I ran excitedly back to Saalim, then repeated this several more times, getting so bold as to let the water splash up my leg and wet the blanket. I reveled in the freedom, the whimsy, and the privacy of that sacred place.
The ruined city hovered above us on the sandy hill. Its gray stone was bright in the soft light. On the crumbling columns and arches, green smudges emerged from their cracks and surfaces. Moss, Saalim had called it. The dome we slept in the night before was coated in a slimy, umber film where the water crashed against it. Black shells stuck tightly to its wet surface.
We dressed and traveled back up the battered steps to the stone street we walked the night before. Brightly colored tiles were in small piles along the ground next to castle walls. A few were still in their original place neatly around windows, arches, and doors. Small squares of oranges, yellows, blues, and greens glinted brilliantly as we passed. Green stems pushed through the gaps in the street, white petals at their ends pressed together to conceal their heart from the day.
In the light, it was apparent that Madinat Almulihi was enormous. Broken buildings led far out into the rocky desert, stone streets half-buried in the sand stretched out toward the tall cliffs opposite that of the sea.
“What happened to it, really? What did the prince do?”
Saalim sighed. “It is a sad story that perhaps one day I’ll tell you in its entirety. But for now, know their rulers were lost. The city fell because of their son. A strong army came to attack it, desperate to absorb its power. Most of the people of Madinat Almulihi fled, turning back to their ancestors’ nomadic way of life.”
We sat at the base of a column, Saalim providing me with a feast of my favorites. I leaned against him, his arm curled around my shoulders, and picked at the pastry in my hands.
“It would be nice to live here.”
“Would you really like it?” His eyes were wide, a tenor of worry in his voice.
“Yes, I would be very happy.” A gust of cool wind blew, and I closed my eyes. I leaned against the column, the sun warming my skin.
He placed a kiss on my brown. “You would have loved it when it was whole.” He clenched my shoulder with his hand. Contented by the ease of us, I couldn’t stop smiling. As I finished my meal, he described what we would see on the street had the Madinat Almulihi been alive. He talked about the sounds, the smells, the life of the city.
He loved his home, and my chest clenched with grief for him that it was lost, that it was never to return again.
“Do you think it could be true that there is another desert, a better desert? Because maybe then we could restore your home, too.” Suddenly the rebels did not seem so imprudent, not if it brought back this beautiful place.
“What would it be worth if there was? If it could?”
“If we could live here together, it would be worth everything.”
“The loss of your family? Of Firoz? Of me?” Saalim smiled sadly. “If only we could tell Masira to give us exactly what we wanted. You’d have to give it much thought before you wished it. Remember we could be thrown across the desert from each other, you know, if the desert was upended.”
I curled my arms around my knees and leaned further into Saalim. I said quietly, “I don’t like thinking about that.” Anyway, the Altamaruq were fools, and I couldn’t believe I was indulging in their fantasy.
Staring at my feet, I saw that white, glistening dust was stuck to my toes.
“This doesn’t look like sand,” I said as I drew my finger across the tiny white crystals. I held my finger in front of my eyes, examining them closely. “It looks like—”
The jinni pulled my hand to his mouth and briefly closed his lips around my finger, sending tendrils of heat down to my elbow. I felt his tongue push against the pad of my finger before he released it from his mouth.
“It’s salt,” he declared, smirking and smacking his lips.
I gasped and reached down to find more of the fine powder. I tasted it, too.
“Salt?” I exclaimed in disbelief. “Like what my father has?”
“The same.”
“It’s just like Rafal said!”
Saalim groaned. “If I hear you mention that man’s name again, I’m leaving you here by yourself.”
“You wouldn’t dare.” I glared at him. “Rafal, Rafal, Rafal.”
He stood up and stormed off, then turned back and ran to me, tackling me to the ground in the gentlest way, attacking my neck and chest with his mouth.
“Wait!” I said, sitting atop him as he lay on the stone. “Salt comes from the sand?” I narrowed my eyes.
Saalim roared with laughter, pulling me close. “No, not from the sand. From the sea. The water is so salty, you can’t drink it. When it dries, it leaves a residue of salt. Besides mines, the sea is the only place it can be found. That is why it is so rare and part of the reason why Madinat Almulihi was such a wealthy city, as your favorite story teller said.”
I ignored the jibe. “The tale of my father . . .”
“What?” He sat up, bemused.
“‘The man who from the sand of the desert, found the salt of tears.’ It’s the ending of his story, but it has always seemed . . . wrong. Now I understand why. ‘The man who from the sand of the desert, found the salt of the sea.’”
I stared at the sky, thinking of the tale, of the role the jinni played.
“The horrid man who from the sand of the desert found an amazing and handsome and quite perfect magical jinni who gave him the salt,” said Saalim. “That sounds the best, don’t you think?”
I shoved my elbow into his ribs. “And here I was being serious.”
“You’re too serious.”
I gasped. “No, you’re too serious!”
“If I am too serious, I will not tell you of Almulihi’s salt trade.”
Urgently rescinding my declaration, I begged him to tell me. Saalim explained the city’s trade—how it was before my father’s settlement was at the heart of it. That people came from all over to collect salt from the inexhaustible supply at the city’s shores. He said there were salt mines, too, owned by smaller settlements not far from here where people could acquire salt. It was a kinder trek for many, the coastal climate easier on the people and the camels. When he made mention of floating ships that carried in stone and other rare goods, I was nearly vibrating with fascination. The questions tumbled out of me. Ships? Travel by water? There was no water on my map. How much was missing? After answering quite possibly one hundred questions, he closed his hand around my lips, silencing me.
“You ask so much. When can I kiss you if all we do is talk?” He declared with a wide smile before he removed his hand so that his lips could take its place.
“You are so happy today,” I remarked, looking up at the joy creasing his temples and mouth.
“I am very happy. I am home with a woman I love very much.” He looked down at me, his golden eyes bright.
I smiled, but it disappeared quickly as a sorrow settled upon me. Our evening, that morning, it was all so temporary, fleeting. Soon we would return to my settlement. To the unknown. To my father. We can’t stay forever, Saalim had reminded me. We had to go back to real life eventually. The longer we stayed away, the harder it would be to return.
“Stop,” Saalim said. “That life is there whether you think of it or not, so don’t think of it. Let us enjoy this moment together. Without anything else in the way. We can always come back.”
“Do we have to leave?”
“Say we stop time. What happens when you grow old, Emel? And you take your last breath? You would close your eyes only to wake up back in your settlement. For life to start all over. Only then, you’ll carry with you the happiness and freedom of dozens of years back into that fettered life. It would be cruel, and no matter how selfish I want to be, no matter how much I want to give you what you want right now. I can’t do that to you.”
So we sat and watched the sun pull itself high into the sky, feeling the air warm around
us. We watched birds settle atop the towering walls, dive into the surging sea. Saalim told me more stories he remembered from life in Madinat Almulihi. Nothing that revealed who he was within its walls or what his life was like. Always stories of other people, of someone else’s home. But I was satisfied by what he told me, captivated as I was by the unbelievable world he described.
We shared tales and food and fondness as a couple: a golden jinni bound by magic, a dark-eyed ahira shackled by a king. Dreams of joy despite our impossible love.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The sun dropped back into the horizon, the ocean air dried, the wind ceased its motion, and the ground softened to sand once again. The night returned and tents were back in their place lining the quiet lane. I clung to Saalim, holding my eyes closed, already desperate to return to the desert’s edge, to anywhere that was not where we now stood.
My stomach churned with anxiety. I did not want to return to home, to the court, to another man’s bed. Every toxic thought rushed back to me as if trying to smother my happiness.
“I don’t want to leave you,” I whispered into his chest, tears slipping out from my closed eyes.
“I know.” His voice was strained. He held me as tightly as I held him, his laughter gone with the waves.
“I want to go back. Stay there. I don’t care about the consequences.” It was childish and pathetic in its desperation, but as real life trampled on my joy, I clung to the sweet memories as strongly as I could.
He frowned. “I want the same. I want to give that to you.”
“Then do it.”
“You know why I won’t.”
“If I wish it?”
“Please don’t,” he said, defeated.
I took a deep breath. “How will we do this?”
“I don’t know,” he said after a pause. “But I will find a way to see you as often as I can. I promise it.” He clutched me more tightly, murmuring in my ear. “Are you ready, my love?”
I shook my head, but I reached up and kissed his mouth one final time. Then, time moved again.
Swiftly, I returned home, fighting my tears as I wound through the lanes. I mourned the loss of what had been and what I returned to, disbelieving that I had seen the desert’s edge known in the village only as legend. It was as real as the jinn.
In my hands, I held the frame of a tapestry depicting the dunes against a backdrop of dusk as my sisters guided loose threads through its taut bands. A commotion of men’s voices penetrated our tent.
“Emel!” A man cried through the din outside.
My head shot up. Oh, no. The last time a man had shouted my name outside the tent, I learned my mother had died. What would it be now? I searched for Tavi, but she was still there, sitting at my side. At least she was safe. I would not lose another sister.
I waited.
“Emel!” he cried again. The voice was familiar. It sounded like Jael. I strained to understand the words being said but so many men were speaking at once. I shoved the frame off of my lap and went to the entrance. A handful of guards were huddled together, loudly talking over each other.
Behind them, the little girl watched with wide eyes. She saw me and waved excitedly. I gave her a small smile then turned to the men.
“What is it?” I yelled over them.
“Emel—thank Eiqab!” he cried. It was Jael.
Another guard whipped his head around and shouted, “Get back inside! You are forbidden from leaving!” I did not recognize him. With the unusual cadence of his voice, I knew he must be a soldier from a distant settlement.
I scoffed and tilted up my chin. “You overstep. I am a king’s daughter and can go where I please in the palace.” My air of superiority diminishing his own, I approached Jael, his expression alarmed.
“What is it?” I asked.
“They’ve just come from the village to tell me,” he panted nodding to the two young guards who stood still shouting with the foreign soldier. “It’s Firoz. He’s in trouble.”
I did not wait to hear more. I rushed inside and rapidly dressed. Flying back outside, I shoved my entire bag of salt into the angry soldier’s chest, a currency I now knew was as abundant as the sea. “To thank you for your silence,” I said pointedly to the power-hungry man. “Split it amongst yourselves.” I turned to the young guards. “Thank you for coming to tell Jael.”
Running down the lane, I was stopped by a horribly familiar face. Nassar. He stood to the side of the passage with another man who looked toward me with white eyes and a tattooed face. The healer? From Nassar’s baffled expression, it was clear he saw what I had just given the guards. Both men looked at me intensely—did the healer see? Could he see? Nassar’s gaze shifted back to where the guards were still hollering at each other, now excitedly, as they ran their fingers through the salt.
I held my breath, waiting for the vizier to shriek at me, to grab me and take me straight to my father.
Nassar’s expression changed from confusion to anger to understanding and back again. He stepped toward me. “Where are you going?” His voice was hard, but it was not threatening. Almost like he was trying to distract me. Like I had caught him doing something he shouldn’t, just as he had with me.
The healer murmured into his ear. Nassar turned to the healer, looked at me one more time, then backed away and disappeared into a billowing tent. The healer regarded me with his unseeing eyes before turning and following Nassar.
My heart pounded in my chest. I couldn’t understand what the two were doing together or why Nassar hadn’t taken me straight to my father. What had the healer just told the vizier? Was my father sick, or Nassar? Would he tell him of Raheemah’s secret? Of mine? I shook my head. Too much time had been lost already, I could not spare another moment worrying about my father or his vizier. If it was the last thing I did, I would find Firoz. I would not lose anyone else. I sprinted through the palace lanes.
“Wait!” Jael shouted at me from behind. “Emel, hold on!”
I stopped abruptly and turned to wait. He caught up quickly, sweat dripping down his chest, ghutra askew. “You can’t just run out of the palace! You don’t even know where to go!” Struggling to catch his breath, he managed an explanation at last. “He has been sentenced.”
“Sentenced! For what? Where is he?”
“For being a part of the uprising, for colluding with the Altamaruq,” he said, then leaned in and placed a hand on my shoulder. “Soon he’ll be at the grounds.”
My hands flew to my mouth as his words settled over me: the execution grounds. He had behaved so recklessly—they all had. I warned him, and he hadn’t listened. I wanted to scream.
Jael seized my wrist, and we hurried to the servant’s passage. He barked at the other guards stationed at the palace entrance—we were on an important errand for the King. Finally, he let me go. “What will you do?”
“I’m going to find him, Jael. I have to see him . . . have to do something.”
“See him if you must, it’s why I came. But what do you think you’re going to do?” he cried. “There is nothing that can be done. The vizier has given his verdict. It is an unpardonable crime.”
“I can’t let him hang, I just can’t.” Not after everything that has happened. I can’t lose him, too.
He looked uncertain. “Go then. But please, be safe.”
I turned from Jael, not knowing what it was I would do.
“Emel.” Something in Jael’s voice startled me, and I looked back. “I don’t know what you can do or how,” he said, “but if there is any hope, it lies with you. You’re the bravest and—” he chuckled mirthlessly—“luckiest person I know.”
I clasped his forearm and squeezed it lightly. “Thank you, brother.” Then I ran, uncaring that my bright fustan flickered beneath my abaya, uncaring of anything except Firoz.
Coughing from exertion, sweat spilling down my brow, I found myself at the arena. I had been there once before, but I had been a child, when the wives had more allowances. It
was so much smaller than I remembered. There was an oval patch of sand with a ramshackle wooden fence lining its perimeter. A smattering of people had gathered around its edges. I did not remember much from the execution I had seen, but I remembered the electric energy, the loud, crazed voices, the jeering and booing and hissing. The people that afternoon chatted too calmly, too idly for any execution to be occurring soon. The arena was empty other than a single structure—a wooden platform that stood a hand’s height above the ground. From its surface rose the gallows, a lone rope hung from the crosspiece.
Maybe the guards had been mistaken?
I dashed back toward the village center, hoping for a mistake. I wove through the villagers and tent-lined streets, through the quiet marketplace, anxious at the sight of Firoz’s shop standing empty despite the early hour. I went to his home, but it was closed. Fearing to disturb his family, if Jael had been correct, I continued on to the baytahira in hopes of finding him there. If not Firoz, someone who knew of his whereabouts, or his sentence.
In the confined byway of the baytahira tents, I looked from face to face, desperate to see one I knew. They had few visitors this early in the day, so they all called to me. They were not the people I wanted.
I spun around seeing no one I recognized. I spun and spun and spun, looking for anyone to help. Sons, where was he?
“Girl, there are plenty of dance partners here. You just have to pay,” a voice slurred. The cluster of men and women seated along the fringe of the byway tittered.
I knew that voice.
“Sabra?” I turned slowly toward the approaching figure. In not even the full cycle of the moon, the woman who was once my sister had been transformed into a sickly creature. She had always been thin, but now she was even thinner. Her hair was filthy and clumped, her eyes were bloodshot, arms bruised, and her clothes—not the clothes she had left with—were torn and soiled.
“Emel?” she sang loudly, artificial sweetness coating my name. “Sister?” Sabra shouted it, drawing the attention of those who had not already turned in our direction.
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