of relationship she wanted to have with a daughter—why, then, would she have condemned her own to the shadows?
At the doorway, Tahmineh turned back to Soraya and said in a lowered voice, “I know how disappointed you were about the div, but I know it wouldn’t have helped you. You can’t trust anything they say.”
“I know, Maman,” Soraya said.
Tahmineh smiled. “I’m glad you understand. And even if you don’t, trust me now and you’ll understand one day.”
Soraya nodded, but once her mother was gone and the door was shut, she felt a scream building inside her chest. How can I trust you, she’d wanted to say, when I don’t know what the truth is anymore? And yet, her mother was right—Parvaneh had destroyed her with a single word, a single suggestion. Soraya would never fully believe Parvaneh, but she would never be able to stop wondering, either.
Before she even realized what she was doing, Soraya went to the hidden door by her bed and stepped into the passageways. She had to do something to either confirm this suspicion or forever dismiss it. Since she couldn’t bring herself to ask her mother directly, she would have to go digging through her rooms for evidence instead. Her mother would be with Laleh now, and then they would all go out to the garden for the ceremony—her rooms would be empty, and so Soraya could sneak in and out unnoticed.
Only when she arrived at her mother’s antechamber did she hesitate. The room was empty, but her mother’s jasmine scent was in the air, and as always, Soraya felt like an intruder.
But she had come there with no other intention but to disturb this room’s peace, and so she began her search, beginning with the antechamber. She gingerly turned over cushions and peered inside empty vases, still feeling as if she were contaminating everything in the room.
There weren’t many places to hide anything here, so she moved on to the bedchamber. As her search went on, she grew less careful, less reverent. She looked under beds and chairs and even rugs, inside drawers and jewelry boxes and the wardrobe, pushing aside her mother’s gowns with a roughness that felt strangely satisfying. She looked everywhere, without even knowing what she was looking for.
She was searching for some sign that her mother knew what had happened to her, but apart from a written confession, she couldn’t imagine what that sign would be. And perhaps that was the reason she had chosen to snoop through her mother’s things: not to prove Parvaneh right, but to prove her wrong.