Later, in the darkness of her room, in the silence after Kalu had departed and all had retired, Izzi woke. She lifted her face from her tear-soaked pillow, listening.

Pay attention, a voice said in her mind.

She sat up instantly. No questing presence should have been able to get through the wards of the khan, and definitely not into her mother’s apartments which she had laced this night with more than the usual spidery web of tells, all now taught and silent. So what was this?

She sat crossed-legged on her bed and attuned herself to the magesty of the khan. The apricot trees hung in the still air, still exhausted from a day in the sun, and the nightjars in their branches rested and preened. The foundations of the khan groaned inaudibly, bearing the weight as ever, and in the stable the sleeping camels grunted and sighed, grinding their teeth in dreams of endless sand. A horse whinnied softly and another snored. The night guards whispered the watchword as they passed on their rounds. 

The voice was only in her head.

Satisfied, she lay back down, turned her pillow to the dry side, and counted sigils to keep away all thoughts until she could sleep again. But it did not work, the lines of sigils blurred and she could not keep them in their proper sequences, their pure progression as trained in the Magekadeh. 

Tomorrow she would have to face Kalu again. She didn’t want to do that from such a position of weakness. How had he seen through her spell so easily? Normally the magian spells followed a strict regimen of ritual and execution, built upon ancient scriptures. Her spell had a totally foreign base, a chaotic magic like nothing the mages were taught, but Kalu had undone it seemingly without effort.

She dared not underestimate him again.

Izzi clenched her fingers into the sheets. The sting of humiliation still burned, but beneath it, something else stirred—something sharper. He thought he had put her in her place. He had silenced her, stripped her of control. But he had also revealed something. He had shown that though her magic was still unformed, unpredictable, he had still been able to stifle and counter it. But the important realisation was that he had felt the need to, and that meant he feared her, a mere student. He feared her magic and what it could become.

Yet Izzi was not frightened of her mother’s magic, so meticulously shared from beyond the grave.

She exhaled slowly, pressing her hand against her chest, feeling its slow fall. She would not cower. She would learn. If her magic could be undone so easily, then she would find the gaps, cover them with complexities and counters. Next time, when she faced Kalu, she would be ready.

She turned onto her side, no longer counting sigils but letting her thoughts drift like wind teasing the ridges of dunes. She was not defeated. Not yet.

✨

The next morning started sour with odours of too much humanity. Now that the war’s approach kept the gates closed, the downwind dumping ground was inaccessible and waste piled. Yasmin laid out a bowl of porridge topped with camel-milk cream and chopped figs, which did little to ease her stomach. She forced a little down before submitting to Laleh’s help in dressing for the day.

The two servants, longtime favourites of her mother, still cared for Izzi, but she couldn’t shake the feeling they were spying for her father.

As Laleh brushed her hair, the brush caught slightly on one of the red woollen strands Izzi always braided in, just as her mother had done years ago. Izzi closed her eyes, murmured the correct incantations, and breathed the lingering scent of her mother’s favourite rose oil, savouring the memories. 

Yasmin and Laleh started to argue over which earrings would best match the blue dress. 

“Enough!” Izzi snapped. “I’ll choose my own earrings.” The servants stepped back, exchanging a knowing look they did not try to hide.

“Just leave me be,” she said, and waved them out. She gathered the last few things she would need for a day at the Magekadeh. In the brightness of the morning, and despite the smell, facing it did not seem so impossible.