Daughter of the Salt King

by A. S. Thornton

  “Talk about what, exactly? You said it yourself. You are an ahira, I am a jinni. We cannot be together. But you forgot one thing. I am magic.” A large leather sack appeared in his hands, and he dropped it onto the bed. Coins clinked together loudly. “And I can pay for my whore.”

  I flinched. Hearing Saalim call me the same thing as Omar was worse than his anger, and tears filled my eyes. “This isn’t you.” My words came out in a gasp. “I can’t watch you pay for me like they do. You’re better than that.” I flapped my hand toward the tent we had just left. My throat was tight, aching like a fist clenched it. “You said you wouldn’t be jealous.”

  “Jealousy. Is that what this is?” His ferocity cleaved my sadness. “So they can grab you and touch you as their coin will allow, but I cannot do the same?” He laughed. “What was it you told me? Your duty lies with the King. Here I am, allowing you to fulfill that duty. Give yourself away for the King, Emel. Isn’t that what you want? So long as he benefits?”

  I watched rage distort the kind, gentle, thoughtful jinni I had known. Was he jealous? Or was he giving me exactly what he said he was, exactly what I had claimed I wanted?

  “You could at least act as well around me as you do around those savages.” His chest heaved with exertion, fury.

  Tears rolled down my cheeks, and I shook my head over and over again. Every word he spoke was a knife sliding deep between my ribs, but I realized it was a different sort of pain. Not the pain caused by violation like Omar’s, by the tedious stripping away of pride, but rather by heart break, the visceral pain that gnaws and chews until there is nothing but pulp left inside.

  “Saalim, I am sorry for what I said. I am sorry for what I did. You were right about him, about everything. I was wrong.” I wiped at my cheeks. “My father deserves nothing from me.”

  He hesitated, and it fueled my resolve.

  “It doesn’t have to be like this. You are not them. You are better. I know this . . .” I hesitated, looking around and trying to find the words. “I was a fool—thought I could be done with you, could move beyond what we had. But Saalim, you mean too much to me. I was wrong.” Not ever in a world in which I knew he existed, where he was trapped by magic and an uncaring god, held in chains by my father, could I be done with him.

  I remembered what my mother told me: Don’t be distracted by untruths. There are no such things. Give your heart to that which is real. Don’t think of me, of your sisters. Saalim was what was real, and whatever the cost to me, to my family, he was who I chose, even if it was only for now.

  “You do not need to pay for me, do you understand?” I moved toward him, pleading. “Because Saalim, you already have me.”

  The truth of the words hit me as hard as it hit him. Did I love him? I did not know. But I knew I wanted him in a way that I had never wanted another. Not for lust, but for companionship. For an honest intimacy that I had never known before the stolen moments we had together, talking of every thought that came to my mind or embracing each other feverishly. I wanted him because with him, I smiled freely and often. His touch one that inflamed as much as it comforted.

  The sharp anger of his face softened.

  “You see?” I repeated gently, like I was soothing a scared animal. “You have me. I am here.” I am here. I am here. I repeated the words over and over, terrified and relieved by their truth. I sat back onto the ground, mind wracked with shame, with confusion, with fear of what I was, and what I wanted. Of how I felt when men touched me. Of how differently I felt when Saalim touched me.

  Of course he was angry with me—I had rejected him and chosen my father, chosen the man who kept him enslaved. Of course he was furious. He was scared, he was helpless, and he had made a fatal error as a slave—wanting something. We both had.

  He wanted someone I was not, probably someone I never could be, and he wanted a life we could not have. Hadn’t I wanted the same? What would be the cost for me to be what he desired or for him to be what I desired? How could I wish away my being an ahira without saying goodbye to everything I knew, without saying goodbye to Firoz, to Saalim? Could I wish away Saalim’s chains without losing him? I was ensnared in the sticky web of my father’s court, and the harder I fought to free myself, the more entangled I became.

  Saalim looked down at me, silent. His anger had dissipated, and in its place, I saw shame. He took several paces back from me, his features rearranged into that of the slave. All details precisely as they were, down to the irregular blotches of red stains spreading from his shoulders to his chest.

  “Stay here tonight,” he said, his voice unfamiliar again. “I will keep you safe from the others.”

  He did not touch me again, did not tell me how he felt. He left, and I cried.

  I awoke to silence, cocooned in unbelievable softness. What was so soft? Where was I?

  As I sat up, the night returned to me in a rush. Ah, yes. The King’s concluding party of the Haf Shata. Where were my sisters? Had they already returned home?

  Back in the main tent, a number of people lingered, withdrawn and exhausted. Outside, the desert was still black with night, or was it morning? I had no idea how long until sunrise. I shivered in the cold room and looked around for my sisters. The musicians had their instruments tucked under their arms and were receiving payment from Nassar, who sat groggily in the King’s chair. The metal basin that sat beside him had glinting coin piled high within. Servants scurried between tents, picking up goblets, bringing guests sage tea or wine, and serving trays of flatbread and pastries to those who needed it.

  Men and women were draped across each other on benches and on the ground. Dried vomit stuck to the chin and chest of one, another slept beside the pile he left on the midnight carpet. So many sleeping soundly. In the other tent, where the panels were again strung open, I saw half-naked bodies huddled closely, most unmoving in sleep.

  Head aching and stomach churning, I turned away.

  Tavi was standing alongside the table where the food had been diminished to shallow, collapsed piles.

  “How was the night?” I asked, grabbing a date pastry.

  “I promise I wasn’t actually here for the entire thing,” she said through a mouth full of food. “Though the evening may have been more enjoyable if I had.”

  “Yours, too, eh?”

  “At least it’s over. We all need sleep.” She nodded to a bench where a few younger sisters huddled together, eyes closed. Other ahiran slept alongside men and women passed out from drink.

  “Any sign Father plans on leaving soon?” I asked. “Where is he, anyway?”

  “With some of his wives in there. Drinking, of course.” She raised her eyebrows and plunged a piece of meat into a thick yogurt sauce.

  My father’s belly jutted out amongst the bodies like a dune of sand. He had a goblet in one hand, the jinni’s empty vessel in the other. “We’ll be here a while then.” I sat down on a bench and leaned my head against a wooden post, my eyelids growing heavy.

  “Did you see Mama tonight?” Tavi asked as she sat beside me.

  I shook my head.

  “Me neither.”

  “That’s good. Maybe she stayed home.”

  As we spoke, I watched the slave that hurried from task to task with wine-stained shoulders. He did not look at me.

  Tavi followed my gaze. “That was cruel.”

  “Hmm?”

  “What Father did. To that slave.”

  “It was.” I took a deep breath. I almost told Tavi everything in that moment. I wanted her to know that though Father did not care for him, I did. That the slave was not alone, no matter how alone he felt.

  But I said nothing more. I hung my head forward and closed my eyes.

  I do not know how much time had passed when Tavi spoke again. “They’re certainly well-rested.”

  My eyes shot open. I had fallen asleep. When the haze cleared from my vision, I saw that Tavi referred to two men walking swiftly through the large room.

  They were for
eign which was not unexpected for the party, but there was something else unusual about them. Both wore traveling robes and headscarves of muted brown and black rather than the bright formal robes and elegant turbans most men wore that night. Shining metal bounced on their chests. Large golden pendants, I realized, hung from long chains. I squinted to better make out the details as they crossed the room. It was not until they were nearly in front of me, passing swiftly, that I saw the design etched deeply into the metal—a large sun enveloped by a crescent moon.

  The medallion reminded me of my mother’s that lay hidden beside the bag of salt beneath my mat. After that night with Omar, I never wore it like she asked. It reminded me too much of her volatility and defiance.

  “What?” I breathed, staring at the men’s backs, trying to piece it together.

  “What is it?” Tavi turned to me.

  Like they passed some unseeing threshold, the men sprinted forward suddenly, straight for Father. They unsheathed long, gently curving swords from their belts.

  “Sons,” I said as I jumped to my feet. No one moved, everyone seemed as if in the clouds. “No!” I shrieked.

  People heard my cry and looked in my direction, cloudy and confused, before realizing what I shouted about.

  “Stop them!” Nassar said, not loudly nor quickly enough in his exhausted daze.

  The King’s soldiers, eyes half-closed, leaning their aching backs against tent posts, slowly lifted their heads. As though wading through quicksand, they started toward the men from the various corners of the room. But it was too late, the predators had already reached their prey.

  My father, bleary-eyed and dampened from his indulgences, watched the men run toward him for a few moments too long. He attempted to stand, but his girth and the softness of the cushion made rising difficult.

  I watched in horror.

  One of the men pulled his sword behind his head and, in a large sweeping arc, brought it down at a sharp angle toward the King’s neck, poised to slice through the tunnels of life-giving blood and air.

  Screams pierced through the room—one of them was mine. I squeezed closed my eyes and then slowly opened them, peering through nearly closed lids, to see the aftermath of the strike.

  My mouth fell open. The blade had not touched the King’s neck at all. Had my eyes not been closed, I might have seen what happened. Did my father move in the last moment? Did another guard parry the blow? Or had the blade hit an invisible, magical shield, a finger’s width from his soft flesh? A guard was beside the King now, clashing his sword against one of the foreigner’s.

  Guests were shrieking and fleeing the room. Those who had not witnessed the attack certainly heard the panic and roused themselves from their stupor. Tavi was hysterical. She yanked my hand. “Let’s go! Come on!”

  “Here,” I said, pulling her along as we scurried behind the table of food where I could still watch everything. My mind was spinning as the foreign man who was not fighting the guard screamed at the other in a thick accent, his words impossible to understand. His eyes were wide with excited triumph, a look that did not match their failed attempt at murdering the King.

  I was sure these men did not want my father. They wanted Saalim. They were the Altamaruq.

  The man’s gaze traveled around the Salt King as the King held his hands before his face like a coward. The man saw the empty glass vessel cupped in his palm and easily pried it from my father’s grasp. The other still swung his sword in broad strokes, warding off the enervated soldiers that clustered around them.

  When their vile fingers clutched Saalim’s vessel, I could not stay hidden. I jumped from under the table. “No! Stop them!” I screamed, panic flooding me. Tavi shouted at me to stay quiet, but I did not listen. No, no, no, I could not lose Saalim. I began to run after them but stopped myself. What could I do?

  The man with the vessel shouted to his comrade, laughing maniacally as he wrapped his hand around the lid. He just had to open it, return Saalim, then release the jinni once, and Saalim would have a new master. Saalim would be gone from me forever. The attacking man evaded the soldiers and joined his partner as they sprinted, golden sparkling on their heaving chests, toward the black desert.

  Frantic, I searched for the wine-stained slave. I had to see him one last time.

  “I wish for them to be stopped!” The King boomed, his voice desperate and crazed. He rose from his chair with a strength and urgency I never before saw him possess.

  The slave was there, standing beside the stage, passively watching the fleeing soldiers. The fool Nassar sat upright and helpless in the silver throne behind him, fervently scanning the tent, panic-stricken.

  And then the man holding the vessel began to cough. It started small, but then it escalated into desperate, gasping chokes. The man ceased his running, clutched his chest, and fell to the ground. The guards descended. In one final, desperate effort, the man flung the vessel to his companion. Then, he was pierced by the guards’ scimitars.

  In the midst of the chaos, the jinni stood calm and poised.

  The foreigner’s partner ran back toward the empty gold and glass jar that spun away on the rugs. He bent to retrieve it, but the delay was too great. The guards reached him too.

  With a surge of nausea, I listened to the blades penetrating flesh over and over and over again. When the guards were satisfied, they walked away with vigor, energized by the conflict.

  I looked back to Saalim. He stared, emotionless, toward the bodies, his arms straight at his sides. None would know that he was the cause of the cough, that magic had killed the men. I began to move toward him, to collect the vessel, but Saalim looked at me for the first time since we had spoken in the private tent and shook his head.

  He was right, what was I thinking?

  Saalim went to the still-warm heaps of men, and carefully stepping over them, bent to pick up his home.

  Never before had I been so relieved for the death of a man. Not even Matin’s.

  Saalim bent over and saw the pendant, pausing just a moment before he stood again, vessel in hand. He looked at his glass home, and I wished I knew what he thought while holding his prison in his hands. Hating myself for how glad I was that he was still there, still my father’s, I sat down and leaned against the table’s leg. I slowed my breathing, letting my heart calm. Tavi cried into her knees, her whole body shaking.

  With his shirt, Saalim wiped the vessel’s surface. The blood stained the fabric more darkly than the wine. The King went to the jinni. They met not far from me. My hands were clenched together, fingers bloodless. Saalim fell onto one knee and bowed his head. He reached his arms forward, sleeves falling back to reveal the golden petals encircling his wrists, and handed my father his vessel. The King grabbed the jar roughly and spat at the jinni’s feet.

  “Too close,” the King snarled. “That cannot happen again.”

  The King turned away from the kneeling slave and faced what few guests remained. He rearranged his features and was suddenly smiling, arms open. He laughed, an edge of hysteria in the sound.

  “Men and women! Get up from your hiding places. There is no harm. This was purely a game! Simple fun—our concluding entertainment!” He clapped his hands wildly. The guests peered around, confused. Their gazes darting to the mutilated corpses on the ground. They would not understand why the men wanted the vessel, would only think it a valuable piece of treasure some beggars wanted to sell for coin. If they had seen that the blade had been prevented from slicing my father’s neck by magic, they would not remember that now. Masira would be sure of it.

  “The party is finished!” The King said. “Now, return to your beds and sleep the rest of the day away.” He reached up and wiped his brow, and I saw that his hand shook.

  The guests adopted my father’s joy. They began clapping with enthusiasm, mirroring the King. Soon, everyone was laughing, back-slapping, and retelling what they just witnessed with wild pleasure, hands grotesquely shooting in the air around them in echoes of the
violence.

  Saalim returned to fetching empty trays and goblets. I did not see his face, but I saw the deaths, his imprisonment, weighed on him as he walked.

  The remaining guests began to file out, leaning on each other while laughing and crying and smacking their lips in drunken nausea. The ahiran clustered together, waiting for our father to send us home.

  A guard ran in, sweat dripping from his brow.

  “My King!” he shouted as he ran past us. People paused their egress to watch.

  “What is it now?” The King whined.

  My eyes fell to the floor as I strained to listen.

  The guard was at the stage where my father stood by Nassar. “Your Majesty.” He took deep breaths, hands on his knees. “Some of your wives,” he paused for breath again, “they are missing.”

  Missing? I reached for Tavi, who linked her arm in mine. We hadn’t seen our mother that night. Though there was no reason to think it, my mind wandered to the Altamaruq. I prayed they had nothing to do with it.

  But a sharp, nagging fear told me they did.

  Was a magical jinni—the promise of a better desert—really worth all this? Pressing my eyes with my fingers, I nearly screamed. To cause so much hurt—so much chaos—for some silly legend. Was I surrounded by fools? I thought of Firoz and his friends, Rafal, the burning prison, the slain guards and attendants, Matin. I remembered the shining, cold scimitar piercing Matin’s heart, the muddled blue of his robes, the golden sun and crescent moon on his collar, stained with red.

  Suddenly, I realized why the men’s medallions were so familiar. Horror, thick and suffocating, rose in my throat.

  The two images embroidered on Matin’s robes were the same as those etched on the medallions belonging to the men. The engraving identical to the medallion belonging to my mother.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Lateef’s cries woke us at sunrise. “Emel! Tavi!” Tired from the party, I roused slowly. “Emel! Wake up! Tavi!” The urgency in his voice peeled away the fatigue. I sat up, most of the ahiran mirroring my confused concern.