“Do you remember the first summer you came?” Agha-Jana asked. “Just to visit, when you were four or five, I believe. I hadn’t seen you in a year and by Allah how much you grew!”

“Itni moti,” Dhadi recounted, laughing. “So chubby and fat.”

“Aur kitni shararti,” Agha Jaan added. “So mischievous, always running around, keeping us all busy.”

“Hai, you gave us such trouble,” Dhadi said, shaking her head. “You wouldn’t listen to any of the nannies or maids, so I had to take care of you myself. And you would only sit to eat if it was in your Agha-Jaan’s lap.”

“And even then, you would feed me one bite, then eat one yourself,” Agha-Jaan said. She remembered it, vaguely. Sitting on Agha-Jaan’s lap like it was her personal throne. How patient they had been with her, indulging even when she was at her brattiest.

“And you insisted on bathing down in the creeks whenever it got too hot and sunny,” Dhadi recalled.

“Those were the happiest days,” Durkhanai said, smiling at the memories. When it was just them three. It felt like another lifetime. An entirely different world, even.

Bathing in the creek always made her feel more at home, rather than the elaborate bath and maids that always awaited her in the palace. Down in the creek, the water was always deliciously icy, straight from the glacier, and Agha-Jaan would hold her in his arms. She remembered being so small but so safe.

“But once, the current was too strong,” Agha-Jaan said. “You got carried away.”

“Ai, januman,” my grandmother winced. “Don’t talk about that. My heart still breaks just thinking about it.”

“But you saved me,” Durkhanai said. “I remember swallowing gulps and gulps of ice water, eyes burning, and then I was in the sun again.”

Agha-Jaan had held her so tight, covering her entirely. She remembered she hadn’t even been afraid, not even under the torrent—she had known Agha-Jaan would be there, no matter what.

“I would never let anything happen to you,” Agha-Jaan said firmly. “It was true then; it is true now. You mustn’t ever worry.”

Chapter Sixteen

One week passed in illness.

One week full of sleep and medicine and home remedies. A week of Dhadi in her bed and Zarmina by her side and Saifullah checking in.

One week without seeing Asfandyar.

He hadn’t come to visit, not even in secret, which he could have. Durkhanai gathered her courage to go see him. She had a feeling he would be around, somewhere close by. If she knew him at all, he would be in her library.

One night, when she was alone, made her way there, on the edge of her private wing. She felt something pulling at her, nudging. Someone had once said that love without intuition was not love at all.

And she was right. Asfandyar was moving to leave as she neared the windows.