The Diviner (golden key)

by Melanie Rawn

  “And you have far more important plans to make—yes, I know, husband.” She set aside her untasted drink and rose. “The children’s lessons must be heard. I will leave you to your plans.”

  Azzad hesitated, then asked, “Once Alessid, Bazir, and Kallad have recited to your satisfaction, may I see them afterward?”

  Her face tightened like an angry fist. But all she did was nod and stalk out of the room in a swirl of bright silks.

  “She isn’t happy,” Fadhil said mildly.

  Azzad cocked a sardonic brow. “I’m sure she was hoping you wouldn’t notice.”

  “She could forbid this, you know. It is well within her rights.”

  “Happy or unhappy, approving or disapproving—she understands. Men simply see a thing and decide one way or another and don’t bother much with reasons. Women think. And those who think longest understand best. As the writings have it, men’s thoughts are the sand, easily scattered by any wind that happens along. But women are the rich earth that grows thoughts and ideas, and from these come understanding.”

  “And what of you, the one they are calling Il-Kadiri?” Fadhil smiled.

  “That silly child, Ferrhan Mualeef, has been reading bits of his work to you, hasn’t he?” Azzad sighed. “’Bringer of Green,’ indeed! It’s only common sense—”

  “Sense, Meryem says, is the least common thing of all.” He glanced around as Alessid’s voice echoed down the stairwell, teasing his brothers into a jumping contest. “Do we tell them everything tonight?”

  “Not quite everything. They’re good boys, but still only boys, after all. They might say something unawares.”

  “And we cannot allow a single grain of sand to stray outside Sihabbah, or it will surely stick in the eye of this Sheyqir Reihan. Ayia, when the time comes for them to know everything, I will be ready with something for them.” He frowned. “I wish, though, that I knew how the Geysh Dushann came by those Shagara items. And what that strange sign means.”

  Whatever Azzad would have replied was lost, for Alessid burst into the room, Bazir and Kallad a step behind him, shouting, “I won! I won!”

  Azzad hid a smile. Alessid always won.

  “They’re coming.”

  Azzad nodded in the twilight gloom. It would be impossible to miss them: the white horses that were the pride of the al-Ammarizzad practically glowed in the dark. The one golden horse, pride of one al-Ammarizzad in particular, shone like the rising of the summer sun.

  Mazzud shifted in his saddle and whispered, “We’re too close to the city. We should have taken them last night at the watering hole.”

  Azzad stayed silent, not reminding his old friend that they were so far from Hazganni that none but the owls would hear, and that the stop at the watering hole had been part of his plan. While the group of al-Ammarizzad and their servants slept, foolishly trusting their horses to warn them of approaching danger, Azzad and Fadhil had, with the aid of specially crafted hazziri, slipped into the saddle waterskins a tasteless, odorless drug. Now, almost a whole day later, peering from the shelter of trees and bushes he himself had ordered planted, Azzad saw the sedative taking slow, subtle effect. Ten offspring of Sheyqa Nizzira and the ten men who served them swayed slightly as they rode, drooping forward, jerking upright again as they felt themselves falling asleep.

  Azzad glanced at his sons. Alessid grinned back—the typical impudent thirteen-year-old, well aware that full manhood was close upon him. Bazir, almost eleven and tall for his age, nodded solemnly when he saw Azzad looking at him; Kallad, two years younger, smiled. Both boys were nervous, but hiding it well. Alessid, by contrast, looked as if he and his horse awaited the start of a race: eager yet controlled, excited yet utterly confident. Azzad was well pleased. He was determined that his sons participate in this act that would define them as al-Ma’aliq. This was their vengeance as much as his. He only regretted that Zellim and Yuzuf were too young to be here.

  The ten sheyqirs lolled drunkenly in their saddles. Azzad knew who they were by name, thanks to his agent in Rimmal Madar, and could not have been better pleased had he given specific instructions to Nizzira about which of her progeny to send. Acuyib was not only smiling, He was laughing in His Beard at the joke shared with Azzad. The Most Noble and Mighty Sheyqirs were all young, all intended for vital marriage bonds with powerful families, to bring a harvest of wealth, alliances, and children.

  Azzad lifted a hand in signal to Fadhil, Mazzud, and the three boys. The al-Ammarizzad reined in, their movements sluggish, confusion scrawled on their faces in the sunset as six riders emerged from the trees on either side of the road.

  “Who’re you?” a bearded sheyqir slurred.

  “Azzad al-Ma’aliq.”

  He laughed a sloppy, drunken laugh. “The al-Ma’aliq’re all dead.”

  Azzad smiled. “Not all.” He turned his attention to the rider of the golden stallion. “Nihazza is an impressive horse, is he not, Reihan?”

  The young man was indeed exceedingly beautiful, even slack-lipped and bleary-eyed with Fadhil’s drugs. He retained enough wits to know this was a trap. He hauled clumsily on the reins—but Alessid leaped lightly from his saddle and gave a soft, melodic whistle between his teeth. Nihazza responded instantly by planting his hooves in the dust and refusing to budge another step. Alessid came forward quite casually and laid a hand on the stallion’s bridle; Nihazza snuffled, recognizing him, and nuzzled a pocket for the expected treat.

  Reihan’s brothers and cousins, belatedly realizing there was danger but not quite believing that danger to their royal persons could come in the form of three men and three boys, attempted to maneuver their horses. But before the al-Ammarizzad and their attendants could do more than fumble at their saddles, bridles were seized and swords were taken and piled on the ground.

  “Robbers,” one of the sheyqirs announced, as if weeks of heavy thought had led him to this brilliant conclusion.

  “Whassa trouble?” another demanded. “Outta way, fallahin—”

  “Al-Ma’aliq,” Alessid corrected him, almost pleasantly.

  “They’re all dead,” came the reply, with a befuddled snort.

  Another, looking to be the youngest, nodded, his head loose on his neck. “Long time ago—orders of the Sheyqa my gran’ma—”

  “You,” Reihan said, swallowing dry and hard as he peered at Azzad. “You sent him—Nihazza—”

  “—knowing you would want more like him,” Azzad finished. “I know you, al-Ammarizzad. I know all of your greedy kind. Acquisitive, selfish, arrogant—I knew Nihazza would be the only invitation you’d require. Acuyib meant this to happen.”

  “It was nothing t’do with me.” Reihan shook his head in a vain attempt to clear it. “I—I was no more than a child—”

  “So were my sisters,” Azzad said. “And all the children your mother ordered burned alive. Innocent children, whose only crime was that they were al-Ma’aliq. Your crime is that you are al-Ammarizzad.”

  “Brigands,” proclaimed the Intellect among them. “Gonna rob an’ kill us—”

  “Kill us?” a proud sheyqir whined, and a third blustered, “Wuddun’ dare—”

  “I have no intention of killing you,” Azzad said—reluctantly, for this had been a point of contention between him and Fadhil. But this way was better; it would cause Nizzira more anguish. “You will live and return to Rimmal Madar.”

  Nine of them had gone limp in their saddles—half with relief, half with the powerful sedative. Only Reihan still fought, his fine features tense, his magnificent dark eyes forced wide open by sheer effort of will.

  Azzad contemplated him for a moment, then said, “All of you, get off my horses.”

  “Your—?” The Intellect drew himself up with what he probably imagined was dignity.

  “Which one are you?” Azzad asked.

  “I—Sheyqir—” He listed to the right before lurching back and steadying himself. “Azhim, third son of Sheyqa Nizzira an’ fourth huzbin’—I mean, fourth s
on, seccun’ huzbin’—” He frowned his puzzlement that he couldn’t quite place himself within the royal hierarchy. At last he simply shrugged, an action that nearly toppled him from his horse, and said, “’M Sheyqir Azhim.”

  “Sheyqir Azhim,” Azzad said pleasantly, “if you open your mouth one more time, I’ll cut out your tongue. Now, get off my horses.”

  After some encouragement at the points of their own swords, they did so, sliding bonelessly to the ground. Bazir, Alessid, and Mazzud swiftly tied up the servants, then hobbled the horses. Kallad and Fadhil placed on each al-Ammarizzad’s left thumb a silver ring. Azzad had watched Fadhil craft the rings, set with etched carnelians and inscribed with rows of tiny ants. Azzad had insisted on the insects, enjoying the pun: Ants were a symbol of harvesting, which was the meaning of izzad.

  One of the brothers squinted at his new jewelry and muttered, “Ugly thing. Wuddun’ givvit to a whore.”

  Another, dimly perceiving that Azzad held all the power here, said, “Issa nice present. C’n we go now, al-Ma’aliq?”

  He ignored them. Still astride Khamsin, he nodded to Mazzud, who kindled a fire in the stone circle constructed that afternoon, then said to the al-Ammarizzad, “Remove your sashes.”

  They grumbled but obeyed, swaying on their feet, fingers awkwardly unwinding the red silk, golden fringes tangling. Bazir and Kallad collected the sashes, then ripped each lengthwise down the middle. Blurts of outrage became gasps as the sheyqirs were knocked off their feet into the dirt. They struggled feebly, but the fear in their brains could not overcome the drug in their bodies. Their hands were bound behind them with their own torn sashes. Azzad watched terror brighten their blurry eyes as the fire lit the clearing in yellow and angry crimson—and showed them the instrument slowly glowing to white heat in the flames.

  Anyone who knew anything about horses would recognize such an instrument.

  “Bring Nihazza,” Azzad commanded.

  Mazzud and Alessid held the gray stallion triple-roped. Bazir held Nihazza’s head, stony-faced, regretting the horse he had hoped would be his, but knowing the sacrifice to be necessary. Quickly and carefully, Fadhil smoothed a thick, sickly-sweet smelling unguent on and around the testicles. Azzad dismounted and personally gelded the stallion with cauterizing white-hot iron.

  Nihazza jerked once, but the salve had deadened pain. Bazir turned his head away. Azzad thought of how he would feel had it been Khamsin.

  Turning to the ten offspring of Sheyqa Nizzira, he said, “This also I will do to each of you. But I will allow you to live, which is more than the Sheyqa allowed the al-Ma’aliq.”

  There were outcries, some of disbelief and some of fear and some of blustering rage. The only one who made no sound, the only one who seemed to understand, even through the drug befuddling his mind, was Reihan. He did not doubt Azzad’s word about what was about to occur; he was neither afraid nor angry. He hated. And in the dark loathing that shone from his eyes by firelight, despite the sensitivity of his poetry and the elegance of his beauty, Azzad saw in him a true son of Sheqya Nizzira.

  Azzad thrust the gelding shears into the fire, and again, and again, ten times in all. And so he harvested the al-Ammarizzad.

  In due course Azzad received a letter from his most trusted agent in Dayira Azreyq. It had been well worth waiting for.

  They have returned. They were led into the palace by night, and in secret. No one saw them but the servants who opened the doors. My sources tell me that many tabbibi came in haste that same night and departed just before dawn in fear for their lives. What this must mean, I think you know.

  Of course he knew. Nizzira wished no one to discover that ten of her progeny were no longer men.

  All Dayira Azreyq holds its breath. The Sheqya has not been seen in days, and there are dire tidings of her rage. More tabbibi have come and gone, and my friends among them says that the violence of her grief may well be the death of the Sheyqa.

  Ayia, Azzad hoped so. Let her feel more anguish than a human heart could hold. Let her suffer every time she thought of her ten gelded darlings. Let her scream the name of al-Ma’aliq without ceasing.

  I regret to write that three days ago, the order for Sihabbah timber was canceled. My friends in the Zoqalo Zhaddim say that orders for certain other items have also been canceled. What this must mean is confirmed by the departure of the officials of the provinces held by the al-Akhdir from court, with no marriage contract regarding Sheyqir Azhim in their hands.

  Azzad wondered if the al-Akhdiri ambassadors had any idea of why Azhim would not be getting married to any woman.

  There has been talk about sending an army to Hazganni by sea. It is not agreed upon, but should this occur, I will give ample warning.

  Very efficient of him, Azzad thought, but unnecessary. The Shagara hazziri, old as they were by now, that had protected this land from invading northern barbarians would function just as well against the soldiers of Rimmal Madar. Besides, with the northern tribes formerly allied to the al-Ma’aliq restless still, Nizzira could not afford to send half her army out of the country.

  Yesterday two of the Qoundi Ammar were dispatched to The Steeps. I saw them ride out myself. What this must mean, I believe you also know.

  He would be five times a fool if he didn’t. There was more to the letter—inventories, business dealings, the usual—but after a quick perusal Azzad returned to the best news. He read it again and again. The proud sheyqirs slinking into the palace by night. The tabbibi summoned to confirm that the deed was hopeless of remedy—and threatened with death if they spoke of it. The marriage alliance that would not be—all the marriages that would never be. The sending of emissaries to the Geysh Dushann to demand revenge. And especially—ayia, especially!—the helpless rage of Sheyqa Nizzira. Worst of all, her favorite son, her beautiful, poetic Reihan, light of her heart and joy of her old age—

  “And so,” his wife said, standing in the doorway of the maqtabba. “At last you have your vengeance.”

  “Yes,” he replied with a humming sigh of satisfaction. “I have it.”

  “Is it sweet to the taste, husband? Does it fill you the way a new child fills me now?”

  Azzad sprang to his feet. “Jemilha—!” He rose to embrace and kiss her, but she eluded him, holding out two shiny objects.

  “I asked Fadhil to make these. One set for you, and one set each for all of us. Say you will wear them always, and I will never speak of this matter again.”

  His gaze fell from her adamant face to a pair of wide silver armbands studded with a rainbow of tiny gems. Purple amethyst, blue turquoise, sea-green beryl and spring-green peridot, golden topaz, red-orange carnelian and crimson garnet—a dozen of each, set around complex talishann, and a single owl for watchfulness. He didn’t remember all the meanings of all the jewels, but he did recognize one because Fadhil had once said it was extremely rare.

  “Peridots. These must have cost as much as Khamsin’s best foal.” He eyed his wife sidelong. “But a small price to pay for protection against my own folly—is that the way your thoughts run, Jemilha?”

  “Will you put these on, Azzad? And never take them off? If you promise, this will be the last you’ll ever hear from me about what you did to Nizzira’s sons and grandsons.”

  “I promise.” He clasped the silver hazziri onto his arms and again tried to embrace Jemilha. Again she avoided him, turning on the heel of one white velvet slipper. In the whirl of her movement the sleeves of her bedrobe shifted at her wrists, and by the lamplight he saw the bracelets that were a match for the armbands. “Qarassia—”

  “Sururi annam, husband,” she said over her should as she left the room. And he wondered if she would ever sleep sweetly again.

  Ayia, this was all nonsense. Nizzira would know who was responsible, but what could she do about it? Send her army? It would be an invitation to the northern tribes to attack. Send the Geysh Dushann? Likely, but not all that worrying. Azzad glanced around the maqtabba. Shagara safeguards
were all over the house in Sihabbah, the house in Hazganni, at the perimeters of all the al-Gallidh holdings. Even if assassins got past these, there were the protections on his person. He held up his arms, admiring the gleam of silver and jewels by lamplight. He and his were safe.

  And there would be a new baby in the new year—a sixth son or a third daughter. It would be a daughter, he decided, a sign of Acuyib’s approval. He’d name the girl Oannisia, for Acuyib had indeed been merciful to Azzad, and just.

  The evening shadows deepened, and Azzad was lighting another lamp so he could read the letter yet again and gloat over it when Fadhil came into the maqtabba. His golden skin looked pallid and fragile, drawn tight across fine bones by worry, lined with sorrow.

  “What is it, my friend?” Azzad asked, rising.

  “Khamsin,” was all Fadhil said.

  He would never know how he got to the stables. He only knew that one moment he was surrounded by books and the scent of fragrant lamp oil, and the next he was in Khamsin’s stall with the reek of medicine in his nostrils.

  “It’s no use, al-Ma’aliq,” said Mazzud, tears unnoticed on his weathered cheeks. “He is old, and it is his time.”

  Fadhil crouched beside him. “I’ve done all I can. Mazzud is right. It’s his time.”

  He knelt there all night, remembering how he had done the same when Khamsin was newborn, so that Azzad would become familiar and beloved. He remembered all the years since—twenty-two of them—that had taken him and Khamsin from the ancestral castle of the al-Ma’aliq to the city streets of Dayira Azreyq, from the brutal climb of The Steeps to the camp of the Ammarad, from the tents of the Shagara to the sweet mountain meadows of Sihabbah.

  The stallion’s heart stopped just before dawn. There was a final sighing breath, and a slight movement of the head against Azzad’s caressing hands, and then the last gleam faded from the huge eyes.

  “No,” Azzad said, and buried his face in Khamsin’s neck and wept.