Bedazzled

by Bertrice Small

  Hurrying through the palace, Azura entered the dey’s apartments, greeting her lord with a smile and displaying the finery. “I thought, perhaps, my lord, that you would want India garbed somewhat differently today. I have brought these garments for your approval.”

  “What think you, my precious?” Caynan Reis asked India.

  “They are lovely, my lord. If it pleases you, I will wear them, but please let me come with you to the general audience. I love watching you judge and settle disputes. I will be happy to ply my fan today that you not become overheated.”

  “Nay, you will sit by my throne,” he said. “Someone else will ply the fan. Now go and put on your new clothing for me while I speak with Azura,” the dey commanded her, and India, taking the garments from the older woman, hurried into the bedchamber. “I want you and Baba Hassan in the audience chamber today, as well as the ladies of the harem. Seat them behind a carved screen so they may see, but not be seen,” he told her.

  “Is this a special occasion I have somehow overlooked?” Azura asked.

  He laughed, and the sound was so happy and carefree that she was surprised, for she had never heard him make such a noise in all the years they had known each other. “I am going to marry her,” the dey said. “Do not feign amazement, you lovely creature,” he teased Azura. “You and Baba Hassan have dangled her before me since the day she arrived. You wanted this to happen, and while I believed you both mad, it would seem you know me better than I know myself.”

  “It is a man’s nature to want love, and be loved in return, my lord,” Azura answered him diffidently.

  “Hah!” he chuckled. “You plotted the entire matter.”

  “My lord.” India had come forth from the bedchamber.

  Caynan Reis’s deep blue eyes widened with approval. “Allah!” he exclaimed. “How exquisite you are, my precious love.”

  “Then you are pleased?” She smiled happily, then turned to Azura. “Thank you, my lady, for making such a fine choice.”

  Azura nodded in reply, and then said to the dey, “You will, of course, want the lady India to have her own apartment, my lord?”

  “Aye. Have the empty rooms next to mine prepared for her,” he instructed the mistress of the harem.

  “But, my lord, those rooms are not within the harem,” Azura reminded him, a trifle amazed by his instructions.

  “The harem is for my concubines,” he answered her. “The rooms near me are for my wife. I do not want my bride far from my side. While India will rule my house, and bear my children, you, my dear Azura, will continue to be the mistress of the harem. This is my wish.”

  “Yes, my lord,” the older woman answered him. Allah! He really was in love with her. She bowed politely, and backed from the dey’s apartments, hurrying to find Baba Hassan so she might tell him of all that had transpired and prepare the harem for their outing. She did not, however, tell her charges of the dey’s decision to marry. That must be his little surprise. The concubines would, of course, be distressed by the news, but she would reassure them that their place within the dey’s household was a secure one. He would not, for the time being, want their company as frequently as he had in the past, but they would come to accept the new arrangement. Any who caused difficulties would be sold away, and replaced.

  While Azura was content that Caynan Reis take a wife and have children, the beautiful India must not be allowed to have such influence over her husband that he perhaps ignore his faithful servants. Eventually there must be a second wife, or at least a favored concubine to engage the dey’s interest. India, however, could be the only woman allowed to give the dey sons lest El Sinut be subjected to the same sort of internecine warfare afflicting the Sublime Porte, where the sultan’s women warred with each other, ambitious for their sons. It was just this sort of thing that had weakened the empire, leaving it vulnerable to factions like the greedy, power-hungry janissaries, who were even now plotting treason. For now, though, India would serve their purpose while making Caynan Reis the happiest of men, the mistress of the harem concluded.

  “Come, ladies,” she said, reentering the harem. “You are to dress in your finest garments, and be allowed to sit in the audience hall today, and watch our master in judgment over his subjects.”

  With cries of pleasure the harem women rushed to find the most flattering clothing that they could; rummaging through their jewel boxes; calling to their personal slaves for their cosmetics and perfumes. Azura oversaw it all, a secret smile upon her beautiful face, watching as Samara chose flame-colored garments, the equally dark-haired Leah, a deep rose. Red-haired Sarai was resplendent in green and gold, and the four blondes exaggerated their delicate coloring in the palest of pastels: pink, sky blue, peach, and apple green. And when the seven women were dressed with matching veils covering their bejeweled hair and their pretty faces, Azura escorted them from the harem to the audience hall.

  Before them the chief eunuch went, clearing a path through the waiting populace, all of whom were fascinated to be given even the slightest glimpse of the dey’s harem women as they hurried through the corridor, heads bowed, eyes lowered, and heavily veiled. Baba Hassan led the women into the vaulted chamber with its green-and white mottled pillars, and settled them behind a carved wooden screen facing the dey’s throne, and set to one side. There, small chairs had been arranged in such a manner that each woman could gain a good view of the proceedings no matter where she was seated.

  Samara silently counted the seats. There were but eight. Just enough for the harem, and the lady Azura. She smiled, well pleased. “Obviously the English girl does not merit the privileges we have been given,” she announced smugly to her companions. “She cannot have pleased him.”

  “Remember,” Deva remarked archly, “that she is merely his body slave.”

  “Exactly!” Samara crowed. “Her status remains lowly while ours is a favored one.”

  “I think she did please him,” the blond Laylu replied. “Look!”

  Azura bit her lip so as not to laugh as the seven pairs of eyes turned toward the dais, where even now Caynan Reis was standing. By his side stood India, her metallic gold veils glittering splendidly in the morning light as the hall grew silent with expectation. The girl’s head was lowered just enough to be modest without being servile.

  The dey spoke. “Today I bring you good news,” he began. “I am the happiest of men, for I have decided to take a wife. I shall ask the chief iman to marry me to this woman before the sun has set this day.” He took India’s hand, leading her forward, saying, “Behold, she who has brought me the greatest joy I have ever known.”

  Then, to Azura’s surprise, India knelt before the dey, kissing the hem of his bejeweled coat and finally flattening herself at his feet. The hall erupted into cheers even as Caynan Reis raised the girl up, his arm about her protectively. Then he brought her to a small satin stool set on his right hand, and seated her before taking his own throne. Baba Hassan looked toward the carved screen, and Azura knew the look was for her alone. It plainly said what Azura had known all along. India was strong of character. Indeed, she had played this hand beautifully, giving the dey the public respect he must have as the sultan’s governor, while cleverly endearing herself to him further. It was obvious that the girl had decided where her fate lay.

  “Well, well,” Sarai said softly. “I should have never thought resistance was the way to our lord’s heart.” She shrugged fatalistically.

  “Do not despair,” Nila murmured. “One wife is always followed by a second. We will have our chance when our lord grows tired of the English girl’s waspishness.”

  “That performance she just put on hardly smacks of pettishness,” Samara observed, wiser than the others. “She is clever. Far cleverer than I would have given her credit for, the little bitch!”

  “Let us give her a chance,” Mirmah said to them, and Leah nodded in agreement. “We do not really know her. Now she will come to live in the harem with us, and it is possible we may become f
riends. After all, she is to be the master’s first wife, and the first wife always has the most influence.”

  “Not always,” Samara replied.

  Azura held her peace, signaling them to silence now that the audiences had begun. They would find out soon enough that India was not to be housed in the harem with them, which would, of course, cause further jealousy. Samara was an obvious troublemaker, and she would also have to watch Nila and Sarai. Mirmah, however, had possibilities that Azura had never before observed. She would mention them to Baba Hassan, and they would keep Mirmah in mind for a possible second wife. She could prove to be the perfect counterbalance to the strong-willed India. Mirmah was a Circassian, bred for the harem and taught to please a master in a variety of ways.

  The dey moved to get through the public audience as quickly as possible without slighting any of his supplicants. The crowds within the hall, however, understood, and some with but simple matters to be adjudicated requested of the chief eunuch that their cases be rescheduled another time so the dey might get on with his own personal business. The hall emptied quickly, for most in the crowds could scarcely wait to get outside into the town and spread the word of the dey’s marriage.

  When the public audience was finally over, Baba Hassan stepped forward, bowing to his master, and said, “Shall I take the lady India to the women’s mosque, my lord, to be prepared for your marriage?”

  Caynan Reis nodded, and then spoke quietly to India. “You will submit yourself to a special bath of purification, my precious. Then an iman will ask you several questions. Baba Hassan will translate what you cannot understand, and instruct you on how to answer.”

  India remembered shreds of stories she had heard from her family, now pushing into her consciousness. “You want me to accept Islam,” she said to him.

  He nodded. “If you are to be my wife, you must,” he told her. “It is customary for all captives to do so in your position.”

  Words. She would say words. What was in her heart was known only to God, India thought. Her great-grandmother had, in a similar position, accepted Islam. So had her stepfather’s great-grandmother. My own grandfather, whom I never knew, but of whom Mama has always spoken, the great Akbar, believed all religions had value. I do not have to reject Christ, India considered thoughtfully to herself. Then she looked into his eyes, smiling, and said, “I will do it, my lord, but in return I would have a favor from you.”

  “Walk with me, my precious love,” he said, taking her by the arm, his look telling Baba Hassan to remain where he was. When they were a distance from any who might overhear, he asked her, “What would you have of me, India?”

  “I have told you that my mother was the daughter of the great Mughal emperor, Akbar. When she was thirteen she was married to her first husband, a young prince. This prince was a follower of Islam, but while my mother had been raised to respect all faiths, she was, as I am, a baptized Christian. At her request she was also wed, in secret in her own Christian faith. Because he loved her, her prince was willing to acquiesce to her request. Will you do the same for me, my lord? Is there a Christian priest here in El Sinut who would marry us, and keep the secret so as not to endanger you?”

  He thought for a long moment, and then said to her, “I am not certain who I can trust within the Christian community, which is very small, India. I promise you, however, that before our first child is born, I will wed you in your own faith. Will you accept my pledge on that, my precious love?”

  “I will,” she replied, “for I have learned in the months that I have been your body slave that you are a man of honor.”

  “Have you?” He was touched by her words. He had not realized she was observing him so closely. Emboldened, he asked her, “Do you love me just a little, India? Or do you wed me because it is the expedient thing to do?”

  “I believe I am beginning to love you, my lord. I know I do not hate you. I realize now that all I have been told since coming to El Sinut is the truth. I will not return to England, and even if I ever did, it would be difficult for me. So is it not prudent for me to accept my fate, and make a happy life for myself?” She smiled shyly at him.

  “Yes,” he answered her, content for now with her candid answer. Then he led her back to Baba Hassan. “Do what must be done,” he told the chief eunuch. “I will go and see the iman.”

  “We must leave the palace, and go to the women’s mosque,” Baba Hassan told India. He then gave orders to the slaves about them, and India shortly found herself in a litter once again, leaving the grounds of the palace for the first time since she had arrived in El Sinut five months back.

  The women’s mosque was a beautiful building of pure white marble. Inside, it was colonnaded with pillars of red-and-white marble holding up horseshoe arches. Baba Hassan put her in the charge of an old woman who took her to the ritual bath already awaiting the bride. It was little different from the harem bath, but India found she was being treated with deep respect by the bath attendants. It is a little bit like marrying a king, she thought, realizing that as wife of the dey, she was indeed very much like a queen.

  When they had finished bathing, massaging, and perfuming her, they brought her fresh garments: a cream-colored kaftan embroidered with silver and gold threads, and small pearls and diamante. Her dark curls were brushed with fragrant oil and dressed with pearls; a gossamer veil shot through with gold and silver was placed on her head, a matching veil drawn across her face. Soft kid slippers covered in beaten gold were slipped upon her narrow feet.

  “You are now ready, my lady,” the mosque’s bath mistress said. Then she led India back out into a courtyard where Baba Hassan was awaiting.

  “Come,” the chief eunuch said. “We must now see the iman who presides over the women’s mosque. I will translate for you.”

  She was brought into the company of a white-bearded elderly man. While frail of form, his look was an intelligent and piercing one. Instinctively India bowed to him, and then stood silently, her eyes modestly lowered.

  “The dey has chosen a beautiful woman, Baba Hassan,” the iman said. “Does she understand why she is here?”

  “I do, my lord iman,” India said before the eunuch could speak for her. “I have come to accept Islam so my lord Caynan may wed me.”

  Baba Hassan smiled silently at her carefully spoken Arabic.

  The iman nodded. “Had you ever heard of Islam before coming to El Sinut, my daughter? Our faith is an old one, though not quite as ancient as Christianity, and certainly not anywhere near as old as Judaism.”

  “I knew of Islam, my lord iman,” India answered him. “Do we not all worship the same God?”

  “Indeed, my daughter, we do. Come, let us sit, and I will tell you of the five pillars of wisdom that are the strength of our faith.” They settled themselves upon a low divan, the chief eunuch standing behind them, and the iman continued. “To be a good member of Islam, you must observe our creed in which we demand belief in God, his angels, his books, his prophets, and the last day in which all men will be judged. Our prayer is a simple one. There is no God but God, and Muhammed is Prophet of God. Will you say the words for me, my lovely lady?”

  “There is no God but God, and Muhammed is the Prophet of God,” India spoke clearly. It was such a simple declaration.

  “Angels, I know you believe in, having been raised in a Christian country. Our prophets are your prophets. Our holy books are called the Quran. We also recognize the scriptures of Abraham, the Torah of Moses, the Psalms of David, and the Gospels of Jesus Christ, all as revealed by God. The second pillar of wisdom is prayer. We pray five times daily. Upon rising, in early afternoon, in late afternoon, at sunset, and finally at night before retiring. The third pillar is alms giving. Like Christians and Jews we believe in charity toward those less fortunate than ourselves. The fourth pillar requires us to fast in the ninth lunar month, which we call Ramadan. Between sunrise and sunset we refrain from eating, drinking, smoking, and relations with our women. The fifth and final p
illar of wisdom requires us to make a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in our lifetime, if we can. These are things upon which our faith is founded, my lady. Will you accept them?”

  “I will,” India answered him without hesitation.

  “Then, my daughter, having now accepted Islam, you are permitted to wed the dey,” the old man said to her. “Understand that while it is every man’s duty to wed and procreate, marriage in our world is not a religious rite. It is a contract between two people. The dey will settle a bride price upon you which is yours, and yours alone. You must be obedient to his will, and his will alone, my daughter. If at any time he wishes to divorce you, he will say, ‘I dismiss thee’ thrice. Your bride price would go with you in that event. We do not however, approve of divorce, and discourage men from it.”

  “What if a woman wishes to divorce her husband, my lord iman?” India asked, curious.

  “Such a thing is not permitted,” she was told. The iman arose slowly from his seat. “Baba Hassan, you will take the lady now to be wed. The chief iman of El Sinut is awaiting her arrival so he may witness this happy event.”

  India bid the elderly cleric farewell, and followed after the chief eunuch. The women’s mosque was next to the main mosque in the city. They had but to cross a courtyard half shadowed with afternoon sun. He brought her into the building to a small room looking out upon a garden. Azura was awaiting them, along with the dey and the chief iman.

  The iman, Abd Allah, was a portly man with a no-nonsense air about him. “Let us begin,” he said. “You have settled a bride price upon the girl, my lord, and it is sufficient enough? Good!” He looked at India. “You are willing to marry this man, my lady?”