The Ninety-Ninth Bride

by Catherine F. King

  “I’m so sorry to hear that.”

  “Fortunately, God has made us tough.”

  “Don’t attempt the crossing again,” Dunya said to them. “If you would take my advice, wait, and… and I will speak to the Viziers on your behalf. I will come up with a way for you to pass in safety. I am sorry that you have to leave your home.”

  “We may return,” said Flicker.

  “Not in my lifetime,” grumbled Winterborn.

  “Thank you,” said Waterfall-Climber. “Strength will escort you back to where you were… how did you enter the river? Jumped?”

  “I was thrown,” Dunya said, with a small glare towards wherever Upalu was.

  “Very well, Strength will throw you out again. Strength?”

  “No! No—I’ll just walk back.”

  “Really? Those legs seem so precarious… not like a good, reliable tail.”

  “I’ll manage somehow. Thank you. I will return here at… this time, say… ”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “I was hoping for more time… ”

  “So were we, but we must make our passage soon. We cannot crowd this part of the river much longer.”

  “Understood. I will be here at this time tomorrow.”

  “Then we can ask for no more.”

  The four merfolk disappeared beneath the surface of the water, Strength remaining a moment longer to nod a farewell to Dunya. She got to her feet unsteadily and saw Upalu waiting on the other side of the fence of stakes.

  “I told you I’d find you,” the djinni said to Dunya.

  Dunya peeled off the sodden headband while Upalu pulled up the stakes with ease. “This was handy, but not as useful as I’d hoped.”

  “Oh, well. Whatever is?” said Upalu, as she pulled out two more stakes and made an opening just wide enough for Dunya to slip through. Now Dunya thoroughly stank of the river, and they made their way back to the Palace.

  “I ignored the Sultan’s illness,” said Dunya to the djinni. “But now I must redouble my search for a remedy. I hadn’t realized that his illness would affect the length and breadth of the Kingdom. I must research this and find a cure for him, as soon as I have found a way for the merfolk to pass through in peace… ”

  “One thing at a time,” Upalu advised her. “Why don’t you start by telling me what those catfish told you?”

  It took the rest of the walk to the Palace to explain. After a bath to wash the smell of fish off of her and dispel the river’s chill, Dunya dressed herself again, but not as a street-ready servant girl. She had requested a few outfits from the Palace tailors and dressmakers, outfits fit for more formal occasions. She donned one such outfit now and went in search of her father.

  He was easy to find; in his office as usual, even though the sun was setting.

  “Hello,” she said, standing in the door of his office. “I wish to speak with you.”

  “It’s you,” he said, without much feeling either of joy or of sadness. “What do you want from me?”

  “I want to talk to you about the river trade. It’s important… ” she hesitated between the two titles she knew for him and said, “Vizier Shareef.”

  At that, he looked up at her and seemed hurt. “And what do you know of the river trade?”

  “I know that there are mermaids swimming through the river, trying to pass, but humans are standing in their way. What will you do to help them?”

  “I have enough on my plate as it is. The mermaids should have thought about the risks before they came to this city.”

  “They had no choice.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I spoke to them this afternoon. I made a parlay.”

  He started back and clutched a scroll to him with alarm. “You parlayed? On behalf of the government of Al-Rayyan?”

  “Well, no one else was going to do it.”

  “Dunya,” he began, “Princess though you may be, you are still just a child who has no idea what she’s meddling with… ”

  “Princess I may be,” she said, “and much thanks to you for that. But if I’m going to be a Princess, I may as well use what authority I have for good.”

  “Authority?” he barked with laughter.

  “Listen to me! I—I am trying,” she said. “Which is more than anyone else seems willing to do for the merfolk. Will you listen to me… Father?”

  The word tasted bitter on her tongue, but he put aside the documents in his hand. “Fine. Tell me what you… ” he waved a hand.

  “I observed,” said Dunya, patiently, “And I suggest… ”

  She explained her visit of earlier, and her ideas about how the situation might be resolved. He shook his head when she suggested that the merfolk might perhaps stay in Al-Rayyan.

  “Never. They would disrupt our trade permanently, and without our trade, what are we?”

  “We’re a city—the Generous City—and shouldn’t we be open to everyone?”

  “Without our trade, we are a husk waiting for the wind to blow us away. No. If the merfolk want to leave, then they should—nay, must—leave.”

  “Then they should be able to pass through unhindered, wouldn’t you agree? Unhindered by knives, by ships… ”

  “Ships?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  “What did I just tell you about the trade in our city?”

  “We won’t die if the ships stop for just one day.”

  “You are only a Princess. I’ve had enough of your ideas for one day.”

  Dunya narrowed her eyes and clenched her fists, but she knew when it was no more use arguing with her father. She turned and left quietly.

  “So?” asked Upalu, when Dunya returned to her chambers. “How did it go?”

  “Remember,” said Dunya, “the Sultan gave me authority to meddle in the city affairs as I see fit.”

  “It didn’t go well, did it?”

  “I’m going to start meddling.”

  The first thing to do was to tell the people of the river to live in peace with their fishy, smelly neighbors. This, Dunya accomplished by crossing to those neighborhoods on foot, with Upalu beside her. Then Dunya would wish for an audience, and by Upalu’s magic, her voice would carry far and wide to the people at work, as Dunya very firmly suggested that they set down their tools and makeshift weapons, and listen to what she had to say.

  She explained that the merfolk were merely passing through, and requested a day to let them go by unharmed, no boats crashing them or knives slashing them.

  The boat people protested this, but Dunya told them, “Your Sultan requests this,” and they fell silent.

  And Dunya assumed that it was Upalu’s magic that made people not only hear her, but listen. She went first down the river, then up the river to meet with the merfolk chieftains—this time, with no undignified throwing into the water, although Upalu suggested it with a grin.

  The chieftains agreed to her plan, but reluctantly. One day to pass through the city meant swimming downriver faster than they would have liked. “We are slow-going creatures, as God made us,” explained Waterfall-Climber, but they agreed.

  Dunya returned to the Palace, and with Upalu, she took great cuttings of the water lilies in the Palace’s Lotus Garden. She wished that Upalu would restore the cut flowers, which Upalu did—to the best of her ability. And then Dunya took the flowers back to the merfolk chieftains.

  “Let this be our symbol of peace,” she said. “Carry these before you, and everyone will know you are under the protection of the Palace.”

  “But are we?” asked Waterfall-Climber. “Have you spoken to your Sultan about us?”

  “No,” said Dunya slowly. “He is hard to talk to. But if everyone thinks you have the protection of the Palace, then no one will dare to hurt you, and it will be nearly the same thing.”


  You should have seen it, wrote Dunya to Munir, a few days later.

  The river traffic stopped and the boats all moored, the city still like I’ve never seen it before. And then the flowers drifting on the water, and the mermaids under the flowers.

  Oh, the complaints are still coming in—will still come in for another moon, or so the Vizier of Trade tells me—but the day to stop the boats has come and gone, and the people, I think, enjoyed the spectacle of the mermaids passing through.

  I think you would have liked the sight of it. They cleverly knotted the water lilies that I brought into a great garland, one for the front of their procession, another for the back. I stood by the Second Gate, waiting for them to arrive and then leave the city, and it took hours for them to all pass through. But they are gone now, and I wish them well, and I do think our city would have been richer for them staying in it. But they must obey their Mandate of Heaven. I have done the best I could. I hope Morgiana would be proud of me.

  Also, you need not fear, I know the Lotus Garden was a project of your mother’s. I made a wish, which Upalu granted, and the water lilies are, well, they are not blooming again, but they are recovering. They will heal. So, I hope, will we all.

  Your faithful servant,

  Dunya.

  The Captain and the Djinni

  Dunya would have resumed her search for a remedy for the Sultan’s illness with renewed fervor the next day, but when she woke up in the early afternoon, there was a clamor in the Palace and she was surprised to find that it was about her.

  It seemed that somebody had been going to one Vizier after another, trying to find who had settled the accord with the merfolk. Finally the Vizier of Trade ferreted out Dunya’s hiding spot in the kitchen, where she was eating breakfast. She was still licking thyme from her fingers when the Vizier of Trade brought her to the receiving room.

  “If you want to govern, learn the first lesson,” he said through a clenched smile, as he led her to the room.

  “What’s that?” she asked, with a glare.

  “Consequences,” he hissed. Then his smile cleared and he said, “If you seek the heroine of yesterday’s passage, this is she, the Princess Dunya.”

  “This one?” came the Sultan’s voice. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” said the Vizier of Trade. “I am absolutely sure.”

  Dunya didn’t say anything, but she stared down at her shoes, hearing her heartbeat in her ears.

  “You. Dunya. Look up at me.”

  She obeyed and saw that the Sultan did not even look as if Dunya were a particularly interesting person to talk to. “I would have expected it of Zahra,” he said, “She has a certain bold streak about her, for all that she acts modest. But you? Parlaying with merfolk in my city?” He leaned onto his elbows. “What gave you the idea?”

  Dunya remained silent, but jumped when he yelled.

  “Answer me!”

  “The merfolk needed help,” she said in her usual small voice, looking down. “They came to the city and people were attacking them, and I just decided I would go… meet with them… listen to them. And the idea came to me that they could just… pass through, in peace. And there need be no more bloodshed.”

  “What made you think you had authority to act in my name?”

  Dunya took a moment to gather her courage before she answered. She looked him straight in the eye. This was no time for modesty. She thought instead of Shirin and her Falcon-princess. “You said so, my Lord. Do you remember?”

  The Sultan tilted his head. “What? When?”

  “The evening after Zahra started to tell the tale of Yasmeen. You said, ‘If you are so intent on the affairs of the Kingdom, you can run them, you ignorant worm.’ Those were your exact words.”

  She heard a sharp intake of breath from the Vizier of Trade.

  “Is that so?” asked the Sultan. He leaned back.

  “That is so,” Dunya said. She wondered, for a moment, if she was going to die.

  But instead of getting mad, the Sultan just smirked. “Huh. My temper got in the way again. Serves me right.” He stood up. “You took authority from that? From a fit of temper? You’re much bolder than I thought.” He narrowed his eyes. “Zahra put you up to it, didn’t she?”

  Dunya elected not to say anything.

  “Well. You seized authority and used it fairly well. There was no bloodshed and now my city has more of a reputation for diplomacy. You might have thought about Al-Rayyan’s reputation… it does not do to appear weak… but you did tolerably well, as my father would say. If you ever want to try something like that again, ever, you talk to me. Do you understand?”

  Dimly, she understood she was not going to die. Not for this. Not yet. “I understand, sire.”

  “Good. Now get out; I’m tired.”

  A handful of mermaids did remain in the city of Al-Rayyan. These were the oldest, the sickest, those without a family to help them hurry down the river. These clustered around the Second Gate, gathering strength for a further voyage. Strength himself remained with them, and Dunya visited the small community every day.

  “Soon we shall be off of your hands,” was what Strength promised each time she came to visit. But time passed, and the mermaids remained. The healthiest among them found work, repairing boats or ferrying small packages across the river. This earned them goodwill among the people of Second Gate’s neighborhoods. After one week of the merfolk living there, Dunya spotted a human housewife leaving a pot of remedies on a stone on the riverbank, and she called back from the safety of her house, that she heard someone coughing in the river every night.

  “I swear, Princess, we shall be off of your hands soon,” Strength said to Dunya, as she sat beside the Gate itself, in the shadowy area that the merfolk liked.

  “You seem to be adapting well,” Dunya said, through her headscarf (she still had not gotten used to the smell).

  “Bottom feeders are excellent at adapting,” Strength replied.

  “Will you take that remedy?”

  “Oh, of course.” Strength took the small jar and held it close to him. “Droplet’s got a terrible case of the wheezes. She’ll be happy to have anything.”

  “I want to speak to you on that very subject,” Dunya said. “About remedies. Do you remember what Winterborn said, about the city falling sick because the Sultan was sick?”

  “Yes.”

  “I have been trying to find out all that I can about ways to heal, but I have no training and it is hard to get the ingredients in the Palace. They call for living animals, such as unicorns and caladrius—I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in my life. I just wondered if you might have a remedy or two on hand—if the Sultan is cured, maybe you can return to the lake where you lived.”

  “Maybe,” said Strength, with a guarded look in his eyes. “According to our lore, the horns of narwhals have certain healing properties… ”

  “What’s a narwhal?”

  “Point taken. Well, a wish from a marid is always… ah, but we’re far from the sea, aren’t we? To tell you the truth, we bottom-feeders rarely get sick. When we do get sick, we mostly leave recovery in the hands of God, blessed be His name.”

  “You must have something,” Dunya urged.

  “Well, when one of us gets sick… up here… ” he tapped the side of his head, “as can happen, sometimes, with bad luck or after terrible events… we set the sick person to work tying knots.”

  “Knots? Out of what?”

  “Grasses, weeds, anything that’s handy. A lot of knots.”

  “That’s it?”

  “And they talk about how they feel.”

  “Oh.” This struck a chord with Dunya. Hadn’t she helped Upalu by just listening to her talk? “They talk, and someone else listens?”

  “Well, maybe someone listens. Or we just leave them to their knot-making.�
�� He shrugged. “Healing is a lot of work. To be honest, humans put more work into healing than we do. Maybe you should ask another human?”

  Dunya paused. “Thank you,” she said stiffly.

  “Always happy to repay a favor, Princess.”

  When Dunya returned to the Palace, she went straight to the great library, where she was reading through a treatise on diseases of the liver. She was surprised to find the Sultan there, deep in discussion with two Viziers. She eavesdropped for a while, but as all that they were talking about was trade and borders, she got bored and read some more about the liver. Presently she heard the Viziers leave. She risked a peek around the corner of one shelf, and saw the Sultan, alone, looking over a book of Persian illuminations.

  Dunya returned the book of liver diseases to the shelf, because she smelled an opportunity in the offing. She approached the Sultan cautiously and cleared her throat.

  He glanced up. “Oh, it’s you,” he said. “My little sister-in-law. What do you want?” He turned back to the book.

  “I want to ask if you are well, your Majesty,” she told him, “and to know if there is anything I can do for you.”

  “I am as well as ever. Slept well this morning,” the Sultan remarked.

  “Are you quite sure you feel well?” Dunya pressed.

  The Sultan glanced up at her, annoyed now. “Why do you ask? Is there something I should know about?”

  “No, nothing, sire—I’m just concerned about you. There, actually, there is something you should know about.”

  “Ah!” the Sultan sat up and slammed the book shut. “A plot against me. I knew it. Name the conspirators.”

  “It is not a plot, sire! I swear, no one is plotting against you… ”

  That I know of, she thought.

  “It is just that...the merfolk, those who passed through the city the other day… You remember?”

  “How could I forget?” he asked drily.

  “They told me that they were fleeing the lake that was their home because it had sickened. They said that the illness had its root in you.”