Daughter of the Salt King

by A. S. Thornton

  “Leave here,” he said.

  Nassar left slowly, looking from the King to me and back again, his brow furrowed, his hands fussing with the air as if trying to do something, anything, to change what was happening. I did not understand his reason for speaking out, but I was grateful for it.

  The King turned to me and said nothing, so I filled the silence.

  “I am not afraid of you,” I whispered through clenched teeth. “You won’t win.” My voice so quiet that none could hear it but my father.

  The King did not flinch at my words. He took my face in his hands. I refused to wince, to cower, though I was sure he would kill me bare-handed in that moment.

  “I wanted you to have everything,” he whispered just as quietly, and I was stunned to see that his eyes were wet, almost tearful. “You were supposed to be one of the best.” His voice cracked. His fingers were soft on my cheeks, nails just barely pressing my skin. “I was a fool for thinking you could be like her . . . was it Isra who poisoned you? Turned you against me?” Again, his voice caught, and he dropped his hands. I heard the ache in his words, and had I not been so angry, I might have felt sympathy. But that pool of water had long dried.

  “You think cruelty makes you strong,” I hissed, and he glared at me. “But what strength do you have without those of us to whom you are so cruel?”

  “Be gone from me,” he said. He moved swiftly to the tent’s exit before he stopped, back turned to us all.

  “Take her to her sisters,” he said to the only guard left in the room, to Saalim. “Then I want you back to my sleeping quarters. Ibrahim, the servants will escort you to your room. Emel will be ready for you to depart at dusk.”

  My feet were heavy as stone, so I stood in the room, unmoving, for what seemed an eternity. Everyone had left, except me, Saalim, and the servants who watched me warily.

  “Move,” the guard, the jinni, said finally. He nudged me coldly, maintaining his act before the servants. My feet moved me out of the room, but I don’t remember how. My body quavered, my heart thundered, my legs were weak with tremors. As soon I stepped into an empty hallway with the guard at my back, the world froze. I could barely register the change in the air before Saalim pulled me to him and the ground slipped from under me.

  And when I felt that we stood in the shade of the trees in the oasis, I cried.

  “You are worthy of being someone’s wife. You are worthy of love. I love you,” he told me over and over.

  He held me as I wept into my hands.

  “I can’t go, Saalim,” I said through shuddered breaths. “I can’t. I would rather have no life than one as Omar’s whore,” I said. “I have to make a decision. It can’t wait.”

  “I know.”

  By the small pool, I paced back and forth, rage and sadness and fear propelling my steps.

  Ideas streamed out of me, ways to get around the King sending me away. I did not want to make my choice. Not yet. Not ever. But I knew my time was up, the base of the hourglass full. I could wait no longer.

  I asked the jinni to change Ibrahim’s mind, but he could not. It was not Ibrahim’s idea but my father’s. Saalim was incapable of changing his master’s plan. Could he kill Ibrahim? Could he cause another attack by the Dalmur? Couldn’t he do anything? No, there was nothing. This was the King’s plan, and Saalim could not interfere with it.

  There was no way out. If I did not make my move, the King would make his. He would win. So I would not let him.

  Saalim knelt before me, taking my hands in his, and watched me with heedful patience.

  I recoiled, seeing that he waited for my choice.

  “Do you know what you want?”

  “Yes. No.” I looked at Saalim, at every angle of his face, the way his lips moved when he spoke, the way his shoulders rose as he breathed. “I am not ready to say goodbye.” And I had to prepare for the fact that it very well would be goodbye. If I freed the jinni, if I freed myself.

  “There is no rush,” he whispered, and I heard the pain I felt in his voice, too. “We will stay here for as long as you need.”

  We stood in silence for a long time. After a while, the leaves rustled, and the water danced with small ripples. I looked at him, worried that he had done something foolish and allowed time to move forward again, but he had only magicked the wind and the sun as he always did.

  He said, sheepishly, “You know I must hear the words of the wind through the trees and see the sun fall into the earth.”

  We lay down together in the cool sand, and I curled into him, marveling at his ability to be so enamored with the world despite its darkness.

  “Saalim,” I said after a long silence, my head on the bend of his arm. My mind had been a torrent of thoughts and wild plans when I remembered that morning. It had seemed so long ago when I held the tile and moon-jasmine and golden necklace. A whole lifetime.

  “Hmm?”

  “The Altamaruq, the Dalmur, whatever they are, they know about Madinat Almulihi. The symbols they carry—it’s a moon-jasmine, not the sun. Why are the same images carved into your vessel? What aren’t you telling me?”

  Saalim studied the cluster of trees above him. He inhaled deeply, revealing nothing on his stone face. His silence made me uneasy. I watched him, waiting for him to say something, anything. When he didn’t respond, I stiffened.

  “How long have you known?”

  “Since your father’s party.”

  I thought back to that dark morning when the men tried to steal his vessel. I recalled the choking gasp and the man’s fall, the slice of blades as they were pressed into soft bodies. The jinni’s face as he bent over one of them, retrieving his vessel, pausing when he saw their golden pendant carved with the symbols of his home. I remembered the ache in his eyes, the curve of his shoulders as they fell forward.

  “When you saw what they wore around their necks.”

  He nodded. “I have killed so many for your father. It is my purpose as his jinni. But their deaths, I will always carry with me.”

  “You did not kill them. The guards did.”

  He laughed flatly. “I might as well have. The man fell to his knees because of me. Everything that came after was because of me.”

  I wrapped my fingers around his arm that crossed my chest. “He wished for it. You can’t feel guilt because you do what your master commands.”

  “Does that work for you?” He asked.

  I thought of the nights I spent with muhamis, forced by my father. I shook my head.

  I said, “You still have not answered my question.”

  He exhaled.

  “Why do these people who bear the symbol of Madinat Almulihi search for a jinni who happens to be from the same place? Why have you kept this from me?”

  He sat up. “It was not something I wanted to burden you with.”

  Of course. How could he tell me that the people I once hated most were from the city which I loved? From his home? Maybe he feared I would think he was like them.

  “I don’t hate them, Saalim. I think, finally, I understand them.”

  They were as desperate as I, doing whatever they could to find a life they could embrace. Is that not what I did every time I left the palace, risking the safety of my sisters and my brothers, every time I drew another place on my map, and every time I closed my eyes to plan a wish that even Masira could not twist?

  “Aren’t we all salt chasers seeking freedom, some semblance of control?” I asked.

  If I did not look out for myself, who else would? I had only me. And I had to endure. Weren’t we all the same?

  Saalim shook his head. “That is not it.”

  I closed my mouth. I waited.

  “They carry the symbols of my home because of the legend that has been passed from mouth to mouth for as long as I’ve been a jinni.”

  The legend. The one all the Dalmur have mentioned, the one that has them convinced that they will find their redemption.

  “What is it?”

  �
�You already may know.” He took my hands. “Do you know the legend of the lost prince?”

  I thought for a moment before I nodded, slowly. “Of course. My mother told it to me often. The one of the prince who was locked away and the family who perished.” I frowned. “I don’t understand how—”

  “Let me explain.” He stood and helped me to do the same. “I think the story is best told from where it took place. If you will allow me to take you there?”

  I nodded and stepped into him, closing my eyes, feeling his heart beating against my cheek. When I opened my eyes again, we stood amongst the crumbling ruins of Madinat Almulihi.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Saalim

  * * *

  The guilt I carry from the fall of Madinat Almulihi is like a scar—it will be with me forever. I still smell the blood that pooled in the streets; still hear the sounds of blades and the screams of neighbors; still see my mother, cold like the dagger she used to kill my father, telling me to run; still bear the shame that I did not stay to protect her.

  Madinat Almulihi was my only home, and like all children who grow in one place, I never appreciated the fortune of my life. It was the most prosperous city in the desert, ruled by my mother and father with unyielding justness. I could not appreciate that then. I do now, but it is much too late.

  It was no wonder people from all over the desert flocked to see our streets. They had heard the rumors of ocean wind, green that crawled across walls, and flowers that sprouted between bricks. When they came, they were amazed to find more wonders than what the whispers told: massive stone palaces, domed temples for worship, homes with strong foundations and sturdy walls. They saw the joy of the neighbors who shared food and drink, the people that loved openly, the freedom with which people were allowed to live. It gave them escape from what was, at that time, a lawless era in the desert when it could only be ruled with violence. But the visitors saw only what they wanted—that there was no violence, there were trees that gave shade, water whose body was larger than the desert’s. They did not see, did not want to see, that no matter where one lived, unhappiness lurked like a shadow.

  Some of these visitors returned to their settlements and tribes telling tales of this extraordinary place, spreading curiosity and jealousy. But many stayed, and as the village grew, the desert calmed. By the time I was born into the palace, Almulihi was a bustling city, a massive center for trade and travel. The desert was ordered, and men used words instead of scimitars. Because our land thrived, it was only a matter of time before someone tore its roots from the ground.

  My father was generous with me as his firstborn. Perhaps it was to make up for his own failures as a husband and king, but he doted on me and groomed me to be his heir. For years, I was a little kingling and paraded through the palace like I wore the crown already. If you had asked me then, I would tell you I did.

  I could not be the only heir, though. Two daughters were born, and then finally, one more son. We were celebrated and adored by the citizens as if we were their own. We roamed the streets of the city with guards on our tails. My sisters twirled in bright dresses, vine crowns woven in their hair. My brother and I clanged our dulled swords on the palace steps as we fought heroically in imaginary battles. We grew into young adults who were too distracted to learn our roles as city rulers, to learn to lead as our parents did.

  We were naive. We were not prepared for what came.

  “Where is your brother?” My mother asked me the morning Almulihi fell. To a servant who headed into the kitchens, she called, “The king needs his tea.”

  Kassim was only my brother when she was displeased with him. “I am not his keeper,” I said.

  She looked at me with great shadows beneath her eyes. “Find out where he has gone. Your father wishes to see him. He is having a bad morning.” She turned her gaze to the windows, the bright blue sky cut into four arching squares.

  The servant bustled out of the kitchen carrying a tray with a bronze kettle and ceramic cup. The queen followed her up the stairs.

  I stormed through the palace, my hard-soled shoes clicking loudly against the smooth tiles. I was no servant to fetch my wayward brother at my mother’s order.

  Nadia was in the gardens clipping roses. She looked up at my approaching steps.

  “Finished at the docks already?”

  Shrugging, I stepped down onto the rose beds, careful my boots did not soil with mud. “I don’t see why Father has me performing a hired-man’s job. I won’t waste my time in dockyards when I’m king, so I don’t see why I should do it now.”

  She raised a knowing eyebrow and turned back to the roses. “Go tell that to Father.”

  I said, “Have you seen Kassim?”

  “He has not yet returned.”

  “Returned from where?”

  She studied the roses, searching for what I did not know. They all looked the same. “To visit some settlement. He left last night, said you already knew.”

  He’d told me nothing, but this was not surprising. Kassim and I rarely spoke except to mollify our mother at mealtime. He was flippant and inattentive, and I could rely on him for nothing.

  “When does he get back?”

  “Late tonight or tomorrow I think.” She clipped three more roses until she had a full bouquet. Then, she held them out to me, smiling. “Should I take them to Father?”

  I turned from her. “I’m sure he’ll love to see that his heir has spent her entire morning trimming blooms from their stems.”

  Passing through the atrium, I flung aside the vines that were left to grow so long they tumbled onto the floor and strode around the fountain whose incessant trickling water drove me to insanity. I climbed the curving stairs and made my way to my father’s chamber.

  The king was in bed, a frail and sad version of who he used to be. Each breath rattled, his arms held no meat, his eyes were sunken, and cheeks hollowed.

  “Father,” I said when I entered. My mother was at his side, holding the cup of steaming tea, readying to bring it to his lips. She did not look at me when I entered.

  “Son.” He began to rise, but my mother pressed her hand against his chest and shook her head. My father listened. “How were the ships? Did Ekram explain the inventory? He was supposed to take you to the storerooms, too.” He looked at me hopefully, and I felt a stirring of guilt that I had told Ekram to handle it on his own. I did not need to learn the minutia of ship trade. My father trusted him, so would I.

  But I nodded. “It’s done.” I fished my purse from my hip and pulled from it a small package. Once unwrapped, I showed my father the contents. “Dried meat from the western sea called ham. The captain sends his wishes for your health. Said his mother made him eat this every day he was ill. Cured him of every ailment.”

  “Good boy,” my father said, but he did not ask for the meat, and I, feeling foolish, wrapped and stuffed it away. My father patted the bed beside him. “Come closer.”

  I did, though I hated every moment of it. Hated seeing my father as a frail man. It did not fit with the man I knew, the man I idolized and loved. My father, the king, was not weak. He was not unsure. He did not rely on others to accomplish his simple tasks; did not rely on my mother to bring drink to his lips.

  My mother spoke. “Saalim, we’ve things to discuss today. Citizen disputes I would like you to assist in resolving. Petitions from merchants and farmers who arrived this morning. Tomorrow, we will meet the keeper of the southeast mine. They’re having trouble, though, I’m not yet sure with what. I have not finished the letter. Thought you might help with that, too. We will look through it together.” The tasks poured from her mouth like the fountains in our home. The burden of the city fell on her shoulders with my father’s illness, and she used the opportunity to supply my siblings and I with the education we had not yet received—a gift none of us particularly welcomed. We did not understand that we had to learn how to be rulers. We thought it came from blood alone. My mother was tireless in her effort t
o care for our father, for our people. When I collapsed into bed at night while she was still tending to my father or managing the servants, I wished I possessed some of her strength for my own.

  “Tell me what needs to be done. I can do it,” I said lifting my chin. And I could. I did not know why she thought to assist me still. My father had been sick for nearly four moons. I had taken it all on without issue. Some things, my father and mother held onto too tightly. I did not need to see Ekram when he could manage the shipyard on his own. I did not have to speak with Azim nearly every day to check on his management of the soldiers. No fool would take Madinat Almulihi to war. It was wasted time, so I did not do it.

  I did things differently, but I was not wrong.

  “Where is Kassim?” my father asked. “I must speak to him.”

  “Nadia said Kassim is visiting a settlement. He won’t be back until late tonight or tomorrow. When I see him, I will tell him you have asked for him,” I said watching my mother, waiting to see her approval that I had done what she asked. “If it has to do with palace work, Father, just tell me. I can handle it.”

  “I know you can, son.” His voice was fractured and hoarse. “Maybe he visits Edala. Will bring her home to me. It has been so long.”

  My mother pursed her lips then turned back to my father. “Take another drink, love.” My mother curled protectively over him, her hand behind his head like she forgave him of everything. My father looked so relieved as he sipped the tea like a child, watching her misty eyes. He seemed so grateful for her mercy.

  From high above, the horns’ blare echoed.

  The war horns.

  My mother’s eyes met mine.

  I stood up and briskly left the room. I had only heard the horns’ cry once before, and it was when my father had the players blow their curving instruments in the atrium. My siblings and I needed to learn its sound, needed to know to fear it.

  I found the narrow, spiraling staircase of the tower. I leapt up the steps, staring at the white-washed walls, glimpsing through the keyhole openings the midday sky outside. Finally, I reached the doorway that led to the platform where three men stood, blaring their horns in succession so that there was no break in the sound. From the top of the palace, I could see other men and women with war horns standing atop their homes, carrying the sound out to the extremities of the city. People emerged onto the streets to see the cause for alarm. None brought their weapons.