Midnight

by Joshua Rutherford

  The dull light of a sconce met her cracked eyes. As did Darya.

  “Asha!”

  Ashallah squirmed from under the door. Darya, chained to thick iron rings at the opposite wall, fought against her shackles as she clawed forward. Ashallah, rising to her feet, scooped Darya up into her arms.

  “You made it!” Darya exclaimed. “You found me. But how? There must be hundreds of buildings with hundreds of rooms within the palace walls.”

  “We heard your cries,” Ashallah stated.

  “Well, truthfully, only she did,” Rahim added as he wedged through the opening in the floor. “I only followed.”

  “But... I didn’t cry. Or yell. Or scream. I only spoke, and even then, that was just before I heard you two on the other side of the door. How could you have come so quickly?”

  Darya’s face froze, with an unspoken realization, with a sense of panic unknown before.

  “Asha,” she said as she dug her fingers into Ashallah’s arm. “You must go. Now!”

  “We will, once we break your locks.”

  “No, now!”

  “What’s the matter...”

  Darya’s lips met hers once again. With them, a flood of thoughts and dreams followed. However, there was nothing sweet or heavenly about the dreamscape. Ashallah pulled away from Darya, whose face had gone pale as the color of her skin drained from rest of her body.

  The moment between when their lips parted and she stepped away was brief, a fraction of a second at most. Yet so much happened, leading Ashallah to believe that she was losing her very sense of time. For in that span, the echo of scales and chainmail reached them, growing from a low ripple to a torrent of clanging and clapping. The massive oaken beast that had barred them from entry swung in with ease as janissaries and turquoise alike flooded the room. Rahim fell first, as his turquoise brothers-in-arms assaulted him. Then Darya, who collapsed to the floor, not from weakness of body or emotion, but from an overwhelming sense of defeat, one Ashallah had seen in veteran generals of past battles whose very hearts had given out due to utter disappointment.

  Ashallah, still stunned from the kiss and the resulting dreamscape, put her fingertips to her lips. The raised sword tips and spearheads before her gave her little pause as she contemplated the torrent of thoughts from Darya.

  Only when a chain had wrapped around her ankles did she come back to the present reality. Once again, it was too late. Her feet went out from under her. The cold tiles of the floor rushed up to her face, slamming against her cheek, her body having fallen. Then came the pairs of hands – some meaty, some lean, some coarse – all of them strong, that dug their fingers into her arms, her legs, her neck to restrain her as shackles bound her wrists and ankles.

  Ashallah was no stranger to difficult situations. While on past assignments, she had been captured, jailed, and even tortured. In such circumstances, her training had served her well. She had always survived in both mind and body, while her comrades and even her superiors had perished. The odds of this moment were no different in action or purpose of her enemies.

  For all the similarities to the past, though, her subjection in the cellar of the library proved different. Devastating it was, crushing Ashallah’s soul.

  What am I? she asked herself, her gaze seeking Darya yet finding no answers.

  Chapter 22

  Her head throbbed. She reached back, her hand seeming heavier. Only when she heard the clank of links did she remember her bondage.

  Parting her eyes, Ashallah found her vision hazy. Tears welled, creating a watery border between all before her. She could see a few figures, some tall, some short. One thing she could be certain of was the darkness.

  Somewhere, doors parted. Ashallah rubbed her eyes as she stood, struggling to focus. Her senses cleared as footsteps, possibly on granite or marble, echoed. The hollow sound told her she was in a room or hall with high ceilings. She looked up and around. Even with clearer sight, only pitch greeted her.

  The footsteps stopped.

  “My viziers advised me against coming here,” came the strong, solid voice of a man from the darkness. “Especially in your state. They said that Jaha would not approve of a man looking upon a woman – not to mention speaking to her – as long as she was unveiled. I considered their warnings, as I always try to do. And yet still, here I am.”

  Ashallah responded with silence, choosing instead to focus on her shackles. Of heavy iron, the chains that held her four appendages laid secured to iron rings in the floor. She extended her arms, her feet stepping lightly on the floor, to find she could only move a few feet in either direction.

  “Move if you must. I hope that for the time being my guards allowed you enough slack. Imprisonment can be a beast, even for a few hours, let alone an extended period. I should know.”

  One of Ashallah’s first lessons flooded back to her memory: give up nothing. Offer no acknowledgment, no words, no gestures. She sat on the ground, cross-legged, preparing her mind to wait out the man’s taunts.

  “Silence in absolution. A true warrior. I admire that. Even if you are a woman.”

  The footsteps reverberated against the stone once again. The sound drew nearer, as did the man who walked. He stopped just out of reach of Ashallah, the outline of his silhouette visible, the features of his face obscured.

  “What? Still no questions? Tsk, tsk. I’m disappointed in you, Asha.”

  Ashallah looked up but quickly looked down once more.

  “That’s right. I know you. You remain an enigma to nearly all, even that mother and sister you had in Yasem. I forget their names. Not that it matters. They’re dead anyhow.”

  Ashallah sprang to her feet to claw at the man. Her fingers swiped through the air, finding no skin nor flesh. Though still veiled in darkness, she could feel the man smirking at her failure.

  She recoiled as she fought the urge to yell and scream. She had already given him the satisfaction of acting out her rage. I will be damned to answer his words with mine.

  “Still not speaking? Very well. I have had my share of one-sided conversations in my life. This will simply be one more.”

  He lowered himself to one knee. “Give me light!”

  At that command, the snapping of flints started. Fire arrows ignited from balconies above. Ashallah braced herself for their burning bite as the unseen bowmen loosed their arrows.

  Every one of them missed her, bouncing off the stone floor to lie on the ground, burning like candles.

  Ashallah looked up to find the face of the man before her. It was similar to the dozens of statues she had seen in fountains and on the reliefs carved into ceremonious columns. It had a likeness to the imprints of the gold and silver coins of Greater Dyli. It reflected the verses of songs and poems she had heard near and far, which boasted of one of divine power, a man who claimed to serve and protect all: Jalal the Grand Sultan.

  “You now know who I am?”

  Ashallah nodded.

  “Do you know why you’re here?”

  She narrowed her eyes. Where is he going with this?

  “Do you know why you’re here – still alive – and not dead?”

  Silence met his question.

  “I would slap you right now for your insolence. That is if I were not convinced you would somehow find a way to kill me and sacrifice yourself in the process.” He extended his hand to the fire arrows, whose flames were flickering as the last of their pitch burned. “You do not fear these. You do not fear death. I know that, Asha. As a midnight warrior, I would expect nothing less of you.

  “Your stamina, your endurance of pain and suffering, will prove useful for what I have in store for you. You have to understand; you are alive and well at this moment for a reason. You are necessary to achieve a goal. Nothing more. The moment you prove not to be useful, you will end.”

  The Grand Sultan paused, as though allowing Ashallah the opportunity to say her piece. With only silence to fill the moments, he circled Ashallah, his footsteps ringing of
f the stone tiles. When he came full circle to face her once more, he tilted his head to the left, studying her in the same way an architect reads a structure to determine its stresses and weaknesses.

  “Let us talk about Darya.”

  Ashallah fought the urge to react, which she knew in itself gave away her emotions. The Sultan, sensing her unease, extending his hands outward as the last light from the fire arrows extinguished. Cast in darkness once more, he continued.

  “A turquoise such as her, in a city such as this, does not travel alone. That much was apparent upon her capture, one that followed the defeat of your comrades, Firstborne and Tirkhan alike. She, like you, chose the path of silence during her initial interrogation. She kept her mouth shut even as other turquoise taunted and screamed at her.

  “Due to our need for her gifts, we could not hurt her much. Until we touched her. And entered her mind.”

  Ashallah’s anger within boiled. She fought the urge to move, to give in to the sultan’s taunts once more. Still, she clenched her fists.

  “None of our turquoise proved up to the task. It required the efforts of several of our own Firstborne. Even two of our jinni. I must admit that her mind is strong. That is probably why her ability to dreamscape is so much more advanced than all the others under my command. Still, those that serve me wore her down, which is how we came to learn of her brother. Then you. Albeit, there is much more to know.”

  Jalal paused. He cocked his head to the right. Ashallah sensed his eyes upon her, beady orbs that propounded hate and anger. She kept her head bowed, refusing to look up at him.

  “I can see that my prodding is getting us nowhere. I could continue speaking, hoping to provoke you, with insults directed at the ones you love, calling into question your character and skills. Such methods take time, which I cannot easily afford. With the help of your beloved, I have empires to conquer. So let us try a different approach.”

  A soft sound followed. Ashallah strained to hear. It emerged first as one sound, then another, coupled with more. Noises similar in pitch and tone multiplied and coalesced.

  Suddenly, the source appeared. A black line, curving from left to right, gliding over the stone floor. A second accompanied it. Along with many more. The hiss from their mouths grew as serpents from every direction descended on her.

  Suspecting the end was near, Ashallah ventured to taunt the only one before her. “Jalal!”

  The sultan raised his hand. The approaching sea of serpents came to a standstill.

  “No one has referred to me by that name in over a thousand years.”

  “That is because none knew the truth of your background. Your family’s pitiful history. Your father’s failures.”

  She had his attention. Terse lips. A clenched jaw. Narrowed eyes, unblinking. Ashallah had seen such looks in men before, those she managed to insult before having the opportunities to open their entrails or slit their throats.

  “That’s right. You think you know me,” Ashallah continued. “But I know you. Darya taught me. So long as I draw breath, I will tell every man, woman and child I meet about the kind of coward your father was. Along with the mistake of a man he raised. So unless you want your legacy to suffer a blemish, you will kill me here and now.” Ashallah looked to the serpents collected around her. “Do it!”

  The Sultan’s eyes shifted, as though he had allowed himself to be swayed by Ashallah’s insults. She half-expected the sultan to command the vipers to descend upon her. Or she imagined him drawing a knife to finish the job himself.

  Neither happened. Instead, he regained his composure, much to Ashallah’s dismay.

  “A brave effort, to stir the thoughts of one’s enemy,” the sultan proclaimed as he lowered his hand and rested it behind his back. “I have done the same with my adversaries. I encourage my generals to follow suit, although not one of them has shown such strength of words as you have. If only you were a man. You would command the best of my janissaries.”

  “If I were a man,” Ashallah retorted. “Greater Dyli would have a different sultan on the throne.”

  “Yes, I do believe you could lift up another to my position. On the other hand, you could take the throne yourself. Again, only if you had a member between your legs. Alas, you do not. So you find yourself in your position, while I stand here, watching you admire mine.”

  “I’ve never admired you.”

  “Yet you fought in my name. You trained. You battled. You killed, many times your fellow women, all to further the reaches of my empire. You, a warrior of midnight, a woman amongst women, slew your own kind.”

  At that, Ashallah paused. Her anger had mounted within her. Her rage had stoked the embers of an inferno within. She wanted to break her chains. Scream a battle cry with all the might of her lungs. And slit the throat of the sultan and all his minions on the gallery.

  The Sultan, sensing her fury, knelt, his eyes level with her. “That’s it,” he urged. “Anger. Frustration. Madness. Feel all of it. Let down your guard. Free your emotions while your mind runs wild with thoughts. Lose control of yourself. It will make this next part that much easier.”

  With the flick of his hand, the serpents – which until then, had been waiting – closed in upon Ashallah. Encircling her, their hissing grew to a pitch she had never heard. Gripping her chains tightly, Ashallah braced herself for the sting of their fangs and the surge of pain to come.

  Suddenly, in a puff of smoke, the first wave of serpents disintegrated. Then the second, along with those behind them, until the whole collection of slithering creatures vanished from her sight, replaced by small black clouds. Dense they were, like a fog of pitch and tar. Even the sultan, who a moment before was but feet away, became obscured.

  “The unique thing about the jinn,” the sultan began, his voice radiating from all sides. “Is that when they do die - as all creatures must – what they leave behind are not bodies that decompose like those of our ancestors. No, that would be too predictable. Rather, they return to the land of Jaha from whence they came. Granules they become, of many colors.

  “Such sand has its uses. When I discovered the tombs of the seventy-seven jinn, I also discovered the remains of their forefathers and brothers, many of whom had given their lives to entomb them in a safe and sacred site. Their granules possess the power they exerted to grant their final wish. Some fulfilled wishes related to knowledge, allowing those who ingest it – yes, ingest – to increase their ability to think a thousand-fold. Other jinn died with strength the last gift they imparted. As you can imagine, recipients of such granules can increase their power exponentially.

  “There are those jinn who wishes were more nefarious in nature. One jinni laid flame to a mighty city, so that his remains became combustible, explosive. Another spoiled the food stores and ruined the crops of an entire nation. In doing so, decay comes to those who partake of his dust. Lastly, there is my favorite. A pinch of sand from this jinni... well, you’ll see...”

  A scattering of dust sailed above Ashallah. For an instant, it hung there, as though red stars against the night sky. As the moment passed, the black clouds around Ashallah began to swirl. Slowly, the clouds churned. Then, propelled by some unseen force, the black mass around her suddenly accelerated. The cyclone enveloped the red granules above. Faster and faster still it spun, creating a black wall streaked with red lines.

  The sound of iron clanking against iron drew Ashallah’s attention from the storm before her. She looked down to see her chains rattling as the cyclone swept over the rings that secured them to the floor. Closer it drew to her, its speed increasing as its radius diminished.

  Then it paused. Suspended in midair. Ashallah saw every red granule before her sparkling, like rubies shining in the midday sun. They stood against the pitch black in striking detail. She almost thought them beautiful.

  Her sight went dark. Almost instantly. What had happened occurred so quickly that Ashallah could not be sure what happened, except that the mass around her – the black
clouds, the red dust – had swept in, to seep into her mouth, ears and eyes. An avalanche of pain and suffering, one that robbed her of sight and sound, taste and touch.

  Is this desert poison? she asked herself, remembering the blend of mustard and sage that had incapacitated her not so long ago. No, the colors were too dark. This is something different. Something much worse.

  Ashallah collapsed under the weight of it all. Her last memory not being sensory, but a thought, plea to one she never spoke to before in her life.

  “Jaha,” she said, perhaps aloud, or at least to herself. “Help me.”

  Chapter 23

  Ashallah had always prided herself on the battles in which she prevailed and escaped unscathed, uncut. Some of those engagements that resulted in scars gave her moments of nostalgia as well, so that when she was with a concubine or a fellow warrior, she would point to a blemish and boast of its origin.

  Only one mark provoked pause in Ashallah, even hesitation. Her first burn.

  It stemmed from a wound she received while on her third scouting mission, her first venture into the former Renaikan city-state of Jydan. Located in southwestern Greater Dyli, Jydan had been a hotbed of insurgent activity during the early days of Ashallah’s career. Many Renaikan assassins and spies were rumored to have frequented its bazaars, cafes and even temples before going on their clandestine assignments. Ashallah, along with five other midnight warriors, had been tasked with identifying sympathizers of such enemies and reporting their findings to the Dylian general Silan.

  The mission started out as many others, marked by long periods of boredom and dead ends. Ashallah visited many a café, tavern and house of pleasure, always watching and listening, yet finding nothing. Vistas of smoke-filled rooms and the calls of wild, sex-driven men comprised her nights, while aimless wanderings through bazaars and fecal-lined streets marked her days. Only the occasional rendezvous updates from her fellow soldiers broke the monotony, one that would last until the completion of their mission.

  Early on the morning of her last day in Jydan, Ashallah had found the rendezvous spot her and her comrades visited absent of her sisters. She waited for an hour before venturing into the surrounding streets and alleys. When her search turned up nothing, the possibilities of what may have happened streamed into her mind, one still raw with inexperience. She forgot her training as she hurried through the streets, drawing attention to herself. She even went so far as to ask strangers about her comrades, another green mistake.