The Ardent Swarm

by Manai, Yamen

  The beekeeper announced himself by lightly knocking on the hive wall. The guard bees flew out to meet him.

  “Hello, my beauties, apologies for the intrusion.”

  They flitted around him, consenting.

  “So, happy with your new home?” he asked, lifting the roof. “Perfect. You all look nicely settled in to me.”

  To limit their flight, he spread the smoke from the bellows above the honeycomb frames. The worker bees remained frozen in place, thinking there was a fire. The most curious among them took a step back.

  “I’m sorry, my beauties. Personally, if I was a little bee, I’d hardly appreciate some man coming to smoke me out. But believe me, it’s for a good cause, and deep down, I feel more like a bee than a man.”

  One by one, he removed the frames from the brood chamber and inspected the small world swarming before him, so dense that it was difficult to distinguish individuals. The bees were circulating in every direction, driven by an exuberance of energy. No time for false niceties or petty squabbles. Each bee knew that they were fellow creatures working for the good of all, and none got upset if jostled or pushed. Not even the queen. They formed a single body.

  “There’s her majesty.”

  He had the expert eye and had identified her easily. Larger than the others, her abdomen entirely golden, the queen gave off a benevolent aura as she weaved among her subjects. Sidi picked her up delicately.

  “Hello, my queen.”

  He looked at her with admiration. Out in the sunlight, she shone like a jewel. Her thin legs were shaking, and her stinger was extended, the ultimate sign of protest.

  “I know,” he consoled her. “I took you from your hive, but there’s another one impatiently awaiting you, one that’s eager for you to help it see clearly again.”

  He placed her in a jar and put back the frame and the roof. The bees began to sense her cruel absence, and their buzzing grew louder.

  “Yes, my little orphans,” sympathized Sidi. “Don’t worry. You’ll get through this, and you’ll raise new monarchs.”

  He then headed toward his old hives. Standing in front of the colony that displayed the greatest weakness when exposed to direct sunlight, the alchemist continued his ritual.

  Once again, he found and deposed the colony’s queen, isolating her in a second jar. As the hive buzzed its displeasure, he took out the wild queen and enthroned her. After a few hesitant steps, during which she was surrounded and jostled by a curious, swelling crowd, the new queen successfully established herself through her dance and her scent. She was unanimously accepted by her new subjects, and the buzzing of protest turned to purring. Harmony returned to the citadel. The worker bees resumed flight. Soon the queen would lay her eggs in this brood, teasing out its memories and awakening a legacy buried in their genes, hidden over time by domestic life in the shadow of cities.

  This legacy would be reintroduced into all of Sidi’s colonies. For two weeks, his orphaned bees would dedicate themselves to transforming a dozen larvae into royal nymphs. The beekeeper would supervise their development in the cells the whole time. When they hatched, he would keep one as queen and remove the others before, out of instinct, they tore each other apart. One by one, he would enthrone them in the different broods of his apiary, at the expense of the old monarchs. His art and his expertise would bring to life generations capable of braving the test of the midday sun.

  8

  One week in, Sidi found himself out of matches. He untied Staka and headed to Nawa. Matches were one of the rare supplies abundantly available in Kheira’s little store.

  The village was located at the base of his hill, which, at most, took him half an hour to reach. A quick trip, he thought as he tightened his burnoose, even though he knew that Kheira was a hell of a talker and you had to be clever to get out of her unending conversations. He never could have imagined that he would end up encouraging her to talk, granting her his full attention in exchange.

  When he reached the village, he tied up his donkey and went to the grocery shop on foot. When he saw the Nawis, he rubbed his eyes, incredulous.

  Where on earth am I? he wondered.

  The women were dressed in black from head to toe, and the men, who had given free rein to their beards, were outfitted with long tunics and tight skullcaps. Everyone who greeted him did so by reciting prayer upon prayer about prophets he knew and others he didn’t. Nothing was familiar anymore. Sidi felt an instant surge of worry.

  He ran to the shop in search of refuge.

  But the shopkeeper’s appearance did little to reassure him.

  Trusty Kheira had traded her legendary red scarf with Berber designs for a satiny black veil that made her look like a widow.

  “Oh, how nice to see you! Where have you been holed up? We haven’t seen you in weeks!”

  “That you, Kheira?” he asked skeptically.

  “Who else would it be?! Don’t you recognize me?” she responded indignantly.

  “Of course I do. Grab me a carton of matches.”

  Kheira got on her stepladder, grumbling. “Of course I do! Yeah right, of course you don’t! You should come down more. You’ll end up not recognizing anybody anymore. If we were bees, you’d visit us more often!”

  “You’re right on two counts. You’re not bees, and I won’t be able to recognize anyone anymore. But come on, where’d this”—he pointed to her ensemble—“come from?”

  “What? My new clothes? Oh, that’s right! You missed the big handout.”

  “The big handout?”

  That’s all Kheira needed to happily launch into a recap worthy of a big-time reporter. She didn’t omit a single detail, moving her account along with a few “you knows?” and a couple “if only you knews!” She told him about the arrival of the first caravan of canvassers who had told them about the fall of the Handsome One before setting up a premade voting booth and handing out truckloads of pamphlets. Then she described the visit by the bearded benefactors who spoke of God in highly polished terms while filling the villagers’ huts with food, clothes, and blankets.

  “They handed out stuff in the name of God?” he asked, confused.

  “And we accepted everything in the name of God!” she answered, kissing the two sides of her hand.

  The matter struck him as shifty.

  “Without asking for anything in exchange?” asked Sidi.

  Kheira thought for a bit.

  “No, they did!” she said, pulling out a folded piece of paper that she laid on the counter. It was a sample ballot, already filled out.

  “On election day,” she continued, “the holy man said to check here. Check the pigeon!”

  Sidi bent over the paper, and instead of a pigeon printed in ink he saw a crow of ill omen.

  “Oh really? That’s all the holy man said?” he repeated, looking more closely. Then he stood up. “And when are these elections exactly?”

  “In a few days. We’re all going. Will you come?”

  “I’m a man with no debts,” he answered, paying for the carton. “I’m off. I have things to do.”

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said as he untied Staka from the tree.

  The donkey sensed his master’s distress and set off.

  What were these beards and tunics, this bizarre vocabulary, these new attitudes doing here? He had lived in this kind of world once before, and he had returned forever changed.

  9

  Douda, riding a mule, stopped in front of Toumi’s hut.

  “Toumi, come out of your shithole!”

  Toumi didn’t take long to emerge, preceded by his two goats and the pack of hens and chicks that shared his roof day and night.

  “I’m going to Walou to buy some fish. Want to come?”

  Hand shading his eyes, Toumi looked at his friend framed in the light.

  “You got what you need to buy fish?”

  Douda indicated two burlap bags overflowing with prickly pears, attached to the sides of his steed.

&nbs
p; “If I can sell these, I’m going to buy one beautiful fish.”

  Looking at the bags filled to the brim, Toumi wondered by what miracle they could sell everything in one day. Prickly pear cactuses grew all over the region and, consequently, their fruits, nicknamed “sultans,” were worth nothing on the scale. There had to be some thirty kilos of them. As he made the mental calculation, Toumi imagined the trouble his friend had gone to finding the sultans one by one amid the thorns. Thirty kilos at half a dinar per kilo would make a fifteen-dinar profit, which, as he recalled, was the price per kilo for fish. Good old Douda, he thought, working hard, despite the December cold, to pick the last fruits left behind by men and late fall, and hoping for nothing but baraka, a divine blessing.

  “Let’s go!”

  Toumi untied his mule, climbed on, and the two friends took the road to town, a good two hours away.

  Douda looked tired, and his hands, riddled with spines, were just barely holding onto the reins. His gaze was pensive.

  “The fish is for Hadda,” he said.

  “Good move.”

  “She’s pregnant.”

  Toumi started astride his mule. “That’s great news! Congratulations, Douda!”

  Douda stared resignedly at his delighted friend.

  “She’s four months pregnant. You know her, she’s not difficult. But lately all she dreams about is fish. And you know what they say—a pregnant woman who doesn’t satisfy her food cravings will bring an unlucky child into the world.”

  Toumi tried to cheer up his friend. “Enjoy it and stop worrying. We’ll get her that fish!”

  Douda didn’t appear to have heard him.

  “She dreams of eating sea bream braised on the kanoun. How does she even know that there’s a fish called the sea bream? Sometimes she really surprises me.”

  Toumi furrowed his brow. He didn’t know any fish other than canned tuna and canned sardines.

  “And it’s not the cheapest one,” sighed Douda. “We’re going to have to sell every last one of these sad sultans.”

  They reached Walou midmorning.

  The town was teeming with locals and visitors alike, cars and carts battling for road space with pedestrians and animals. The Nawi duo tied up their mules and set up at the market entrance. As Douda slumped in exhaustion, Toumi took charge. He unloaded the merchandise, presented it as best he could, and began to shout, “Eight sultans for one dinar! Eight sultans for one dinar!”

  When the muezzin announced the midday prayer, they had only made three dinars.

  They left to pray. When in Walou, they never skipped a prayer because it was their only opportunity to wash up, thanks to the faucets available in the mosque restroom. Douda prayed with all his heart to the Most Generous for a small sea bream so that Hadda wouldn’t bring an unlucky child into the world.

  But the afternoon didn’t go much better than the morning, so much so that Douda lowered his aims accordingly. “Twelve sultans for one dinar! Twelve sultans for one dinar!”

  The new price brought in a few more clients but not enough. At the end of the day, they were left with seven dinars and half a bag of sultans on their hands. Little by little, the market closed down. The merchants began to pack up their stalls.

  “But we have a Seventh Heaven!” said Toumi. “It must be worth something. Hurry up, before the fish merchants clear out.”

  Douda followed him, clutching the dinars like a talisman in his scarred hand. On the way, they passed the produce section, where fruits considered nobler than the sultan reached exorbitant prices per kilo. The vegetables weren’t spared either. Everything had shot up in price. For many, any plans of cooking a piece of meat came to an end in the butchers’ aisle. Douda advanced reluctantly. He was scared to continue, and his steps grew heavy. He told himself that a man who can barely afford two kilos of bananas couldn’t hope to buy sea bream. But Toumi didn’t seem to realize any of this and marched straight ahead. As they got closer, they picked up the smell of the sea, and the cats began to outnumber the people. Meowing with frustration at the entrance to the fish merchants’ territory, the most adventurous felines earned nothing but a stern kick.

  The fish were displayed at angles in piles of ice, smooth and glistening, in different sizes, shapes, and colors. But they were all goggle-eyed with mouths wide open, as if stunned to see the two Nawis appear before their majestic stand.

  Behind their wares, the fish merchants stood on large platforms, which made them look considerably taller. Sporting nitrile aprons, rubber gloves, and plastic boots up to their knees, the overall impression was of torturers. Douda felt so small and pathetic that he could no longer speak.

  “Which ones are the sea bream?” asked Toumi.

  With a trembling finger, Douda pointed at a silvery pile. A sign indicated a price of thirty dinars per kilo. Toumi had trouble believing it.

  “That’s impossible. There must be a mistake.”

  He asked the vendor, “Hey, pal, how much per kilo?”

  The fish seller bent over and identified the object he was eyeing.

  “The sea bream? Thirty dinars!”

  “Thirty dinars per kilo?!” Toumi whistled.

  “It’s sea bream, not pool bream,” explained the fish seller. “Farmed bream is half price, but I don’t have any left.”

  Toumi had never been in the sea or a pool, so the man’s explanations did little to satisfy him. The Nawi bristled. “So? What a scam!”

  Visibly outraged, the seller descended from his stand. It turned out there was nothing gigantic about him. He was an old fisherman with skin tanned by sun and salt.

  “Do you think that I’m eating any of the fish that I catch? You know how much it costs me to go out to sea and bring back fish on ice all the way to Walou? I have no doubt there’s still people running scams in this country, but they’re not here!”

  As Toumi, confused, mumbled an apology, Douda broke his silence. “Look, what can I have for seven dinars?”

  “A couple red mullets.”

  He resigned himself. “Weigh out that amount.”

  “I’ll tell her it’s sea bream,” he whispered to Toumi.

  As they were preparing to leave, the muezzin announced the sunset prayer. The two friends looked at one another, then headed back to the mosque. A crowd of young men was restlessly queuing at the door, like the first day back to school. Like the Nawi duo, they had grown out their beards and were wearing tunics and skullcaps, undoubtedly obtained during another big handout.

  “What’s going on? Why are there so many people?” Douda asked a man organizing entry to the prayer room.

  Though overwhelmed, the man responded in a fraternal tone. “It’s the sunset prayer, my brothers, like every night! Come, find a spot.”

  “The sunset prayer?” puzzled Toumi.

  “Like every night?” puzzled Douda.

  They knew about the Friday prayer. However, neither of them knew that there were now prayers at sunset, and at nearly every hour of the day.

  Douda pulled Toumi’s hand. “We don’t have time. It’ll be night soon, and there’s not even a crescent of a moon to light our way back.”

  But the man they had questioned held them forcefully by the shoulders and urged them. “Stay, my brothers! Stay and listen. A holy man will be speaking.”

  And he pushed them inside.

  CONFUSION

  10

  Douda and Toumi took their places in the ranks. They learned from their neighbors that the holy man was the new imam of Walou, tasked with preaching by the Ministry of Religious Affairs, itself restructured from top to bottom since the Party of God had won the national elections.

  Seated in the mihrab, the man was facing the crowd, which was kneeling with ears wide open. He coughed lightly, chased the frogs and devils from his throat, lifted his hands to the sky, and thundered: “Glory be to God the All-Powerful, and may praises blanket His Prophet, the Last in Name!”

  “Glory be to God the All-Powerful, and may pra
ises blanket His Prophet, the Last in Name!”

  “My brothers, settle in and listen to my words. They are important words, so listen closely and listen to the end, for he who listens, whatever he did before, will see the list of his sins purged soon enough. My brothers, come closer to me, and God will bring you closer to Him in the afterlife. Repeat after me: Glory be to God the All-Powerful, and may praises blanket His Prophet, the Last in Name!”

  The crowd repeated the holy man’s words several more times until he was satisfied. He raised his hands and silence reigned.

  “I’ve seen people turn toward he who has gold.

  “And turn away from he who does not!

  “I’ve seen people take interest in he who has money.

  “And lose interest in he who does not!

  “I’ve seen people go wild for he who has diamonds.

  “And go cold for he who does not!

  “My brothers, I’m going to tell you a story. A story that took place in our country—and recently, I should add. A story of two brothers, one rich and one poor. The rich brother was a sheep farmer and had an enormous flock. He shared nothing, not even with his own brother. Worse! He let him rot in misery. One day, the poor brother was sitting outside, leaning against a wall with his son. No one came to see them or ask about their circumstances. They were avoided, in fact, like lepers, while across the street, the wealthy brother was holding a massive feast packed with people. Between two mouthfuls, the rich farmer sneezed, and without even giving thanks to God, he continued eating. Nonetheless, men came running from the end of the street to bless him.

  “‘May God bless you! May God bless you!’ they told him, kissing his hand and begging for a spot at the feast.

  “God made it so that at the same time the rich brother sneezed, the poor brother sneezed, and when he did, he gave Him thanks. And yet, nobody came to bless him.

  “His son pointed this out. ‘Father, nobody came to bless you even though men from all over came to bless my uncle.’

  “‘Son,’ answered the poor man, ‘God blesses the man of good deeds, and men bless the man of many sheep!’