Ahmad’s heart pounded. Was this a vision, a way of messing with him? If he kept staring, would the boy materialize into a small child with a cake-sticky mouth from a birthday party he, only moments ago, had been careening through? Would he have his father’s ears and his mother’s cheeks and tears streaking his face from crying for his big sister?

Was that dream . . . a real dream?

The sand died for just a moment.

Just a moment to realize that he was wrong.

It wasn’t a version of him, a younger Ahmad.

It wasn’t a memory, or a nightmare, or a trick.

It was the Architect.

He was smaller and thinner, but his clothing was well tailored, carefully stitched, and his face was still smugly round. His eyes, even through the storm, were locked on Ahmad’s.

They continued to stare at each other as the storm picked up once again. The Architect—or at least, this younger rendition—seemed to mouth something. Ahmad squinted.

What?

But before he could make out the words, the boy threw up his wrists to shield his face from the swirls of sand that spun around him. He faded away with the winds of the dying storm.

“Ahmad? Ahmad, are you all right?”

Ahmad turned around and faced Madame Nasirah. Underneath her protective layers of gauze and gathers, her expression was inscrutable.

“Didn’t you see—”

“See what?” She drew the curtains. “There are a great many things to be seen in the sand, and not many of them are true. Remember that, Ahmad. Most of this world, more than ever, is made up of smoke and glitter and dreams that will never come true.”

Ahmad couldn’t shake away the image of brown skin and dark hair vanishing into the whirling sand.

Was that an omen?

And if it was, what was it supposed to mean? A foretelling, or a cry for help? What type of game was this?

“Do you need tea?”

“No,” Ahmad said quietly. “I’m going to try and get sleep. Thank you, Madame Nasirah.”

But as he curled back up next to Winnie, the questions bubbling over in his mind were enough to keep him awake until the early hours of the morning.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

BY THE TIME MORNING—WITH its hustle and bustle on every street corner—had started to settle into early afternoon, Ahmad and Winnie were getting antsy.

They had attempted to make the corner of the tea shop that faced the Minaret their base. Nothing too fancy, just a nest of sheets and pillows and their knapsacks neatly tucked into a corner, ready to be claimed at a moment’s notice.