“Magic!” exclaimed Shahrayar. “Why should that be?”
“Because the king did not do as he proclaimed, and all for the sake of a story,” the boy replied. “What else but magic could make a true king go back on his own word?”
At this, the chamberlain hissed, “Silence, you impertinent ruffian.”
“Leave him be,” Shahrayar commanded. He took a turn about the room, his expression thoughtful. “Tell me, my young fellow,” he said at last. “May not a king simply change his mind?”
“But—,” the boy said, then broke off.
“It’s all right,” Shahrayar said. “Go on.”
“Surely a king must be strong,” the boy said. “What he commands must come to pass, for his word is law. Who will respect him if he’s always changing his mind?”
“But what if in changing his mind, he rights a great wrong?”
Without hesitation, the boy shook his head from side to side. “That could never happen,” he said boldly. “What a king proclaims is right to begin with, or he is no true king at all.”
At this, Shahrayar’s eyes became opaque and expressionless. “Do you think so? I perceive that your mind is a sharp one, at any rate. Too sharp to be a … what?”
“A kitchen boy,” the lad said, and he hung his head as if in shame, though in fact it was to hide his expression of triumph. Though he had used no weapon but words, nevertheless he thought that he had struck a blow.
“What is your name?” Shahrayar asked. “Do I not know you?” There was something about the lad’s face that grew in his mind the longer he looked upon him.
“I am called ’Ajib,” answered the boy, but to the second question he gave no reply. For ’Ajib was his true name. He and his brothers had considered giving him a new one, but the second brother had decided against it at the last moment. It would be one more thing that might cause confusion and send their plans awry.
“Well, ’Ajib,” said Shahrayar. “As of this moment, you are a kitchen boy no longer. Since you show such an aptitude for politics, I will place you in the household of my vizier so that you may learn from him whether your notions of what makes a king are true or no. Do honor to the lady Dinarzad, his daughter, for without her protection you might have come to harm.”
At this, the boy turned to where Dinarzad stood beside her sister and made a bow. “I will honor both the vizier’s daughters to the best of my ability,” he vowed.
“Well spoken,” said Shahrayar.
In this way did Shahrayar take a stranger into the bosom of his family. Though whether this would turn out well or ill, not even ’Ajib himself could know.
Fourteen
THE CALM BEFORE A STORM
And now there came a time when the days and nights flowed into one another like the great silk ribbon in Shahrayar’s vision. Nights when Shahrazad spun out her tale, her voice falling silent only with the first cock crow of the morning.
Nights when the lamplight glowed softly over her hair and skin, and Shahrayar discovered he wanted no world other than the sound of her voice. Nights when the scent of jasmine wafted in through the open window and Shahrazad found herself happier than she had been since her mother died. Her mouth filled with tales, her sister and young ’Ajib curled at her feet, and her heart full of wonder for what was coming to blossom there for Shahrayar.
For, in her husband’s company in the long, quiet hours between darkness and dawn, Shahrazad began to feel a thing she had not expected: Perhaps, at last, she had found the place where she belonged.
But even though the feelings grew with each day that passed, neither Shahrayar nor Shahrazad spoke them aloud. Each was uncertain how to put what their hearts felt into words, and so they waited for the heart of the other to reveal itself.
Each day, the king sent a herald to announce to the people that he would spare his wife for one day longer, and the whole kingdom rejoiced. But, as the days wore on and began to blend together like drops of rain streaming down a leaf, fewer and fewer people came to hear Shahrazad’s life proclaimed in the palace courtyard. Finally the day came when none appeared at all. For people had ceased to wonder whether the queen might live, but came to take it for granted that she would do so.
And thus it came to pass that the only ones for whom Shahrazad’s life continued to be a wonder were those whom it most closely concerned: Nur al-Din Hasan, the vizier, her father. Dinarzad, her sister. Shahrayar, the king, her husband. Shahrazad herself. And also young ’Ajib, who had once been a prince in his own right, though this was a thing that those around him still did not know.
Then during the peace and quiet of these days a rumor began. Though it came to roost in many ears, then flew from many mouths, none could say for sure just how it started. For that is the way of such things, both their weakness and their power.
And the rumor all heard, then spoke, was this: The reason Shahrayar prolonged the life of Shahrazad, his queen, was not that he was gracious and beneficent (though, the fact that he was both these things was surely so). No! The reason King Shahrayar spared the life of Shahrazad the queen was because, with her stories, she had woven a great enchantment around him. In short, the king was bewitched.
A very dangerous situation indeed. One that could not be allowed to go on.
It was the king’s own chamberlain who added these final words himself. For no sooner had the rumor found a place first in his ears, then in his mouth, than it found its way into his heart and made itself a home. Long had the chamberlain nursed a grudge against the vizier, for Nur al-Din Hasan had been honored by two kings in succession, and it seemed to the chamberlain that he himself had yet to be honored or even appreciated by just one.
The honors bestowed upon the vizier left none for him, or so the chamberlain had always thought. And furthermore, he thought that it was unjust that this was so. For was he not charged with at least as important a duty as the vizier who, as a councilor, did little more than talk when all was said and done? The chamberlain was charged with guarding the life of the king, even at the cost of his own.
How had it come to pass, then, that the vizier should be honored and the chamberlain ignored? Never had the chamberlain been able to answer this question, for never once had he perceived that it was due to a lack within himself. And so he had failed to place the blame where it belonged—at his own door. But with each passing day the king continued to spare Shahrazad’s life, the chamberlain began to perceive an important truth: His misfortunes, as well as the king’s, had the same cause. And that cause was none other than the vizier himself, and his daughter, Shahrazad.
For the more the chamberlain thought about it, the more certain he became that the vizier and his daughter were plotting together. It only made sense, after all. What father would consent to put forward his own daughter to be the bride of the king, knowing she must die? Even the vizier could not be so unnatural, or so the chamberlain surmised.
Surely that left just one explanation: The vizier and his daughter were plotting together to overthrow King Shahrayar.
First, they would weaken his mind with magic. Indeed, this had already begun. For there must be sorcery at work in Shahrazad’s stories. Had they not caused the king to repudiate what he himself had proclaimed must be so? What else did Shahrazad’s stories do but prolong her own life by holding the king in thrall?
And the longer she lived, the greater the danger to Shahrayar must be, for the more potent her spell over him would become.
When the brothers of the former queen heard this (for of course it was they who had started the rumors in the first place), they could hardly contain their secret delight. For now their rumors were impossible to separate from those of the chamberlain, and the claim that Shahrazad and her father had bewitched the king came to roost in every ear, then flew from every mouth until the whole of Shahrayar’s kingdom rang with the sound.
And from there it was but a simple step to the one the brothers hoped would give them their revenge. And so they took the gift t
he chamberlain had unknowingly bestowed upon them and to it added one final touch.
Soon all began to whisper that if Shahrayar could not show himself stronger than his wife’s enchantment by putting her to death, it would be proof that Shahrazad’s magic ruled his mind. In which case, Shahrayar would no longer be a true king and could not be considered fit to govern.
And so, by degrees, though neither of them could remember from whose mouth they first had heard it, the rumors reached Shahrazad and Shahrayar. But from there they went no further, for neither could bring themselves to speak of it to the other. And in this way did doubt begin to cloud the bright things that had been growing in their hearts.
When Shahrazad learned what the people were saying, her first thoughts were not for herself, but for her father and for Shahrayar. For, like her mother before her, Shahrazad recognized that the love of the people was a thing that she had never truly possessed. She had only provoked their curiosity.
And now, it seemed, their fear. And so Shahrazad knew fear also. For in her quest to save the heart of the king she had two main allies: time and her skill as a storyteller. So tightly were these two woven together that disaster must surely follow if they were unraveled from each other before the proper moment. But when that moment would come, Shahrazad could not know. She knew only that it had not yet arrived.
And so she trembled as she stood in a pool of bright sunshine, for the very first time finding no joy in the coming of the morning. Her blind eyes were turned toward a window although they gazed only inward, and still she saw nothing. She trembled for the things already said as well as for the things she might not now have time to say. Things she had not known that she would long for. For, in her desire to save Shahrayar’s heart, she had forgotten that she must also contend for her own.
And it was in this fearful state of mind that Shahrayar found Shahrazad.
He had heard the rumors just that morning. Though his first reaction had been rage, it did not take long for fear to creep into his heart just as it had into Shahrazad’s. Suddenly he remembered the words of the boy, ’Ajib, who had proclaimed there must be magic in Shahrazad’s story. And if even he could perceive this possibility, being but a child …
But whereas Shahrazad’s fear had been a path that carried her straight to her husband’s and father’s doors, Shahrayar’s fear was like a great jewel that sparkles in the light. Sharp-edged, and so multifaceted as to be all but blinding.
Everywhere his fear compelled him to look, it seemed Shahrayar saw his own reflection. Each one the face of a man who had made a different decision in his time of greatest crisis. But which face was his true reflection, which deed should be his true act, these things Shahrayar could not see, for his own face blinded him.
And so, in their fear, Shahrazad and Shahrayar increased their own danger, though they did not do so knowingly. For, each in his or her own way, both looked in the wrong direction: not inward, but outward. In the moment when they most needed to recall it, both forgot the first queen’s prophecy.
Only by knowing what was in their hearts and being unafraid to have it known could all be made right once more. And so the final chapters in the story, which they were weaving together themselves, came to be set in motion.
When Shahrayar entered his quarters and saw Shahrazad standing before the window, he felt himself struck by so many different emotions that he could do nothing but stand and behold her.
What is she thinking? he wondered. Did she know of the rumors that filled the land? The ones that proclaimed her a sorceress and called for her death? If she did, would she even tell him?
For it came to Shahrayar suddenly as he gazed upon his wife that she was still almost completely a mystery to him in spite of the way her voice had found a home inside him. Her voice, yes. That he thought he knew. But her mind, her heart, those things were still unknown and were as deep and fathomless as any well. And just as vital to his life as water, or so Shahrayar was coming to suspect.
What does Shahrazad truly contain? he wondered. Was she pure, as he had originally perceived her to be? Or was she tainted, as the rumors now insisted she must be? For in this uncertainty, more than anything else, did Shahrayar’s fear distract and blind him. And so he turned to the wrong place to find the answers to his questions: not to his own heart, or even to their hearts together, but to Shahrazad’s heart alone.
If only she would reveal herself to me, all would be well, he thought, never stopping to remember that to reveal one’s heart alone is a difficult thing, perhaps the most difficult thing of all.
So, though he had come to his quarters with some vague notion of telling her what he had learned so he could weigh her reaction to it, when Shahrayar opened his mouth to speak, no word of the rumors came out. Instead he said, “What do you see when you gaze out the window, Shahrazad?”
At the sound of her husband’s voice, a ripple passed through Shahrazad. For the first time since they had been wed, she had not sensed his presence the moment he entered the room, so far away from the place her body was had she traveled in her thoughts. Her journey had not been a pleasant one. Never had she felt so blind.
“I do not see,” she said. “Instead I … wonder.”
“What do you wonder?” asked Shahrayar.
Shahrazad was silent for a moment, as if framing her reply. “Whether the great world outside is as I remember it,” she said at last. “I have not been outside the palace since I was a child.”
At this, it seemed to Shahrayar that his fear and confusion vanished, and he saw his way clear once more.
“Come with me,” he said on impulse, and he moved to Shahrazad’s side and took her by the hand. “Let us go out together.”
At his words, Shahrazad felt her heart give a great leap, even as her words faltered. “But … the people—”
Ah! Shahrayar thought. So she knows. But it mattered less than he had thought it did.
“Let us not worry about them,” he said. “Just for a little while. I am tired of seeing you only in the lamplight. Come with me into the sunlight, Shahrazad.”
And Shahrazad answered steadily, though Shahrayar could feel the way her fingers trembled in his.
“I would like to feel the sun upon my face with you beside me.”
Shahrayar raised her hand, pressed his lips against her palm and felt the way her trembling spread throughout her body.
“Come, then. Let us go.”
Fiffteen
A SUNLIGHT STORY
And so Shahrayar and Shahrazad left the palace. They took no retainers, wore no fine robes. They did not even pause to tell the vizier that they were going. Indeed, Shahrayar sent the vizier on an errand that would keep him busy until after nightfall. In this way, he hoped he and Shahrazad might leave the palace and return again with no one the wiser. He did not intend deception in this, merely to travel as another man might. For this one day, if no day else, to leave the cares of government behind him.
So he wrapped Shahrazad in a cloak from head to foot, lifted her upon his horse, then vaulted up behind her. She leaned back against his body. Shahrayar stretched his arms around on either side of her to hold the reins. Both remained silent. In this way, they passed through the least impressive of the palace gates and, at length, through the gates of Shahrayar’s city itself and out into the desert beyond. Unremarked upon, unheralded, unnoticed.
“Where are you taking me?” Shahrazad inquired.
Shahrayar laughed suddenly, surprising them both.
“I am not going to tell you. Let the tale of this journey be as much a mystery to you as the tales you spin are to me.”
“As the king commands,” answered Shahrazad, her tone as light as his own. “Meantime, with your permission, I will enjoy the wind in my hair.”
“Gladly,” said Shahrayar.
So Shahrazad shook back her cloak and Shahrayar spurred the horse forward till they flew along the sand, Shahrazad’s long, dark hair like banners in the wind around them. How long
they traveled she never knew, for it was a thing she had ceased to care about. She cared only about the warmth of the sun on her face, the breath of the wind through her hair. The rhythm of the horse as its strides came together and apart, together and apart. And, always, the feel of Shahrayar’s arms around her.
After some time, she heard him speak to the horse, and the pace of their travel slowed, then came to a halt, and her hair settled down around her shoulders.
“This is the place,” Shahrayar said.
Shahrazad took a deep breath, “Do I smell water?”
Shahrayar smiled as he slid from the horse, then lifted her down. Though she was steady on her feet, he kept one arm about her shoulders, for he had suddenly discovered how empty his arms could feel without her inside them.
“You do,” he replied. Gently, he began to lead her across the sand to where a stand of date palms created a small oasis of shade. “My father brought me here when I was but a boy. I should always know how to find water in the desert, he said. So that when I grew to be king, I might never forget its importance to my subjects.”
“Your father was wise. My father always told me I should never take anything essential for granted lest I lose it, but now I see it is probably because yours said it first.”
Shahrayar chuckled. They settled beneath the trees, Shahrazad with her back against one great trunk. Shahrayar stretched out and laid his head in her lap.
I am free, he thought. Though he had not known he had felt confined until this moment. He looked up at Shahrazad, who was sitting with her face tipped up to the sun.
“Shahrazad, will you tell me something?”
She did not reply, but merely nodded.
Do you fear to lose me? Have I become so essential to you that you will treasure me always and never take me for granted?
The words quivered upon his tongue, welled straight up from his heart with a heat that left Shahrayar shaking as if he had a fever. But at the last moment, he found he could not pronounce them.
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