68. Ambition (Patreon)

Aloe almost fainted. Frankly, she thought she had already fainted and all of this was a mirage, a delusion formed by her sickly mind.

“W-what do you m-mean?” Her fears were exacerbated. “T-that y-y-you want me?”

Nothing in that line meant anything good.

“What else could it mean?” Rani leaned forward, her smile the imitation of a night lurker. A djinn of the sands. Even though they were far away – a desk separating them – Aloe could feel her warm breath clearly. It didn’t help that with her movement, her silky hair and bountiful breasts swayed hypnotically. The scribe’s breath became rugged, almost collapsing entirely. Then the emir opened her succulent lips. “To see you, of course.”

“Huh?” A dried, soft, and mute groan escaped Aloe’s mouth.

Her whole trail of thought had been thrashed by a sandstorm. She had been pushed into a cold water well. Someone had slapped her in the cheeks hard enough to pop her eyeballs out.

The scribe of commoners blinked several times as she replayed the emir’s last words in her mind, a task that was difficult as she could only see the woman’s smile slowly rising in pleasurable torture.

It took her half a second to notice that she had been played, hoodwinked, bamboozled, led astray, run amok and flat-out deceived. Not only by the serpentuous woman before her but mainly by her own hyperreactive imagination and paranoia.

“Uhm-but of course!” Aloe clapped her hands together, mostly in order to focus herself. “So then, Rani, you do not need a reason to see me, but I guess you have one, am I right?”

The sultanzade hid her smile behind her hand. “You might be right. Perhaps I have a reason to visit you. Or perhaps not.” Rani’s eyes unlatched from Aloe and then swept the room. “Tell me, have you left the palace’s premises in the last days?”

“No, I have not. I have dedicated myself fully to completing the leftover work.” Aloe answered carefully. She didn’t know if the question was a test, but she certainly didn’t enjoy the tone of how it was uttered. “Is that a problem?”

“No, not at all.” The emir leaned forward even more, to the point that she put her elbows on the desk and rested her head on the back of her hands. Even with her arched back, her eyes were on the same level as the scribe. “It has just nudged me a little. Shahrazad always insisted on going back home, no matter how much work she had. Yusuf – my before-predecessor as you may know – allowed her to do so because she knew her personally. But even the wormrot of Hassan even permitted her that luxury, just because she was competent. That would be one of the words I would use to describe Shahrazad, competent. She was so competent that three whole emirs admitted her talent. But even then, she didn’t make much noise. That is the second word I would use, silent.”

Aloe had no idea where the whole monologue was going, but as she heard Rani, she realized something. She truly knew her mother. It was no act; she had spent time with her and there was some underlying appreciation.

“Shahrazad Ayad was a competent yet silent person. It was easy for her to slip unnoticed, even if she was one of the people who shaped Sadina’s course the most in these last decades.” The emir squinted slightly. “I have mixed feelings there. On the one hand, I hate people who have no lust for power, no ceaseless hunger, and strive. I believe that is what makes people human, and Shahrazad did not have that. On the other hand, if it was not for that hiding attitude, she could not have been as influential as she had been. In a way, she was powerful, hidden in plain sight without anyone noticing. If she had only been greedy, she could have been a mighty opponent. Not just for the emirate, but the whole sultanate.”

The sultanzade sighed apparently thinking about what could have been. Aloe detected no lies in her actions or words, but at the same time, it was impossible for her to distinguish any truth. Rani-al-Sadina wasn’t a readable person.

“A waste, if I might say. But when I look at you, I see a different shade of Shahrazad. If she was pistachio, you are emerald. Not to undermine pistachios, everyone likes them. Alike Shahrazad in a way. But emeralds... they need polish and the right hands. Not everyone needs an emerald, and I do not say that because a street urchin may not wear them correctly, but because some people are just better off with rubies, ambers, or amethysts.” Rani’s eyes, like the gemstones she mentioned, settled on her own. Though the sultanzade’s glittered. “And when I look at you, Aloe Ayad, I see a lifeful radiance, a greed that Shahrazad didn’t possess and – in my mind – makes you way tougher than her. Ambition rides people to surpass themselves.”

There were a thousand thoughts trailing in Aloe’s mind, a myriad of words being pondered but not spoken. She couldn’t react, not in a way that convinced her. With Rani, every step seemed a trap. If she wasn’t light-footed or identified the trap, then she would set it off.

“That is an interesting meditation.” She started assertive, pleasing to the emir. “But what does that have to do with me?” Then she appealed to her.

Her education had been extensive, any good could-be-scholar needed to be educated in every field, but rhetoric was never a strong point of hers. However, interaction and diplomacy were a masquerade, and she knew about masks.

“Not much, I fear,” Rani admitted, or so she would like to push it like so.

There was no truth in her statement, it was a sentence devoid of meaning. A random string of words meant to calm Aloe, rather than inform her. She could see that far and even read her, but that didn’t eliminate the fact that she feared the woman. Stepping out of line could cost her a lot.

“But I won’t deny I have high expectations of you.” The sultanzade’s expression was tender, the scribe would almost as far as to say caring. “However, they diverge greatly from the ones I had with Shahrazad. My sights on you and your mother are quite different.”

A statement that should have been neutral, an off-hand comment, weighed down on Aloe. Those words had something she didn’t like, though she couldn’t identify what.

“Let me ask you one thing,” Rani looked at her straight in the eyes. “You are the last member of your family, is that right?”

Aloe was going to respond, but she held herself off for a second as she felt she was going to stutter. She didn’t suffer from a stutter, but when she was with Rani, that was almost a given.

“Yes,” A short answer, until she was able to calm herself. “Up to my knowledge, I am the last member of my family. There are no branches whatsoever as it started with my grandfather.”

“I see...” The sultanzade caressed her bronze cheeks with her purple nails. “Would you like your family name to disappear?”

The scribe of commoners frowned. She couldn’t identify if that was a rhetorical question, a threat, or an actual question.

“I would not like so, no.” Aloe chose to interpret it as the latter. “Are you suggesting I should marry soon, Rani?” She used the emir’s name as more of an honorific than anything else, as the question came out rather aggressive.

If it was a threat, then the best case of action was to ignore it. Threats only had power when one felt menaced by them. Replying with another question would make the threatening interlocutor lose their footing.

“Quite the opposite.” She revealed, her mask indescribable. “Marriage is a transaction. I know that well. I would have been married to a foreign country because of my lacking Nur... abilities. But I proved far more resourceful and useful than what Aaliyah had expected. Enough to not be disposable. So marrying yourself now would be a waste. It is too soon, some products gain value with time, like wine.” What she didn’t mention was how some others lost value, like fruit, which easily spoiled. “Hold yourself on those thoughts, grow a bit older and more powerful before marrying. Otherwise, your family might die even if you birth to an heir. Unless the transaction is way more profitable.”

Her words were obvious, someone needed to marry into her, not the opposite. But her final statement betrayed all of that, it left the window open in case an offer more valuable than her own family name presented.

“Anyhow,” Rani straightened her back and clasped her hands. “I did have a reason to pass by it wasn’t all just random babbling.”

Out of nowhere, the emir’s posture got more authoritative. In one moment, it seemed like a familiar one not dissimilar to a friend, and in the next, it was that of a boss.

“Some... things need to be reported into the palace, back at Asina.” The sultanzade’s eyes shone in intellect. “This means that in about a month I’ll go to Asina to visit Aaliyah.”

As she didn’t continue with her speech, Aloe interjected, almost out of peer pressure. “And that concerns me... in what manner?”

“I want you to come with me to Asina and see the Sultanah.” Darkness formed in the sparkling gemstones.

“Excuse me?” The words left Aloe’s mouth without her being conscious, a reflex.