Page 156 of A Thousand Nights Before Dawn
A thought came to Zahra’s mind, and she took off her necklace, wrapping it around Namir’s wrist and placing the token in his palm. He glanced back at her in confusion, but kept his torso faced forward.
“Re has forbidden Iset from harming his heirs. You can do nothing to my son!”
“You are right,” Zosar said, “but I do not need to.” He threw another ball of fire at them. The Pharaoh Queen’s hand shot up, and a thick, glass-like dome that glowed with the sun’s light appeared in front of them. The fire fizzled against it, and the Pharaoh Queen grunted as she was forced back a few feet. Zosar fell to the floor, gasping in pain.
At the same time, moonlight flashed in Zahra’s eyes, and she pushed Namir and herself forward as a dagger reflected the light of the lamps.
Nubia struck the area where Namir and Zahra had been, her teeth gritted as she swung her arm to swipe Zahra’s back. Waaiz stepped in the way, catching Nubia’s arm. Ramses grabbed her wrists and Waaiz knocked the dagger from her hand.
Waaiz and Ramses secured her as she let out a cry.
Waaiz gasped. “She is possessed!”
Nubia whimpered, her lip trembling. “Menes, help me!”
Namir’s moved toward her. “Nubia!”
Zahra put her hand against his chest to stop him. “She is not possessed.”
Namir looked at her with a combination of horror and confusion.
The Pharaoh Queen glanced back at Zahra as she kept the shield between them and Zosar intact. “You know not what you say,sibyl.”
“Nebthet has shown it to me,” Zahra said, turning to Nubia.
Anger flashed in Nubia’s eyes. She looked at Namir. “Menes, I did not mean to. It was an accident.”
Conflict sat in his face, but still he remained by Zahra’s side. He glanced at Nubia’s dagger on the floor. “That first night, I saw you in the hallway. When the dagger fell, I assumed it was one of the assassins’, but it wasn’t. It wasyours.”
Nubia pushed against Waaiz and Ramses’s hold, smiling softly. “Come, brother. I am not capable of murder.”
Zahra shook her head. “You were the one who warned the assassins every morning. You interfered with our search, and you remembered because you bore the mark of the Thoth.” The vision in the oldpr-aahad shown it to them, and they had not realized. If Nubia had not remembered, she, too, would have been bound by a string in the vision of Aur, just as Zahra was.
Nubia growled. “Your bride lies, Menes. I am your ally. I am yourfamily.”
Zosar laughed from his spot on the floor. He leaned back, guffawing as shadows leaked from the cracks in his body. His skin looked sandy, as if he might fall apart at any second. He held his side, grinning wildly at them. “It is no use, Vizier. He knows.”
The Pharaoh Queen looked back in horror at Nubia.
Namir scrunched his forehead, angered and pained. “I don’t understand. Why would you do this? Was it your plan to die so that you would get the mark?”
Nubia’s innocent facade faded into rage. “Of course not. The plan was to kill you during the blood moon. With the Thoth’s power in motion, we would have had many opportunities for the assassins to lie in wait. But we did not expect you to choose your bride the very first night, or for the assassins to fail.” She gritted her teeth. “Every day, I had to face you with the hope that the assassins would succeed, but every night they would fail. I could not risk triggering your memory or revealing myself. So I waited, encouraging you to look for your bride, and framing your real bride’s father in hopes you two would never meet again. But, somehow,sheremembered.”
Zahra narrowed her eyes. “Zosar told you to touch Namir the second day so you would remember what had happened.”
Namir shook his head. “But the Thoth should have made you forget today, and Zosar was detained all day. How did you remember if?—”
“You think that these many days could be erased because you took the mark from me?” Nubia scoffed. “No, I knew what I experienced was more than a nightmare.”
The Pharaoh Queen lowered her hands a little, though the shield still held. “Nubia, why? Why would you do this?”
Nubia’s head snapped toward the Pharaoh Queen. “You promised me that I would be Queen, but the moment Jt died and said he chose Menes instead, you forsook me! You cast measide to play the role of the Vizier! The people blame me for their problems, andhetakes all of the credit formywork!”
“We did not know Menes’s fate when we named you heir,” the Pharaoh Queen insisted. “The path of the Pharaoh is a difficult one. I thought you were happy to be free of the burden.”
“Burden? Is that what you think?” Nubia tugged against Ramses and Waaiz’s hold. “I worked tirelessly foryearsto fill your shoes. All I wanted was to be the ruler you desired me to be. But as soon as Menes started recovering, you abandoned me to be by his side. He was the child you cried about at night. I was the one you did not want. All I wanted was the love and praise you promised me!”
The Pharaoh Queen opened her mouth to speak, but Zosar stood, pulling their attention back to him. The cracks in his skin deepened as he threw another ball of fire at them.
