Grief welled up hot in her blood again. She bit down on her lower lip, holding it in. Maryam had been right after all. Her father had finally stopped letting his guilt control him. Fear had taken its place. Mehr understood his fear. She had felt it in her own bones. The Amrithi were not safe in Irinah. Clans had vanished; Lalita was gone; Usha was dead. Mehr was simply not Ambhan enough to be safe in this household, this land, any longer.

But she was Ambhan enough to be sent away. Ambhan enough to marry and leave Irinah, and pretend to be the good noblewoman she was not.

When Mehr lay back down on the divan, when she curled up like a creature inside its own shell, the edges of the seal pressed into her skin. Mehr breathed against its weight, slow and steady, and tried not to feel like a chained animal, tried not to feel like she was drowning. She tried to feel nothing at all.

A week passed before anyone disturbed her grieving, full of nothing but sleep and tears and the slow wait for her heart to knit back together. She had half expected Maryam to come and gloat, but it was Nahira who hobbled into her bedroom one dull evening without so much as a greeting.

“Oh, no need to stop your wailing for my sake,” she said, when Mehr scrambled off the divan and onto her feet. “But now you’re up, you’d best make yourself presentable. I’ve brought you a visitor.”

Mehr hastily wiped her face clean. She heard a sound from beyond the door, and then a delighted cry.

“Mehr!”

Arwa rushed toward her and leaped up into her arms. She knocked Mehr off balance instantly. They both fell back on the divan, but Arwa held on tight, muttering joyful nonsense against Mehr’s ear. She was warm and smelled of rosewater and her knees were sharp where they dug into Mehr’s sides. Mehr pressed a palm to the back of Arwa’s head, like she had when Arwa was a baby and needed the support of firm hands to hold her steady.

“Hello, little sister,” she murmured. Her heart was light, so light. “What are you doing here?”

“She insisted on coming to see you,” Nahira said. “Complain, complain, that’s all the girl does. Right now for a moment of peace I’d have taken her to the Emperor himself.”

“Where have you been?” Arwa cried out, oblivious to her nurse’s grumbling. Her eyes shined. “It’s been ages and ages, and I kept waiting for you to come see me, and you didn’t.” Her grip tightened.

“I’m sorry,” said Mehr. “I would have come, but I was …” She hesitated. “I was in trouble.”

“How?”

“I disobeyed Father and he told me to stay in my chambers.”

“You’re too old to be punished,” Arwa said stoutly.

“I’m not that old, Arwa.”