by Fuad Baloch
“If you could just step away,” said Shoki, gingerly placing a foot forward. The men continued to chortle. He took another careful step. His foot caught onto something and with a yelp he lost his balance, the bowl skittering away into the darkness.
He fell on the muck face-first, knocking out his wind.
The two mercenaries roared with laughter. Shoki blinked back the tears in his eyes. What had happened?
“He never saw you trip him up,” said the bald man’s companion. “Walked right over your foot.”
“It’s like...” the mercenary scratched his abdomen, “like... he doesn't even have eyes.”
Hardly the most eloquent speech Shoki had ever heard. But both men chortled as if appreciating their witticism.
“Well, bring up too many generations of stupid animals in captivity, and this is bound to happen. Like parent, like child.”
Like a volcano smashing against the thin earth crust, red hot anger rose in Shoki’s chest. Trembling with rage, he clambered to his feet.
“I’m trying to imagine them now,” said the bald mercenary, extending his arms sideways as if unveiling a canvas. “A mustachioed woman more than seven feet tall. And... wait for it... wait for it... a bumbling midget.”
Again, the two men clapped each other’s backs, guffawing.
Shoki chewed his lip, a haze of red blood covering his eyes. If he had half the courage of the sultana, he’d have chewed these bastards out and spat them to the side there and then.
“Look, it’s blinking at us,” said the bald man again.
“Shame we ran out of leaves, eh?”
Shoki hobbled forward, forcing a smile he didn't really feel. “Say, did you hear the terrible secret the sultana’s brother is going to announce?”
“How do you know?” asked the bald mercenary, his face scrunching up in confusion.
“I’ve my sources.”
The men exchanged glances, leaned forward. “Well, before the Ameer of Nikhtun and his army find us, you better get on with it.”
That surprised Shoki, but he didn't let it show. Instead, he shrugged.
“Do you really know what it is?”
“I know what it is,” declared Shoki, striking a thoughtful pose he recalled seeing some past Istani sultan in a portrait. “Wanna hear?”
“Yeah...”
“They say...”
“Yeah...”
“Actually, I don’t know if I should really be telling you these things,” said Shoki, turning his head away accompanied by another sad shrug.
“We promise to keep it between us,” said the bald man. “You do eh, Deraman?”
“Aye,” Deraman agreed immediately.
“The sultana’s brother is going to announce,” began Shoki, leaning forward, his voice dropping low as the other men leaned forward, their stupid, beady eyes shining in the flickering torchlights, “a bounty for anyone that rounds up unsuspecting simpletons to be forced into court jesters.”
For a second, they stared at each other. Shoki braced himself. Deraman turned to his companion. “What does that mean?”
“The simpletons aren't meant to know,” grinned Shoki. Then, he clamped a hand on his mouth. “Oops!”
The bald man blinked. Realization bloomed on Deraman’s face a second later. He balled his fingers into a fist, his face twisting into a snarl. “How dare you insult us like that!”
“Insult?” his companion asked, his voice unsure.
Shoki spread his hands, taking a precautionary step back. “Just something I heard. Not right to hate the messenger for what he carries, right?”
“Are we hitting him, Deraman?” growled the bald mercenary.
“We are, Liaman!”
“Oh,” said Deraman, scratching his head. “What are we waiting for then?”
“Gods’ guts!” exclaimed Shoki, stepping back. “Guys, come on. No need for violence. Ain’t fair we muddy my name by engaging with the likes of you!”
Liaman turned his ugly head around. “Was that another insult?”
“Aye.”
“You’re gonna really get it, you camel-dung!” barked Liaman, his tiny eyes bulging in their sockets. “Really gonna get it.”
Shoki raised a hand. “Judging by the absolute paucity of your vocabulary, you’d make positively rich vivisection subjects for the scholars at Harapan.”
That time, Liaman didn't consult Deraman. Snarling, he advanced, his nostrils flaring. A laugh came from Rurik’s direction. Jinan’s second in command had shifted around to face them, a big grin spreading on his jowls.
Deraman gestured and the two men dropped into a martial crouch. Shoki beamed, glad to finally have an outlet for all this pent-up frustration. Instead of rushing back to the capital, he’d been forced to put up with these country dullards for far too long. The cold treatment he’d received from the sultana hadn't helped matters much either. They might laugh at his height all they wanted, but they had no idea of the biggest advantage his limbs provided him.
The ability to run like the wind.
Turning, picking a direction at random, Shoki broke into a sprint.
“Hey, come back!” shouted Liaman.
“After him, you fool!” came Deraman’s growl.
Shouts and screams followed Shoki as headed for the nearest cook pot. A mistake. The men behind him howled, screamed at their mates to help them capture Shoki.
“Damn it!” Panic rising, Shoki looked around. To the right was the dark forest. The one place he was sure he could lose these men as surely as he would himself. The routes forward and back swarmed with mercenaries and thus weren't really alternatives worth considering.
Without another thought, he darted left.
“Grab him!”
“Gonna skin the bastard!”
“Gods’ guts!” cursed Shoki. Sometimes, there was a real virtue in learning when to keep one’s mouth shut, no matter how frustrated one got. One of these days, this mouth was going to be the death of him. Assuming this wasn't that time.
A shadow lunged for him. Shoki stepped aside, surprised by his own dexterity, taken aback by the howling that came from the man who fell to the ground in his wake. He turned left, then filling his lungs until they threatened to burst, dashed into the nearest alley.
The Sultana’s Hands weren't an army. Despite the steady trickle of mercenaries swelling their ranks, they were still far too few to deserve the army epitaph. And even if the rabble-rousers ended up acquiring that status, they hadn’t had half the training ordinary jawans of the Sultan’s Body had.
Another disadvantage of not being at a larger campsite was how quickly he ran out of it.
Shoki stuttered to a stop, the shouts still coming from behind, getting closer by the second.
“Seven hells!” he grunted, knowing he was running out of options.
Shoki darted left, away from the dark and foreboding forest, and ran right into a man’s thick chest. Vise-like arms gripped him, holding him in his place even as he tried desperately to free himself.
“What’s the meaning of all this?” growled the man who Shoki couldn't break away from, the voice familiar and disdainful. Shoki ceased his struggling, inclined his chin to meet the eyes of Jinan Hoshbar, the preening, self-assured, mercenary salar.
Boots skittered to a stop. “He...” panted Deraman, “he...”
“Attacked us!” completed Liaman, panting even heavier than his mate.
“Did he now?” asked Jinan, his voice taking on an amused tone.
Any other day of the year, Shoki wouldn't have minded taking the credit for attacking not one, but two of these men. This wasn't one of those days though. “Lies,” he croaked. “Filthy untruths.”
Jinan tsked. “You speak like a blasted courtier in the diwan-e-aam.”
Shoki squirmed against the arms still holding him at bay. “Let me go!”
Men were emerging from their tents, heads turning away from card games and bowls of soup. Shoki closed his eyes, praying to the Cr
eator and all the gods of all the faiths he knew and didn’t know of yet to let him off this once.
“Your men do not tell the truth,” came another voice behind Shoki. Grunting with effort, he twisted his neck. The djinn tramped forward, carving a way through the mercenaries who stepped out of his way. Whether they knew his real ability or not, even they could see he was someone who had the sultana’s ear. “I saw it all from the beginning. Shoki was provoked when these two,” the djinn raised his fingers to point at the mercenaries, “insulted his parents. His dead parents at the hands of Ahasan and his men.”
Jinan hissed.
A dull pain throbbed behind Shoki’s eyes. “Don’t... mention my parents!” he croaked, unsure if anyone heard him. All the better for he didn't want anyone to see the cursed tears brimming in his eyes once more. Anyway, he wanted nothing from the djinn. It was said, one never got into a djinn’s debt even when he’d given up all hope.
“Hmm,” said Jinan, then let go of Shoki without warning.
Shoki stumbled back, then raised a finger toward Mara, his breath coming in gasps. “Don’t ever... try and meddle... i-in my affairs.”
The djinn remained quiet.
Reckless confidence flared through Shoki’s chest. He took a bold step toward the mercenary salar. “And... y-you...” Jinan didn't bother looking at him and Shoki’s resolve almost collapsed. Knowing he couldn't keep quiet now, not unless he wanted Deraman and Liaman to come at him again, he cleared his throat. “N-never touch me. That would... be for the best.” The last sentence came out as a whisper.
Again, no one rebuked him.
Had he really done it? Managed to win respect for once?
Shoki licked his lips, straightened his back. Finally, he’d stood up to bullies instead of just taking it. He should have done that a long time ago.
Then, he realized they were all too silent. All these men, who should have been shouting, snarling, quiet as mice.
He whirled around, gaped. “S-sultana...”
Accompanied by Maharis, she stood outside a large tent. Her tent, Shoki realized. Two guards glared at him, their swords bared, pointed toward him. The sultana took a step forward. Shoki gulped, his sinful eyes arrested by her once more.
She wore a dark peshwaz, her body as feminine as any he’d ever fantasized about. But in that moment, what rose in his chest wasn't lust. Well, not just lust. Something purer, more abstract, more confusing, a power so strong it wrenched his guts, left him breathless.
Love? Was this the elusive emotion he’d heard the Nirdu poets in the Mercantile quarter talk about? He wanted to snicker at the sheer absurdity of his jumbled emotions and would have had his tongue not gotten all tied up.
“I need men to carry messages for me,” she said.
Shoki blinked when he realized she was looking right at him. “M-me?”
She took another step forward, nodded.
Jinan cackled. “This useless boy? He’s good at nothing!”
“None can top you at sucking up, that much is certain,” Shoki replied reflexively. Then, he froze realizing he had spoken the words out loud. Curse you, Shoki! Just shut your mouth.
The mercenary salar gritted his teeth and Shoki turned away. The sultana was half a dozen steps away now. In the dim moonlight, the eyes that beheld him were familiar, but not in the sense he might have expected. Through the beautiful oval face, eyes of the dead Iron Sultan stared at him.
“Jinan,” said the sultana, her voice low but firm. Shoki gritted his teeth, an inexplicable anger growing in his chest at the casual manner with which the salar regarded her. “Your men are capable warriors, growing in strength and number each day. Yet, if there’s one lesson to take away after my meeting with the Nizam, it’s that we lack people who can communicate well on my behalf.”
“But—”
Sultana Nuraya raised her arm, then turned toward Shoki. A part of him screamed at him to lower his eyes, but awed as he was, he looked the sultana right back.
“You need something to do,” she said. “A man meandering about without a solid path is no good.”
“T-that’s... quite true,” he stammered back.
“You accepted a mission from my father not too long ago. Would you now take one from me?”
Anything if it means remaining with you. Close to you. Any excuse to be able to steal glances like these as long as I can. “A... message?” he said instead.
“My uncle hasn't been receptive to my message, but I am hoping the Ameer of Mashriq would be more amenable. The Reratish forces are amassing at his borders too. A... development that ought to encourage him to make a quick decision.”
“I... erm...”
“Good,” she said, turning around as if the matter was concluded. “Do better than the men who have failed. You shall leave at first light.”
“I...”
Sultana Nuraya marched into her tent, Maharis shooting him an evil glare, then following her. Shoki licked his lips, unsure of what had just happened.
One by one, the mercenaries left. Deraman and Liaman grumbled loudly but didn't say anything to him. Even the salar stomped away without a word. Shoki forced a grin, waved an arm at his retreating figure. “Nothing to say, eh?”
Sighing, finding himself all alone once more, somehow laden with a mission that took him even further from Algaria, where he should have been in the first place, he turned around.
And gasped.
The djinn had somehow snuck up to him, standing a mere step away. “Shoki, I’ve got a favor to ask of you as well.”
Shoki bared his teeth, hoping his fear wasn't as obvious. “Aren't you a djinn, one that grants wishes to others?”
Mara smiled, the act making Shoki’s hairs stand up. “Time for that might still come, boy.” The djinn brought his left arm up, then slipped off one of the steel bangles. “These are tough times. Occasions where I fear what might happen from this point onward.” He extended the bangle to him. “Will you look after this for me?”
“What’s this?” asked Shoki, eying the bangle warily. “Doesn't look expensive.”
“My relic.”
“Relic?”
“The one thing that ties me to this world,” he said, his voice low yet sonorous. “Will you hold on to this for me?”
Shoki stared at the half-naked magus in a man’s body, then at the bangle. In the middle of all that had been happening, he’d almost forgotten that the djinn was here on a purpose of his own. One Shoki knew nothing about.
“Please?” asked the djinn. Shoki blinked, taken aback by the simple word.
What in gods’ names was he getting himself into?
What worse could happen to him though? He reached for the bangle.
Chapter 22
Nuraya
Nuraya grimaced at her reflection in the grimy mirror. Would even her mother recognize her in this state? Mona stood just behind, her pale reflection revealing a worried but unblemished face.
Her men’s voices came through the flimsy fabric of the tent. Louder than usual. Chirpier. Men overcompensating for their tensions by forcing chuckles and a jovial manner.
Something Abba never had to fake.
Then again, there weren’t many like him anyway. Except her, of course, with the ability to see beyond the facade these men kept up all the time.
Mona cooed. A most incongruent sound in the middle of these uncouth men. She reached forward, her fingers interlacing with Nuraya’s. Mona said nothing but, then again, there was no need for it either.
Sometimes time carried a foreboding within its currents, little hints of massive threats to come. Nuraya felt that. So did Mona, it seemed. Nuraya’s insides twisted as the apprehension grew heavier. Today was the day. A day long time coming.
“What are you going to do, my princess?” asked Mona, her voice surprisingly steady.
“The time and place for patience is gone,” replied Nuraya. Then, turning away from her friend, she sauntered over to the giant table in the middle of t
heir tent where a large map of the Istani Sultanate lay open. There in the south, in the middle of the world was Algaria, a black elephant piece depicting Ahasan’s forces.
Her eyes traveled north to Kohkam and the surrounding castles. All this time, the green horse depicting Kinas’s forces had been sequestered there. Now, it lay empty, the castles unguarded, provisions and men drained.
Nuraya cleared her throat. “Send for my council.”
Nodding, Mona exited the tent to relay her commands.
Troubling thoughts filled her mind. And some trivial ones. Again, the faint, nagging voice scolded her for sending Shoki away. She had a soft spot for the man from her city, one who’d lost not one, but both parents at once. She sympathized with him, that much she acknowledged. Anything more bubbling in the distance was merely her mind’s way of coping with all she’d lost.
Mona re-entered the tent. Nuraya didn’t look up from the map. No matter how much similarity she sought with Abba, there was no denying how much separated them. Unlike Abba’s council, hers lacked both prestige and a high caliber of men. Both Jinan and Vishan, her military salars, had little experience in waging a war. Even as mercenaries, they hadn't been lauded for winning battles, but for the booty they looted.
Mona, the only daughter of a rich cloth merchant from Algaria, acted as her vizier. One who seemed to understand very little of the real world. Then there was Maharis, the magus. That gave her pause for thought. Abba’s council contained Riyan, leader of the Kalb inquisitors, someone charged with keeping the magi in check, and here she was, actively soliciting advice from one of these abominations. Nuraya shook her head, not wanting to dwell on it.
Such was her lot.
Her lot.
The curtain flap rose, and Jinan strode through. He still wore the green turban he’d worn the day before; his bare arms lean and rippling. Grinning, he came to stand around the table. He may not have raised what had gone on between them in the clearing the other day, but his eyes continued to linger on her face. Unbidden, her thoughts rose to Shoki once more. The two men couldn't be more different. Neither right for her of course—nor could anyone be, considering her station—yet, the recollection of the young guard’s face as she ordered him to leave the camp came back as a haunting memory.