The Curse of Zohreh

by Sophie Masson

  Husam frowned. Before he could say anything, Khaled cut in. ‘Husam, I have very little time. I must have all the help I can possibly get. We need to follow up every single lead. And you are here to protect me. You have your sword, and you know how to deal with Jinn. We must take the chance. You must see that!’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Husam, looking from one to the other. ‘Very well. But don’t try any funny business, Sharib. I won’t hesitate to kill you if you betray us.’

  ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t,’ said the Alhindi, ‘and I value my head, friend Husam. Besides, Khaled is right. You must try everything. You don’t have the luxury of picking and choosing, when it comes to defeating strong magic.’ He paused. ‘Now, I have to explain to you: we are going to go through this door here, which leads to a strongroom, where my friend will be waiting. You will have to be blindfolded. I’m sorry, friend Husam, but it must be so.’

  ‘Please, Husam,’ said Khaled, warningly.

  ‘Well, I’m not leaving my sword behind for anything,’ said Husam. ‘And I’m warning you: blindfolded or not, I can still cut you in ribbons.’

  ‘I know that,’ said Sharib, smiling faintly. ‘Now then, if we’re agreed, we’ve got to get going, and quickly. For each of you, I have a scarf to tie over your eyes. There is also a rope, which you are each to hang on to. Once you are ready, I will escort you to where my friend is. You are to keep on the blindfold the whole time you are in his presence. Agreed?’

  Slowly, they nodded.

  ‘Good,’ said Sharib. ‘You won’t regret it.’

  As Khaled tied the blindfold around his eyes, he felt a soft fluttering near his right ear. ‘Oh, dear, oh dear,’ came Farasha’s anxious whisper. ‘Where exactly are we going?’

  Khaled said nothing, because what could he have answered? Perhaps they were going into a trap.

  ‘Right, all ready? Off we go!’ The rope gave a jerk, and Husam and Khaled stumbled unseeingly after Sharib. ‘Now then. Here’s the first door,’ came the dwarf’s cheerful voice. ‘Step through. That’s right. Now a few steps down. Careful, don’t slip. Another door, and then we’ll be there.’

  They could hear a bolt being drawn across. The rope jerked a little more, then stopped. ‘Drop the rope now,’ Sharib said. ‘Remember: do not try and take off your blindfold.’

  They heard the slap of Sharib’s rubber sandals on what sounded like a concrete floor; they heard the murmur of voices, at some distance, then coming closer; and at the same time, they heard the sound of another pair of footsteps beside Sharib’s, sliding along as if their owner were crippled in some way. They could smell a rank smell, overlaid with the heady fumes of kalfkat, a powerful herb. But they could see nothing.

  ‘Welcome,’ said a voice. It was a soft, dark, velvety man’s voice. Khaled felt the hairs on his arms rise up, for it seemed to him as if the material of his blindfold was thinning out, gradually, till it was like a kind of pale mist over his eyes: a mist in which he could, at first vaguely, then more clearly, see forms emerging.

  They were in a room lit only by a warm, glowing lamp. There was a big safe against one wall, a shelf with ledgers on it, a workbench with tools scattered on it and a tall water pipe, from which wafted a thin stream of kalfkat smoke. Husam’s hand still gripped his sword. Over there was Sharib’s squat form and beside him – dear God, what was it – a hulking male form, wrapped in black, whose face seemed to be nearly all covered in what looked like shaggy brown hair, with a strange lock of pure white hair at the front. Only the eyes were visible under all the hair: almond-shaped, amber-coloured eyes with black, spiky lashes, the pupils narrowed under the influence of kalfkat. Khaled could see that the man held himself stiffly, painfully upright, as though, he thought suddenly, he would prefer to go on all fours. It was a beast – or a man that looked like a beast. He couldn’t help make a gulping sound, and then heard Farasha whisper, right near his ear. ‘Quiet! Quiet! He must not know I am helping you to see. Act as if you can’t see.’

  So that was the explanation for the sudden way he could see under his blindfold. Khaled gulped again, and struggled to control himself. ‘My name is Gur Thalab al Kutroob. My friend Sharib has told me what you need. Please give me the carpet, that I may examine it.’

  Through the thin mist over his eyes, Khaled could see, as if in the muddied reflection in a stream, hands stretching out for the carpet Husam was holding out: hands that were almost paws, big, square, hairy, yet set with magnificent rings. Then he saw the creature and Sharib bending over the carpet; he could hear an unintelligible murmur. At his shoulder, Farasha was silent, though Khaled could feel his tension. Husam, too, was silent, holding himself stiffly, every muscle stilled.

  Sharib got to his feet. ‘My friend confirms that your carpet is indeed a rare thing. It was made by a Mesomian Carpet Enchantress – but a very young one. She had too many ideas and did not finish the piece properly. He thinks he can fix it, but it may take some time, for at present he is not well. You will have to come back in three days.’

  ‘Three days!’ said Khaled, before he could stop himself. ‘But we have just over three days before I –’ He broke off abruptly as the hairy head turned sharply towards him, the amber eyes glittering with an alien shine. At the same moment, Husam moved swiftly in front of Khaled, blocking any action the creature might take. There was a heartbeat of tense silence, then the beautiful voice said, very softly, ‘Before you what?’

  ‘Lord,’ came Sharib’s voice, no longer cheerful but full of a barely repressed anxiety, ‘he is a boy. He does not know how to –’

  ‘Let him speak,’ said the beast.

  Khaled said, ‘Forgive my impatience, but I am under a curse, and if I do not break it before three days are up, I will die. And my family name will die with me. Sharib has told us the carpet may help to save me, and that you are the one who can repair it. Will you help us?’

  There was silence, then the beast said, ‘I will try. But if you are cursed, then so am I, with a curse nothing and no-one can ever break. And today is not a good day for me, so it will take time.’ The amber eyes glittered fiercely, the hands that were almost paws clenched around each other close to the creature’s chest, as if they were crushing something – or as if they were preventing the creature from leaping on the humans. ‘Now go. You have been here a long time already, and I am afraid I will not be able to leash the beast inside me for too much longer. It is good you wore those blindfolds; it is never good for me to meet others’ eyes in this state.’ The eyes rested on Khaled for a shivery instant. Khaled looked straight ahead, as if he were truly blind under the scarf. His heart pounded like a drum.

  ‘Here’s the rope,’ came Sharib’s voice, very brisk. ‘Hold on and follow me.’ He took them almost at a run through the door, which he slammed shut, then up the stairs, and back through the next door, which he closed with a clang and locked and bolted as soon as they were through. It was then that they heard the long, mournful wolf’s howl, wafting up from down below: a howl of fury and grief, of frustration and despair and a deep, deep sorrow that made their blood feel as if it were turned to ice.

  ‘You may take off your blindfolds now,’ said Sharib. He sounded tired, and rather breathless. ‘It’s safe, don’t worry. Good, that’s done. It’s always a little bit – er – edgy when my friend is in one of his bad moods.’

  ‘The Light preserve us,’ said Husam. Khaled noticed there was sweat on his forehead. ‘You took us to meet a werewolf. No wonder you were so secretive and jumpy.’

  ‘He is under the werewolf curse, but he is a good man,’ said Sharib earnestly. ‘He’s the son of an Arga, a prince from the beautiful green Kirtis Mountains of Mesomia, and in his family the werewolf curse visits every other generation. He should have been the heir, but renounced his claim, fearing the thing in his blood would make him too dangerous. He left his home and ended up in the armed resistance against The Vampire, hiding out in the Marshlands, where he learnt carpet repair from the Enchantresses. It did not he
lp his family: his father the Arga was murdered by his own brother with the help of The Vampire, and took the Kirtis throne by force. Gur Thalab was betrayed by one of his own kinsmen and was captured by The Vampire’s agents and taken to the notorious Black Prison, where he was foully tortured. But somehow he managed to escape, and found refuge here.’ He sighed. ‘Poor Gur Thalab. Poor Mesomia. But that is not your concern, friends. Your carpet will be in good hands. And it’s quite likely he’ll have it ready before it’s needed.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ asked Khaled anxiously.

  ‘I am sure.’ Sharib peered rather owlishly at them. ‘Now, then, what are we to do? It is in my mind I could help you, too, to break this curse of yours, for my Jinns may well be useful to you.’

  Khaled said, ‘Oh yes, I think that you should come with us, Sharib, back home, to meet Father and Kareen Amar. Don’t you think so, Husam?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Husam, a little grudgingly.

  Sharib smiled and rubbed his hands in great satisfaction. ‘I am glad to be working at my real job again. Heavens! If you only knew how dull it is to try and wheedle people into buying trumpery rubbish. Lead on, Khaled bin Abdullah – I will follow you wherever you want me to go.’

  Omar frowned mightily when he heard that the ragged little street seller was actually coming back with them to the palace. Though he did not say anything, it was plain he was more than disapproving. As he drove along he kept glancing at the seat beside him, as if checking that Sharib wasn’t vandalising the car or stealing some fixture. Sharib didn’t seem to care, he was too busy chatting with the others. Which was why nobody noticed the motorbike following them at a discreet distance, all the way back from the Gold Market.

  That evening, Khaled went to bed early, exhausted in every way. But he lay awake for ages, worrying over their lack of progress, and the way the clock was steadily ticking towards the fateful day. His father and the clerks had, so far, discovered nothing about the Talisman’s hiding place at all; and he might have to wait for days for the carpet to be fixed. Meanwhile, Kareen had vanished on some lead of her own, and Sharib’s Jinns had turned up nothing of any consequence in the library. Indeed, they appeared unable to function in there at all, perhaps because Bikaj was somehow hindering them, out of spite.

  He would have been even more worried if he had been in the library at the stroke of midnight. Soheila, summoned again by her insistent dream, stood in front of the tall carved mirror, holding the silk sachet in which lay Zohreh’s ashes. She was pale as death, shaking all over, but trying hard to be brave.

  ‘Zohreh, Grandmother of Grandmothers, I am here. It is I, your descendant, Soheila. Will you not speak to me?’

  The mirror began to cloud over but Soheila could see nothing in it, not even the hooded figure. ‘Grandmother of Grandmothers, honoured Zohreh, please speak to me. I need your help, if I am to do my duty.’

  It felt to her as if the very air were freezing over. Her teeth chattered in her head.

  The hooded figure suddenly materialised in the misted mirror. Soheila could not see the figure’s face, but knew it was staring straight at her. She whispered, ‘Please, are you Zohreh?’

  The figure did not move, but it seemed to get larger, more menacing, more dominating. Soheila’s hands shook so much that the sachet fell on the floor. She bent down to pick it up, and as she did so, suddenly the hooded figure in the mirror moved. The hood was thrown back and Soheila found herself staring into the most terrifying face she had ever seen. It was an inhuman face – lipless, hairless, the colour of ash, but with two burning, glittering eyes of a startling blue-green, just like her own. The horrid lipless mouth moved, but Soheila heard not a word. She had fainted.

  She came to a couple of minutes later and sprang to her feet, cursing her own weakness and fear. But it was too late; the mirror had cleared. The figure had gone. Clutching the ashes, she whispered, ‘Come back. Come back. Forgive me,’ but nothing happened. Her ancestor had gone. Perhaps she would never appear to her again.

  Heart wrung by guilt, regret and sorrow, she crept back along the passages to the servants’ quarters. She slept very badly that night, and woke early so that she could stow away in the car bound for the al-Farouk graveyard.

  Fourteen

  Morning, and the big shiny four-wheel-drive car bounced along the highway, heading for the turn-off to the disused desert road that led to the old al-Farouk cemetery. In the back, hidden under blankets, Soheila hardly dared breathe. The effect of the previous night had not quite worn off, and she felt exhausted, her eyes gritty, her throat constricted. But she was determined that this time she would not show any fear, no matter what horrors lurked in that graveyard.

  She felt a measure of faint relief at knowing that at least the wicked man who had so foully murdered her innocent ancestress did not lie in honour, but in a deserted place, and that even his kinsmen were afraid to visit his burial place. Ghouls did not frighten her – they had no place in the stories of her own people – but what of the ghost of Kassim, if it should appear? She offered several prayers to Akamenia to protect her, and made the sign of the Truthteller to seal them. She had not brought Zohreh’s ashes with her. The graveyard was a place of unclean spirits, the resting place of a wicked man. Who knew what evil things might be there, to sully her ancestor’s honoured remains? She had failed Zohreh last night; she did not want to fail her again.

  The car lurched to a stop. Soheila could hear the murmur of conversation; she did not dare poke up her head just yet. Then car doors slammed. Cautiously Soheila lifted her head up, and slid, the dark blanket still wrapped around her, to the back window. The vehicle had tinted reflective windows of the kind that are easy enough to see out of but not see into – perfect for anonymity in traffic, and also for Soheila’s purposes. She peered out and saw low dunes of sand, and a solitary large thorn tree, under whose tortured spreading branches was what must be the old cemetery: an enclave surrounded by a tall, crumbling mud wall, with a heavy metal gate set into it. Faded signs against the evil eye were painted on the metal: an attempt to ensure that whatever foul thing was inside stayed inside.

  Once the others went through that gate, Soheila would see nothing. She had to follow them. But how, without being seen? She looked at the thorn tree and had an idea. Part of its massive trunk grew outside the cemetery wall; if she climbed up it, into the branches, she would see what was happening down below whilst being unseen.

  Soheila breathed another prayer to Akamenia, opened the rear door, and very cautiously slipped out of the car. She hid for a second behind the sand dune closest to the car, then peered around and saw that the driver was making his way back to the car, where, presumably, he would wait. She ducked behind the sand dune and looked out. The driver had pulled down the car shades. He wouldn’t see her. The others had already reached the cemetery. It was safe for her to move. She crawled as carefully as she could, round the back of the dune, till she reached the thorn tree.

  She shinned up the tree and quickly reached the top of the wall. She looked down into a strange and desolate place indeed. Broken grey marble headstones, dead twigs from the thorn tree and what looked horribly like bits of bones lay scattered on the sandy ground. In the very centre stood a tall, polished red marble headstone. Somehow this was the most horrid sight of all, for it stood almost undamaged amongst the desolation around it, the very sand around it quite undisturbed. There was nothing written on the stone – if there had been once, it had vanished – but Soheila knew instantly it was the headstone of Kassim himself.

  Down below, Abdullah and Husam and Khaled were standing at a cautious distance from the headstone, deep in conversation. The Jinn Kareen Amar prowled around the further reaches of the cemetery, sniffing at the air, her hands held out in front of her, groping, feeling for unseen presences. The Jinn’s eyes were glowing bright red; her mouth was set in a thin line, and an eerie warning whistle was coming from it; her hair seemed almost electric. It was obvious there were things th
ere – things that so far were not choosing to manifest themselves.

  Soheila felt an urgent, shameful desire to clamber down from her post, run back to the car and hide under the blankets. She silently told herself: ‘You’re scared before anything’s even happened, you fool, you coward. You will stay here; you will not hide or run or faint; you will be steadfast, strong as a rock.’

  She tore her attention away from the Jinn and concentrated instead on the men and the boy. Husam’s features were set in an expressionless mask and he appeared to be quite calm; but there was a faint sheen of sweat on both Khaled’s and Abdullah’s brows, and a staring quality about their eyes which told a story of rigid self-control. Abdullah had one arm around his son. ‘Kareen,’ he called out softly, in a voice that tried to be steady, ‘what is it you feel?’

  The Jinn whirled around to him, her hair standing quite on end, her face suffused with a red glow. Her voice came out as a low growl. ‘They will let you speak. Speak quickly, though.’

  Abdullah gently released his son, handing him over to Husam’s care. ‘Do not be afraid,’ he said. Khaled nodded, gulped. Something evil, truly evil, was here, he knew. He hardly noticed how he clutched at Husam’s hand. He said prayers under his breath, prayers for all of them, but especially for his father.

  ‘Great-great-great-grandfather Kassim,’ said Abdullah, clutching his walking-stick and bowing his head very low so that he appeared to be speaking to the sand at his feet, ‘we come today to ask of you one thing. Will you speak with us?’

  ‘Necromancy,’ thought Soheila, clutching desperately at the tree. ‘He means to ask his wicked ancestor for help in finally destroying their already defeated enemies.’ Burning hatred filled her heart to the exclusion of all else, except fear.

  Kareen Amar came back to their side. She stood very close to the headstone, her head up, her eyes roaming everywhere, as if she were on guard. But she said nothing.