Page 6 of The Wishless Ones
Jafar rubbed one of them between his fingers. It was rich, far smoother than even the premium papyrus Baba used to make his missives appear more important. He leaned closer to the light, trying to make out what was written on the scraps.
“What is this?” Jafar asked. He made out words:pleased,welcome, and his name in bold script where a nib had gone over the letters twice.
And then his blood went cold.
It was his scholarship.
He didn’t see the inky black of the room anymore—he saw red. He felt it, too, like a brand over his heart, burning and searing and angry.
It had arrived. His scholarship had finally arrived. He had been accepted into the House of Wisdom, one of the most prestigious institutes in their world, and he couldn’t even celebrate. He couldn’t—he didn’t know what to think.Thiswas the outcome? This was his reward?
“Your silence is scaring me,” said the stranger, the statement punctuated by a weird squawk-like sound that was likely a chortle at Jafar’s expense.
What if this wasn’t real? What if whoever was on the other side of this door was playing him for a fool or trying to provoke him into doing something to Baba? Jafar didn’t even know what he would do. He’d never been this angry. He’d never felt so helpless, so unattuned with his own emotions.
“Is this some sort of joke?” Jafar finally asked, surprised by the hoarseness that grated from his throat.
He didn’t like that this stranger had a hold over him. He was trapped in here, unable to see the face of the one who had delivered such horrible news, unable to read his body language or his expressions.
“I found it on your father’s mess of a desk,” came the reply.
How did this stranger evengetto Baba’s desk? Baba was a merchant on the rise. His circle might not be the smartest, but he kept them close. They were loyal—to a fault. They wouldn’t defy Baba even when it was clear from the glimmer in their eyes that they agreed with Jafar.
Which crossed all their names off the list of Jafar’s possible suspects.
“Baba would never do this to me.”
If only Rohan were here. He was the one person on Jafar’s side, the one person who could help him right now.
“The proof is in your hands, Jafar.” The snooty response was followed by a sigh. “If it makes you feel any better, your babawastorn until your brother swayed him over to a solid no.”
“Rohan?”
“Unless you have another brother I don’t know about.”
Jafar ground his teeth against the reply he wanted to lash right back with. Baba’s ripping the scholarship to shreds was more believable than Rohan’s having a hand in it. Jafar folded the scraps back into the makeshift folder, growing more and more suspicious by the second.
“I think you should leave,” Jafar managed to say. He was reeling, spiraling. Hewantedthe stranger to be lying; he wanted the scraps in his hands to be a cruel joke.
He heard another whoosh outside the door—a sweep of the stranger’s robes as he left, but it sounded different through the roaring in Jafar’s ears. So much like the wind cutting beneath a bird’s feathers that Jafar was reminded of Baba’s parrot. Oh, the secrets that bird would be able to tell if he could truly speak. If anyone knew what had happened to the scholarship, it would be him, perched where he was by Baba’s desk.
“So what are you thinking?”
Jafar startled at the voice. He hadn’t heard the stranger’s returning footsteps on the other side of the door, and Jafar knew the tiny hall outside this room like the back of his hand.
“I can see Baba doing this, but not Rohan,” Jafar replied.
Jafar imagined the stranger shrugging. “The truth still remains.”
“And I’m supposedly meant to believe you care for me? At least Rohan is trying to get me out,” Jafar said. “Rubbing my misfortune in my face while I’m unable to do a thing about it doesn’t precisely make you a friend.”
It made him a bully, and Jafar knew from experience that bullies, in general, were simply—
A click halted his thoughts. It sounded like the lock.
The door swung open.
Jafar looked into the hall, but his savior was nowhere to be seen. The hall was empty, only a little less dark than the broom closet he’d been locked inside.
