Lions of Istan

by Fuad Baloch

  Her mother remained motionless. Except for the eyelashes, her body appeared like stone, a statue so delicate, so fragile, it looked ethereal.

  Nuraya interlaced her fingers. “When I was young,” she croaked, “I often wondered how you could remain so serene despite all that went around you. Envied you, if I’m honest. As I grew older, I thought this inability to feel, to express, to be part of the world was a great weakness.” She exhaled, not in control of the words spilling out of her mouth, the heavy weight in her chest lightening. “I was wrong.”

  The queen remained quiet.

  The world grew misty. Nuraya tried to swallow the urge, fearing her dam of restraint was about to collapse. “I’d love to have some of your calm now, Mother. Ever since Abba...” her voice quivered, the tears finally leaking from her eyes, “passed away, I’ve not had a single day, a single hour where I have not mourned his loss. I am surrounded by those who accept my claim to be the sultana, my best friend beside me, yet… yet I feel this vast emptiness, this gnawing feeling that I am just a child, play acting, lost in the wilderness.”

  Nuraya paused. The queen continued to ignore her. A sob escaped her lips, the tension in her chest dissolving, spreading through her body. “And every time I try to look for Abba... to seek his counsel... it’s like someone slices my heart all over again.”

  A voice rose from outside the doors. Not the harsh guttural tones of her men. A soft feminine purr. Mona? But she was far away. Nuraya clicked her teeth. “You never approved of my choices anyway, did you? Never liked the friends I made, the hobbies I took up.” She barked a short, bitter laugh. “Turns out you weren't wrong there either. Mona travels beside me, close like a shadow. Yet each day that passes, it seems I know her even less. Once, we could spend all day studying under the Kur’shi teachers, gossiping in the ambassadors’ enclaves, dissecting the latest fashions sweeping the capital. But… now that I need a friend, someone to confide in... share thoughts on men… I find myself alone. All by myself.” She raised her hand. “Like a neem tree standing tall over the grass stalks, both inhabiting the same space yet looking at the world in fundamentally different ways.”

  Nuraya knew she was babbling, not making any sense. How long had it been since she’d unburdened quite like that though? When had she ever talked with her mother like this?

  The queen still refused to meet her eyes, the stony face unmoved by the daughter’s confessions. Nuraya chewed her lower lip, her left thumb rubbing furiously against the middle finger. Were all mothers as cold-hearted like hers? Unbidden, Shoki’s face rose in her memory. Not the sad, broken man she had sent away, but the carefree guard he had been in the diwan-e-aam a world ago. Had he been as unlucky as her to have been raised by someone like her mother? If not, was it wrong his mother had died and hers, sitting still like a corpse, hadn't?

  A strange and uncomfortable unease spread in her chest. She inhaled sharply, tried to banish Shoki’s image. The young man was a nobody. A mere city guard who would’ve likely gone on to live a meaningless, anonymous life. Yet, the more she tried to divert her thoughts, the more they kept returning to him.

  What was this if not sheer madness?

  Nuraya shook her head, barked another laugh. “Have you any idea what goes in the life and heart of your only child, Mother? Of all these... confusing and utterly nonsensical thoughts it harbors for the unlikeliest of people?”

  No response.

  Another terrible worry took root in her chest. For all things Shoki was, he’d never appeared a warrior. Had it not been for Mara, the Zyadi magus, she’d have never even known his name. So, in a way the magus was to be blamed for all this mess. Her thoughts moved to Mara. Where had he gone anyway?

  Had he realized what she was only beginning to now, and decided to go after Shoki to ensure no harm fell on him?

  Why was she worrying about one man anyway?

  She’d made a decision, and that was that.

  As sultana, she was responsible for the lives of millions. What was just one man compared to all that?

  The pang in her heart didn’t let up.

  A maid shouted at another outside the door. Feet scraped in response. Nuraya adjusted her weight, her hand subconsciously going to her right toward the sword buckled there. Except there was no sword, of course. They had won the battle. Kark was theirs, a glorious battle she had led herself.

  A battle? She shifted again, feeling the weight of the past two sleepless nights catching up to her with a vengeance. A young man and his grandfather mowed down in seconds. The streets littered with the dead. Her hand flinging the spear. The boy dropping down. The grandfather’s gasps. Her men looting, pillaging property and women.

  Another sob escaped her chest, taking her by surprise.

  War wasn't what all these men had made it sound like before she’d entered it herself. It took a long time, an awfully long and grueling time to get to the point before one faced a foe on the battleground. And then... just like the thin mist in front of the raging sun, before one even blinked, the battle was over, leaving one in a place worse off than they began even if they won.

  Her thoughts were unmoored, wild.

  There was a reason for that, one she knew subconsciously, even if she didn't want to acknowledge it.

  She had to ask a question.

  She needed to know.

  The thought, once given voice, took hold of her, refusing to dissipate.

  “Mother,” said Nuraya, fixing her eyes on the queen, “is there any truth to the rumors around your role in... Abba’s death?”

  Had it been anyone else but her, they wouldn't have been able to detect the slightest of twitches on her mother’s lips.

  Nuraya’s heart sank.

  She could get up, walk away, leave whatever lay ahead dead and hidden. Except, she’d never be able to live with herself. No amount of strategies with Jinan and his lieutenants on troop movements would bring her any solace or distraction.

  Nuraya rose, walked over to stand in front of her mother. The large black eyes twitched once more, then rose to find hers, glistening in the sunlight.

  A rush of emotions washed over Nuraya. Surely, she was wrong, and had been corrupted by all these rumors Ahasan had been flinging about her mother. But now that she saw her, her heart knew, and wailed in terror.

  “Mother...” said Nuraya, her voice shaking, “deny these rumors. Tell me they are filthy lies, far removed from truth as day from night.”

  A sob left Queen Aleena’s lips, then a lone tear ran down her cheek.

  “No!” hissed Nuraya, taking a step back.

  “I... killed your father,” whispered the queen, the words slow, halting, earth-shattering.

  The light was suddenly blinding, the world taking on an angry red sheen. Nuraya shook her head, convinced she’d heard her wrong. Hot tears ran down her own cheeks.

  “I had a friend like Mona when I was your age in Buzdar,” said the queen. “Her father was a kindly old physician with a wife who’d been dying for twenty years.” Her eyes found hers again, held them there. “‘Nothing worse than seeing your loved one die every day,’ he used to tell me.”

  “Mother, stop!”

  The queen raised her hand and sultana or not, Nuraya shut up. “Then one day, he came and confessed to me the crime he’d committed out of love. Of the concoction of poppy seed and alcohol that he had slipped into his wife’s tea the night before. How her final moments of a terrible existence had been blissful.” The queen’s voice quivered, cracks appearing on the facade that had seemed impenetrable. “Of the joy he felt at the thought of seeing her one day again in the Creator’s court.”

  “No...” whispered Nuraya. “Lies. All lies.”

  “It’s the truth, girl,” she croaked. “For all his faults, this time Ahasan doesn't tell a lie. Just a half-truth. Your father, my… husband was in pain. Terrible pain, the likes of which he never let anyone see. Not you. Not me.” She leaned forward. “But I knew.”

  Nuraya shook wit
h rage, with sorrow. “And so, you... you killed him? Poisoned my...Abba?”

  “Aye,” confessed the queen, the simple answer more chilling than any other word Nuraya had ever heard in her life. She recalled her mother, standing over a row of white cotton-like flowers, Ghansi in tow, neither of them known for their love of gardens. Then she recalled Ghansi outside her chambers, her fingers clutching the very same flowers, announcing Abba had passed away.

  Nuraya stared at Queen Aleena who glared right back with the conviction of the righteous. They were mother and daughter, yet they were so vastly different, one’s actions terrifying the other.

  But they did have one trait in common. A stubbornness to do what they thought right, no matter what others thought.

  Nuraya blinked, tears flowing freely from her eyes. A sickening feeling of loss spread through her, a searing pain twisting itself round and round within her, threatening to rip her heart apart.

  Had Abba been in pain like this? Despite all the smiles, had he been suffering like this too?

  Was it selfish on her part to want more time with him, no matter how terrible he might have been?

  Time that this woman in front of her had taken away.

  “Nuraya—”

  “Quiet!” snarled Nuraya. Her mother’s eyes shot up in indignation. Never before had Nuraya cut her off like this. But then again, this was a moment unlike any other. “You were selfish. Only seeing the good in your action without realizing its impact on the wider world and...” she trailed away, struggling to formulate an adequate response. With a sleeve, she wiped her tears, ashamed at breaking down like this in front of another soul.

  One as shameful as her own mother.

  Drawing in a long breath, her heart broken into a thousand pieces, a rage somehow holding her together, she wheeled around.

  She was the sultana, and she had many demands on her time and attention. Her men waited outside. A whole world did.

  Whether or not she liked what her mother had done, it was done.

  The past was written.

  All she could control was the present. And the future.

  “My child, all I did—”

  “Shush,” Nuraya cut her off, her heart aching once more. Thankful her back was turned, she cleared her throat. “The sad thing is you don’t even realize what you’ve done. You didn't just kill my father… but my mother too.”

  She stormed away, fearing what Abba would have done had he been in her shoes.

  The sun had turned a harsh ball of fire by the time Nuraya strode outside the castle. Sweet poured down her back, the air hot and sticky. In the distance, she saw Maharis whispering into the ears of a man she hadn't seen before, also wearing a black turban. A magus? She exhaled, sickened by what she had unleashed onto the world.

  Before long, Maharis would approach her once more and this time she wouldn’t be able to push him off. Now that her proclamation had spread afar, condemnations had been quick in coming. The Kalb inquisitors had denounced her—an expected response—but even the neighboring ameers had taken affront.

  Not that she cared for them all. When she took command of Buzdar, governed the west, they’d all fall in line. And when she did take the capital, took over the Peacock Throne… well, then, she’d worry about what to do with the magi.

  Breathing out of her nose, she pushed all thoughts away except what she was here to do.

  She was the sultana, present here in her capacity as the very personification of justice itself.

  Swift and cruel and necessary.

  Her eyes traveled up to the raised platform her men had set up over the past few hours. The two condemned men, jawans of the Sultana’s Hands stood in the middle, their hands and feet tied together, a menacing executioner looming behind them. They struggled as they saw her, the white slab of granite in front of them gleaming in the sunlight, its surface smooth, worn.

  Nuraya exhaled. The crowd gathered to witness the beheadings was small. Just a hundred or so citizens, most rounded up by her men for the occasion. They weren't needed of course. But if the weight of her words was to be known throughout the sultanate, then she needed eyes. When the sultana demanded her men not to burn, not to pillage, and found them doing otherwise, she couldn't stand still and merely watch.

  “Mercy, Sultana!” called out one of the men, a vein throbbing on his forehead. The executioner behind him gave him a push and he stumbled. “All we did... we did under your name!”

  That was the problem, all of these acts in her name.

  Nuraya chewed on her lower lip, forcing herself to remain still. Like children, they had cherry-picked what she’d said, ignoring all the parts they hadn't liked while claiming adherence to the rest.

  Rabb and the Atishi gods of the pantheon might be more forgiving, but as their divinely anointed avatar, she couldn't afford these omissions.

  She cleared her throat, stepped forward until she was midway between the dais and the castle gates. Beads of sweat gathered on her brow. She didn’t wipe them. She was a fount of justice that wouldn’t flinch from what needed doing.

  A part of her registered how ironic it was that her power was constrained by laws she was meant to uphold.

  “Sharf and Casrau, for raping and pillaging,” she began, her voice carrying over the crowd that had fallen silent, “actions carried out most definitely not in my name, I condemn you to death by beheading. All deeds of your service to my cause will be wiped clean. From now until the end of time, your names will never be uttered again in the noble gatherings of this blessed realm.”

  Sharf, taller of the two, started whimpering, his knees buckling. Beside him, Casrau stared at her, his jaw hanging loose, his eyes going wild.

  “Mercy!” cried Sharf, his voice hoarse, disbelieving.

  Nuraya gritted her teeth, then nodded her head slightly.

  “Bitch!” snarled Casrau, the vehemence in the voice taking her by surprise. “Without us, you’d be nothing but—” The executioner kicked him in the knee, and he crumpled to the ground. Two men, their faces covered in black masks except for their eyes, ascended the dais.

  A priest clambered up as well. An Atishi priest from the local temple. He began to chant, his loud, accented voice grating on her ears. Casrau’s last word rang over and over. Was this how her men and all others referred to her behind her back?

  What would they say if they knew her mother had killed their sultan?

  What would they do once they knew she had done nothing upon hearing the confession?

  She bit down hard on her lip, felt blood bubble up. Impartial and fount of blind justice or not, it seemed there were other limits she had yet to master.

  The condemned men were crying, even Casrau. Not the brave mercenaries full of bluster and bravado. Mere children, pleading for one more chance.

  They weren't children. This was no game.

  Nuraya forced her fingers to relax. Sharf shouted, the words coming out as gibberish. The executioner laid down Sharf’s head on the granite block. The priest’s voice grew louder. Casrau snarled and struggled as two men kept him in place.

  A hush fell upon the men and women gathered to see organized death descend in their midst.

  The executioner raised his scimitar. Sharf trembled, his head shaking on the smooth rock. For a short second, the sharp blade glinted in the sun.

  She had a fraction of a second to give life.

  The scimitar swooped down in a smooth arc.

  Thunk!

  Like a carrot chopped in two, Sharf’s head fell away from the torso, blood gushing from the severed neck, the limbs thrashing, jerking for breaths it’d never experience.

  When the body finally ceased its throes, the onlookers turned to her.

  Again, a part of her chided her for the hypocrisy within her, for this hidden battle ravaging her.

  Different circumstances, she told herself firmly. Before the other part of her could rebel, protest, she nodded once more.

  Again, men of the Sultana’s Hands f
orced one of their own to the block.

  Another raise of the scimitar.

  And another head rolled forward.

  Life took so much effort to nurture and grow. All these years mothers preened their children. All this training and energy spent on rearing a child through to adulthood.

  And then, in an instant, it vanished.

  Nuraya wheeled around. The crowd was already breaking up, their hubbub a buzz of worker bees. Vishan trudged over to her.

  “You did the right thing, my sultana,” he said quietly.

  “Did I?”

  Nuraya looked up at the heavens, the skies completely bereft of any cover today. She felt the dead men’s eyes watching her, their blood mixing together, dripping down the planks onto the thirsty ground below.

  She didn't see just Sharf and Casrau. The old man was there. As was the young boy beside him. More faces shrouded in darkness that had fallen due to her, their names and faces unknowable to her.

  It was only going to get worse from here.

  She closed her eyes, her shoulders tensing, the fingers fidgeting. The foundations of successful empires were founded upon blood. Lots of it. One lesson she had learned well, it seemed.

  “Prepare the men for a hard march, Salar Vishan.”

  Halfway through scratching his nose, the large man looked up. “Where to?”

  Fighting the urge to rush east, she shook her head and looked at the sky once more. “We march to Buzdar!”

  Chapter 29

  Shoki

  Slumped over the saddle, Shoki drifted in and out of consciousness. Trees rushed past him, a never-ending parade of dark sentinels, overhanging branches, and falling leaves.

  Forcing his remaining eye open, he squinted toward the horizon. A faint pink hue was strengthening in the east. The burned flesh across his left eye twitched, shards of pain lingering at the sides of the skin that was still raw to the touch.