Hart, Mallory Dorn

by Jasmine on the Wind

  Her smile lost some of its spontaneity. "I will survive my captivity," she said dryly, "if you will."

  The sarcasm was not lost on him, which was why he would not tell her that if and when she departed Granada his life would shrivel like a dried apricot; she would be sure to misunderstand. Instead he rose and stretched and rebuttoned the high neckline of his tunic. "Please forgive me, doña, I shall be happy to play for you tomorrow evening, but tonight I will spend in the city since Boabdil occupies himself with his Sultana."

  She scrambled up too. "In the Albayzin? But I thought you said you would refrain from sending messages for a while."

  Francho drew his eyebrows together. She had become much too interested in the exact ways in which he spent his time in the city, and for her own protection he wanted her to know as little as possible. To make an innocent visit to his little house with trinkets and scent purchased in the First Plaza as if for a concubine, to stay the night and seem the industrious lover, was all the more important now as answer to any interest in his absences from the Alhambra. What was more, he had become very fond of the two youngsters there and enjoyed visiting them, hearing Ali's proud recitation of his lessons and exclaiming over Azahra's cooking, even delighting the girl and himself by requesting her to dance for him. He knew his casually explained visits to the Albayzin made Dolores unreasonably jealous, but her insinuations irritated him. He had no intention of accounting for his actions to her.

  Her expression had faded from eager expectation of an evening together to an unreadable blankness that made him uncomfortable, and he suspected he had been too offhand in ignoring her obvious pleasure in his return—a clumsy but necessary ploy to keep distance between them, and to keep himself in check. But he plowed on, "I would prefer you leave my business to me, doña. Return to the harem tonight. In fact, study your lessons. I will be interested in your progress in Arabic. I shall return in the early morning to attend the Sultan, and if he finds my presence unnecessary in the evening, I will send for you."

  Disappointment and insult tightened Dolores's chest to hear him order her about as if she were a little child, do this, do that, and she could do little but obey. That cursed, heathen dancing woman! A while back one of the harem ladies had slyly jabbed her with the information that the Sayed ibn Ghulam had been seen buying a Persian shawl in the First Plaza and if it was hers why did she not wear it? Why did she not wear it! Because it was not in her garment chest such a pleasant gift rested. Oh, why was it that men had such freedom to take just what they wished and women must do nothing but bide? "When I come back perhaps I will remember you," she paraphrased his last sentence to herself, making an invisible face.

  Resentment churned behind her eyes, but she worked hard to hide it for a tiny bud of an idea had bloomed in her brain. To him she nodded slowly, tilted up her chin, and murmured with a thin smile, "As you wish..."

  Feeling helpless, he thought she was angry as she salaamed exaggeratedly and turned to go, but in a few steps she turned to face him again and seemed to have changed her attitude for her expression had smoothed and become more cheerful. In fact, as she faced him in her rippling pale green veils and pantaloons, saucy mouth curving under the gauzy yashmak she had just refastened, her provocatively kohl-outlined, dark silver eyes were wide with a hope. A shimmer of garnets hung from her earlobes, and golden bangles clinked when she moved her arm (since shopping amused her he supplied her with ample dinars to keep her occupied). She stood smiling before him with dainty bare feet in purple-painted sandals, impertinent, delicious, and desirable, and she knew it. He felt the muscles in his stomach tighten.

  "Good raiss, would you be kind enough to order a litter for me tomorrow so that I may go down to the Grand Souk?" she asked sweetly. Francho raised an eyebrow. The kidnapping of beautiful female slaves was not unknown. Reduan, perhaps alerted by a palace guard, would not be past such spite, and once incarcerated in a household's harem a woman could be hidden forever. "But can you not find what you want right here in the First Plaza?"

  "Oh, but there is not much choice in the merchandise. They do not care to transport a great deal up the hill. And I would so much like to find an unusual casket to keep my baubles in, something the other women do not have and would envy."

  Her request was harmless enough, and he was probably being too jittery about the cold-eyed general. He finally gave in to her eager look of expectancy. "Well, go then if you must. I'll have a litter sent to you. But stay only in the souk and do not linger overlong."

  "Why?" she jousted with him mischievously, head tilted. "Are you afraid I'll be stolen away?"

  She was joking but he saw no reason to alarm her unnecessarily. "No. I just don't want you to fall into any trouble. Anyone who was unwise enough to travel close to the border when the passes were clear of snow must have a penchant for creating difficulties."

  Her cleft chin rose haughtily. "When one is confronted with the face of doom one flees, helter-skelter or any other way," she protested. But her eyes were still alight with the thought of going down into the city to shop.

  Francho accompanied her to the door and then called Selim in to attend him. A wry smile touched his mouth as he remembered, years before, the young Dolores's delight with the gaudy-stoned belts she had slyly maneuvered from unsuspecting waists in the crowd. A man would have to be rich to placate her love for adornment, but he had little to buy with the dinars the Sultan heaped upon him. It gave him pleasure to indulge her.

  ***

  The Great Sultan could not have wished for more receptive, excited subjects than those who peered and craned from streets, balconies, rooftops, and trees along the path of his procession which wound down the petal-strewn Street of the Gomeres to the blaring of trumpets and clashing of cymbals.

  The populace saw, closely following the heralds, squadron after squadron of cantering knights in glistening, spiked helmets, masses of horsemen under gold banners and Moslem crescent standards, riding with warlike frowns, lances erect and painted bucklers held stiffly, their light Barbary steeds covered with nets of coins and medals that flashed in the onlookers' dazzled eyes. The Royal Musicians in striped turbans and pantaloons and yellow sashes marched hard on the heels of the cavalry, led by the Sultan's favored Head Musician mounted on a black mule, tall, stern, and important in his embroidered mantle. The drums, fifes, horns, and tiny bells behind him sounded clear in air washed clean and cool by rain the night before.

  Behind him Francho heard the crowd's pitch of excitement rise as they saw the Sultan approaching, preceded by an honor guard of splendid palace Nubians with glistening black faces fierce under their high white turbans, their naked scimitars shining as they marched. He heard a roar of approval come from section after section of the citizens of Granada as the smiling Sultan passed before them, stately on a white horse with gilded hooves. The Sultan's red banners with the motto "La Galib ile Allah," "There is no conqueror but Allah," were carried by staunch cavaliers on either side of him. But what pleased the populace most, Francho knew, was that Boabdil was dressed as a soldier, in gold link armor and spiked helmet crusted with jewels, a round buckler with a graven Hand and Key on one arm and a great war scimitar at his hip.

  Other renowned personages followed in this parade to celebrate Boabdil's victories in the mountains: Muza Abdul, Reduan, the Grand Vizier, the Chief High Mufti, the Sharif Aamer, and the knights of Granada's powerful families, the red-plumed Abencerrages, the violet-plumed Go-meres, the Zegris in green-and-gold attire.

  The procession wound down into the lower city and through the main bazaar, where the wondrous products from the ends of the earth engaged the attention and mingled odors filled the nostrils: spices, garlic, fried fish, incense, camphor, cinnamon, goats, heady smells as all-pervading as the cries of the vendors and the daily yammer and babble of merchants and their customers. In fact, Francho's heart sank as he contemplated how long a siege it would take to reduce such a fat city to starvation.

  Still, as they paraded down
a path of strewn rose petals enjoying the dappled shade of a tree-lined street, the exigencies of war seemed remote and far away, improbable on this balmy, fragrant day. A mild smile curved his lips, and his thoughts drifted loose as the mule carried him on in state to the inspiring, rhythmical martial music of the corps of musicians behind him.

  But just before he rode past the West Gate in the city walls the great, iron-banded portals swung open to admit a bedraggled troop of Moorish cavalry, some of them riding double with wounded companions, their reduced number testimony to the blood-price paid in their constant attacks and ambushes against Christian strongholds in the mountains. The elite members of the procession proudly raised scimitars in salute as they rode by the weary, dusty soldiers, and the people cheered as they scattered to allow them passage, for the men were flourishing numerous captured Spanish emblems and the decapitated head of an enemy knight spitted on one of the pennon staffs. Suddenly, for Francho, the day turned to ashes. He recognized the tattered banner of the house of Pacheco and with horror realized that it was the gaping and bloody head of Don Alonzo de Pacheco, brother of the Marquis de Villena, which was so grotesquely skewered on the pike.

  With a smile turned false and frozen he rode on, nor did his interior anger seep away until later that day when Boabdil, in vaulting spirits and careless of Reduan's warning of spies, triumphantly informed his entire council that an organized resistance had been formed against the Christians in both Baza and Gaudix and that when winter closed the northern passes both cities would be ready to overthrow their subjugators and open their gates wide to Boabdil's warriors of Islam. He spoke of the ringleaders of the insurrection with gloating for they had once been his hated uncle's followers, who now despised the defection of their leader. He made flowery promises of victory. Cries of "Jihad! Jihad!" rose from every part of the room, and in their approval of his Holy War Boabdil found such peace that toward evening he dismissed Francho and made ready to visit Morayama in her own quarters.

  ***

  In an excited state Francho left the palace and rode across the bridge to the Albayzin, in his pouch a detailed missive on the Baza plot efficiently naming names that would draw a commendation from even the impassive Tendilla. He planned to send Ali off with it to the blind man, as he had been doing as a precaution in reaction to Reduan's hard stare at Albolodny.

  But he found Ali sitting on the threshold step of the little house in the alley sobbing bitterly as one of his urchin friends tried to comfort him. Francho vaulted off his horse. "What is the matter?" he demanded. "Ali, what is wrong?"

  "It's Az... Azahra," the boy stuttered through his gasps, tears streaming down his thin, anguished face. "Old Zatar found her. He came with city guards and took her away. Ahmed saw it and came to the school to fetch me. Oh J... Jamal, he will beat and whip her. He will punish her for running away," the child wailed. "I w... want my sister!"

  Francho patted the shaking shoulders. "Here now, don't weep so, boy. Tears are for women. Save your grief, Ali. I'll bring Azahra back. How in the name of Shaitan did he find where she was?" He shook his head, angry at himself, for he had been negligent not to ensure Azahra's freedom long ago by using the pressure of his connection with the Sultan to buy her. Well, the swinish Zatar would have to give her up now, if not willingly then by force.

  Then Ahmed, a tall, squint-eyed ragamuffin, spoke up proudly. "Sayed, I saw it. I was in the street not far from the Golden Horn when the woman gave me a dirham to take a message in to Zatar. And when he read it Zatar sent his servant hurrying for guards. I followed them to see what was going on, and when they came here and dragged Azahra away I ran quickly to tell Ali."

  Francho grabbed the boy by the arm. "Woman? What woman?"

  Frightened by Francho's scowl the boy stammered, "I... I don't know, I swear. But she came in a rich litter with a royal crest. She hid her face behind the curtain, but I saw a silken green veil and her arm held many gold bracelets. And she pronounced her words funny, like an infidel slave."

  Dolores! Shocked, Francho recoiled. How had she dared to strike at Azahra this way? And why, the incomprehensible virago...?

  He shooed Ahmed away and steered Ali into the house, coaxing the boy to dry his tears, and promising, if Ali would go on a mission for him, that Azahra would greet him on his return. The youngster finally collected himself and slipped out with Francho's message for the blind man's delivery to the snow gatherer. Francho then waited impatiently until complete darkness covered his rich garments and turban with a hooded mantle and strode off among the dwellers of the quarter toward the Golden Horn.

  This time he did not descend into the murky common room from whence issued the wailing sound of a flute as it tootled over the din of voices but used the street-level entry reserved for lodgers. A barefoot slave wielding a slow broom in the passageway looked around and announced in a dull voice, "No more beds to let, effendi, our space is full—"

  "Where do I find Zatar?"

  "But there is no available pallet, master, I sw—" Francho grabbed him by the front of his greasy tunic so that the stupid eyes bulged with fright. "Where is Zatar, filth, and don't tell me he is occupied. Point out his chamber!"

  "B... but..." Francho twisted the dirty garment tight about the scrawny neck. "Arghh—Allah have mercy—down there, effendi, the last chamber—b... but he is occupied, he is very busy. Mercy, my master, he will kill me."

  Francho spotted a tall cupboard with an ill-fitting door and hauled the choking menial along. He stuffed him into the dank space and threatened to return and slit his gullet if he so much as sneezed, then jammed the wooden peg into the latch.

  Swiftly he went down the empty corridor and then stopped, listening, before the last door. The slave had not lied. He heard the angry voice of the fat proprietor and behind it Azahra's gasping sobs. He gently pushed at the door, it was not barred. From under his tunic where he always carried it he drew the snake-headed dagger and held it ready beneath his mantle just in case Zatar was unwise enough to be stubborn.

  The slam of the door and instant noise of the bolt shooting home whirled Zatar around from where he contemplated Azahra, slumped like a tattered rag in a corner, her face battered, blood dripping from her nose and mouth, her cotton tunic ripped in strips. A blood-flecked leather whip lay on the floor where the panting Zatar had tossed it. The man's eyes narrowed as he prudently backed away from the intruder's advance. "Eh? What do you want? You have made a mistake; this is a private chamber." His nasal voice held annoyance but not fear.

  Azahra forced open one puffed and purpling eye. "Jamal!" she mumbled. "Oh, Allah is good, I prayed you would come—" She cried out in pain as she tried to rise.

  Francho wasted no time. He kept his voice low, but its cold menace was not lost on Zatar, who was trying to edge toward an inner door. "I am Jamal ibn Ghulam. I want to buy this slave from you. Name your price, you vermin." With a quick step he cut off Zatar from the other door.

  Zatar scowled, his chins quivering. "So! You are the culprit that sheltered a runaway slave from her lawful master." The fat face glistened with sweat, but the piggish eyes gleamed maliciously. "You shall suffer the darkest dungeon in the Alcazaba for your thievery, knave. One does not trifle with Zatar, you will find out, nor steal from his property—"

  Francho threw his purse, heavy with dinars, on a littered table. "That will pay you for four slaves. Now fetch me her bond paper."

  "She is not for sale. I do not wish to give up the pleasure of teaching her to obey. No female scum makes a fool of Rashid Zatar." With a lumbering lunge at the door to the corridor he pushed past Francho shouting out, "Haramay! Haramay! Thief, thief! Abdullah, Hamet, to me...."

  Francho jerked him away from throwing open the bolt and swung the man's great bulk around. Then the muscles of Zatar's flabby face tightened and his thick lips trembled, for the sharp point of a knife was jabbing into his shrinking belly, and his hamlike arm was in the grasp of iron fingers.

  The voice of the antagonist fac
ing him, though not any louder, had become pure ice. "Bring out that paper, fat pig, and be quick or I'll find it myself and dip it into your stinking blood. Move!" The dagger jabbed harder and Zatar gasped. "My sharp little friend will slit your guts open if you contemplate anything foolish."

  Gulping like a bloated and beached fish under Francho's rough urging, Zatar moved to the table, fumbled around, and finally drew a small document from under a pile of ledgers and papers. There was a reed and an ink pot on the table. With one hand Francho shook open Azahra's bond bill and scanned it quickly.

  "Now write a transferral of ownership to Jamal ibn Ghulam and sign and seal it," he commanded, pricking the dagger hard enough into the side of the lardy stomach to draw blood. The pen was hastily taken up and his order complied with.

  "May your bones rot, vile thief," Zatar cursed, finally hurling the pen to the floor in outrage. "I shall bring guards and haul you before the mufti and swear I signed her away under force. Zatar is not without powerful friends, you will see, to your woe." He flung his words at his tormentor, purple with anger, but careful not to stir under the deadly little blade almost piercing his belly.

  Francho released him suddenly and stepped back, throwing open his mantle to exhibit to Zatar the silver medallion of office hanging on his breast. Zatar stared at it.

  "Are your friends more powerful than mine, innkeep? Think you I jest when I warn you that I can whisper one word in the Sultan's ear and no more will you sit by your wineskins and count your profits? If you do not wish to have the river fish snatching pieces from your corpse, I advise you to take that purse and be happy I do not disembowel you right now for your cruelty to this girl."

  Zatar gaped. "Of course. Jamal ibn Ghulam, the musician the Sultan smiles upon so generously. The name did not strike me at first. Of course." Like a wave washing over a wrinkled strand of beach a benign expression flowed across his fat face to smooth away the ugly wrath of a moment before. "But why did you not treat with me like a gentleman, sayed? Had I known you wanted my miserable slave so direly we could have come to an agreement without such— distress. Would that not have been simpler?"