The Ninety-Ninth Bride

by Catherine F. King

  Dunya laughed and led the way to the servant’s gate. By now she knew the lay of Al-Rayyan quite well, and she led the way north, to the First Gate, with confidence.

  “So what was your inspiration, exactly?” asked Upalu as they crossed over a small canal. “A dream? A vision? Did tea leaves tell you?”

  “A dream,” said Dunya. “I’ve had it before. I’ve dreamed of someone in water, crying out for help.”

  “You can’t help a drowning person.”

  “They weren’t drowning. I think they were a water spirit… ”

  “Even worse. Water spirits are the most fickle creatures under the sun.”

  “I’ve had this dream before, Upalu. Whatever was crying has been miserable for the better part of a year.”

  Upalu was silent after that, until they came into sight of the river, when she said, “Is the fishing good in this river? Because otherwise, the spears are an odd touch… ”

  The men and women working the river were not, strictly speaking, carrying spears, but they had tied knives to the ends of long poles and were slashing at the water as they worked. One woman, who was patrolling the water while her family unloaded bolts of cloth behind her, sank her makeshift weapon into the water only to have it torn away from her. She nearly fell in.

  “Are you all right?” Dunya asked the woman when she recovered.

  “Just as well as before, thank you, but that was my best knife.” The woman shook a fist at the water.

  “What were you knifing at the water for?” Dunya asked.

  The woman looked at Dunya as though she was witless. “Where have you been? It’s the damn trash-eater marids come in to the river. They’ll choke Al-Rayyan dry, just you wait.”

  At that, the woman’s husband called for a hand with a bolt, and the woman turned away. Dunya looked up at Upalu.

  “Marids?” she asked.

  “If there are marids in the water, I’ll be damned,” said Upalu. She pinched Dunya’s clothes and pulled her away from the rush of traffic. “Marids prefer the ocean. They’re distant cousins of mine, if you want to know the truth.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Oh, yes. They’re also in the wish-granting business. But I’ve never known one to come this far inland on freshwater.”

  “So the woman must have been mistaken.”

  “Certainly. If there’s anything in the water, it’s likely mermaids.”

  “Mermaids?”

  “Oh, sure. Can’t you smell them?”

  Dunya took a good sniff and shook her head. “No, I don’t smell anything other than the usual river smells.”

  “Yep, a nice whiff of garbage. That’s mermaid smell.”

  Dunya wiped at her nose and asked, “And how do you know?”

  “I’ve been out west, I’ve met quite a few mermaids. There’s all kinds, kinds that prefer the sea, kinds that prefer the land, but none of them like to be sliced at while swimming, I know that much.”

  She looked at the water, where sailors were still stabbing at the water. In the press of boats, it was almost impossible to see a whole arm span of empty water, let alone anything swimming in it. She turned back to Upalu. “They aren’t like wild animals, are they? They’re spirits.”

  “That’s right. They’re as smart as humans.”

  “Then why are the people attacking them?”

  “Because they’re damned nuisances,” growled a sailor behind them. “Now will you stop trading in two-bit gossip and get out of my way?”

  Dunya got out of the way, with Upalu pushing her gently until they were well out of the path of traffic.

  “The nerve of him,” muttered Upalu. “Some people have no manners.”

  “I think this is what my dream was about,” said Dunya. “These mermaids are being treated unjustly.”

  “They don’t belong in Al-Rayyan. They’ve never been here before.”

  “Then why are they here? Maybe they’re just passing through. Surely they deserve to… you know… swim around without knives coming at them. Where do you think we could talk to some?”

  “I think we should follow your original idea.”

  Dunya grinned, then pointed north. “To the First Gate!”

  And so, Dunya met her first mermaid. And for a while there, she honestly wished she had not.

  Upalu had not been kidding about the smell. And, as the djinni helpfully added, fire spirits didn’t normally care about smell. Apparently, neither did water spirits. These freshwater mermaids smelled like garbage and all manner of waste, since that was, apparently, all that they ate.

  Merfolk were also the yellowish color of unripe olives, pale on their stomachs and dapple-spotted on their backs. And at least one of them—that is, the male that was sunning himself on a bank by the First Gate—had long, handsome whiskers.

  “What do you want?” he asked. He was occupying an inlet normally used as a neighborhood laundry pool. There were people going about their business, or lingering in windows and doorways. All were glancing at the insouciant merman. All mistrustful.

  “I want… ” Dunya tried to summon up Shirin’s haughtiness, but decided that it would be better to emulate Morgiana.“I want to talk to you,” she said as kindly as she could manage. “Or to your leader. Chieftain? Your Sultan?”

  “And why would you want to do that? To throw blades at them all?” asked the merman, stretching his arms out. He had no legs, just a long middle that tapered into a fish’s tail. When he splashed it, another terrible whiff of garbage floated through the air. Dunya delicately held her headscarf over her nose.

  Time to act the royal. “I am a Princess of Al-Rayyan,” she said. “I would like to speak to your leader and understand your needs, if you are to live here in this city.”

  The merman barked a laugh at that. “Well, if you insist. I’ll call them up. You don’t scare me by the way, fire-brat,” he added, looking at Upalu before he dove under the water.

  Dunya glanced up at the djinni. She looked miffed. Dunya said, “I think that went well.”

  “Fire-brat,” Upalu muttered.

  “Oh, get over it.”

  “Dreams. We’re here on account of dreams.”

  “Well, now we’re here on account of diplomacy.”

  “And what gives you authority to be a diplomat?”

  Dunya thought, then smiled up at her friend. “The Sultan said I could run his affairs myself. He then called me a presumptuous worm, but it’s the wording, not the thought, that counts.”

  The merman surfaced again. “Follow me. Er… walk, if you absolutely must,” he added, with something like a sneer. He then swam upriver, out the First Gate. To follow him, Dunya and Upalu had to pass through the gate for humans and look for him on the other side. Dunya had been expecting open air and wide empty plains, not a small tent city pressed right up to the wall itself.

  When she expressed this thought to Upalu, the djinni said, “Well, cities grow. When taxes are high, people will live outside the city walls and do business there. This is like another bud on the tree of Al-Rayyan.” She then made a face. “Ugh. I was being poetic there. Ignore that.”

  Dunya laughed and pulled the djinni towards the river. Out here, the river was surrounded by a recently erected fence of crude wood spikes. There were openings for wharfs and jetties, because the river was crowded with boats, if anything, more crowded than the river within the city.

  “Are they also avoiding taxes?” Dunya asked, while squinting at the water to try and spot more merfolk.

  “Yes, most likely.”

  “Taxes must be a terrible thing.”

  “I wouldn’t know; I’ve never paid them.”

  Dunya spotted the merman at last. He was laughing at them from the center of the river.

  “There he is, Upalu, he’s laughing at us.”

  �
��Well, we can’t have that.”

  “Upalu, could you grant a wish for me?”

  Upalu narrowed her eyes. “What are you thinking of now?”

  “To let me go to the merfolk and talk to them. Just to hear them out. Hear their story.”

  “You’re the strangest human I’ve ever met.”

  “Is that a yes or a no?”

  “You won’t want to get that scarf of yours wet. Hold on.”

  Dunya removed her headscarf herself and handed it to Upalu. “Take good care of it. It’s not mine.”

  “Yes, yes, I know. Now, you’re sure you want to go into the river?”

  “Yes.”

  Upalu dug her hand into a pocket and drew out a line of mud-colored cloth. She deftly tied it around Dunya’s head and said, “Don’t lose this. It will let you breathe and talk underwater.”

  “But I can’t swim.”

  “If you wash up, I’ll find you. I told you, I can only grant wishes within my own power.”

  “And how will you send me into the water?”

  Upalu grinned. “Remember, you asked.” Before Dunya could answer, Upalu picked her up, swung back, and tossed her into the river, into a gap between boats.

  Whatever indignant names Dunya was going to fling at the djinni were swallowed up in an angry gurgle.

  “You were serious?” asked a voice next to her. Dunya turned and saw the merman. He was head and shoulders out of the water while she was foundering. She managed a nod, and felt him take her hand, and draw her down, down, down—it was with a horrified gasp that she realized she could indeed still breathe. She couldn’t smell, though, and that was a relief. Nor, she realized, could she see. Underwater was blurry and full of grit, and getting darker by the minute. She closed her eyes just to protect them and felt her guide bring her to a stop.

  “You wanted to meet them, and here they are,” said her guide. “Lucky for you they were in a meeting.”

  Dunya focused on breathing, the strange sensation of drawing in air while there was water all around her. Allah bless Upalu and her wishes.

  “Who are you?” came the first watery voice. Dunya had the impression of an old woman, a matriarch that immediately reminded her of her own grandmother.

  “I am Dunya, Princess of Al-Rayyan.” She elected not to go into semantics just now.

  “What is Al-Rayyan?” asked another voice. This one seemed younger.

  No one answered, and Dunya cleared her throat, trying to get used to the clash of bubbles in her mouth and air in her lungs. “Al-Rayyan is the city that you are in now. Er, entering. Er, trying to enter… ”

  “Al-Rayyan is the city. But what is Al-Rayyan itself?”

  “It means the watering place.” Dunya giggled and gestured around her. “You know what water is, right?”

  “Don’t patronize us, girl!” snapped the elder. “We asked what is Al-Rayyan itself; why is the city here? What does the city mean?”

  “Well… there was a story that my grandmother once told me… ” Dunya’s fingers covered her mouth a moment, as she remembered. Then she drew her hands away and said, “The people and the river made a deal. The river would flow through, and it would bring water. The people would live on either side, and they would give music and stories to the water, and share the water.That is how Al-Rayyan came to be.”

  “A pretty story. And who was your mother?”

  The change in conversation confused her, but it would not do to show hesitation in front of them. “Her name was Rashida and she had an olive grove.”

  “What are olives?” asked the younger voice.

  “A sort of seaweed of the land,” answered the elder. “Very well. Your mother was a tender of plants. That’s good. You have our attention. You come before us as—what? An ambassador of the humans?”

  “Yes. Why have you come to Al-Rayyan? Why now? We’ve never before had mermaids in our river.”

  “We’re migrating,” said another voice. This one sounded older and male. “And we’re not returning.”

  “We might not return… ” said the younger voice.

  “Not in my lifetime,” said the older female.

  “Please,” said Dunya, “Could you tell me your names? It is hard to keep track… ”

  “Why don’t we emerge,” offered one, “and allow our guest a little fresh air and sunlight?”

  “I hate fresh air and sunlight… ”

  “No one asked you, Flicker.”

  “Flicker” was an odd name for anyone, Dunya thought, until she felt herself moving upwards, and her head broke the surface of the water. Her guide pushed her towards a rock, where she clambered and sat, dripping endlessly. When she looked around, the light was blinding, and in the water, the light flickered.

  “What are your names?” Dunya asked, blinking and trying to get a good look at her conversants. They were all merfolk—she could tell that just from the smell—and her eyes adjusted to three—no, four, counting her guide—yellowish-grayish-green forms all staring at her. All of them had handsome whiskers and no hair to speak of, and she could only guess at their ages. Clockwise from her left, they spoke:

  “I am Waterfall-Climber,” said the one whose voice reminded Dunya of her grandmother.

  “I’m Flicker,” said the one who had asked what Al-Rayyan was.

  “Winterborn,” said the other male, who had said little up to now.

  “And I’m your guide,” said the one directly to Dunya’s right, “Strength.”

  “Those… those are all good names,” Dunya said awkwardly. “Now… why are you leaving and not coming back?”

  “All we want is to pass through this city in peace,” said Winterborn, “because our home lake has become poisoned. It is no longer safe to live there, so we decided to try our luck moving downriver.”

  “We might not find a safe habitat,” said Flicker mournfully.

  “We are the bottom-feeder merfolk,” said Waterfall-Climber, sternly, “We will always find a place to live. Don’t mind her,” she said to Dunya, “She was born at the dark of the moon; she can’t help it.”

  “The lake is poisoned?” Dunya asked. “How? By what? The poison will eventually come here, to the city.”

  Winterborn shook his head. “Do not worry about it. It originated here.”

  Dunya bit her tongue on an exclamation and said, “I would appreciate it if you explained that, please.”

  “What good manners!” said Waterfall-Climber. “Whoever raised you, raised you right.”

  “Thank you. Why do you say the poison originated here? Is Al-Rayyan already sickened?” Dunya thought about the city she had walked in just this morning. The markets were as busy as ever, the soldiers still drilling in the northeastern quadrant, the storytellers loud and melodic in the cafés. How could it be sickening? Dying? Tears sprang into her eyes at the thought.

  “Oh, but we can’t expect you to feel it. You’re just a human,” said Flicker, splashing her tail anxiously. The shadows of the wooden fence seemed to fall heavily on her.

  “Are you saying-” Dunya lowered her voice, because the subject was almost too horrible to even contemplate, let alone vocalize, “Are you saying there is a plague here?”

  “Oh, no, nothing as literal as that,” said Flicker. “But the center of Al-Rayyan—the person that everyone should follow—don’t you understand? Your moon and sun. Your—what is the word?”

  “Your chieftain,” said Waterfall-Climber. “The first human of this city.”

  “The Sultan?” Dunya pushed a strand of hair out of her eyes. “You’re saying his illness is what’s infecting the city?”

  “And it infected our home. We fall within the borders, as you humans have drawn them up.” Waterfall-Climber gave a sniff and traced her whiskers with one finned hand. “And the chieftain here has been acting wrongly, so deeply w
rongly that it is poisoning us.”

  Dunya leaned forward and covered her eyes. The water seemed suddenly far too bright for all of this. “I know this. I know that he is ill. But I don’t understand how what one man does—even a Sultan—can affect you, far away, or why it means that you have to come here.”

  “The Mandate of Heaven,” said Winterborn, to an impressive silence.

  “What he means by that,” said Waterfall-Climber, “is if the ruler does not act in accordance with what God wills, then the water and people will suffer. Well, you would say the land would suffer.” She gave a little scoff.

  “How did your water suffer, though?” Dunya asked.

  “We are weakening,” said Strength, abruptly. He had not spoken much throughout this exchange. “Our seers’ mirrors and knots no longer have potency. For the past year, our life has been in crisis, but we hoped it would get better, and instead… we are trying another water.”

  “Wait… you said it’s been a year?” Dunya asked. The answer came in the affirmative, from all four.

  She thought quickly. A year ago… well, nine months ago had been the hunting trip, and a month before that, Dunya had married the Sultan, and three months before that had been the death of his first wife, and then he had begun executing the women of the harem.

  “A year and a month ago was when the Sultan first went mad.” She paused, then said, “I should have known. Upalu warned me. I should have worked harder to find a remedy. But nine months passed and I forgot, and… ”

  “You are just one girl,” said Waterfall-Climber, in what she probably meant to be a kindly voice “and not even fully grown at that.”

  I am fully grown, Dunya thought, miffed.

  “You say you are a Princess, and you have the smell about you.”

  “You can tell?” Dunya asked. She couldn’t help herself; her own nose had shut down some five minutes ago.

  “You have the smell of important waters about you. It’s a matter of where you live. I don’t expect you to know. All we ask is that you speak to the others of importance, and let us pass through the river here without injury. Some of us are attempting the passage. Most return, bearing stab wounds and slices for their trouble.”