Page 59 of The Wishless Ones
“As did we. For years.”
Jafar’s eyes flashed. “Never from a palace. Never something of value.”
The man would take that trinket and sell it for coin, money he would later trade for food. There was no difference between them and him—except that he got caught.
Which is his fault.
Rohan shook his head free of the thought.Theyhad caught him, which meant they had the power to let him walk free. Who were they to judge someone when they’d done the exact same?
“He loses a hand,” Jafar said. Interrogating a prisoner was one thing, but a thief was different. Closer to home. Why was Jafar being so ruthless? So heartless?
“No,” Rohan rasped. “We can let him go. No one will know about this but us.”
“P-please,” the man whimpered.
Rohan couldn’t stop his lip from curling. He hated begging. “Or we take him to the Sultana and allow her to decide.”
“Allow the Sultana to decide? Ask her like she’s your mother?” Jafar asked. He left his post towering over the man to circle Rohan. “Just a trinket, just an orange, just a bit of bread—what kind of prince would you be if you let every criminal walk free? Your kingdom would be full of rats.”
Iago shuddered at the image.
Rohan had to hold back a shudder himself, because Jafar was right, but that didn’t mean he was going about it the right way.
“You would kill him instead?” Rohan asked, refusing to let Jafar goad him.
Jafar studied the man, still whimpering and on his knees. He didn’t even try to rise. He had accepted whatever fate was being cast upon him, andthatdisappointed Rohan more than anything else. The longer Rohan remained in the man’s presence, the more he felt it was folly to compare him to them. They had been better thieves than this failure.
“I’d make an example of him,” Jafar replied simply. “That could mean killing him or taking a hand, or even doing something far less permanent.”
A crackle broke the silence, along with a heavy rustling and more crackling—like bones being reshaped with a series of sickening crunches.
It was coming from where the man was kneeling.
The two of them whirled to face the thief, and Rohan’s jaw dropped as he watched the man transform, rising up and up and—
“Sultana,” Rohan whispered.
“Alchemy,” Jafar murmured.
The Sultana stood in the place of the kneeling, whimpering servant, gown and jewels intact, without a single hair out of place.
“Indeed,” she said, an aura of electric blue still sizzling around her figure.
“We didn’t know,” Rohan said.
“As was the intention,” the Sultana said, looking between the two of them. “One of you wanted to kill me, one of you wanted to send me away. You both still have much to learn, but time is not on our side.
“The crown must be donned today, and one of you will wear it.”
Time had spun too quickly for Rohan in Maghriz. His next breath always felt leagues out of reach. Lifetimes seemed to pass in the span of hours; and now either he or his brother would become a prince after they’d nearly killed the queen. He hadn’t wanted to believe it when Jafar had told him one of them was to replace the missing prince, but the Sultana had cleared the air without a care for how he’d take the news.
The embers of their old life in the village of Ghurub had not even turned to ash.
Harun was already in the throne room when Rohan and Jafar arrived with the Sultana. The emptiness was almost tangible. The vizier watched them with displeasure, and now Rohan would forever associate sapphire blue with disdain.
“He doesn’t look happy,” Jafar whispered, surprising Rohan with the commentary. As loath as Rohan was to admit it, he had missed Jafar’s usual banter. He couldn’t tell him that now. He couldn’t even speak to him now, not without looking like he was pandering or begging or lonely.
“Never does,” Iago whispered back, and only then did Rohan realize that Jafar hadn’t been speaking to him.
