‘Hand it over, Amani.’ The Sultan gave me a distracted order as he continued his conversation with Rahim. I tried to catch his eye over his father’s shoulder, but Rahim might as well never have known me for all the attention he was giving me.
‘It’s all right.’ The first servant, too, sounded familiar somehow, although I was sure I’d never seen her in the harem before. ‘We’ll take good care of him.’
In that moment, as the Sultan turned his back entirely on us, the first servant dared to lift her head fully and I was face-to-face with Hala.
She was hiding her golden skin from sight with an illusion but it was still umistakably her. It was unsettling; she was both wholly familiar and completely strange. Her high, arrogant cheekbones and long nose were unmistakable, but she looked younger and more vulnerable without her golden veneer.
And the other servant. I looked closer now. Her eyes were wrong. They weren’t the desert dark they ought to have been. Instead they were the colour of liquid gold.
Imin.
My heart sped up. Something was in motion. But I wasn’t sure what.
Imin winked at me. It was so quick that even if the Sultan had noticed, it would’ve been mistaken for a blink. I loosened my grip on the baby in my arms as I passed him over to Hala. I’d been given an order, yes, but there weren’t many people in the world I’d trust with Fadi more than Hala. She might not scream maternal instinct, but Demdji took care of their own.
I didn’t have time to watch them disappear into the harem before Imin grabbed my arm. ‘Walk quickly. And don’t look back.’
‘What’s happening?’ I asked under my breath as we moved fast down the hallway. Too quickly, I realised. If the Sultan took his eyes off Rahim for even a second, he’d realise I was all but running.
‘Something that passes for a plan at short notice, that’s what. Take a right here.’ We turned the corner and then we were out of the Sultan’s view. Rahim wasn’t betraying us, I realised; he was a distraction. I felt suddenly ashamed for believing he’d turn on us so easily. By the time he was done talking to his father, the Sultan would think I was back in the harem. If he wondered at all.
‘Fadi, the baby,’ I started. ‘The Sultan will look for him, you need to—’ Imin’s eyes rolled to the sky, cutting me off.
‘Believe it or not, we can make a stab at executing a plan without you.’ Imin slowed down as we left the cool of the marble palace walls and passed into one of the huge, sprawling gardens. It was only early morning, so the unrelenting heat of the day hadn’t set in yet, but I still squinted against the sun after the dark of the vaults.
We stopped, ducking behind a tree, out of sight of anyone who might walk by. Imin yanked the servant’s clothes off in one quick gesture. Underneath was a palace guard’s uniform that had been made for someone a whole lot taller and broader. Imin started unrolling the sleeves and loosening the belt buckle, making room for a new body. ‘We can’t just walk a baby out of the harem. Someone would notice he was gone. Unless the Sultan thinks he’s dead, that is. If, say, half of the harem were to see Kadir drown the baby in a fit of rage, for instance.’
Hala could do that. That’s why they’d risk bringing her into the palace. All she’d have to do was take Fadi back to the harem and then play the scene out in the heads of whoever happened to be nearby. She could even put it into Kadir’s head if she wanted to. She could make him believe he’d really killed him. And even if she didn’t get to Kadir, who would the Sultan believe, a dozen wives and daughters in the harem who saw it happen, or a son with a violent temper? Especially when the child was nowhere to be found. ‘Then my dear sister can just walk him out the palace door to safety under the cover of an illusion.’ Imin shook out the long sleeves so they fell over the dainty hands of her female form. ‘It’s almost easy.’
Imin was right. This could work. We could save Fadi. ‘And his mother?’ I asked, anticipation building in my chest. ‘My cousin Shira – how do we get her out?’
‘We’re not going to—’ Imin started, then quickly stopped herself before she could truth-tell the future. But I knew what she had been about to say. We’re not going to save Shira. It didn’t matter whether she said it or not; it seemed like it was already decided.
‘Why?’ I asked. ‘If we can get Fadi out, why not Shira? Sam has clearly just walked you and Hala through the walls, he could—’
‘The prison is iron bars all the way through; there’s no way for Sam to walk in there and walk her back out.’ Imin didn’t meet my eyes. ‘But I can walk you in there to see her before she’s executed.’ So that was what the guard’s uniform was for. ‘She’s asking for you.’
‘That’s not a good reason not to save her.’ Imin was holding the truth back. I just didn’t know why. ‘If Hala wanted to, she could get a soldier to unlock Shira’s cell and walk her out under the Sultan’s nose. Which means there’s some other reason saving Shira’s not part of the plan.’ It wasn’t a question. ‘Why?’
Imin straightened. She was drowning in the guard’s uniform. She looked liked a child playing dress-up in grown-up’s garb. But her face was wise beyond her eighteen years. ‘Because we haven’t given up on saving you yet.’ Understanding hit me all at once. Because if Shira disappeared, I might as well turn myself in. An infant could disappear believably, but Shira’s death couldn’t be faked near so easy. If she was gone, she’d be counted as escaped. And sooner or later the Sultan’s eyes would turn to me, the girl who had already tried to help her once. And he would ask questions and I would sell out the whole Rebellion with a word.