The merchant scoffed. “Yet another question I intend to ask him when we return to Madinne.” She stared hard between the two of them. “I hope you didn’t plan on using me to find the lamp only to throw me into the Sandsea. Because I refuse to die by your hands.”
Mazen balked. “Of course not!”
But the moment he said the words, he realized he had no way of knowing. Clearly, his father had not cared for her safety. He’d hired her for her tracking skills. Her compass.
The merchant looked unconvinced, but she did not linger on the subject. Instead, she turned the conversation back to Imad. “When I cut Imad in the ruins, there was…” She faltered. “Ink under his skin. Or black blood?” She eyed them suspiciously. “Why?”
Mazen sighed. He had not been able to watch Loulie al-Nazari hack the thief to pieces, but he’d seen the black blood. The bangle’s side effects, revealed. When he told the merchant this, she crossed her arms and said, “I’ve never heard of such a thing.” She paused, glanced at Mazen’s shadow. “But I guess there’s still a lot I don’t understand about jinn magic.”
She asked about his shadow last. It was a gratefully straightforward story. Afterward, the merchant sighed and said, “It was wise of the jinn to make your shadow her relic; it kept her magic out of your brother’s hands.”
Mazen paused. He had not thought of it that way before. But now he remembered that his father and Omar had been looking for something in the diwan. A relic they never found.
Silence hung between them after that, broken only by the crunch of bread and the aggressive clatter of the women’s chai cups every time they set them down on plates. As was his habit, Mazen filled the silence the only way he knew how: with conversation.
“I’d like to start again, on a new scroll.” He put a hand to his chest and flashed what he hoped was a sincere smile. It had been so long since he’d worn his own smile that he half worried it had become permanently crooked, like Omar’s. “I’d like to reintroduce myself. My name is Mazen, and I am—”
“A liar.” Loulie scowled.
Aisha glanced at his shadow. “The Prince of Darkness?”
Mazen paled. “What? Why?”
“You have a magic shadow and often lurk in dark corridors.”
“But Prince of Darkness makes me sound like a villain!”
Aisha smirked, and the merchant—it was only for a few seconds, but she smiled. Not a smirk, not a sneer, but a genuine twitch of her lips.
“I thought you were going by Yousef?” Aisha said.
Mazen’s smile turned sheepish. “I am. I think it’s a good idea in the cities, at least.”
The merchant’s expression softened enough that the dent between her brows relaxed and faded. It seemed ages since he’d introduced himself to her as Yousef.
“Well then, Yousef. Merchant.” Aisha set down her empty cup and stood. “I’m going to see if I can ‘acquire’ some more equipment. The least you can do is gather enough coin to purchase horses.”
It was a task much easier in theory than in practice. Mazen had never done a day of honest work in his life, and Loulie was accustomed to selling merchandise, not skills. It was unsurprising that they didn’t find jobs that suited either of them.
Mazen’s mood only dampened when, while searching for employment, they stumbled upon information from Madinne. Loulie was visibly relieved when they learned Ahmed bin Walid had been declared innocent of his crimes and was staying in the palace as a guest. Mazen could not help but be anxious. Ahmed had noticed him wearing the relic in Dhyme; would he be able to pick apart Omar’s disguise when he saw that same bangle?
He was still brooding over the possibility when day faded to night. They were wandering through the heart of the souk when his rumination gave way to inspiration; he spotted a storyteller—marked as such by his ornate cane, which depicted carvings of various mythical beasts—sitting under the shade of a cloth canopy and telling stories to a fascinated crowd.
Mazen stopped to watch him, to admire the flutter of his hands through the air and the fluidity of his shifting expression. When the story was over, the old storyteller bowed, and his audience leaned forward to drop coins into a tin can.
Loulie nudged him. “Prince?”
He smiled. “I have an idea.”
It was a small, humble idea that, less than an hour later, became a small and humble reality. Mazen charmed a stall owner into letting him borrow a dusty rug while the merchant “borrowed” one of the lanterns hanging from the date trees around the souk.