1
1198 Words
Samira
The sea spoke before I did.
It breathed through the shell-lattice windows in long, patient sighs—salt and hibiscus braided together, old as memory. Dawn stretched thin across the horizon, pale gold dissolving into blue, and the pearl-blushed curtains stirred as if they listened too. I lay still beneath silk sheets, suspended between waking and refusal, letting the ocean finish whatever I thought it had begun centuries before crowns learned how to weigh a woman's worth.
I was not dreaming.
Not anymore.
"Fifty times, your Riah."
The curtains were wrenched aside. Light flooded the room like judgment.
I didn't open my eyes. I didn't need to. Yema's steps were as familiar as tide rhythm—coral heels sharp against marble, skirts whispering purpose. She paused. Inhaled. The pause meant that I had exactly two seconds before patience expired.
I stretched deliberately, slow enough to be insolent. "It's only forty-nine if you don't count the morning, the bell cracked."
"That was still a bell," she said. "And you are still late. The Malkia is already in the temple."
I groaned, rolling onto my back and throwing an arm over my eyes. "Let the gods forgive me. I was communing with the ocean."
"You were drooling on silk."
The sheets vanished with ruthless efficiency. Cool air kissed my legs as I sat up, blinking against the gold spilling across the chamber. Yema stood before me, hands on her hips, brows arched—dark skin luminous in the dawn. She had been sculpted for war against disorder, against excuses, against me.
"You'll miss the language review," she continued. "Your political tutor is pacing. And the High Matrons arrive by week's end."
"Wrinkled foreheads and veiled threats," I muttered. "How festive."
"You're not funny."
"I'm devastatingly funny. Just unappreciated."
She didn't indulge me, though the corner of her mouth betrayed her. Instead, she crossed to the wardrobe and withdrew a gown—cream-toned, soft as sea-foam at rest. No pearls. No embroidery. No ceremonial excess.
My mother would call it underdressed. I called it breathing.
The bodice laced simply, sleeves gathered in sheer tiers that brushed the elbows like wind through reeds. Timeless. Quiet. Honest.
"Wear this," Yema said. "You look like yourself in it."
That mattered more than approval.
She dressed me in silence, fingers firm but gentle as she tightened the laces, shaped my posture, smoothed the lines. The fabric held me without suffocating—reminded me I was still flesh, not only a symbol. I sat before the mirror as she gathered my hair into soft waves that would never survive the afternoon.
My gaze drifted past my reflection.
To the far wall.
My father's portrait watched from above a small altar dusted in rosewood ash, framed in mother-of-pearl.
Sultaani Tharno I.
King of Zafiria.
King turned martyr.
He smiled like the future hadn't already decided to bury him on foreign sand.
I pressed the shell-shaped pendant at my throat, feeling its familiar weight. He had given me a legacy and left me inside it.
Yema followed my gaze. "You dreamed of him again?"
"No," I said. "This time, it was the sea."
The garden terrace shimmered with dew. Hibiscus and star-root glistened in the early light, petals trembling as if aware of being seen. Tharno sat cross-legged on warm stone, a scroll half-hidden in his lap, fingers stained purple from sea grapes.
"Up early?" I asked.
He grinned without looking up. "Unlike you, I attend temple rites."
"Unlike you," I replied sweetly, "I'm expected to marry a stranger and smile through it."
"I'm fourteen. I'm expected to memorize battle poems and not cry when I lose my knife."
I laughed at myself. He handed me a grape; it burst sweet and sharp on my tongue, grounding me in now.
He had our father's eyes and our mother's stubbornness—but none of the weight yet. No one had tried to carve him into something acceptable.
"What's that scroll?" I asked.
He hesitated.
That was answer enough.
I plucked it from his grasp. Aryavahn script—precise, militant, unapologetic.
"This is banned."
"I know," he said. "But their strategies are brilliant. They use hawks instead of doves."
"You respect too easily."
"You judge too fast."
We shared fruit in silence, letting the moment stretch thin and precious. I wanted to freeze it—this light, this before. But the air had shifted. Servants bowed longer. Voices lowered when I passed.
"They want me to become him," Tharno said quietly, nodding toward our father's portrait.
I brushed a curl from his brow. "No. You would be better."
By midday, incense burned low in the temple. The High Priestess offered a thin smile but no rebuke. My attendance was symbolic now—ritual without refuge.
I recited the invocation. My voice did not waver. My hands were steady.
Still, somewhere between peace and unity, I felt the hollow where my own voice used to live.
At dusk, Yema found me beneath the pearl-glass dome, my father's death papers unrolled across the desk. She closed the doors carefully.
"You've been summoned."
"By whom?"
She hesitated.
"The Malkia." The Queen
I set the scroll aside. "She's been the Malkia since I was fifteen."
"She's not calling you as your mother."
That made me stand.
The corridors stretched longer than they should have. Servants bowed too deeply. None met my eyes.
The council chamber doors stood open.
My mother waited at the head of the room—hands folded, posture immaculate. Grief had burned fidgeting out of her long ago. Oracles, matrons, and generals formed a pale semicircle behind her.
No one sat.
I inclined my head. "Amani na mwangaza, Malkia." — Peace and light to you, O Queen.
Her eyes softened for half a breath.
"Amani na fahari, Malkiazah mdogo." Then the Queen returned, "Come forward." —peace and honor, young queen.
The High Matron stepped aside, revealing a sealed document—gold-edged parchment bound in crimson cord.
Not Zafiria's colors.
"A proposal has been accepted," my mother said.
"From whom?"
"Aryavahn."
The word sank like iron into water.
"No," I said calmly.
"This is not a debate," a Matron snapped.
"Then you should not have summoned me."
Silence fell at my mother's raised hand.
"It is not punishment," she said. "It is protection."
"For whom?"
"For us—from them. Zafiria cannot afford another war."
"And Aryavahn cannot afford peace without payment."
Her jaw tightened. "Amir Rayan Han ascended young. He's different."
I laughed once. Sharp. Unladylike. "You mean it binds me to him."
"You are my daughter," she said softly. "And Zafiria's future."
"When?"
"Within the month."
I smiled, just enough to wound. "Efficient."
"Careful, Samira." She stepped closer, voice meant only for me. "Do not mistake my restraint for indulgence."
I bowed. Perfect.
"I will go," I said. "I will smile. I will give them silk and salt and oath. But do not ask me to believe this is mercy."
That night, the sea did not whisper.
It waited.
And somewhere beyond the horizon, Amir Rayan Han was breathing the same air—unaware that Zafiria had just chosen to ruin us both.
- Writer
