CHAPTER SIXTEEN

FANI MEANT WELL AND DID not mean to eavesdrop, but the group of men in the other room spoke rather boisterous. She kept quiet like she had all her life to listen to what they were saying.

Staying hidden against the crumbling wall, Fani exhaled slowly to calm her nerves. She was here to collect money for her family, not to gloat.

"This is our only chance though," a raspy voice told the group of men. "We do it now or else it's too late."

Someone cleared their throat. "I agree," the second voice supported. "It's a rare occasion, not even the Caliph celebrates his own birthday."

The spy knitted her brow in dubiety but kept quiet, gathering the information she needed to connect the dots together.

A more quiet and stern tone pierced through. "Fools, fools, fools. After all these years, you wish to do it now?"

The first voice was back to defend his idea. "Now, Razi, because it has been said that a girl has calmed the beast. If there is no killing spree, there is no fear, therefore it gives the people of Yaheisea hope. We are to instill in that in them, not some girl. We kill the queen first, and when the Caliph starts his hunt once again, it is then that we will kill the king and reassure the people that they are in our good care."

"I agree with Cadoc," the second voice said.

If there's three of them, Fani concluded, there must be more.

There was a moment of silence. "Fine," Razi relented. "We strike at Amon's party. But we only kill the queen."

Fani covered her mouth in horror. Her mind went back to the night she turned the queen in to the thieves, not knowing who the woman was. It was only then when she saw the Caliph and his right hand man come to save her did she realise who she dealt with.

Guilt poisoned her system from that day forward, the look of betrayal never leaving her mind. She didn't mean to sell the Malika off, she was desperate for money.

She needed to tell Mazeeda, somehow, she had to warn her. She wouldn't be able to live with herself if Mazeeda died because she did not have the courage to speak up.

Yes, that's what I'll do, she reassured herself.

The hardest part was finding a way into the qasr.

SINBAD HAD ENOUGH TIME TO travel farther into this unknown land before he had to head back to Yaheisea. He was a thousand miles away from the shore, but he was not lost.

When he found a water well, he rushed to it. He looked down and found nothing. Not a single drop of water.

"You won't find anything in that well," a soft voice told him.

He turned around and found a young woman holding a jug of water against her hip. Sinbad stayed cautious.

"You're not from here, are you?" The woman readjusted her grip on the jug.

"What makes you believe that, if I may ask?" He shot a smile at her, hoping to win her over with his charm.

She remained calm and collective. "Everyone here in Evilla knows that this well no longer works. Nor does anyone walk around a sand kept land in silk unless they are to bring death a gift."

Sinbad rubbed his chin, feeling the start of stuble. "Perhaps you should bring me to your village. And offer me some water."

The water girl quirked up an eyebrow. "I am no fool to bring a stranger to my village."

He pointed at her. "Ah, but I am no ordinary man. You see, I come with stories that I don't share so willingly with anyone."

"A storyteller, then? We have many in our village, far greater than you."

He started to stalk towards the girl, each step light. "But I come bearing stories from a place where if you drink the sand, the salt will kill you in an instant. And within this salted sand, I have killed magnificent beast in my voyages."

That was enough to convince the water girl.

THE PLACE FELT STRANGE AND too lively, as if there was a force of energy that needed to be unleashed but had no place to go. The feeling traveled into Sinbad's bone and made it groan unpleasantly.

He trusted this sensation and did not like this village.

It has turned cold and cruel and corrupt from an ambition he could not place at the moment. He knew the feeling, knew what this would lead to, but did not know what it was called at the moment.

Everyone's brown eyes hollowed in on him, but Sinbad kept his head held high as he took a sip of water. The cool sensation traveled down his throat and into his body like a waterfall.

He set the cup down and looked at the girl. "I wish to know your name."

"Shazerade." One name. And it was enough.

The tent ruffled above them from the hot breeze. "Sinbad is what you can call me." A pause, and then he drunk the rest of his water. He stared at the other tents that surrounded them, watched as children and adults alike walked back and forth. "You told me how there are storytellers in this village, what do you weave in them?"

Shazerade stared ahead and eyed the strong mountain man, Alik. "We weave what you want to hear, what you desire. All you have to do is listen."

He didn't miss a beat on where her eyes landed. "And you yourself is one?"

She smiled for the first time. "No, but I had a friend who was. She was a magnificent storyteller, so good in fact that they could be mistaken as real."

From the corner of his eyes, he saw a man no older than he was watching them warily. Or rather, Shazerade, at the edge of the village. "Who is this woman you speak of?"

The water girl finally tore her gaze away from the mountain man. "She was Mazeeda. She's dead now." Bitterness filled her face.

And then Sinbad realised that everyone here was filled with that. The feeling he felt when he arrived in this village was bitterness filled with hatred and sorrow. A combination strong enough to cause trouble; to cause war.

"More water or do you wish for something stronger?" she offered the voyager.

He hesitated. "Water, please." As he watched her pour the water back into his cup, he asked, "That man over there, who is he? He stares our way."

Shazerade looked over his shoulder and frowned. "Oh, that is Mazeeda's brother, Sokath." Her tone was filled with irritation and...guilt.

She simply did not want to think about him or how badly they ended things. They had too much history together, so much indeed that the sand would not be able to hide it. Never had she imagined that things would end this way, one with a broken heart and one with a new love.

But it was Alik she wanted now, not Sokath.

Sinbad stood up. "I think I shall talk to him."

She girl just shook her head. "Of course."

Sokath calmed his nerves into the steady beating of a bird's wing as the strange voyager approached him.

"You are Sokath, I've heard."

The storyteller's brother simply nodded, looking out in the distance. "And you are Sinbad, the great voyager. Tell me, why are you here?"

His answer was smooth like a steady sea. "Some people are warriors, some people are storytellers, and some are wanderers. Like myself. I have never heard of Evilla."

The man shrugged, his shoulder length hair riffled with the humid breeze. "No one knows this place. We live on the edge of Yaheisea, and yet the Caliph comes to our village to bring grief to yet another family. My family."

And then the calling --the beating of war drums-- pounded in his head, his body, his soul. "This Mazeeda, she was taken by the Caliph wasn't she?" He silently cursed Khai and Zaabit for what they mindlessly stirred up.

Sinbad watched the man swallow, hard. His brown eyes were glazed over with tiredness and heartbreak --not from Mazeeda, but from Shazerade-- and his jaw forever clenched.

Running his hand through his no longer silky hair, Sinbad couldn't grasp on to what was happening. "So all of this...all these Iskawr warriors..."

Sokath looked at this charmless man and did not know if he should despise him or trust him. His face was scratched by the ocean winds, lips chapped from dehydration, the recklessness in his charcoal eyes. He smelled like power. Spoke with authority. But had the personality of a fool.

"It means war to a new beginning," the grieving brother said. "And the Caliph within the kingdom will go down with it."

By his smallgods, Sinbad needed to warn Khai. "I think I need a drink. A strong one." He needed to get back to the qasr.

MAZEEDA RUSHED INTO THE BATHROOM and opened the lid to the toilet. Within seconds, she was throwing up.

Once she was dry heaving, she laid her head onto the side. The painful and withering sensation in the queen's stomach was something she never felt before in quite some time. And her ears burned as strong as the brightest flame.

Khai would be coming any second now, but she damned him. She was in no mood of telling her story let alone explain herself to him.

Settling her heating body on the tiled floor, she rested her heavy eyes. The last time Malika ever felt like this was when something horrible was bound to happen.

She didn't like the feeling at all.

When she finally awaken, Mazeeda found herself in the bed with new clothes and the warmth of the sun hitting her face.

|AUTHOR'S NOTE|

ok, so if anyone's confused i'll elaborate and explain what has happened in condensed form. fani realises that their is a conspiracy group against the royal family. for sinbad, he finds out that the village evilla is throwing a rebellion against the kingdom of yaheisea. keep in mind these have very different intentions but theyre happening at the same time.

oh and, shazerade and sokath are not a thing anymore. remember how sokath wanted to marry her? well she changed her mind and is falling for alik (who was engaged to elce before being a suitor for mazeeda) so they kinda have an age gap of about seven years, shazerade being nineteen and alik around twenty-six.

hmm, makes me want to write a short companion book explaining all of this through sharik's pov. the same with amon and elce. and possibly one for khai in first pov. just a random thought.

anyways, happy reading.