The Candle and the Flame

by Nafiza Azad

  Aarush’s heart quakes at the woman’s words. He regains his composure, but it is too late. The dignitaries have all seen his reaction to the news. He manages to get through the rest of the meeting with some effort, assuring the dignitaries that he has no plans to sweep his country into some long-drawn civil war. Aarush doesn’t know if he convinces them, or if they leave pitying him for his rapidly unraveling rule.

  As soon as he emerges from the extended luncheon, Janab Jamshid tells him that the representatives of the five forest provinces of Qirat request a private audience with him.

  White-lipped with anger, Aarush responds shortly, “Tell the representatives that I will grant them an audience in the grand hall in ten minutes.” He is in no mood to indulge anyone.

  The five men who enter the grand hall, where Aarush hears all petitions, are all rich men. They have always been rich men; their families have owned the most lands in their provinces for centuries. They also all look distinctly displeased. Some of them are staring at him disapprovingly. Aarush narrows his eyes and leans back on the throne, waiting for them to speak. Earlier today, he would have been tripping all over himself to keep these men happy. Earlier today, he hadn’t tasted the salt of desperation.

  “Maharaj, we come to bring your attention to the rebellion gaining momentum in the forest provinces of Qirat. We think the rebels have credible grievances, and we would like you to pay attention to them,” the oldest man, Rathod Singh of Khair, says.

  Aarush smiles, and the entire assembly takes a startled breath. No one has seen the young maharajah smile this way ever before. His eyes are hard, and his face, once the smile fades, is furious. “Tell me about these rebels since you know so much about them.”

  “They are all working men, men of Qirat. They want to see Qirat returned to them,” Malhotra of Asur, another rich man, says.

  “And you all presume to speak for these working men?” Aarush keeps his voice light. He keeps his anger reined in. “Tell me, these working men you speak about, these rebels, are they all from the forest provinces of Qirat?”

  “What does that matter, Maharaj?” Rathod says loudly, as if the volume of his voice will make up for the shoddiness of his reply.

  “Have any of you been to the desert cities? Have you been to Rahm? Sabr? Baaz? Perhaps some of you went to Ummeed? Did you ask the working men in the desert cities of Qirat whether they want Qirat back? Have you asked the working women? Surely the working women in this country get a voice too. Do they want Qirat back as well?”

  “Huzoor, you are deliberately muddying the issue,” Rathod says.

  “When was Qirat taken from these working men you speak so admiringly about? I don’t recall any of them being dragged off their lands and out of their houses. Ah, we did have more than eight hundred thousand people in Noor dead when the Shayateen attacked. Was it then that Qirat was taken from these working men?”

  “You gave half our country to those creatures, and you dare question us when we demand it back?” Rathod roars. The man must have realized the gravity of his actions because he hasn’t even finished speaking before he starts backing away.

  “You dare stand here and speak against your king? Against my father?” Aarush’s voice slips down an octave. “Tell me, Rathod Singh of Khair, when did you find out about the gold mines in the desert city of Sabr? Oh, I knew when the gold was discovered; the Emir himself told me about them. Offered to share the wealth, but I said no. We are blessed with the diamond mines, our agriculture, and so much more. We can give them the gold. Did you find out before or after the fever of patriotism burned in you?”

  Aarush pauses and looks at each man in turn. All of them avoid his gaze.

  “Do you know the consequences of treason, my friends?” Aarush asks, his voice barely a whisper. Silence slams down in the grand hall. “Perhaps I should refresh your memories. Your families will be stripped of their lands and their riches. They will be stripped of their names and their histories. They will be exiled from Qirat, never to cross any of its borders again. You, however, will be too dead to witness any of this. Small blessings, I suppose.”

  The five men are all suddenly very pale, their bluster from earlier lost in the pallor of their skin.

  “I want you to consider very carefully who you are, who I am, and what you are telling me to do.” Aarush looks around the room and addresses everyone present. “I may not have spilled blood yet, but I do know how to wield a sword.”

  The old man falls to his knees in front of the throne, as do the other four; they beg his forgiveness. Aarush leaves them kneeling there.

  People, Firdaus told Fatima Ghazala, are afraid of death for two very different reasons. The first one is obvious: They do not know what, if anything, lies beyond the veil. That is a matter of faith. The second reason is also obvious: People are being afraid of being forgotten. They live their lives carving themselves spaces in time and history only to be forgotten anyway. Even those who gain fame or notoriety fall victim to time; what people remember are not the individuals directly but as they were experienced by the people who knew them. A person’s truth, a person’s essence, fades with a person’s death. That is simply the way of life.

  Fatima Ghazala picks up the journal on top of the stack she received from Zulfikar. Her baba’s journals are simple notebooks, worn and well-used. She presses the cover to her face, and the elusive scent of mitti ittar—ittar that smells like the scent of the rain as it falls on parched earth—assails her. This was Firdaus’s favored scent. She breathes in deeply, and for a moment, just for a tiny moment, thinks she can feel him in the room with her.

  The grief she so carefully packaged away rises to the surface, and for a while, Fatima Ghazala can’t see the pages through tears that fall fast and hard. Firdaus knew many languages, but he chose to write his deepest thoughts in Qadr, the language he called his own. Fatima Ghazala wonders if the reason he insisted on teaching her this language was because he intended to give her these journals someday.

  She will never know.

  She locks the door of her room in Southern Aftab against the distractions of the world outside and starts reading. She pauses only to pray or when her hunger demands fulfillment. Through Firdaus’s eyes, she sees the red-streaked skies of Al-Naar, the red sands of the deserts in Tayneeb and the grand estate he had a room in. Through his words she experiences his grief at losing his wife to the Shayateen and the wonder he felt every time he looked at his daughter, Ghazala.

  A fair number of the journals are a devoted father’s records of a daughter he adores. The only time Firdaus falters is when he writes his concern that the Ifrit his daughter has chosen to marry is not worthy of her. In her father’s eyes, Ghazala was a tempest, unexpectedly softhearted, and vulnerable to those she gave her heart. She loved Anwar, but Firdaus writes of meetings after her marriage in which she confessed to her father her deep unease about her husband’s possessiveness and love that strayed too deep in dark places. How she felt suffocated by his attention. Soon, her only solace was her child, Shuruq, on whom she lavished attention and love.

  As Fatima Ghazala reads about her, the Ifrit woman who gave up her name and her fire for her sake becomes real. She gains flesh, blood, and fire. She becomes the heat Fatima Ghazala feels in the fire that burns underneath her skin.

  When she disappeared, Firdaus looked for his daughter. While following her trail, he came to the human world and met with Maharajah Arjun. Firdaus writes of meeting the king and asking his help in locating Ghazala. In return for the king’s aid, Firdaus gave his word to provide assistance one time. That occasion came seven years later, when the king sent him a message through a fire asking for assistance against the Shayateen attacking Noor. But Maharajah Arjun asked too late; by the time Firdaus Named the Ifrit army, almost everyone in Noor was dead.

  The sun is rising when Fatima Ghazala finally finishes reading the journals. She succumbs to her exhaustion and sleeps.

  Zulfikar is going through the reports sent to him
by the emirs of Sabr and Baaz when he feels Fatima Ghazala’s fire approach. He gets to his feet and walks to the open door of his office without realizing he is doing so. The strength of his feelings for the Name Giver flusters him. He forces himself to return to his seat, not at all desiring to present himself as an overeager swain. In fact, he has no intention of acting on these feelings because he knows they are not his. These feelings, these entirely inappropriate feelings he doesn’t want to give a name to, are a result of the bond between his fire and hers. A bond forged without proper thought.

  Still, Zulfikar knows the exact moment she stops in front of his door. He knows she is tired, happy, sad, a mix of feelings, before he looks up and sees the smile she seems to have only for him. One that tells him he is not a stranger but not exactly a friend. One that both pulls at him and holds him at bay. The bond tattles on her freely. Zulfikar knows that the liberty the bond affords him to see and feel into Fatima Ghazala’s emotions is a violation, but try as he might, he cannot stop himself from doing these things. The only one who can break this bond is the Raees.

  “Assalaam wa alaikum,” she greets him, and Zulfikar replies, doing his best to keep his face as bland as possible. She is wearing her favored mint-green tunic and shalwar. Her turban is blue today.

  “So? Have you read the journals?” Zulfikar asks, and she nods, placing the stack she has been carrying on his desk. “Did you learn anything about the Naming process?”

  Fatima Ghazala sits down in the chair opposite him and pulls up her legs. Zulfikar wonders when she became so comfortable in his presence. As if she reads his mind, she smiles apologetically. “I am sorry, I read all through the night and lack sleep.” Zulfikar pours her a cup of coffee from the pot he usually keeps on his desk. She takes it gratefully. He drags his attention back to his reports while waiting for her to speak, but he can’t help sneaking glances at her. His traitorous heart whispers that having her beside him just like this is the forever he is looking for. He stanches the thought immediately.

  “All right. I think I have regained enough of my wits,” Fatima Ghazala says, cutting into his thoughts. Zulfikar inclines his head and gestures for her to continue. “I told you the Qareen we saw has a name, didn’t I? As I saw it, his name was in pieces, trying to join together. The grief he felt prevented the pieces from uniting.” Her voice warms. “Do you think that because the Qareen are present on earth since inception, they don’t need Name Givers to Name them? The pieces of their names unify automatically once their service is completed? Do all Djinn, apart from the Qareen, have Name Givers? What about the Shayateen?”

  “The Shayateen have Name Givers, but I’m not sure about the rest of the clans. The Si’lat, a clan of shape-shifting Djinn, might but they are very secretive, so we don’t have much interaction with them. They keep entirely to themselves and do not have relationships with anyone outside their own clan—or at least that’s what we think. Everything we know about them comes from the few books that exist about them in Tayneeb. I have never heard of the Qareen having names either.” Zulfikar thinks. “It makes sense, however, that they would function on the same basic principle as the rest of us.”

  “Exactly. So I wondered if the disparity between Qareen names and Ifrit names is that the former unifies automatically while the latter requires a Name Giver. My theory was somewhat confirmed by Baba, though he discusses Naming far less in the journals than you would assume,” Fatima Ghazala says, blushing. Zulfikar watches in fascination as her entire face is suffused by a rosy-pink color.

  “What does he discuss?” Zulfikar asks. What could the old man have written to provoke such a reaction?

  “He talks about his daughter and … he talked about me.” Fatima Ghazala ducks her head shyly. “My learning abilities. He is quite effusive in his praise in his journals, though he never said more than ‘good job’ to me during our lessons. Anyway”—she clears her throat—“I feel like I have the theory of Naming understood. The power is instinctual.”

  “Only if the Ifrit you are Naming isn’t tainted,” Zulfikar confesses. But Fatima Ghazala’s reaction is unexpected.

  She looks contemplative. “You said that a tainted Shaitan will have a corrupted Name? Sort of like a rusted—no, more like a decayed Name?”

  “I suppose? I can’t see Names, remember?” Zulfikar says.

  “The Shayateen in the desert, the ones that attacked me. They had tainted Names. Well, the one that I killed had a tainted Name.”

  Zulfikar tenses. “You held a tainted Name?”

  “Yes. It didn’t affect me.” Her eyes are clear and fearless.

  “Are you sure?” Zulfikar is not certain he can believe her.

  “Well, would I know if my Name got corrupted?” she asks.

  “Yes, definitely.”

  “Then yes, I am sure.” The Name Giver frowns. “The taint that killed Baba, how was it transferred?”

  “Through a tainted Shaitan’s blood,” Zulfikar replies.

  “Why would they attack Baba specifically? How did they know where he was? What he was?”

  Zulfikar grows grim at the questions. They are ones he has been constantly asking himself.

  “I don’t yet know.” He is failing Firdaus, even in death. He shakes the thought away with some difficulty. “Do you want to try Naming someone? Obviously not the Raees, but someone with weaker fire. Just to see if you can work out the mechanics of the process.”

  Fatima Ghazala thinks, and Zulfikar waits. They don’t have much time, but he does not want to push her into anything she is not ready for. Finally, she nods. “I will try.”

  “I will contact the elders, my superiors, in Al-Naar, and they will send someone you can Name.” Zulfikar is pleased. Perhaps not everything is as bleak as he thinks it is.

  The Name Giver nods again and rises, as if to leave. Then she pauses as if something has occurred to her. “If Ifrit have to be Named to gain form on earth, why was Ghazala able to be here without being Named?”

  “Firdaus handed his power to her before she passed on. It’s how we knew she had died, actually. The only reason the power would return to Firdaus is if Ghazala had died.”

  “I thought the power could only be passed over if the original holder died,” Fatima Ghazala asks.

  “Only if the power passes to a different family line. It is possible to pass the power to your direct heir as Firdaus did.”

  The Name Giver nods slowly, as if some great curiosity of hers has been satisfied. She looks up suddenly, and Zulfikar freezes, wondering if the grin on his face is going to give him away. But thankfully, she seems distracted by her thoughts.

  “I will send you a message when I have something more concrete to report. I may receive word from Al-Naar this afternoon or by tomorrow morning by the latest.” Zulfikar stands up, too, intending to escort her to the door, but the Name Giver waves him away. She mumbles a goodbye and, stifling a yawn, walks away. The room seems too empty without her in it. Zulfikar feels the need to spar.

  It is a little after seven in the evening and the lower levels of Southern Aftab are mostly deserted. Sunaina has just finished her day’s work and is cleaning up. She leaves the door to her rooms open to let some of the heat out. A pleasant ache, the sign of work well done, has her rolling her shoulders.

  The work is fulfilling; creating cosmetics makes her happy. Being at the mahal while doing this work that she loves makes her happier. Or it should. There is no reason for her to be sad. Her hours are full, and she sleeps through the night … mostly. So she has nightmares. Who doesn’t? So she misses her sister. Why can’t she? It would be strange if she didn’t. Lost in her thoughts, she sinks down in a chair.

  Sunaina hasn’t seen Fatima Ghazala ever since her first day at the mahal. She doesn’t know what Fatima Ghazala does at the mahal, where she goes, and whom she spends her time with. And that is just fine, Sunaina tells herself. Fatima Ghazala can take care of herself. But then she remembers the filthy eyes with which the rajkumar was looki
ng at her sister, and she worries.

  Just then, as if someone has carved her right out of her thoughts, Fatima Ghazala walks past the open doors of Sunaina’s room. Sunaina jumps to her feet. A few seconds later, Rajkumar Aaruv follows in Fatima Ghazala’s footsteps. Sunaina runs to her open doors and peeks out. The corridor outside is enveloped in shadows. No one apart from the servants uses this corridor. And the servants have all retired for the night. Sunaina watches the rajkumar stalk her sister, who walks ahead, seemingly oblivious to the danger. She watches the rajkumar lift a hand, perhaps to grab her sister’s shoulder.

  “Fatima Ghazala!” Sunaina is unaware of speaking out until her exclamation splinters the silence.

  Fatima Ghazala whirls around. Upon seeing the rajkumar so close to her, her eyes widen. The rajkumar turns and gives Sunaina an annoyed look before he continues walking. Fatima Ghazala turns and watches the prince walk away.

  “Fatima … Ghazala, come here!” Sunaina commands.

  The reluctance on her sister’s face hurts Sunaina. But really, how could she expect anything different? “I have somewhere I need to be.”

  “You will come here right now.” Sunaina’s tone brooks no disobedience. Fatima Ghazala, scowling, stomps her way into Sunaina’s room. She folds her arms and stands right in front of the doors, her face mutinous.

  “Sit,” Sunaina says.

  “No,” Fatima Ghazala replies. Sunaina’s heart lurches at the emptiness in her sister’s eyes. Did she put it there? “If this is about the rajkumar, you needn’t worry. I would have handled him.”

  “How? He’s the prince. We are lower than the dirt on his shoes.” Her sister refuses to see anyone in the way society dictates they should be seen. For her, everyone is equal.

  “Have you forgotten, didi? I am a monster,” Fatima Ghazala bites out. “If he had touched me, he would have regretted it.”