The Will of the Wanderer

by Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman

  “Your wish is my command, Princess,” said Fedj, bowing humbly. “In the morning you will find upon the floor of your tent what appears to be a small, brass charcoal brazier. Take up the brazier in your hand, tap it gently three times with your fingernail, and call the name ‘Usti.’ Your djinn will appear.”

  “I would prefer a female.”

  “Alas, Princess. The djinniyeh are the highest ranking of our kind and rarely deign to have dealings with mortals. And now, will you return to the bridal tent?” Fedj asked, holding his breath in anxiety.

  “I will,” said Zohra magnanimously.

  Smiling broadly, Fedj patted the Princess’s hand. The djinn could not see Zohra’s face, hidden as it was by the folds of the headcloth she wore, or he might have been less pleased with himself.

  “Shall I transport you, Princess?”

  “No, you take care of the horse.” Zohra stroked the animal’s nose with regret, “We will have our ride another day,” she promised the stallion.

  “What about the guards?” Fedj gestured to several stalwart men of her father’s tribe who were standing around the tent. At that moment he noted that one of the guards was leaning at an odd angle against a straggly-looking palm tree. “Ah, I see you’ve taken care of them. He’s not dead?”

  “No!” Zohra said scornfully. “It is a magic spell used to soothe teething babies to sleep. He may wake screaming for his mother”the princess shrugged—”but he will wake. Farewell, Fedj.”

  Zohra began to make her way down the side of the Tel, slipping in the loose sand and gravel. Suddenly she stopped and looked back up at the djinn. “By the way, how is my father? I heard he was wounded in the fight.”

  “He is well, Princess,” Fedj answered, noting that Zohra had not asked this question earlier. “The sword thrust penetrated no vital areas.”

  “It would have served him right if it had,” Zohra remarked coolly. Turning, she made her way down the side of the hill, heedlessly trampling the Rose of the Prophet beneath her booted feet.

  Zohra’s mother, dead these ten years, had been an intelligent, strong-willed, and beautiful woman. A powerful sorceress, she was not only Jaafar’s head wife but his favorite wife as well, bearing him many fine sons and a single daughter.

  This one daughter, Jaafar used to say sadly, gave him far more trouble than any of his sons. Intelligent and strong-willed, and even more skilled in magic, Zohra, at the age of twelve, had the misfortune to lose the influence of her mother. Fatima could have shown her daughter how to use that intelligence for the good of her people, how to use the magic in order to help them survive their harsh way of life. Instead, without her mother’s guidance, Zohra used her gifts to run wild.

  The men of her tribe were responsible for the sheep, herding them from pasture to pasture, driving off predators. The women were responsible for the camp, using their magic in domestic matters from the building of the yurts to the cooking of food and the healing of the sick. Zohra found women’s work boring, the confinement of the seraglio stifling. Dressing in her older brother’s cast-off clothes, she constantly escaped the harem, preferring to play at the boys’ rough sports. Jaafar’s wives dared not correct the girl, for Zohra’s doting father—grieving over his favorite wife’s death—could not bear to see the daughter who resembled her made unhappy.

  “She will outgrow it,” he used to say fondly when his wives came to him with tales of Zohra seen running among the hills with the sheepdogs, the skin of her face and arms brown as that of a boy’s.

  Time passed, Zohra outgrew her brother’s cast-off clothes, but she did not outgrow her wild and rebellious nature. Her brothers—grown men with wives of their own—were now scandalized by their sister’s unwomanly behavior and tried to persuade Jaafar to control his daughter. Jaafar himself began to think uneasily that somewhere along the road he had made a mistake, but he could not figure out how to correct it. (His sons had suggested a sound beating. The one time Jaafar had attempted to beat Zohra, she had grabbed the stick from his hands and threatened to beat him!)

  When Zohra was sixteen, the Sheykh let it be known among the Hrana that he was interested in contracting his daughter’s marriage. This announcement precipitated a sudden outbreak of weddings in the tribe, the eligible men all hurrying to marry someone else—anyone else! Those ending up without brides disappeared into the hills, preferring to live among the sheep. They returned only when it was known that Zohra had publicly vowed to Hazrat Akhran that no man would ever possess her.

  Moaning the usual—that he was cursed—Jaafar gave up all hope of changing his daughter and retired to his tent. Zohra, triumphant, continued to roam the hills dressed as a young man— her long black hair tangled and windblown, her skin deeply tanned from the sun, her body growing lithe and strong. She was twenty-two years old and could proudly boast that no man had laid a hand on her.

  Then her world collapsed. The Wandering God abandoned her, casting her into the arms of her enemy as if she had been nothing more than a slave. She had refused to marry Khardan, of course, and would have run away from her home the moment she heard the news had not Fedj set himself to guard her day and night.

  Then came the storm, terrifying her father and the rest of the weak-hearted cowards of her tribe. Jaafar decreed that she would marry Khardan and in this he stood firm, the ‘efreets scaring him more than his daughter. Leaving the sheep with a few guards in the hills, the rest of the Hrana tribe made the long journey into the middle of the desert to the Tel, dragging their princess every degrading inch of the way.

  These thoughts and memories a jumble in her mind, Zohra stopped again, halfway to the bridal tent. She had very nearly made good her escape this time. Why not try again? Surely Fedj would be occupied with watching the men. . . .

  Biting her lip, looking at the bridal tent, Zohra sighed. Fedj’s words returned to her. If you do not go back to your people, they and perhaps all the people of the desert are doomed. Although at times the princess thought her people as stupid as the sheep they tended, she loved her tribe fiercely. She didn’t understand it. It seemed ludicrous. How could they be in such danger? But if they were, it would not be she who brought the wrath of the God down upon her people!

  Zohra felt pleased with herself; she was making a noble sacrifice, and—by Sul—the Hrana would never be allowed to forget it!

  Creeping past the slumbering guard, the princess crawled beneath the opening left between the tent wall and the felt floor. The tent flaps were lowered. Outside she could hear the groom’s drunken procession wending its way through the camp, coming closer and closer. Stripping off the caftan and trousers and hurriedly stuffing them beneath a cushion, Zohra dressed herself in the silken bridal gown. Adorning herself with her jewelry, the princess sat before her mirror and began brushing out her waistlong black hair.

  To be head wife. . . wife of the Calif. . .

  Zohra smiled at her reflection.

  She would make this Khardan wish he had never been born!

  Chapter 6

  The desert slept in the moonlight, languishing like a woman in her lover’s arms. Khardan breathed deeply, joyfully inhaling the air scented with the smoke of burning juniper, roasting meats, and the elusive, mysterious fragrance of the desert itself.

  He called to mind a story about a nomad who had become so exceedingly wealthy that he moved to the city. The nomad built a splendid palace, causing each room to have the perfume of thousands of crushed flowers blended with the clay of its walls. A visitor entering room after room was overwhelmed with the scents of roses, orchid, orange blossoms. Finally, however, the visitor came to the last room, which had no windows or doors but was open to the air.

  “This,” said the nomad proudly, “is my room!” He drew a deep, satisfied breath.

  The visitor sniffed curiously. “But I smell nothing,” he said, puzzled.

  “The scent of the desert,” replied the nomad with wistful longing.

  And the desert had a fragrance—a clean, s
harp perfume that was the smell of the wind and the sun and the sand and the sky. Khardan breathed again and again. He was young and alive. It was his wedding night. He was being awaited by a virgin of twenty-two who, though reputedly spirited, was also reputedly extremely beautiful. The thought was more intoxicating to him than the qumiz.

  The Calif had not seen Zohra, nor had any of the men of his tribe. But he knew what she looked like. Or at least he supposed he did. Once Majiid had made his will known that his son would marry the Hrana’s princess—Khardan had secretly sent Pukah, his djinn, to investigate.

  Hovering about the shepherd’s camp, completely invisible, the djinn followed a veiled Zohra for days, and at last his patience was rewarded when the woman—out on one of her solitary rambles—decided to strip off her clothes and bathe in a rushing stream. The djinn spent an afternoon observing her, then went— not to his master—but to Fedj, Jaafar’s djinn.

  Pukah found the older immortal lounging inside his ring. Although somewhat smaller and more cramped than most dwellings of the djinn, the ring suited Fedj to perfection. He was an orderly djinn, liking things neatly arranged, each in its proper place. The ring was sumptuously decorated, but it was not cluttered with furniture—as were some immortal dwellings. A carved wooden chair or two, a bench with silken cushions for his bed, a fine hubble-bubble pipe in the corner, and several very rare tapestries embellishing the ring’s golden walls made up the djinn’s establishment. .

  “Salaam aleikum, O Great One.” Pukah performed the obeisance due to this older and higher-ranking immortal. “May I enter?”

  A djinn may not cross the threshold of the dwelling place of another unless he has been invited.

  “What do you want?” Fedj, drawing smoke up through the water of the hubble-bubble pipe, glanced at Pukah with distaste. He neither liked nor trusted the young djinn and liked and trusted him still less when Pukah was respectful and polite.

  . “I have been sent on an errand from my master, the Calif,” replied Pukah humbly. “And knowing your wisdom, I am seeking advice about how to discharge my errand, O Intelligent One.”

  Fedj scowled. “You may enter, I suppose. But don’t get the idea that just because our tribes are uniting means anything else but enmity exists between us. Your master could marry a thousand daughters of my master and I would just as soon see the eyes in his head eaten by ants as not. And that goes for your eyes too.”

  “A blessing upon your eyes as well, O Fedj the Magnificent,” said Pukah, seating himself cross-legged on a cushion.

  “Well, what do you want?” said Fedj, glaring at the young djinn, not certain but having the feeling he’d been insulted. “Be quick. There’s a redolent odor of horse in here I find nauseating.”

  “My master requested that I view his bride and ascertain her beauty,” said Pukah glibly, his face smooth as goat’s milk.

  Fedj tensed. Slowly he lowered the stem of the hubblebubble from his mouth, his enjoyment of his quiet smoke ruined. “Well, have you seen her?”

  “Yes, O Exalted One,” Pukah replied.

  “Then return to your master and tell him he is marrying the most beautiful of women and leave me in peace,” Fedj said, lounging back among his cushions.

  “I would that I could, O Peerless One,” Pukah said sadly.

  “As I have said, I have seen the princess. . . .”

  “And are not her eyes the soft and gentle eyes of the gazelle?” demanded Fedj.

  Pukah shook his head. “The eyes of a prowling leopard.” Fedj flushed in anger. “Her lips, red as the rose!”

  “Red as the persimmon,” said Pukah, his mouth puckering. “Her hair, black as the feathers of the ostrich-”

  “The feathers of the vulture.”

  “Her breasts, white as the snows of the mountain tops.”

  “That much I’ll concede. But,” Pukah added sadly, “after viewing her from the neck up, my master may never get that far down.”

  “So what?” Fedj retorted. “He’s been ordered to marry her and marry her he will, be she as ugly as the bustard. Or does he want to contend with another of Hazrat Akhran’s ‘warnings’?”

  “My master has the courage of ten thousand men,” returned Pukah loftily. “He offered to challenge the God, Himself, in single combat, but his father forbade and my master is a most dutiful son.”

  “Humpf!” snorted Fedj.

  “But if I return with a report like this . . . well”—Pukah sighed-”I cannot be held responsible for the consequences.”

  “Let the hotheaded Calif fight Hazrat Akhran,” Fedj sneered. “I will enjoy watching the ‘efreets rip his arms from his body and wipe his face with the bloody stumps.”

  “Alas, I fear you would miss the spectacle, O Salty One,” said Pukah. “I doubt if much would be visible from the bottom of the Kurdin Sea.”

  Fedj glowered at the young djinn, who gazed at him with limpid, innocent eyes. “What do you want?”

  “Flying on the wings of love, I will return to my master and tell him that his bride-to-be is truly the loveliest of women with eyes of the gazelle, lips of roses, breasts of whitest snow, thighs—”

  “What do you know of her thighs?” Fedj roared.

  Pukah bowed his turbaned head to the ground. “Forgive me. I was carried away by my enchantment over the beauty of your mistress.”

  “Well,” continued Fedj, eyeing the djinn warily, “you will tell your master this—in exchange for what?”

  “Your thanks are all I desire—”

  “And I’m Sul. What do you want.”

  “If you insist on giving me some reward, I ask only that you promise to do me a like favor some day, O Magnanimous One,” Pukah said, his nose pressed into the carpet.

  “I would sooner cut out my tongue than make such a promise to the likes of you!”

  “Hazrat Akhran might be, able to assist you in that,” Pukah said gravely.

  Remembering the God’s threat if the djinn failed in his assigned task, Fedj choked.

  “Very well,” the djinn snarled, fighting a momentary longing to grab up Pukah and stuff him bodily into the hubble-bubble pipe. “Now leave.”

  “You agree to do me a like favor someday?” Pukah persisted, knowing that a “very well” would not be acceptable as evidence before a higher tribunal of djinn in case Fedj ever tried to worm out of his agreement.

  “I agree . . . to do you. . . a . . . favor. . . “ muttered Fedj sourly.

  Pukah smiled sweetly. Rising to his feet, the young djinn exhibited every sign of respect, backing out of the ring, his hands pressed together over his forehead. “Bilhana! Wishing you joy! Bilshifa! Wishing you health!”

  “Wishing you devoured by demons!” muttered Fedj, but he waited to say this until Pukah had vanished. Moodily the elder djinn sought solace in his pipe once more, only to discover that the charcoal had gone out.

  Now, on this moonlit night, his wedding night, Khardan approached the bridal tent, images of his bride—as described by an effusive Pukah—filling his mind and causing his blood to burn.

  So what if she was the daughter of a shepherd? She was a beautiful daughter by his djinn’s account, and anyway, this marriage only had to last until some wretched cactus flower bloomed. That would be, when? A matter of a few weeks until spring?

  I will amuse myself with her until then, Khardan reflected, and if she grows wearisome, I will take a wife of my own choosing and relegate this shepherd’s daughter to her proper place. If she proves too difficult, I will simply return her to her father.

  But that was in the future. For now, there was the wedding night.

  Turning to face his companions, who were weaving unsteadily on their feet, hanging on to each other’s shoulders, Khardan bid them farewell. Sending him forth with several final, ribald suggestions, the men of the Akar turned and staggered off, never noticing that several cold-sober Hrana left the shadows to follow them.

  Khardan reached the bridal tent just as the moon attained its zenith. The
guards—members of the bride’s tribe—stared stonily straight ahead, refusing to look at him as he approached. Khardan, grinning, wished them an impertinent, “Emshi besselema— good night,” pushed past them, shoved aside the flap of the bridal tent, and entered.

  A soft light glowed within the tent. The fragrance of jasmine met his nostrils, blended—oddly—with the faint smell of horse. His bride lay reclining upon the cushions of the marriage bed. In the dim light she was a shadowy figure against the pure white of the bridal sheets. Struck by a sudden thought, Khardan turned and poked his head out the tent flap.

  “In the morning,” he said to the Hrana, “enter and see by the blood upon this sheet that I have done what you sheep followers could not do; see what it is to be a man!”

  One of the guards, with a bitter curse, made a lunge for his scimitar. The sudden appearance of Fedj, springing up out of the sand, his arms folded across his massive chest, caused the Hrana to contain himself.

  “Leave,” the djinn commanded, “I will stand guard this night.”

  Fedj did not do this out of love for Khardan. At this moment he would have enjoyed nothing more than seeing the Hrana’s blade rip the braggart Calif from crotch to throat.

  “Akhran commands,” he reminded the guards.

  Muttering, the Hrana left. The djinn, full seven feet tall, took his place before the tent.

  Khardan, laughing, ducked back inside and shut the tent flaps. Turning, he approached the bed of his bride.

  She was dressed in her white wedding gown. The light sparkled off the golden threads of the elaborate embroidery that lined the hem of gown and veil. Jewels sparkled on her hands and arms, a band of gold held her veil upon her head. Drawing nearer, Khardan could see the swelling curves of her breasts rising and falling beneath the folds of the filmy material that swathed her body, the full curve of her hips as she lay upon the bed.

  Sinking down upon the cushions beside Zohra, Khardan reached out his hand and gently removed the white veil from her face. He could feel her trembling, and his excitement mounted.