THE SUN WAS warm on my face. Such a hot welcoming sun. A shallow pond lay before me, only ankle deep, a jewel cradled in the green hands of proud cypresses. Small fishes darted through the clear water, golden and white sparks against the turquoise bottom. In the middle of it a pavilion of pink stone rose with a domed roof, no walls, only four arches. A delicate mosaic of colored tiles lined the ceiling, showing the sun, the planets, and the stars, as if a Persian carpet of incredible beauty had been stretched across it. A dark-haired woman sat on the steps of the pavilion, her feet in the water, her blood-red dress floating on the surface of the pond. She beckoned.

I stepped into the pond and walked to her. The turquoise stones felt smooth under my feet. My white dress floated, swirling in the water.

The woman patted a step next to her. She was so beautiful, my aunt.

I sat. She reached for my hair. It was long again, the way I liked to have it. She ran her hands through the brown strands, pulled out a tortoiseshell comb, and gently brushed it.

I saw our reflection in the water. The girl in the white dress had my face but she seemed so young and pretty. Soft, like she had never opened another human being with her blade and let their blood flow on the sands of the pits. Someone had brushed gold on my eyelids. Someone had lined my eyes with black. Someone had put a delicate gold chain around my neck with a red stone full of fire.

Was it really me?

My aunt put a white flower into my hair. “This is what you were meant to be,” she said. “The princess of Shinar. Not a mongrel without family. Not some man’s attack dog. Not the mindless weapon I saw in your memories. You didn’t know about it, your father kept it from you, but it is yours.

“Is this what it looked like? The Water Gardens?”

“Yes.”

I could stay here forever. It was so peaceful here.

“This was my favorite place. I wanted to bring my daughters here the way my mother brought me,” my aunt said, her dark eyes soft like velvet. “The war destroyed everything you see and I never had any daughters. He rebuilt the gardens, but they weren’t the same. It was never the same. All gone now. The splendor of Shinar is dust. We are all that remains.”

“I don’t want it to disappear.”

“It must,” she said. “It lives only in my heart. Now it will live in yours.”