In the winding streets of the Persian Empire, a poor girl is chosen to become the third prince's concubine.
Aliya Farhad has no interest in the lofty ideas of the palace, the staff, or her lover. Prince Cairo has all the interest in his blue-eyed A...
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"HELLO, YOU'RE ALIYA, AREN'T YOU?"
I looked up from my dinner to see a pair of wide, blown out eyes, so brown that, underneath the chandelier light, they looked like small golden suns.
"Yes, and you are?"
"Maryam," she said, offering a little smile. Past her lips, I could spot two bunny teeth peeking through.
A vague recollection of yesterday flashed in my head, and I recalled Prince Finn choosing a small, petite girl as his companion.
Without meaning to, my lips quirked down.
Poor girl.
"Oh, you're the girl Prince Finn picked out on our first day, no?"
Maryam's dusty, tan cheeks flushed pink, and she seemed to shrivel underneath my gaze, a finger reaching up to twirl her hair. "You remember that?"
"Of course; you made quite an impression on the girls."
I hadn't meant to say the words in a condescending way — at least, I hadn't meant to send the exact impression of it to her — but Maryam cringed either way, scrunching her nose.
"Please don't remind me; if only I knew the impact it would have made, I wouldn't have reacted the way I did."
"The impact that it made?"
"Everytime I try to sit with one of the girls, or I try to introduce myself, they all give me the stink eye, before standing up and moving away from me. They're acting like I have syphillis or something," Maryam said.
I paused. "Well, that makes sense, actually. After all, you were the first girl to obtain a date, no? They must feel a little jealous."
"Well, yes, and yes, the date was incredible — he's such a gentleman — but it's absolutely no fun being treated like an outsider."
It took me more than a second to stop myself from blurting out that there was absolutely nothing about Prince Finn that screamed gentleman to me, but before I could compose a better, more well thought out answer, my mouth had blurted out, "Was it really?"
"Oh, yes; he took me to the kitchens and we ate a lot of food," Maryam said, eyes lighting up, looking very much like a child. In a way, I suppose she was one. "But now, I don't have to be treated like an outsider anymore!"
"You... You don't?" How?
"Of course not! You got a date too, didn't you? With Prince Cairo? You even got fought over by him and Prince Raza! All the girls are wondering how you did it, you know," she said, edging closer.
For a moment, I wondered if Maryam was one of those girls, those girls who pretended to be nice in front of your face to learn about nonexistent secrets to use to gossip behind your back later on, but looking at Maryam's big, wide, genuinely curious eyes, I couldn't help but think this girl who couldn't be older than fifteen just didn't have the heart in her to do so.
