The Seven Keys of Balabad

by Paul Haven

  “Whatever you say,” said the driver.

  The man reached into the pocket of his beige shalwar kameez and pulled out a book of matches and a broken cigarette. Then he leaned back in the vinyl seat so that he had a view through the mirror of the hotel's comings and goings.

  After about five minutes, the driver turned around and smiled.

  “So why you watching those kids?” he asked. “Are you detective? You need assistant?”

  “Shut up,” said the man.

  “Sorry,” said the driver.

  They sat in silence after that, until suddenly they heard a gate creak open behind them. In the mirror, the man watched as the three children rushed out of the hotel.

  A guard in a crumpled green uniform pulled himself off a plastic seat and walked into the street. He threw his hand in the air and hailed a rickshaw. After a few words from the doorman, the children climbed inside and the rickshaw pulled away again, shooting off down the street.

  “Wait here!” hissed the man. He flicked away his cigarette, climbed out of the backseat, and ran down the street toward the hotel.

  The guard smiled as the man approached, and he smiled even wider when he handed him a crisp bill. The rickshaw driver watched him fold it up and stuff it in his pocket, and wondered who had gotten the bigger tip.

  A moment later, the man in the gray turban ran back down the street. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small cell phone. He dialed a familiar number.

  “Have you found them?” said a breathless voice on the other end of the line.

  “I have, boss,” said Suavec.

  “What about the key?” said the voice excitedly. “Have you got the key?”

  “If my calculations are correct,” said Suavec, “they should be bringing it to you themselves in about ten minutes.”

  uilt on the hillside overlooking the city, the Royal Palace could still boast the most breathtaking views in Balabad. To the east loomed the Ghozar Mountains, their craggy peaks covered in snow, even in summer. To the west lay golden fields of wheat and green pastures filled with grazing sheep. Just below the palace were the royal gardens, and beyond them the city itself, sprawled out like an enormous, faded carpet in the afternoon sun.

  A seventeenth- century visitor, standing on a marble porch amid the garden's blooming bougainvillea trees, twisting vines, and beds of snapdragons and tulips, had once famously remarked: “If there is a paradise on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this,” and the place had been known as the Gardens of Paradise ever since.

  In those glorious days, it more than deserved its name.

  Water trickled through long, narrow channels that crisscrossed the gardens, which lay in three terraces below the palace. Peacocks strutted along the stone paths that bordered the edges of the stream, spreading their regal tails.

  Wide beds with exotic flowers from as far away as Africa and China buzzed with honeybees, and colorful birds probed the bright hibiscus petals with their long beaks. At the top of the garden, on a clipped green lawn, stood a dazzling open-air mausoleum with six massive pillars and a roof of delicately carved white marble. In the center of the mausoleum was the tomb of Hagur I, the very first ruler of Balabad.

  Nobles strolling through the terraced grounds would sip chilled lemon juice and rosewater sherbet, the perfect thing to quench a parched throat. At night, under the brilliant stars, musicians played softly for the king's guests, the sounds from their strings drifting down to the city below.

  But whatever was heavenly about the gardens in those days, it was long gone by the time the rickshaw carrying Oliver, Alamai, and Zee from the Mandabak Hotel pulled up at the ruined palace gates just before six o'clock.

  The palace, ravaged by war over the centuries, had finally been abandoned when the king was forced into exile a decade earlier.

  The flower beds were overgrown with shrubs and weeds, and the stone paths had cracked or been blown apart. Even from this distance, if you turned around and looked at the city below, you could see the scars of war: the abandoned buildings, the crumbling streets, the brown squares that had once been parks.

  Zee pushed the gate open with a creak and stepped into the garden.

  “You two follow me,” he said. “But whatever you do, be quiet.”

  “What exactly are we looking for?” whispered Oliver.

  “Anything,” said Zee. “A piece of clothing. The smell of food. Any sign of life.”

  Zee scanned the garden grounds.

  “Come on, I want to show you something,” he said.

  He led the way through the tangled undergrowth and across a small stone footbridge over an empty canal.

  “Look!” Zee said when they reached the other side of the bridge. He pointed to a clutch of low trees at the edge of the garden, their branches weighed down with ripe purple fruit.

  “Damsons,” Zee hissed.

  He trotted over to the trees and reached up into the prickly branches, pulling down three small pieces of fruit and handing one each to Oliver and Alamai.

  Inside, the fruit was green and fleshy, the taste tart, like a sour plum.

  “They are practically the only thing in the garden still living from my father's day,” Zee said. “The damson is a hardy tree, a survivor.”

  “And this is the only place is Balabad where they grow?” said Alamai.

  “I believe so,” Zee replied.

  “I must say, Zaheer Mohammed Warzat ul- Hazai, you are almost as sharp a detective as your friend,” said Alamai, her chin covered in damson juice.

  Zee shrugged his shoulders, but Oliver could have sworn he saw his cheeks flush for a split second.

  “Come on. Let's check out the palace,” he said. “If Mr. Haji is here, I bet that is where they are holding him.”

  Zee cut across to the middle of the garden, where a wide marble staircase led up to the palace. The three children tiptoed up the steps, the great building slowly coming into view as they climbed.

  Even in ruins, it was an impressive sight.

  It was as long as a football field and three stories high, with two looming towers on either end. The roof had been blown away during the war, leaving behind only a twisted iron skeleton. Where once there had been graceful, arched windows, there were now just darkened holes. They stared at Oliver, Alamai, and Zee like dead men's eyes, warning them not to come any closer.

  A shudder went down Oliver's spine as he gazed up at the wrecked building.

  Suddenly, he thought he saw something stirring in one of the second-floor windows, but by the time his eyes had focused, the figure was gone, if it had ever been there at all.

  Oliver grabbed Zee by the shoulder.

  “Can I ask a stupid question?” he whispered.

  “What is it?” said Zee.

  “Let's say we do find Mr. Haji. What are we supposed to do then?” said Oliver. “I mean, it's not like Hugo Schleim is just going to hand him over to us and tell us to have a nice day.”

  “Of course not,” said Zee.

  “So, I mean, maybe we should call the police or something,” Oliver said. “You know, instead of, uh, going in there all alone.”

  “Oliver,” said Zee, as if explaining himself to a young child. “Maybe that's how they do things in New York City, but it's not how we do it here. I assure you that if we call the Baladi police department and tell them we are looking for a guy with cold hands who likes to eat damsons, and who, by the way, we think is holding our friend in the ruins of the Royal Palace, there is no way they are going to believe us. They'll either laugh at us or arrest us for wasting their time.”

  “He's right,” said Alamai. “We at least need to know for sure that Mr. Haji is here. After that, we can call the authorities.”

  Oliver took a deep breath.

  “All right,” he said. “But I have to say I have a bad feeling about this.”

  he front door of the palace had been blown out during the fighting and lay in pieces on the ground, leaving the high, arched d
oorway open and dark. Zee led the way through the door and into what was once the palace's grand reception hall.

  The walls had originally been carved with marble, but they had been stripped down to the plaster. The ceiling had an enormous hole in it, perhaps the size of a sofa, through which you could see the floor above. There was a shattered chandelier lying on its side in front of a sweeping staircase, but other than that, any furniture that had once graced the room had vanished.

  The children huddled close together in the huge hallway, glancing up at the ceiling and at the staircase, which climbed into the gloom.

  On either side of them, dark corridors led to the opposite wings of the palace.

  “Which way should we go?” said Alamai.

  “I guess it doesn't really matter,” said Zee.

  Oliver looked from left to right. Neither seemed like a particularly good option.

  “Man, I wish we'd brought a flashlight,” he mumbled.

  Zee set off down the corridor to the east wing, with Oliver and Alamai close behind him. The children crept slowly along, the wooden floor creaking under their feet. Oliver grabbed the wall to steady himself, and a piece of plaster crumbled off in his hand.

  Zee stopped in front of the first door and pushed it back with his foot. Behind it was a large room with tall windows and a huge marble fireplace. Wallpaper peeled from the walls, which were pocked with bullet holes. An overturned easy chair lay in the middle of the room with three of its legs missing.

  Oliver poked his head in quickly, then pulled it right back out again.

  “Well, he's not in here,” he said.

  “Quiet,” said Zee. He stepped over the threshold and looked around, kicking pieces of plaster aside and peering behind the chair. Finally, he returned to the door.

  “I guess he's not,” he said, and headed onward down the hall.

  But the next room didn't contain any sign of Mr. Haji, either, and neither did the one after that. Each door led to another abandoned room, and each room was more desolate than the last. Almost nothing remained from the days when the palace played host to sultans and kings, prime ministers and presidents. All that was left now were the remnants of war—a pair of soldier's boots in one room, an abandoned military radio in another.

  The children looked in every room along the corridor, but there were no signs of life. They searched the west wing but found nothing there, either. By the time they got back to the grand hall, the sun had fallen low in the sky, casting the room in pools of grim shadow. Oliver glanced nervously at his watch. It had just gone seven o'clock. If he didn't get back soon, his parents would start to wonder where he was.

  “This place is enormous,” said Oliver softly. “How are we ever going to find him?”

  “I don't know,” whispered Zee. “And it's going to get a lot harder in the dark.”

  There were still two whole floors to check. It would take hours, and that was assuming they didn't fall through a hole while they scrambled about in the darkness.

  “There's no way we are going to get through the entire palace tonight,” said Oliver. “Maybe we should come back first thing tomorrow.”

  Zee gazed through the palace's empty main door at the twinkling lights of the city below. He ran his hands through his hair.

  “I hate to think that Mr. Haji might be here somewhere and that we would leave him,” he said.

  “You're right,” said Oliver. “But we don't even know for sure that he's here.”

  Oliver turned to Alamai.

  “What do you thi—” he began, but Alamai wasn't listening. She was staring past the destroyed chandelier and into the shadows beneath the stairs.

  “Look at that!” she hissed.

  “What?” said Oliver.

  “Over there,” said Alamai.

  Oliver and Zee followed her gaze across the room. Just above the floor was a thin crack of dim light.

  “How did we miss that?” said Zee.

  “Perhaps it only became visible in the darkness,” said Alamai.

  She crept softly across the hall, Zee and Oliver behind her. The faint outline of a small door emerged, like the entrance to a pantry closet. Alamai reached for the knob, and before Oliver or Zee could stop her, she had pushed the door open.

  The three children froze as it swung back with a creak, a draft of cold, musty air shooting out at them across the threshold.

  “My God!” Zee exclaimed.

  “Wow!” said Oliver.

  “I think we have found what we are looking for,” said Alamai.

  Behind the door was a narrow stone staircase leading down, and at the top of the stairs was a flickering gas lantern, its flame turned down low. The lantern could mean only one thing: there was somebody else in the palace with them.

  “Whoever left this lantern is either upstairs in the palace, or they've left the building. This might be our chance,” said Alamai. “Who wants to lead the way?”

  She looked from Oliver to Zee.

  Oliver remembered the shadowy figure in the second-floor window and shuddered. The last glow of the sun had vanished from the sky, and the palace had sunk into darkness. Zee fingered the chain around his neck, and Oliver wiped his sweaty palms on his shalwar kameez. Neither said a word.

  With a huff, Alamai stepped forward and grabbed the lantern off the step. A moment later, she was creeping down the stairs, steadying herself against the stone wall.

  “Wait for me!” whispered Zee.

  “Right behind you,” said Oliver.

  As the three children descended the narrow steps, sour air filled Oliver's nostrils and a dank chill seeped into his bones. The faint sound of classical music echoed hollowly through the gloom. It was far from soothing.

  “Wagner,” whispered Zee. “The Ring Cycle.”

  “No kidding,” said Oliver. “Now, shut up.”

  The stairwell opened out onto a vast underground chamber with a vaulted brick ceiling and a floor made of cold stone. Alamai turned the flame up as high as it could go, but it still only cast a small pool of light.

  There was a chair propped up against the wall next to the stairs, with a newspaper folded up on top of it. Next to the chair were a glass of water and the silver wrapping paper left over from a takeout kebab. Alamai pointed to them silently.

  Slowly, the children crept into the room, huddling so close together that they were practically on each other's shoes. There was a wide table in front of them, and on top of it sat a dark wooden chest. Next to the chest was an iPod connected to a set of small portable speakers, belting out music in the dark.

  Suddenly, Zee stopped in his tracks. He pointed to the near wall.

  “Give me that lantern!” he whispered to Alamai.

  As the children got closer, the end of a rolled-up carpet came into view. The roll was as high as Oliver's thigh and stretched back into the shadows.

  “You don't think—” said Alamai.

  “I do,” said Zee.

  “The Sacred Carpet of Agamon!” whispered Oliver.

  Zee bent down and pulled back the corner of the carpet to reveal an elaborate red and gold border.

  By the time they got back to the grand hall, the sun had fallen low in the sky casting the room in pools of grim shadow.

  “So, we were right!” said Alamai. “Mr. Haji must be here somewhere.”

  No sooner had she said it than they heard a noise from the far corner of the room. It was a faint rustling, like a mouse trying to escape from a paper bag. Zee spun around, the lantern swinging the children's shadows up against the wall behind them like contorted hand puppets.

  As he tiptoed toward the sound, the rustling got louder and more desperate. Soon it was accompanied by a soft banging, like the fall of a hammer.

  “Grrrumphh! Grrumph!” said a voice in the darkness.

  Zee held the lantern up, and the three children rushed forward.

  “Mr. Haji!” Oliver shouted.

  The carpet salesman was seated on a heavy chair, his ha
nds bound behind his back and his feet tied to the legs. His shalwar kameez was covered in dirt, and his gray turban lay crookedly on his head. He had a black handkerchief over his eyes and a gag in his mouth, making it impossible for him to speak.

  The children ran across the room as quickly as they could. Zee put the lantern down on the floor and pulled off Mr. Haji's blindfold and gag. Alamai ran in back of the chair and started to untie the rope around Mr. Haji's hands. Oliver threw his arms around the carpet salesman and gave him an enormous bear hug.

  “Boys! Boys! And my dear Alamai!” Mr. Haji whispered when the gag was removed. “What on earth are you doing here? How did you find me?”

  “Are you okay?” said Oliver.

  “Yes. Yes,” said Mr. Haji. “I am fine. A little sore from sitting in this chair, but nothing serious. I can't believe you are here!”

  “We came as soon as we figured out where they were holding you,” said Oliver.

  “It was Oliver who figured it out,” said Zee.

  “No, really, it was Zee,” said Oliver. “And Alamai got us on the right track.”

  Mr. Haji looked at the children in amazement. Quickly, his face turned serious.

  “You shouldn't have come,” he whispered urgently. “These are dangerous people.”

  “Do you know where they've gone?” asked Zee.

  “No, but they have not gone far,” Mr. Haji replied.

  “These people have no honor. They know no limits,” the carpet salesman continued. “There is no telling what they would do if they found you here. You must leave now!”

  “Another minute,” said Alamai, “and we can all leave together.”

  She was doing everything she could to undo the rope around the carpet salesman's hands, but it was knotted well and difficult to loosen. Zee bent down and started to work on freeing the old man's legs. He glanced back at Alamai nervously.

  “Quickly, Alamai! Quickly!” he said. “We don't have much ti—”

  No sooner had Zee spoken than a wheedling voice cut through the darkness.

  “Indeed you don't,” said the voice. “In fact, I believe your time has entirely run out.”