by Nafiza Azad
“Look, if we walk at the pace you do, it will take us forever to reach Taaj Gul,” Fatima Ghazala tells Bhavya not unkindly. “Maybe you should return to the mahal.”
“No!” Bhavya feels tears prick at the idea of returning home. She looks imploringly at Sunaina.
“Do you think we’ll be accused of kidnapping her?” Sunaina asks Fatima Ghazala, not paying attention to Bhavya.
“Can’t be kidnapping if she came with us willingly and without any coercion,” Fatima Ghazala points out.
“You know rich people. It will be easier for them to claim we kidnapped her than admit that she ran away,” Sunaina says darkly.
“I am right here,” Bhavya says as haughtily as she can manage under the circumstances.
“Indeed, you are,” Sunaina placates.
Fatima Ghazala grins and looks toward the street. Her expression perks up. “Oh. You are lucky, Rajkumari.” She lets out a piercing whistle and attracts the attention of a cart driver. Soon, Bhavya is sitting on the back of an ox-driven cart for the very first time in her life. Sunaina has the dubious pleasure of being the one in the middle. Their feet dangle over the edge of the cart. Bhavya peers at the ground, pales, and clutches the side of the cart desperately. A hundred different scenarios, all of which involve her falling and dying in the most painful ways, play out in her head.
“How do you know this man?” Bhavya asks Fatima Ghazala when they have been riding for about ten minutes.
“I delivered some milk for him once. It was cheaper for him to hire us to do his deliveries than to hire employees,” Fatima Ghazala replies.
“I see,” Bhavya says, though she truly doesn’t. Fatima Ghazala’s life sounds foreign to her. She cannot imagine what it means to be able to plan your own days and decide your own movements. A life where your every action is not commented on and either praised or censured. A life where you can be anyone you want to be. Bhavya looks at the passing scenery avidly, paying particular attention to the people. Even though she has been living in Noor all her life, she doesn’t get to venture into the city on her own like this, so everything feels new to her. People wear different styles of clothing but almost always in bright, bold colors. She catches snippets of a hundred different languages, which adds to the cacophony and charm of the city. A trepidatious feeling sprouts in her, however, as the cart treads the road to the poorer parts of Northern Noor.
The streets get busier, and Bhavya’s discomfort rises. When the cart shudders to a stop, Fatima Ghazala jumps off, helps Sunaina get off, and turns to Bhavya expectantly. Bhavya hesitates, looking around the street.
“What? Too poor for the rajkumari?” Fatima Ghazala quips. Bhavya bristles and jumps off. She miscalculates the distance to the ground and stumbles. Sunaina steadies her with a hand on her arm.
Fatima Ghazala thanks the cart driver, and they set off, plunging into the busy streets. Sunaina warns Bhavya not to dawdle, but she can’t help it and keeps stopping to stare at one spectacle after another: trick-performing monkeys, snake charmers, bangle sellers, and many more. Finally, exasperated, Sunaina grabs Bhavya by the arm and forces her to walk faster. When they reach the apartment building, Bhavya comes to a complete standstill. She gapes at the building, twin feelings of pity and shame filling her. Pity because she cannot imagine anyone being happy living in such a squalid place. The shame is secondhand because she thinks that the sisters can’t be anything but ashamed of showing her the place they used to call home.
Fatima Ghazala and Sunaina, however, betray no shame when they realize that the rajkumari has stopped walking.
“Will you hurry up?” Fatima Ghazala growls.
Bhavya starts and reluctantly follows them up the stairs and through the entrance of the building, fearing, as she does, that the building will succumb to its mortality and collapse while she is still inside it. A film of rose-pink dust covers everything, the walls are filthy with handprints and other stains, and Bhavya doesn’t even want to look at the floor of the building. She hears a dozen voices arguing, screaming, whispering, and talking behind closed doors. Different smells waft from up and down the corridor—not all of them palatable. Bhavya hangs back when the sisters go to visit the old grandma they call Laali; there is no way she’s stepping into a room in this place. Luckily they exit quickly; the grandma is not lucid and cannot recognize either of them. Fatima Ghazala bounds up the stairs to the ninth floor to see if her friends are home. Sunaina and Bhavya wait in the foyer at the entrance.
“How did you live here?” Bhavya finally asks.
“What do you mean?” Sunaina frowns at the question.
“It’s filthy and small. It stinks and is noisy. How can anyone live here?” Bhavya knows she’s being rude, but she can’t help it.
“Is that how you see this place?” Sunaina says, and lets out a huff of breath. “I suppose that’s to be expected. Did you think, Rajkumari, that we all lived in gilded palaces?”
Bhavya remains silent.
“Do you know where Fatima Ghazala and I lived before we moved here?” Sunaina doesn’t wait for an answer. “On the streets. We couldn’t afford anything else and were too young and too proud to accept charity. When it rained, we stayed in the masjid, the mandir, the gurdwara—any safe place that had room for us. We huddled in the darkest corners at night so we wouldn’t be prey to those who thought us tender morsels. This building and the four walls it gave us are infinitely more precious to us than Southern Aftab is to you.” Sunaina swallows. “The money we poor people spend is ours. We have earned it through our own sweat and hard work unlike the landowners who live on the blood of their workers. We have more right to our humble comforts, Rajkumari, than you do to your luxuries.”
A moment, ponderous in its silence, passes.
“I apologize. I got carried away. I forgot that I am not supposed to have opinions,” Sunaina says, and retreats into an icy silence.
To Bhavya’s complete mortification, the tail end of Sunaina’s speech was heard by Fatima Ghazala and the three girls who accompany her. The girls all have dupattas around their heads and glee in their eyes.
“Rajkumari, this is Adila, Amirah, and Azizah, also known as the Alif sisters.” Fatima Ghazala makes the introductions without commenting on, or acknowledging, the excoriation Bhavya just received from Sunaina. “Ladies, this is Rajkumari Bhavya from Southern Aftab.”
Bhavya finds herself the subject of an intense stare from the youngest Alif sister.
“Azizah, stop staring at her!” the oldest sister reprimands.
“I can’t help it! I’ve never seen an actual live rajkumari before!”
“Have you seen many dead ones?”
“That’s disgusting, Amirah! You make me sound like I go peering into coffins all the time!”
“No, but you did it once.”
“I was five!” Azizah says huffily.
“What is the rajkumari doing with you?” the oldest one asks Fatima Ghazala in a loud whisper.
“She ran away from home,” Fatima Ghazala replies in a louder whisper. Bhavya glares at her.
“Why would she do that?” The middle sister joins the conversation.
“She heard rumors of Bilal’s beauty,” Fatima Ghazala says completely seriously.
The youngest girl’s mouth drops open. Bhavya wonders who Bilal is.
“She’s just joking, Azizah. Calm down.” Adila elbows Fatima Ghazala.
“Didi, the Alif sisters and I are off to see a nautanki. A troupe from Bharat is in Noor for only a week, and they’re holding performances in the maidaan. Are you going to go back to the mahal, or will you come with us?” Fatima Ghazala links arms with Adila, looking happier in this moment than Bhavya has ever seen her.
“Coming with you!” Bhavya says eagerly. She has never been to a nautanki before, though she has heard much about their wonders.
The nautanki begins with the wail of a sitar and continues with skits, songs, music, and dialogue. The costumes are glorious and colorful. The charac
ters feature handsome monsters and pretty princesses with hidden depths. Bhavya laughs, cries, and gasps. By the time the performance is over, she is seriously considering running away to join the troupe. But reality objects immediately when Fatima Ghazala and Sunaina look at each other and decide in silent accord that it is time to return to the mahal. Fatima Ghazala insists on escorting the Alif sisters home. They are lucky enough to hitch a ride on a cart in Taaj Gul that delivers them very close to the Northern Aftab. The plan is to return to Southern Aftab through Northern Aftab without, hopefully, rousing any suspicion from anyone.
However, when they cross the bridge and step into the driveway leading up to Northern Aftab, a small commotion breaks out among a group of Ifrit soldiers gathered in front of the mahal. Bhavya keeps her head down as Fatima Ghazala leads them quickly up the driveway. They are almost at the corridor connecting the two sides of the mahal, when, all of a sudden, a horse blocks their path. Bhavya looks up and sees the Emir glaring down at them. She forgets to breathe for a moment. The Emir is furious; his eyes are narrowed, his lips are thinned, and his jaw is clenched. Bhavya thinks that he looks beautiful. He dismounts from his horse and strides over to them. Bhavya wonders if he is finally going to speak to her.
Instead, he walks to Fatima Ghazala and grabs her by the shoulders. Sunaina makes a sound of protest.
“Where have you been?” the Emir says in a low voice, practically seething with the force of his anger.
“I believe you are overstepping your boundaries, Emir.” Fatima Ghazala extricates herself from his grasp. The Emir sucks in a breath at her words like they have hurt him.
“Let’s go,” Fatima Ghazala says. Bhavya follows her and Sunaina but keeps looking back at the Emir, not that he even glances at her.
Zulfikar clenches his fists and watches Fatima Ghazala walk away from him. He has no right to feel hurt by her coldness. None at all. Not when he practically courted it, but at this moment, particularly at this moment, his heart is a wounded thing. Conscious of the bemused glances his soldiers are giving him, he retreats to the library. The moment Zulfikar realized he couldn’t feel Fatima Ghazala’s fire in Southern Aftab had been a terrifying one. Firdaus died all over again in his memory.
He slumps down in a chair, aware that his misery is of his own making but piqued anyway. The idea that Fatima Ghazala’s elusive smiles with the flash of those dimples will never again be directed his way makes him mournful. He felt her hurt at his words the night before, felt her surprised embarrassment and a deeper pain that made him hurt too. But he cannot let the bond between their fires link them any further than this. He will not risk his heart again.
“What have you done to anger the little Name Giver so?” a husky voice asks from the doorway.
Zulfikar stiffens. He had been so deeply immersed in his thoughts that he did not hear the door open. The scent of desert roses announces the owner of the voice. Once upon a time, Zulfikar would have been able to identify the Ifrit woman by her footsteps alone. The night before, when Fatima Ghazala Named this Ifrit woman into the human world, into human form, that one brief moment before memory tainted everything between them, Zulfikar had felt an intense unadulterated joy at her presence. But that moment was a firefly blinking out. Now, every time he looks at her, all he can remember is her betrayal and the way it undid him.
“I got tired of awaiting your summons, Emir,” says Tali, Firdaus’s primary apprentice and the Ifrit who used to be Zulfikar’s beloved. She is wearing a red tunic and a white shalwar. Her hair is in a braid down her back, and a pale pink dupatta is wrapped around her head. She looks at Zulfikar and smiles slightly. “Are you not going to answer my question?”
Zulfikar can feel himself returning to the hurt he had thought was a thing of the past. “My affairs with the Name Giver are my own and none of your concern, sayyida.”
Tali’s face, beautiful if a bit too narrow, freezes for an instant, before her features ease into a smile. “Come now, you do not need to make me feel like an outsider.”
“Will you train the Name Giver?” Zulfikar changes the subject. He will not be drawn into a discussion. It is difficult enough to share space with her.
“As much as is possible. But, Zulfikar”—Tali comes and sits down beside him—“training your Name Giver is my secondary purpose.”
Zulfikar gets to his feet and moves away. He pretends not to see the hurt in Tali’s eyes. He doesn’t want to know the reason she is here. He wills her not to say it.
“Even if you don’t ask, I will tell you,” Tali says with a smile Zulfikar used to know well. “I am here for you. I am here to reclaim you.”
Zulfikar looks at the Ifrit woman he spent his entire life loving until that one afternoon now carved into his memories. That afternoon when she took him aside in the garden and told him she was in love with someone else. That he was too safe, too easy. She needed the danger he couldn’t provide.
Their parents had been inside talking about their engagement. Zulfikar remembers the exact moment his heart broke. He remembers the shadows on the garden walls, the heat of the midday sun, that moment.
“Am I some sort of land or object for you to reclaim?” he says to her now, conscious of how his voice breaks.
“Of course not! That is not what I meant!” A plea resides in her voice.
“What has happened to your great love? Did you think I do not know who your heart wandered to?”
“It was a momentary madness! You and I grew up together, Zulfikar. Our lives entwined long before either of us knew what love meant. I was scared that I was settling. That I was confusing friendship for love.”
“Was that why it was so easy for you to toss me aside?” Zulfikar takes a deep breath and is grateful his voice doesn’t wobble. Small mercies.
“You know that’s not true.”
“What you did, Tali, what you said, unmade me. You were the standard by which I measured myself. You were both my road and my destination. I didn’t know who I was without you. I had to leave Al-Naar to find myself again.” He pauses. “In this world, I am beginning to know who I am, and who I am is not the boy you knew. I will never be that boy again.”
“I will learn you once more!”
“Do you think I can just forgive and forget? Fine, maybe I can forgive, but I will never forget. I cannot wipe the slate clean.”
“You can try!” Her eyes are full of tears she is too proud to shed. Her voice trembles, and she is taking quick little breaths that announce her distress. Zulfikar observes her as if from a distance.
“I don’t want to,” he says, and watches as her control crumples. He wonders if he’d say the same thing if Fatima Ghazala weren’t around, if their bond didn’t exist. But that’s a moot question because she is and Zulfikar will ensure that she remains that way.
“Are you in a relationship with the Name Giver, Zulfikar? I ask as Firdaus’s apprentice,” Tali says, wiping her tears away brusquely.
“No,” Zulfikar replies shortly. “You will be given a week to make the Name Giver familiar with the theory of Naming.”
“She’s not strong enough,” Tali says, all evidence of her earlier distress absent.
“What exactly do you mean?”
“She barely Named me. I am not at all confident she will be able to name the Raees. The Raees’s fire will kill her.” Tali gets to her feet. “The Name Giver’s physical strength is considerable, but her fire is weak. Too weak perhaps. I will have more to report once I meet with her tonight.” She leaves Zulfikar sitting in the library with a stricken look on his face.
The air is fragrant with the scent of night-blooming jasmine. Fatima Ghazala prays Isha, wraps a shawl around herself, and sets off for her appointment with the apprentice. The Ifrit woman has a Name—no one knows that better than Fatima Ghazala—but Fatima Ghazala is loath to use it. As she navigates the darkness and draws closer to the fire pit behind the barracks, the scent of the air changes slightly. The air still smells of the jasmine, but now it h
as smoky notes Fatima Ghazala associates with the Ifrit. Zulfikar is present when she reaches her destination, standing stiffly beside the apprentice. He sees her, and a yearning blooms on his face. Fatima Ghazala looks away from him, telling herself that he presents a lie. She cannot yield to the softness in his smiles, especially not when he has warned her not to.
“Name Giver,” the Emir says, “I present to you, Tali, a soldier in the Ifrit army and Firdaus’s primary apprentice. She will instruct you as much as she can.” Contrary to the expression on his face, his voice is cool and impersonal. Fatima Ghazala clenches her fists and tells herself that this distance is for the best. “If you need me for anything, I will be in the mahal.” With a nod, he leaves. When Fatima turns to the apprentice, she finds the Ifrit woman staring after Zulfikar’s retreating back with a longing look on her face. Fatima Ghazala clears her throat.
“I am not at all sure what to teach you,” the apprentice says, seeming unconcerned that her feelings for the Emir are so apparent. She is a tall, striking woman with high cheekbones, gold eyes, and long black hair. She wears a dupatta around her head and a pale green shalwar kameez.
“How do I control my fire?” Fatima Ghazala asks. “It flares sometimes when I am scared or angry.”
“Did Zulfikar not teach you those things? Did he not discuss with you what Djinn fire is?” The apprentice frowns. “If what I was told is correct, then you were born human but something happened that led to Ghazala transferring her fire and her Name to you. Which means that until recently you had no idea about Names and fire. Am I correct?”
Fatima Ghazala nods. “The knowledge of fire is there, perhaps in the fire itself. What it is, what it means. I don’t know how it feels to you, but the fire feels like an innate part of me. Not like a limb but like my strength. It’s there when I need it and absent when I don’t.”
The apprentice looks thoughtful at the comment. “I can teach you the things we learned as Ifrit children. How to control our fire in times of emotional upheaval. How to mask it when we want to hide. Things like that. I can also teach you the theory of Name Giving since that’s all I ever learned.”