Aghraas held out a second hand silently and Maram, in turn, placed her second hand in it wordlessly. When at last she released her hands Maram didn’t know what to do with them. She laid them over her knees and stared at the rock surface between them.

“They would be better hidden on your feet,” Aghraas said quietly.

Maram didn’t look up. “I cannot see my feet, nor can I routinely take off my slippers to look at them,” she replied. She hated that the admission had come out, however lopsided and misshapen. As if she were still a girl fascinated by what her mother had had, by what her mother had worn. By what her grandmother had worn. She was a woman now, a Vathek Imperial Heir of high standing.

“You can make fun,” she said stiffly, her eyes fixed now on a spot above Aghraas’s head. “I know how it must seem.”

“How must it seem?”

Still Maram would not look at her. Inside, the shame had turned to dread and fear and anger. And nursed in its center was grief.

“A half-breed that is hated and reviled equally by all has built for herself a Kushaila retreat where she can pretend,” she said.

She jumped when Aghraas’s thumb swept over her cheek and turned her head just so. No one touched her—no one ever dared. She hated it, how she craved it—the world blurred momentarily as her eyes filled with tears.

“Do you love your mother?” Aghraas asked.

Maram exhaled a trembling breath but didn’t answer. Aghraas’s hand remained on her cheek. Maram wanted to— She didn’t know what she wanted. The hand wasn’t enough and yet was too much at the same time.

“I love mine … even when she is angry with me.”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Why is she angry with you?”

Aghraas smiled sadly and withdrew her hand. Maram remained perfectly still as it found hers in her lap.

“She wishes me to come home—I was only here to deliver a message. I became … distracted.”

She clung to this conversation—anything to take the focus off her. “Isn’t … isn’t this your home?”

Aghraas shook her head. “This is where we’re from. But home is elsewhere.”

For long moments Maram didn’t know what to say. She watched Aghraas, who in turn watched their clasped hands. “Why are you here, Aghraas?” she asked at last.

Her grip tightened around hers. “Where else should I be?”

10

There was one person who would be able to help me contact the rebels.