Dead Girls Tell No Tales

f o u r t e e n

SHAHRAZAD BREATHES IN the lingering mixture of hyacinths, the scent underlined with sweet, sickly roses.

Her hand flutters to her eyes, falling back when the filtered, ashen beams that reach instead. It is bathed in shadows, to the point that daylight makes little difference.

Of course, she thinks, it's his abode of darkness.

"Pleasant stay?" Laleh breaks the train of her thoughts, a particularly ill smile crossing her lips.

She looks above in sleepy despondence, snuffing the remark. "It's nothing."

"Oh, I'm positive it isn't, Malika," Laleh assuages, folding a pile of midnight shaded robes, lined with the thinnest border of gold. "The King insisted that you wear these."

She holds it towards her, the material lighter than her usually bulky attire, and surprisingly modest in its plaintive design. Shahrazad finds it quite lovely, elegant even, but she's hesitant in doing something for him. It is a weak resolve she harbours, a small act of defiance, and she is desperate to hold onto it. "Do I have to?"

"If you want your head on your shoulders," she reasons, bristling about. "Today is important."

"What?" The Queen questions, cupping her chin. "Why is it important?"

Laleh fills the resplendent bath with water, tipping into it an array of perfume oils, too strong for her personal taste, and all too familiar. "For one, the murderer Khalifa strode into the servant's quarters this morning and announced, 'The Malika will be joining me for dinner'."

Shahrazad's ears fill with the rushing sound of water. "But why dinner?"

"I don't know? Maybe he wants to eat you."

"Laleh!"

She steps into the bath, turning towards the handmaiden. "I'm perfectly capable of carrying on from here."

As she leaves, Shahrazad relaxes, leaning her fountain of curls against the ceramic back, sticking to her spine in drenched coils. She notices that this space is far more well equipped than hers, decked with the most extravagant of necessities, probably brought in from different corners of the land.

It makes sense, befitting a King.

When she is done, she tiptoes outside, carefully, ensuring that his expensive rugs are not soiled. Laleh is seated on the bedding. She proceeds to comb the tangles in her hair, braiding it, like an overflowing waterfall cascading past her shoulders.

Her eyes are lined in kohl, sleek and pronounced. She looks beautiful. "I don't understand."

"You don't have to," Laleh counters, smiling at her. "It suits you, this colour."

She laughs, after the longest time, as if her eternity in the palace is dawning to an end. "I look like I am the maiden of darkness."

"Perhaps that is exactly what he wants you to be."