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Her breath caught as a memory hit her like a tidal wave: ten-year-old Jasmine, curled up with a book at her father's feet while he worked through the piles of parchment in the box, full of official correspondence from his ministers and satraps, the governors who ruled neighboring provinces in the sultan's name.
"One day, Jasmine azizam, this will be your job too," he had said, peering down at her with a serious expression. "It's the most important work a mortal could ever do: taking care of an entire kingdom and its people. Is that something you can see yourself doing one day? Ruling just like your Baba?"
"I only have to do it if you don't have a son." Jasmine had shrugged off the question with all the carefree obliviousness of a child.
An inscrutable expression had come over her father then. He opened his mouth to say something and stopped, as if thinking better of it. And then he reached down to squeeze her shoulder.
"There will be no son, Jasmine," he had said. "You are the one.
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