The probe appeared, emitted a white light, and scanned the space where I’d only just stood. It hovered in place for a minute, then turned around and floated away.

I should have felt relief, watching it drift out of sight and out of range, but a new fear took its place. Why was Idris here, and prepared with a diversion beacon? Had he followed me? What had he seen?

The whirring, beeping sound of the probe faded away completely, and Idris led me back into the main passageway. Neither of us spoke as we made our way back to the hidden entrance in the royal suite. And we remained silent as I led us back to the double’s suite I occupied. We made our way to the sitting room. He dropped the beacon on the table, and I closed the doors, then waved a hand. Lanterns ignited around the room, giving his face a garish cast.

“Did you follow me?” I asked softly.

“Yes,” he said, and then, “How long?” When I said nothing, he rose to his feet. “You will not answer?”

I lifted my chin. “I do not have to answer.”

He swore, angrier than I’d ever heard him, and raked his hands through his hair.

“Do you not understand the cost of what it is you do? Do you not understand what they will do to you if they find out what you are?”

“I know the price of treason,” I replied.

“And yet you say it so calmly. I don’t think you do.”

“Do you suggest that I am stupid?”

“Amani.” He said my name on an exhalation of breath, as if all life were being torn from him. “Do not play.”

“Long enough,” I said at last, conceding defeat.

“You must stop.”

“Stop?”

“Stop before you lose your life.”

“No. I will not.” I remembered and dreamed of the tesleet that had come to me just after the assassination attempt. It carried me through the mornings when I thought I couldn’t face another day being someone else. It promised that one day I would be myself again, that when I went out people would know my name.

“No?”

I pulled away from the door and met him in the center of the room. “Would you condemn me to this life?”

“Condemn you?”

“I am a slave, Idris,” I said. “I wear jewels and velvet, and I am fed and pampered, but I am a slave. I have no future in this world. Is this what you want for me for the rest of my life?”

“No—”

“And your people? The subjects who entrust their health and prosperity to you? What of them? Will you condemn them to this shadow?”

“It is not a shadow,” he cried out. “Shadows are benign. It is a cancer, and it has won. It is here to stay.”