The scarabs had done their work. Now that Hiril Altaïr lay dead before him, Sarn reached into the folds of his clothing and removed four thin, leather-bound books and laid them next to the body. Dassai wanted these books, but Sarn was not concerned with his avarice.
For now, he had his own matters to attend to.
He spoke the arcane words of the spell as he sprinkled a pinch of ebon dust from a small glass vial. The disk-shaped granules covered the body and sent out a clear message.
An assassin's mark.
A bright flash lit Sarn's eyes as he gazed at a shimmering mirror of blue-metallic liquid outlining dark blood and shards of bone—the last remains of Hiril Altaïr. It continued to expand before engulfing the ruined body in a pool of cobalt.
Soon the alchemy began to subside. The mark was invisible to all others save for one man.
Sarn rose. He had fulfilled his duty. He was jinn-bound to the Sultan and thereby his lackeys, men such as Dassai. He had been compelled to kill Altaïr, but he did not care about the books. Let Dassai retrieve them himself.
Pealing across the city, the bells of many masjids tolled sonorously.
Istanna had ended.
Across the great square, Sarn disappeared into a small passageway, a shade lost in deeper shadow. The silence lasted for only a brief moment, until a flock of sable-winged gulls gathered, squabbling greedily over their newfound feast.
The doors to the embassy remained closed.
YOU ARE READING
Arabesque
FantasyA brutal assassin, a drug-addicted spy, and a vengeful widow are embroiled in a potentially world-shaking conspiracy. A fantasy thriller that has echoes of both A Game of Thrones and The Da Vinci Code, Arabesque races across the brilliant white sand...
