When the first maid arrived, Mehr was covered in sweat, her hair tangled. Instead of giving Mehr a significant look, as the maids usually did when Mehr troubled them unduly, the girl simply lowered her eyes and went to work. Mehr supposed there was no value in disliking her any longer. Maryam was gone, and her favor could no longer be won by slighting Mehr.

It occurred to Mehr that now that Maryam was gone, she was the most powerful woman left in the Governor’s residence. It was an uncomfortable thought.

Mehr was not used to the kind of overt power Maryam had always possessed: the kind that came only with the right title, the right husband, the right blood flowing through your veins. All her power had been won by struggle. She had always fought so very hard to maintain what little control she had over her own life. She’d managed to continue practicing her Amrithi traditions—despite Maryam’s great displeasure—by using her father’s guilt to her own ends. She had bowed and scraped to Maryam, put aside her own pride time after time, simply for the chance to keep Arwa in her life. Now, for a brief moment, she was the highest-ranking woman in the household. All the power she’d never possessed was in her grasp.

And once she was wed to the mystic, it never would be again.

If Mehr had made different choices—if she had left Irinah as her father had wanted, and married a man in Hara or Numriha—she would have had power of her own. A household of women to run, a husband’s burdens and a husband’s power.

What kind of power would she have as a mystic’s wife? She couldn’t grasp the shape of her future. She couldn’t imagine the forces that would mold her life once she stepped beyond the walls of her father’s household, out into the desert and the vast unknown.

Other maids arrived. Mehr bathed, and the maids combed, oiled, and threaded her hair. They brought her a robe and underskirt in warm ivory. As Mehr was dressing, Nahira entered and barked orders at the maids, sending them scuttling off in search of pins for her veil and for the silk shawl currently slipping from her shoulders.

“What are you doing here?” Mehr asked. The night had been long, and sleep scarce. She felt exhausted. She had no idea how Nahira was standing at all. But even though her old nursemaid’s heavy gait was more pronounced, her hair was neat and her eyes as sharp as always.

“I’ve come to supervise,” Nahira said. “You clearly don’t know what’s needed.”

“I’ve never been introduced to a suitor before,” Mehr agreed mildly.

“Look at you,” Nahira tsked. “Have you slept at all?”

“Have you?” Mehr countered.