She mentally chided herself for her despondency as she tore off a piece of meat, and stoppered her memories before they could overwhelm her. They were well into the second course when she noticed the circle had quieted. She did not realize why until she heard the high prince telling a story. She looked up and saw him waving his hands. Smiling. Not the condescending smirk he usually wore, but an honest-to-gods smile that made his eyes sparkle.
“… And though the jinn was trapped, it did not falter. Do you know why?”
“Because it had magic!” cried a young boy.
“Yes, but not just any magic. This jinn was stronger than the others, for its army was made up of immortal shadows. The jinn melted in and out of them as easily as if they were rays of sunshine…”
Loulie recognized the story of the shadow jinn. The longer it went on, the more fictitious it became, until it sounded more like a legend than the truth. She found herself oddly charmed by it. Or perhaps it was not the story that captivated her, but the high prince, who seemed a different, more pleasant person when he told it.
“In the end…” He leaned forward, pausing dramatically. “The shadows dispersed. Because even the mightiest of jinn succumb to a hunter’s iron blade.”
In the silence that followed, the prince grew stiff, expression shuttering. But then his audience clapped, and his cocky smile returned. Loulie turned away, disgruntled. Had there always been such a discrepancy in his personality?
She was still mulling over this later, when she was bedding down for the night in a guest tent. Normally, she would have vented her frustrations to Qadir, but the jinn had chosen to give her a wide berth that night. As far as she was aware, he was wandering the campsite, watching her from a distance through the fire he’d lit in their lantern. Loulie stared at the lantern-cast shadows until they faded into the darkness behind her eyelids. Thoughts of Omar chased her into slumber.
Always, she saw him out of the corner of her eye, flickering in and out of sight as if he were a mirage. Every time he reappeared, he wore a different face. First, a condescending grin. Then a harsh scowl. Then, disconcertingly, a starry-eyed smile. He lifted a hand to point at her. And laughed.
She realized she was sinking.
The sand sighed as it devoured her. She clawed at the air, but to no avail. She couldn’t see. Couldn’t breathe. Darkness pressed in on her—
Abruptly, a flame flared into being.
Loulie shot up and out of her blankets. She squinted into the sudden brightness until she could make out Qadir’s shadowed figure, and relaxed when she saw the fire cupped between his palms. “Nightmare?” he said softly.
She groaned as she rubbed at her eyes. “I was drowning in the Sandsea.”
Qadir’s fire shimmered a gentle white. When she squinted, she saw the tattoos on his arms flash the same color. “I could keep this fire alive, if it would help you sleep.”
“And attract unwanted attention? No.” Her limbs cracked as she stretched. She found she was no longer in the mood for slumber.
Qadir blew on the flame until it was nothing but embers on his palms. His tattoos dimmed as well, until they were just barely visible in the darkness. Loulie had learned long ago that the tattoos appeared only when he used his fire magic. She traced the patterns with her eyes, wondering at some of the less aesthetically pleasing marks.
“So,” he said. “I see you’re speaking to me again.”
She answered with a noncommittal grunt.
His lips quirked. “How convenient. I was just thinking it would be strange to tell you a story and not have to suffer your questions afterward.”
She drew her blankets around her like a shield. “Story?”
“You were angry at me for hiding the truth, so I thought I would apologize by giving you a history lesson.”
“The subject?”
Qadir raised a brow. “Myself.”
“And what will you talk about?” She kept her eyes on his tattoos.
Qadir saw her looking and set a hand on his bicep. “I’ll tell you about my markings.”
Loulie leaned forward, close enough that she could make out where the patterns connected and diverged. She thought of the way they flared like fire. “Are they made with magic?”
“… Of a kind.”
“How did you get them?”
Qadir considered for a few moments before he said, “Some of them I was gifted. Others I received as punishment. In my culture, every mark has a meaning.”
“What kind of meaning?”
He shifted so that the inside of his arm was visible to her, and ran his fingers down his veins. The tattoos flared back to life beneath his touch. They glowed red and gold, flickering softly as he traced the curved lines toward his fingers.