Princess Hawa – Legendary princess who sang the sun into the sky.
The Hero Attallah – Lover of Princess Hawa.
Chapter 1
I woke from a sleep filled with nightmares to the sound of my name.
I was already reaching for a gun when I recognised Sara’s face above me, swimming in and out of focus as my eyes blurred with exhaustion.
My grip on the trigger eased. It wasn’t an enemy, just Sara, the guardian of the Hidden House. She was holding a small lamp that lit up only her face. For a moment she looked like a disembodied head floating in the dark, like the ones in the dream that was fading now as I woke.
Imin wearing Ahmed’s face going willingly to the executioner’s stage.
My cousin Shira screaming her defiance as she was forced to her knees in front of the block.
Ayet, with eyes full of madness, awaiting the death that would come from having her soul drained out of her.
Ranaa, the Demdji child, who had carried the sun in her hands and died by a stray bullet in a battle she shouldn’t have been fighting.
Bahi, who’d burned in front of me at my brother’s hand.
My mother, who’d swung from a rope back in Dustwalk for shooting her husband, the man who’d never been my father anyway.
People I had watched die. People I had let die. The accusation was all over their faces.
But Sara was real. Sara was still alive. And so were others.
When the Sultan ambushed the Rebellion’s camp in the city, many were captured. But there was only one execution.
Imin. Our Demdji shape-shifter.
Imin had died wearing Ahmed’s face to deceive the Sultan and all of Izman into thinking the Rebel Prince was dead, while Delila cast an illusion to hide her real brother, who had been jailed with the rest of them.
And so Ahmed was still alive. So was Shazad, our general, even if she didn’t like being called that. We needed her back to lead us in the fight against the Sultan. And Rahim, another of the Sultan’s sons, who had held a grudge against our exalted ruler since he caused his mother’s death. He was our key to getting a whole army in the mountains that had never been loyal to the Sultan, but to him instead.
And now it was up to me to rescue them. Along with a handful of others who’d escaped capture that night. We had our reluctant prince, Jin, our professionally difficult golden-skinned Demdji, Hala, our shape-shifting twins, Izz and Maz, and our semi-reliable foreign thief, Sam. Not exactly an army, but it was what we had left.
I’d fallen asleep in a chair in some corner of the Hidden House, our last refuge in Izman, where what was left of the Rebellion had retreated. A faint glow coming in through the window danced across Sara’s face, enough for me to see the worry etched there. Her hair was tousled from a restless night, and a dark red robe hung loosely over her nightclothes, like she’d tied it in a hurry.
It must have been dawn. But my body still felt heavy with exhaustion, like I’d slept only a few hours. I reckoned I could sleep a year and I still wouldn’t shed this tiredness from my bones. It was the exhaustion of pain and of grief. My side still throbbed from the effort of using my powers a few hours ago, and for a second my vision tilted dangerously to one side, like I might lose my footing.
‘What’s happening?’ My voice came out a croak as I stretched my aching body, still sore from being cut open by my aunt just yesterday. A necessary evil to get out the iron the Sultan had put under my skin to keep me from accessing my Demdji power. ‘Is it morning?’
‘No, it’s late. I got up because the baby was fussing.’ As my eyes slowly adjusted, I noticed the sleeping infant balanced in the crook of her left arm. It was little Fadi, my cousin Shira’s newborn Demdji son. If there was any justice in the world he’d be with his mother now. But Shira had lost her head on the chopping block too. I remembered the accusation in Shira’s gaze in my nightmare. That her son would grow up without a family, all because of me.
‘When I woke up, there was …’ Sara hesitated. ‘I think you’d better see for yourself.’
That didn’t sound good. I pressed my palms against my tired eyes. What else could possibly have gone wrong in the last few hours? Behind my lids I saw Imin’s head falling on to that stage all over again. I dropped my hands. Better to face reality than nightmares. ‘All right,’ I said, slowly getting to my feet. ‘Lead the way.’
Cradling the small, blue-haired Demdji in her arms, Sara led me up the dark, winding staircase to the rooftop that gave the Hidden House its name. The garden that topped the flat building was surrounded on all sides by trellises thick with flowers that concealed the house from prying eyes and kept Sara and all the women under her charge safe.
I knew something was wrong before we fully emerged on to the roof. It was late at night. But there was a dim glow outside, like the red of an angry dawn. That didn’t make any sense this near midnight, not even in summer.
Sara reached the roof ahead of me and then quickly stepped out of the way, giving me an unobstructed view. And I saw what she was talking about.
The city of Izman was domed by fire.
Rippling flames hung over my head and to every side of us, like an immense vault placed over the city. I could just see the stars on the other side, but it was like looking through warped glass; they were blurry and indistinct. To the west I could see the fire arching down towards the walls of the city, and to the north it plunged down towards the sea. A memory came to me from nowhere, of my mother in our kitchen when I was little, slamming a glass over a beetle as it scurried across the kitchen table, capturing it inside. I’d watched curiously as the thing scrambled up the side of the glass, frantic and confused. Trapped. Staring up at the dome of fire over us, I understood that little Dustwalk beetle pretty well right now.