Prince of Cahraman: A Retelling of Aladdin (Fairytales of Folkshore Book 2) Read online

  Prince of Cahraman

  Fairytales of Folkshore: Book Two

  Lucy Tempest

  PRINCE OF CAHRAMAN – A RETELLING OF ALADDIN

  Copyright © 2018 by Lucy Tempest

  Cover Art Copyright © 2018 Lucy Tempest

  Editors: Mary Novak, Jennifer Jansen

  First edition published in 2018 by Folkshore Press

  ISBN: 978-1949554014

  All rights reserved.

  Sign up to my VIP mailing list at www.lucytempest.com

  [email protected]

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, stored in, or introduced into a database or retrieval system, in any form, or by any means, without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  Disclaimer

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Created with Vellum

  Ah, Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire

  To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,

  Would not we shatter it to bits—

  and then Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!

  The Rubaiyat, Omar Khayyam

  Contents

  Introduction

  Map

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Note from the Author

  Pronunciation Guide

  About the Author

  Also By Lucy Tempest

  Introduction

  Welcome to the magical world of Folkshore!

  Fairytales of Folkshore is a series of interconnected fairytale retellings with unique twists on much-loved, enduring themes. It starts with the Cahraman Trilogy, a gender-swapped reimagining of Aladdin.

  Join each heroine on emotional, thrilling adventures full of magic, mystery, friendship and romance where true love is found in the most unexpected places and the fates of kingdoms hang in the balance.

  Among the retellings will be:

  Beauty & the Beast, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Hades & Persephone, The Little Mermaid, Snow White…and more!

  Map

  Chapter One

  In the five years since my mother died, I’d become an expert in an assortment of petty crimes. Now I was about to graduate to a much more serious offense.

  Arson.

  The plan to start a fire had burst into my mind the moment the Final Five of the Bride Search competition had been announced—and I’d been chosen among them.

  I’d been certain I’d be cut, that I’d survived elimination in two major tests in the past month by a combination of sheer luck and others’ total incompetence.

  My shock at being chosen had been followed by relief. I’d thought this was a lifeline fate had thrown me, another chance to remain in the palace, to finally get to the gold lamp I was here to steal. The lamp I was to trade for the lives of my best friend and her father, and a portal back home to Ericura.

  Then reality had sunk in like a rock tied to my foot, dragging me to the bottom of despair.

  None of that would be possible if I stayed. Now the other girls and their entourages were leaving, without the divided attention they’d afforded me and without Cyrus to sneak me out of my quarters and around the palace….

  My heart clenched painfully, as if it was shrinking, becoming a dried-out husk at the thought of him.

  There was no Cyrus.

  My Cyrus, the servant I’d thought was a fellow thief, the one I’d built all my hopes for the future around, was Cyaxares.

  The Prince of Cahraman.

  Every time my mind tried to wrap around this discovery it unraveled, spooled away into chaos. And if during my initial shock I’d fleetingly thought that I could use this fact, that I could continue the competition, and even win—win him—that notion had now joined the massive heap of hopes that had shattered with the blow of one realization.

  I couldn’t possibly win.

  I didn’t even know how I’d thought there was a chance I could.

  Without Cyrus’s help, I couldn’t hope to get into the king’s quarters, especially now with the heightened scrutiny that would come with only five of us left. I’d been invisible as one of fifty, but as one of five, I had no hope of escaping everyone’s notice. I wouldn’t be able to get the lamp, and Bonnie and Mr. Fairborn would be sacrificed to the Beast of Rosemead!

  Being one of the Final Five wasn’t a lifeline, it was a tightening noose.

  Since I couldn’t wait for it to choke the life out of me, I had to find another way to get the lamp. And it had to be now. While the crowd of far-more important people cluttered the palace, where I had one last chance to disappear.

  But to get into the most guarded place in the whole kingdom, I had to create as destructive a diversion as I could.

  Burning down the ballroom we were all in might be an extreme measure, but I was out of options. I was a cornered prey. To get out, I had to lash out.

  I eyed the largest chandelier that hung over the now-empty dance floor, blazing with a thousand candles. Though no one was anywhere beneath it, and I calculated no one could get harmed, I was literally playing with fire. Fire was unpredictable, unstoppable, and the smallest spark could result in devastation. But I couldn’t consider that now. This was my last chance to save the Fairborns.

  Trembling with the enormity of what I was about to do, I picked a carving knife off the service table before retreating deeper into the ballroom. At its end, I ducked behind a column next to the thick, knotted rope that held up the chandelier.

  Eyes darting around to make sure no one noticed me, I breathed as deep as my constricted lungs would allow. I let all my breath out in an explosive rush as I slashed the rope with a slicing blow—and only cut halfway through it.

  Fright and frustration booming in my head, I gave my back to the room, trying to hide further behind the column, and frantically sawed through it. My heart seemed to have migrated to my arm, painfully throbbing in the hand that gripped the knife, threatening to loosen my cold, sweaty grip on the etched handle. I was panting by the time the rope finally snapped.

  With my next heartbeat, the chandelier plummeted to the floor with a crash that shuddered beneath my feet like an earthquake.

  All who stood within its vicinity scattered like the pearls of a snapping necklace, their shrill screams joining the cacophony of its shattering glass and distorting metal as the lush carpet instantly caught fire like it
had been soaked with fuel.

  With a blooming pillar of smoke, the ballroom descended into mayhem.

  Shuddering, I tossed the knife back onto the table and dove into the crowd, hands over my head and screaming with the rest of them as they stampeded for the doors.

  Guilt clanged within me before its echoes faded among the shouts and stomps surrounding me. I couldn’t feel bad about my actions now. I had no worries to spare for anyone who wasn’t in direct danger. I could only think of those whose lives depended on me. Whatever I did now, it was out of desperation to save the only family I had.

  But that didn’t stop me from being skewered with worry for my friends. For Cyrus.

  I looked feverishly around, heart squeezing harder until I saw them. They were at the front of the panicked masses as all double-doors were flung open to accommodate the escaping herd. Cora was dragging Ariane by the hand behind her while lugging Cherine on her back like one of her massive bags. Master Farouk had lost his fez, his usually groomed hair falling around his eyes as he pushed as many people as he could towards the exit while bellowing, “Loujaïne, Loujaïne, where are you?”

  Then I saw Cyrus.

  He wasn’t fleeing like everyone as the fire raged. He’d climbed atop a chair by one of the exits to tower above the crowd, the prince I now knew him to be shepherding his subjects and guests to safety,

  His voice rang even over the din. “Slowly exit the room, so everyone can get out safely. Go left once you’re out, then down the stairs to the entrance hall!”

  Left and down. That was where all the guards would now be. I had to go right and up, far from witnessing eyes. It was also where I believed the king’s quarters were. Where the lamp was.

  Breathing through a layer of my skirt, I waited for the largest numbers to squeeze themselves through the doors. As I hung back, I couldn’t help watching Cyrus, sun-streaked hair in disarray, sweating from the soaring heat as he continued to shout orders, somehow managing to control the panicked crowd. A born leader. More proof that the Cyrus I’d known had been an act. This—this was the real him.

  My heart clenched harder when I noticed him looking around, searching for someone. Then his wild eyes met mine and their intensity made me gasp, inhaling a noxious lungful of smoke.

  I had caused him this distress. I’d ruined the night he’d spent months planning. He’d looked so pleased with himself when he’d danced with me earlier tonight, so excited when he’d announced the names of the chosen to thunderous applause. To him, this night had been a successful step in his efforts to choose his own destiny.

  Now I’d literally sent it up in flames.

  Holding a hand over his mouth to block the smoke, he gestured vehemently with the other one for me to run, to get out. But he was staying behind, endangering himself to make sure everyone else got out first.

  I wanted to stay and help him, then afterwards ask him to help me as he had before. But that wasn’t possible anymore. I was going to further ruin all his efforts when I disappeared tonight. Just like he’d ruined mine when he’d told me who he was. But he’d done more than that. He’d shattered my plans for all our futures harder than I had that chandelier.

  It was painful to look away from him, like peeling off a large scab, re-exposing my bleeding wound to the harsh air. This would be the last time I would see him.

  But I had to push all my warring feelings about him to the back of my mind and continue. Bonnie and Mr. Fairborn’s very lives depended on me pulling off this last gamble.

  I dove into the current of fleeing people the farthest away from him. Once outside, I broke away to the end of the hall. Around the first corner, I stopped. Taking in shuddering breaths and coughing out smoke, I tried to listen over the turmoil of my breathing and heartbeats for any approaching movement. When no guards rushed past and the pandemonium I had unleashed grew distant, I bunched up my skirt and sprinted up the nearest green-marble staircase.

  At the top of every flight was a portrait of a former king, but there was none of the one I was sent to rob. And now I knew why. Cyrus had hidden in plain sight, impersonating a servant to oversee the contestants himself. He couldn’t risk any of us recognizing him, had needed to hide his resemblance to his father. The father who’d indirectly put me in this position. If he hadn’t banished Nariman and taken her lamp, she wouldn’t have kidnapped me and held my friends hostage to force me to retrieve it for her.

  As I reached the top, now-deserted floor, sweat was drenching me, making me almost slip out of my shoes and lose my grip on the bannister. It wasn’t just effort, but dread doubling.

  What if the king’s guards hadn’t left their post? What if they had, but I couldn’t pick the lock? What if I did, but he kept the lamp in a hidden safe? Would I have time to search for it and unlock it? What if there was a magical ward on everything?

  What if he was still in his quarters?

  Caught in the storm of what-ifs, I stumbled over the final step and flew into the hallway. Swallowing a shrill shriek, I flailed and came to a staggering halt, a few inches from a statue’s spear.

  After dodging so many dangers, I could have died the dumbest death, impaling myself right at my target’s door.

  Straightening up, heaving in difficult breaths, I scoped out the place.

  This floor was less spacious than the ones below it, the layout more complicated. Decorations crowded every inch: mounted paintings, engravings, calligraphic art, platforms holding figurines, idols, vases and busts of both royals and gods.

  From robbing a few lords’ houses and a mansion or two, I recognized the pattern. Places like this were built to impress. Arranging one’s belongings in ascending order of extravagance pointed to the best spot around, acted like the dotted-lines in treasure maps. When the king entertained dignitaries and other royals, they’d no doubt be taken down this hall, to see the best of his acquisitions, before they reached his private quarters.

  It meant I was in the right place.

  Feverish with fear, I felt like I was dragging my feet beneath a sweltering summer sun. The exhaustion that accompanied inescapable heat was growing as well, as if I was seconds away from fainting on a scalding road, like I once had when I’d been homeless.

  I was close. I couldn’t lose my wits now that I was this close.

  I struggled to pull myself together, reminding myself that this was my one chance to get the lamp and escape, to undo everything Nariman had done to the Fairborns and myself.

  This time tomorrow, the three of us could be back home, with Cahraman and the people I’d met and befriended, or even loved, a faraway, fading dream…

  A cooling shudder snapped me out of it. I had to focus on my task, on this moment. Nothing beyond either.

  Just as I was about to turn the last corner, the towering double-doors at the end of the massive corridor creaked open.

  I almost swallowed my tongue smothering my gasp as I jumped back and flattened myself against the wall as voices flowed out of the chamber. They rang against the walls in an ominous echo, still too far to be distinct but quickly growing closer.

  I had to turn back!

  As fast as I soundlessly could, I rushed back to the stairs. On the verge of hyperventilating, I barely resisted the urge to jump down entire flights. But that could end in yet another form of disaster.

  As I reached the floor below, I heard multiple footsteps following me down steadily.

  It was no good. I was too exposed. Once they reached the next bend, they’d see me fleeing and it would be as good as a guilty confession.

  I had no choice but to turn and pretend to be ascending.

  Stiff with dread, I met the last person I wanted to see halfway up the flight of stairs.

  Princess Loujaïne—the king’s sister whom I’d belatedly realized was Cyrus’s aunt—stared down at me coldly, slim eyebrows pulled into a frown, silver grey eyes shining with irritation. “Lady Ada, what are you doing up here?”

  “Your Highness!” I pretended to be
relieved, avoiding her gaze and hoping she couldn’t hear my teeth chattering. “I have been looking all over for you!”

  Her frown deepened, shadowing her bright eyes. “Why would you be looking for me?”

  “The ballroom caught fire!” I shuddered with the effort to keep from breaking down and weeping over the lost opportunity.

  Her stiff expression shattered on a yell. “Fire?”

  “Y-yes. Everyone ran out and headed down, but we couldn’t find you,” I stuttered, feeling my sweat grow cold, along with my blood. I could sense her disbelief setting in, see the probing interrogation about to follow in the hardening lines of her mouth. I quickly added, “Master Farouk is still looking for you.”

  With the mention of Farouk, the suspicion and disdain she’d been aiming my way at once melted into agitated concern. “I better let everyone know I’m fine then.”

  Before I could excuse myself, duck into a different direction to return when she left and try to salvage this mission, Loujaïne grabbed my arm and led me down the stairs. The staff members she’d been speaking with tailed us. “But first let’s escort you back to your quarters, Lady Ada.”

  I had no choice but to let her take me back. If I resisted her, that would invite more questions. About why I of all people had been searching for her—and up here of all places—and why I wasn’t eager to regroup with the girls in safety now that I’d found her. She might even ask about the fire. All the stress had depleted me. Coming up with more plausible lies would be impossible tonight.