Spotlight: Dawn of the Firebird by Sarah Mughal Rana
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For fans of The Poppy War, She Who Became the Sun, and The Will of the Many, a breathtaking fantasy novel about the daughter of an overthrown emperor from an exciting new voice.
Khamilla Zahr-zad’s life has been built on a foundation of violence and vengeance. Every home she’s known has been destroyed by war. As the daughter of an emperor’s clan, she spent her childhood training to maintain his throne. But when her clansmen are assassinated by another rival empire, plans change. With her heavenly magic of nur, Khamilla is a weapon even enemies would wield—especially those in the magical, scholarly city of Za’skar. Hiding her identity, Khamilla joins the enemy’s army school full of jinn, magic, and martial arts, risking it all to topple her adversaries, avenge her clan, and reclaim their throne.
To survive, she studies under cutthroat mystic monks and battles in a series of contests to outmaneuver her fellow soldiers. She must win at all costs, even if it means embracing the darkness lurking inside her. But the more she excels, the more she is faced with history that contradicts her father’s teachings. With a war brewing amongst the kingdoms and a new twisted magic overtaking the land, Khamilla is torn between two impossible choices: vengeance or salvation.
Excerpt
Before…
Year 495 after Nuh’s great flood,
Era of the heavenly birds
Tezmi’a Mountains, Azadniabad Empire
I would inherit the power of the Heavens, Uma had said so.
But my power was a curse, this she did not have to say. Like any great legend, my tale began with tragedy.
In the stories later recounted from my maternal uncle, my uma had a glad-tiding the night of my birth, as all mothers of gifted children did. It was near the winter solstice in the year 495, she dreamt of light emanating from my infant body, bathing her in a cool glow. She knew the Divine had shown the power I would come to inherit: nūr, cold Heavenly light, the same spiritual power that flows through the firebird.
But that night when I sprang free of Uma’s womb, our chieftains dreamt of a world of darkness. War and destruction. She is an omen, the tribe murmured, despite my uncle the khan reprimanding their frivolous superstitions. Her mother refuses to name her, nor does her father, the Great Emperor, accept her. With his many wives and heirs, this child is but one of many. But Uma knew in her heart that blessings came with a little suffering, that was the Divine’s way. My child is neither cursed nor omen. She has the affinity of light. Uma liked her secrets. This one she tucked close to her chest.
In the spring pastures of our valley Tezmi’a, that year brought a drought that starved the lands, killing portions of herd. Other peculiar happenings sowed fear in the tribe: more raids, more deaths. When Uma suckled me, wild birds would encircle the yurt before flapping into the felt tents, spilling dried meat, spoiling the yak milk and provoking our hunting birds.
‘The girl is cursed,’ my clansmen argued.
‘The girl is simply a girl. And we are God-fearing men,’ my uncle would reprimand. ‘We blame misfortune on no one but our own sins.’
‘But the birds,’ the tribe would insist, ‘they surround the babe. She is unnatural!’ It was true – wherever I was carried there was the sweep of wings above, and birdsong from the trees.
Swaddling me close, the khan’s most favoured wife spoke. Babshah Khatun. To her, not one dared argue. ‘Enough, you superstitious fools. She is a blessing who has brought forth more birds for hunting. She is unusual; but, unusual children bear the greatest gifts. However I hear your fear. The chief folkteller has the hearts of their kinsmen, for they carry the histories of our sorrows. As your folkteller, Divine as my witness, I will make this babe my apprentice. She will carry with her the tales of your greatest joys and fears until the end of her days.’
The stern lady, though young, never broke her oaths. In irony, her oath became my curse.
In the winter quarters, the best pastures were south of the alpine lake. That year, the khan’s tribe erected their yurts and herded thousands of yaks, wild mares and lambs at the base of the harsh snow-capped mountains, amongst the rolling green alpine meadows, thin grass growing above cold dirt. From the lake, icy streams broke through the rocky grasslands of Tezmi’a.
It was my seventh Flood Festival, commemorating the day Nuh left the ark after the Great Flood. That morning, the children competed, to see whose prized hunting bird would find the keenest prey. Before long, the khan’s favoured wife interrupted and led the children up the pastures until they reached the end of the settlement of tents, toward the thick woodland.
Some of the tribe’s warriors, who’d escorted goods and cattle across the mountain pass for the emperor’s merchants, rested against the boundary of trees, waxing their compound bows. Others sipped apricot tea to fling back the wet chill, nodding to us in greeting. The khan sat with them, my uma – his sister – beside him. When she spotted our group, Uma scowled and stalked toward us.
‘O, Babshah, what senseless idea do you have now?’
Babshah Khatun merely smiled in silence. Uma placed a hand against my back, staring at the hunting birds cowing upon my shoulder. She warned, ‘Do not go too south of the mountain pass. There are patrols from the enemy clans who snatch away children like her.’
Still Babshah Khatun continued deep into the womb of the valley, past protruding boulders, and clumps of elm, into the tall deep grasses that fattened the wild onagers. Trails where humans rarely ventured, and the jinn-folk still reigned. The wind whispered into the children’s hair. The entombed roots of wizened trees sprawled through the woodlands, and whizzing sprites, those mischievous little apprentices to the long-passed fae of these lands, showered seeds to pollinate the flora. A deceivingly drowsy day for the violence that it promised. A place where the old ways still mattered and the Divine-made boundary between jinn-folk and human blurred.
Determined, I tripped along next to Babshah, resisting the urge to clasp the long end of her yak leather tunic, lest she think me not brave. Even my hunting buzzards on my shoulders canted their heads, curious.
Babshah sat squat and brushed her pale hand across the dirt. Her black hair swung with the wind, a dozen thin braids clasped in silver beads and an array of hawk feathers, not dissimilar to my own. The only difference was a camel-skin cord around her temple with a blue wooden block indicating her status as a wife of the khan.
‘Today, we will do a new type of hunt,’ Babshah declared. ‘Hunting by folktelling.’
The children murmured amongst themselves, but Babshah did not elaborate. Instead, she latched on to my hand – ‘Prepare yourself, my apprentice’ – before continuing along the fir path.
When we stopped, and it came time for our hunting pairings, my milk-sibling Haj refused to take me as a partner. He was ten years old, only three years my senior, but the gap was large enough to fuel his arrogance. He took his complaints to Babshah.
‘My uma says to stay away from her, else she will curse my bird’s game! I train with a spotted sparrowhawk. The girl trains with a pair of sooty buzzards. Smaller and useless, just like her. With all the birds that follow her, she will scare away the prey.’
‘I may be Ayşenor’s only child, but I am not useless,’ I muttered, keeping my lip from trembling.
***
Excerpted from Dawn of the Firebird by Sarah Mughal Rana, Copyright © 2025 by Sarah Mughal rana. Published by Hanover Square Press.
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About the Author
SARAH MUGHAL RANA is a Muslim author and student who completed her bachelors with honours at the University of Toronto and is now at Oxford University, studying at the intersection of economics and policy. She is a BookTok personality and the co-host of On The Write Track Podcast where she enjoys spilling tea with her favourite authors about the book world. Her debut YA novel, Hope Ablaze, published in February 2024. Outside of school, she falls down history rabbit holes and trains in traditional martial arts.
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Author Website: https://www.sarahmughalrana.net/
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