Chapter 16 · Untitled Chapter

I did not look at the pen. To acknowledge the gold nib poised between my uncle's fingers would be to grant it weight, and in this house, nothing had weight unless Bandar permitted it to fall.

Gathering the soft black crepe of my abaya closely around my wrists, I remained within the private wing, looking past the threshold into the corridor where Abu Fahad was kept at bay. The heavy door separated the public corridors from this sanctuary as absolutely as stone. The faint scent of smoked oud clinging to Bandar’s crisp white thobe brushed against the cardamom-heavy draft drifting from the distant majlis.

"Noura," Abu Fahad said from his place in the hallway, his voice dropping into that measured, paternal cadence meant to command obedience without the indignity of raising an octave. His arm remained lowered in the corridor, the pen held firmly in his grasp well outside our wing.

"Do not let stubbornness dictate the standing of your house. It is five strokes of ink. A formal closing. The men outside have waited past midnight. You insult our elders by leaving them at the gate while you retreat into the shadows.