Chapter One Chapter One Yara Sulimayah was running. She could hear her friends calling after her, making half-hearted attempts to follow. She had never been very fast, but it was amazing how quickly you could move when you were desperate to get away. Only her familiar, Ajal, was keeping pace, sparks flying from his goat hooves as he cantered. Yara! Leyla Khatoun''s voice sounded in her head, a mental message from her furious teacher. Yara Sulimayah, come back this instant! Yara ignored her, shutting the sorceress out of her mind as best she could. She weaved her way through the sorcerers'' settlement, through its cluster of houses with their silver-birch roofs, past cauldrons that filled the air with warm colorful steam, and under clotheslines where newly dyed shawls had been hung out to dry. The Settlement had become as familiar to her as her old home back in Bournemouth--and she had become familiar to its people too; as she ran past they called out to her, some trying to slow her down.
But she didn''t stop, and soon they were far behind her. To the west of the Settlement were the mountains, where the stream ran milky with melted snow and the ground became steep and rocky beneath Yara''s feet. Still she ran, and when she could no longer run, she climbed. Even in the mild spring air her back was damp, her hair sticking unpleasantly to her scalp. Leyla''s voice sounded in her mind again. Yara, come back. It''s not safe! Yara squeezed her eyes shut until the sorceress''s voice faded to static. Next to her, climbing as nimbly as if he were a born mountain goat and not a jinn who had taken the form on a whim, Ajal lowered his brow and glared.
"You cannot ignore her forever." Red-faced and panting, Yara fired her thoughts straight back into his mind. I can try . The morning hadn''t started badly. Yara had been late to her lesson--but although Leyla detested lateness, she had merely pressed her lips together and asked that Yara take her place beside Rafi and Mehnoor. With the Settlement warmed by the sun, Leyla decided they would learn outside. Magic always came easier in the open air, and in the early morning the trees and grass around them were still full of starlight, which made things easier too. "Where have you been?" Rafi asked her in an undertone.
"Tell you later." It wouldn''t do for Leyla to overhear that she had been wandering around near the boundary of their settlement--not when the sorceress had expressly forbidden them from venturing too close to where the soldiers had set up residence at their perimeter. With every day that passed, Yara felt as though she were being squeezed into a smaller and smaller space, her thoughts circling each other with increasing frustration, her chest tangled in knots. "This is a particularly useful spell for you to learn," Leyla began, looking at the three children seriously. She was immaculate as usual, her turban tightly wound and her abaya creaseless. The only signs of how hard she had been working were her stained fingertips and dark shadows beneath her eyes. "It is sorcery that hides you from your enemies, first practiced by merchants traveling between the great ancient cities. More importantly, it is one of the spells I use to hide us from the guards who wait by our border.
I want you to master it, and then in time I hope the three of you will be able to help maintain our defensive magic." Mehnoor and Rafi gave solemn nods. Since the alchemists had poisoned their surroundings, killing half their most senior sorcerers and devastating the land, the lack of magic was an ever more pressing worry, even more so than their dwindling food supplies. Half a year later, many of the adults were still rebuilding their reserves; even Leyla, their most powerful sorcerer, found spells more difficult. The younger children were being taught for the first time how to use magic: how a person could use words, powerful words, in a particular order with a particular rhythm, to make wondrous things happen. Anyone could do it, although there were some with a certain spark in their eyes and a quickness to their tongues who found it easier. But even so, it was a difficult, sometimes painful process with children so young. In the old days of Zehaira, a child wouldn''t have practiced magic until their thirteenth birthday.
Meanwhile, Yara, Rafi, and Mehnoor had been enlisted to help with the practical spells necessary to keep a small community on its feet, a responsibility they all felt keenly. Yet in that moment Yara was having different thoughts. She could use an unseen spell to sneak into the alchemists'' dungeons, find her way past the locked door that held Ismah Parveen, and spirit her away from the clutches of Omair Firaaz. Leyla continued, breaking Yara''s train of thought. "This spell is not only about the words used in the verse. To become unseen, you must imagine that you are part of your environment. You must make yourself emotionless and fill your thoughts only with your breathing and with the feeling of your feet on the ground." Yara''s excitement flickered.
Her failure to get her emotions under control was a constant refrain on Leyla''s lips. Leyla turned to Mehnoor. "You may go first--concentrate and repeat after me: "Like a shadow in the night Let me fade out of sight." Mehnoor echoed Leyla, her forehead puckered in concentration. "Like a shadow in the night, Let me fade out of sight." Yara repressed a sigh. Mehnoor''s pronunciation was exquisite. Every word fell in the right place; her sentences ended on exactly the right cadence, as though she had found some hidden music behind the verse.
It was an ability Yara thought she would never master herself. Within seconds Mehnoor had melted into the air, her curls vanishing one by one until only the tip of her nose was left, stubbornly refusing to disappear. Then, just as quickly, the air shimmered and she reappeared. "Good," said Leyla, nodding at Mehnoor with approval. "With practice, you''ll be able to hold your unseenness for far longer--but that was an excellent start." Mehnoor''s face lit up, and Yara felt her own expression soften at the sight of her friend. "Well done," Yara whispered, squeezing her arm. Mehnoor beamed in reply.
"Now Yara," said Leyla, and Yara stepped up, her thoughts still full of rescuing her mother. She closed her eyes and chanted: "Like a shadow in the night Let me fade out of sight." But when Yara opened her eyes, she was as solid as ever. She looked up at the sorceress, who raised an eyebrow. "Have you been practicing speaking in verse?" Yara flushed. Leyla knew full well that she had barely glanced at her book of wonders for weeks--its long passages on the technicalities of spoken-word spells were unbearably boring. Ajal, watching nearby, butted her hand with his horns. "Why don''t we do it together?" "No," said Leyla, before Yara could reply.
"She needs to be able to manage it on her own." Yara bit back an angry reply, held out her hands, and spoke with a voice that was somewhere between a mumble and a growl: "Like a shadow in the night Let me move out of--" She broke off in a spluttering cough. All her spell succeeded in doing was producing a large cloud of green smoke around her head, which Leyla dispelled with a wave of her hand. Yara felt her face go even redder. Only a few months ago she had had so much power that Leyla wouldn''t let her attempt an invisibility spell in case she flung herself out of existence. Now that she had to rely more on the language of the verses for her power, each spell she tried was an uphill battle. She folded her arms and scowled. "It''s pointless.
I can''t do it." "You''re distracted," said Leyla calmly--although her fingers were twitching, always a warning sign--"and you''re cross with me, which is making things harder." "Nine stars, I can''t think why. Perhaps because Ismah Parveen, my mother , is rotting in the dungeons of Istehar Way, and you won''t let me do anything to help her!" Mehnoor took a sharp intake of breath. Leyla''s mouth disappeared in a very thin line, and when she spoke, every word was given a great deal of care. "Returning to Zehaira is an utterly stupid idea. You would be walking straight into the arms of Omair Firaaz--the most dangerous man in the kingdom, a man who has very good reason to hate you. Your mother would be no better off with you dead.
" "That''s not true," Yara said hotly. "We could help. I know you could--if you weren''t too cowardly to even try." " Yara ," Mehnoor interjected, horrified. "That is quite enough." Leyla''s eyes flashed. "You are not going, which makes this conversation futile. More to the point, why you think you would be any use when you cannot muster a basic unseen spell is beyond me.
" Yara felt cold with rage, her heart thundering. For the first time in a while she felt magic--her own magic--welling up within her, sparking at her fingertips. And then, without warning, Leyla''s cauldron gave a groan, and the ceramic cracked, its contents spilling onto the ground. Leyla started, turned--and Yara fled. Which was how Yara found herself scrambling frantically up the side of a mountain, her hands red-raw from her climb. "Do you intend to reach the.