Lions of Istan

by Fuad Baloch

  “Stop!” shouted the queen.

  He heard her voice faintly, his heart both terrified and relieved at how his life had turned out. Before he had the chance to reconsider, to get cold feet, he swapped his own energy with the darkness that had been encroaching on the smooth stone.

  For a long moment, nothing happened.

  Shuddering, Shoki took a step forward.

  A loud creaking sound came from the Shahi Qilla. Breath catching in his breath, Shoki took another stuttering step forward.

  The air hissed and crackled then grew quiet.

  Brilliant light burst from the stone, a dazzling array of whites, yellows, and reds that blinded him. Weakness growing in his chest, his knees buckling under him, he took one more step, and collapsed.

  He crashed through the air, falling, falling toward the distant waves. He was tired, drained, lacking even the strength to scream as he plunged to certain death.

  Shoki cast one final look up at the Shahi Qilla.

  It shone, glittered, its ancient walls aglow under the blazing light from the stone which now hovered over the ancient fortress, more than half of its surface a brilliant white.

  He smiled. He might have sacrificed his magic well to restore the purity of the stone, but that was worth it. That was his mission. That was what he had been sent to do. Something the sultan would have wanted.

  Screams filled the air from the right. He craned his neck, finding it increasingly difficult to keep his eyes open as the winds grew even fiercer, his own will to fight them fading.

  Flames danced over the queen’s thin body. She screamed, long, shapely arms trying to pat down the flames engulfing her in desperation. Shoki began shaking his head when realization dawned. They were linked in this world, their energies always working and countering in tandem. His swapping out his well had disrupted her connection too, sentencing them both to similar fates.

  His eyelids closed for a second.

  When he forced them open one more time, despite the rush of wind, he could feel the damp there. Shoki smiled. Keeper of the Divide! That was what he had thought of himself mere breaths ago.

  What a preposterous idea. Then again, maybe men thought these impossible thoughts just before they perished.

  Either way, he’d done his job.

  He looked up one final time and smiled at the pale sunlight spreading on the horizon.

  Chapter 50

  Nuraya

  “No,” Nuraya screamed as flames engulfed her mother. An instant ago, she had been standing a dozen paces from Nuraya, and then fire had broken out on her skin. “Someone, get water. Now!” Not caring for the heat, she approached her. The heat singed Nuraya’s hair, sharp crackling and hissing filling the air. Crying out, Nuraya stepped away, looking around for support.

  Maharis and his magi were no longer in sight. Shoki lay still a dozen steps to her right. Only the grand vizier stood calmly, his long beard swaying.

  “Madhu,” she screeched, “fetch the guards. We need to douse the flames!”

  The grand vizier didn’t move. Fury rose within her chest, a part of her wanting to go back, retrieve the sword that had slipped from her hands, and skewer the old man for his insolence.

  “Mother…” she croaked, turning her attention back to her. Bright yellow flames danced over her body, still standing upright, her features lost under the blaze. Despite the heat, Nuraya felt her eyes water. She dabbed at them, then flicked the meager nothing toward the flames.

  Not even a hiss to acknowledge her contribution.

  A groan came from behind her. She turned around. Jinan, her tall, handsome siphsalar, the man who been transformed into a monster by Maharis, shuffled toward her. His leather vest was in tatters, wounds leaking blood all over his chest, mixing with his and Mona’s blood.

  “Jinan,” she shouted. “Hurry, we need to help Mother!”

  Without breaking his stride, Jinan shook his head.

  Nuraya frowned for a second, then turned toward the queen. This time, not caring for the immense heat, she dashed forward. Time was of the essence. Each moment she wasted not doing anything further sealed her mother’s fate. She felt her eyes grow dry as dust, the saliva in her mouth evaporating, each fiber of her being protesting at the blazing heat.

  Taking off her leather vest, she swatted at her mother’s body. For the briefest of moments, the flames stuttered under her assault. Then, the vest too caught fire.

  With a yelp, she let go of the vest, letting it join the fire.

  The air filled with the sickly sweet, revolting smell of burning flesh, not that different from the cook pots outside her command tent a lifetime ago.

  Impossibly, her mother had remained standing until now, but now she swayed on her feet, the flames still showing no signs of abating.

  “Mother!”

  “Princess,” came a calm, fatherly voice. “There’s nothing you can do. Step away.”

  She inclined her chin toward the grand vizier. “Sultana! I am the sultana of this realm and you—”

  “No,” said another voice from her right. Weak. Quiet under the crackle of the burning fire. Yet, one impossible to ignore.

  Nuraya darted her head. Shoki was struggling to get up, using his elbows to prop himself up. His eye patch had come loose, revealing the barely healed wound underneath. He looked up and their eyes locked. Nuraya shivered, realizing a strange iciness in that one eye where she had only ever seen affection before.

  Another emotion lingered there now.

  Pity.

  And something very familiar in the way the eye never blinked. She shivered, startled by the unbending iron, the well of strength in a man she’d never suspected.

  Shoki coughed, then croaked, “You… are not fit to be the sultana of this realm.”

  Simple, terrible words. Familiar too. A judgment that could very well have come from the man who used to sit the Peacock Throne.

  “We need to go!” came Jinan’s voice behind her, so low even she barely heard it.

  Nuraya shook her head, truly lost.

  The flames brightened. She turned, just in time to see her mother collapse to the floor.

  “No!” Nuraya screamed, once more rushing toward her. Not caring for the heat, the dancing tongues of flames, she bent down and reached for her mother’s blackened hand.

  With a sharp crackle, the flames lost their intensity, started to shrink. Nuraya whimpered. Again, she reached for her mother, jerking her hand away at the terrible heat.

  “Mother!” she sobbed. “Don’t you dare leave me too!”

  Queen Aleena, daughter of Nikhtun, second wife of the late great sultan, a magus, her mother, did not respond. In fact, she hadn’t even cried out since she’d caught fire. Sniffing, Nuraya reached for her hand once more, winced at the pain, but didn’t let go.

  Just as unnaturally as the flames had come to life, they vanished, leaving behind not even a wisp of smoke. Nuraya inclined her chin and gasped in horror. The perfect pink skin her mother had preened over all her life had been reduced to a grisly black. The hair was indistinguishable, fused together with the skull. Teeth, drawn back, stained with soot, stared at her.

  “No…” she whimpered.

  The burnt husk remained still, parts of the body still sizzling, crackling.

  A hand grabbed her arm. “We need to leave!”

  Nuraya shook her head, refusing to be drawn from her mother. Wasn’t it enough that she had lost her father, a brother, and her dearest friend? Did it have to be her mother as well?

  “What are your orders?” she heard the grand vizier say.

  Gritting her teeth, she closed her eyes. No matter what happened, it didn't change her mission. She had to compose herself, ensure—

  “Re-institute the Order of Kalb inquisitors,” came Shoki’s reply. “If Riyan Hambur cannot be located, set Altamish Aboor as their leader.”

  Nuraya shot to her feet and turned around. Jinan blocked her view. “We have to go,” he said, once more leaning forw
ard to grab her by the arm.

  “As you command, my sultan,” said the grand vizier, the man who had served his family all his life, the man who now… impossibly, listened to a common city guard for orders.

  “What—” she began, shaking her head, unable to take it all in.

  Shouts were filtering in to the diwan-e-khas from the open doors. Nuraya tilted her head to the left. Three of the marble pillars had been knocked down, smashed into smaller fragments. When had that happened?

  “We have to go,” insisted Jinan, this time leaning in to grab her arm and not letting go when she protested weakly. He began guiding her to a small door to the east, one she knew would lead them out into the servant corridor.

  No more than a few minutes had passed since her mother had pushed her away, using her jadu. No more than an hour since she’d entered this august court. But somehow, in that little duration, her entire world had shifted. The woman she had looked up to all her life, no matter how much she might have resisted her, was dead. The man she had grown to like had betrayed her, taking her mantle from her. Kinas lay dead at her hand. Mona was gone.

  Despite all that had happened, all she had sacrificed, why did it feel she had gained nothing in the end?

  “We can commandeer horses when we get out,” said Jinan, pushing her east, his arm never relenting.

  “I don’t want to go!” she protested, waving her arm back at the entrance. Soldiers were pouring in through the gates. She smiled, cleared her throat to call them in. Then, she realized the golden armor they wore, the pristine cloaks fluttering behind them as they streamed in, stood in ranks in front of the still-prone figure of Shoki Malook.

  They weren’t there to listen to her.

  They had a sultan.

  A simple, bitter realization that set her fuming. “No!” she bellowed, striking at Jinan’s hands to let her go.

  Two knights of the Sultan’s Body inclined their head toward her, one of them drawing his sword.

  “Run!” screamed Jinan, pushing her forward.

  She resisted. After all, she had never been one who ran from a battle.

  Yet, in that moment of all moments, she realized this was a time where nothing would be gained by fighting back. The retreat that Vishan had been arguing for all along, was finally an option she had to take. The alternative was simply untenable.

  She looked up at the Peacock Throne.

  Shame, terrible and heavy, descended in her gut. She had failed Abba. In this final moment, she could finally see all she had done wrong, all she should have done otherwise.

  Swallowing her tears, her rage, her helplessness, Nuraya Istan turned her head away from the Peacock Throne that still stood unoccupied, vowing to come back one day as the rightful, worthy heir.

  Epilogue

  For all their teachings of equality, the Atishi priests still didn’t bury their commoners near those who’d held better stations in life.

  Something Shoki didn’t care much for as he shuffled forward in the section set aside for commoners in the Matli graveyard, his eyes scanning names of those who’d died in the civil war, carved in immature, hastily scrawled Nirdu script.

  The sun bore down hot, bleaching the stunted hills to the north and west, surrounded by the never-ending sands. He raised his head toward the western horizon, his eye settling on the road that snaked its way all the way to Buzdar and beyond. Not that long ago he had set down on that road with the inquisitor, having no idea where that journey would take him.

  He shook his head, resumed his shuffling, doing his best to ignore the masses gaping at him from a distance.

  He had somehow been acclaimed the new sultan of the Istani realm, his own coronation now mere days away. Something the grand vizier, a man of many secrets, had insisted. And so, on the prophet Binyom’s birthday, he, a commoner would sit upon the Peacock Throne, take over the title of Keeper of the Divide.

  Had it really been only three days since the events at diwan-e-khas? He shivered.

  Would he ever see Nuraya again?

  He’d stopped the knights from pursuing her. Not a terribly wise decision in hindsight. He knew her. She’d be back. And when she did return, it wouldn’t be a pleasant encounter.

  Memory rose of how she’d stared at him in the end. The large, beautiful, green eyes full of hatred. She had cause. First, he had killed the woman who had birthed her, then taken away her birthright.

  Oh, Atishi gods… and Rabb, if you’re there, let us meet again. On good terms!

  Shoki waited for half a breath. The gods still didn’t talk back.

  Shoki chuckled, then winced at the pain in his insides. The physicians had been unable to find anything to fault, yet with each breath, his body continued to complain as if it was missing some vital organ.

  Jadu. That was what was missing. Something an inquisitor had confirmed as well. A cause for jubilation, the inquisitor had said, for it was good to have a sultan that could not wield jadu. After all, an abomination wasn’t meant to rule over the masses.

  Shoki didn’t decry the reasoning, but he still missed that part of his being, much like his eye that had been lost for good.

  He chuckled ruefully, cast a glance at the citizens of the grandest city gawking at him. The one-eyed sultan, that was what they called him now.

  They’d heard what he’d done to the famed city walls. They should have spat at him, derided him as the usurper who took over the throne from the children of Istan.

  Yet, no one jeered at him. Sheep handed from one shepherd to another, unconcerned with the manner of the transaction.

  Clenching his fists, Shoki concentrated on the tasks facing him. Far too many for any one man. Enemy forces were still pouring through the eastern and western borders. The armies he had dispatched were set to engage them in a few days, and he wouldn’t know what happened for weeks. Rebellions breaking out in the north couldn’t go unpunished. With the lack of rains this season, drought was a severe risk. And, he still had to find out what was going on at Ghulamia.

  Worse was not knowing whether the pari folk had finally been beaten back for good, or were they, even this instant, planning a counterattack.

  Shoki exhaled.

  He didn’t know the first thing about governing a small cadre of soldiers, let alone a realm spanning millions of souls. He chuckled, wondering how Salar Ihagra would acknowledge him when he finally presented himself at the diwan-e-aam. Would the old veteran acknowledge Shoki as his liege lord instead of the cowardly youth he had recruited into the city guards as a courtesy to his parents?

  Shoki’s heart choked. He dabbed at his good eye with the rich silken sleeve. Who were his parents anyway?

  He shook his head. Whoever they were, it made no difference. The two who had been buried in this graveyard had reared him better than any real mother or father would have.

  He caught sight of a priest approaching from the right. His face was dark under his habit, his profile outlined by the ancient statues of the long dead Istani sultans. Shoki considered the man for a second before resuming his shambling walk through the freshly dug graves.

  Far too many had died when civil war had broken out in the city. Most of the richer citizens had managed to flee in time, a luxury denied to the peasants.

  Shoki sighed, feeling his lungs protest at the exertion of walking. Fighting the queen had drained him in more ways than one. The fight itself might have used a resource he could no longer see or grab, but it had also seemingly sucked his bones dry. His face might still appear largely unlined, youthful in the mirror, but every time he looked at himself, he saw a soul in its tenth decade.

  When was the last time he had laughed? Chuckled mirthfully at some stupid thing?

  He passed row after row of the Atishi commoner graves buried in the manner of their Husalmin neighbors. Two of them belonged to his family. Two, who would have been buried in the royal section had they but died a few weeks later.

  Mother, Father… forgive me for I should have been there for
you.

  His feet faltered as his eye finally fell on the row three yards ahead. One of the Sultan’s Body had marked it with an arrow etched in the sand.

  The row where his mother and father lay.

  Shoki paused, gathering his strength, searching for the words he would need to ask for their forgiveness and seek blessings for all that lay ahead of him. No matter what the world thought, what the grand vizier insisted, he was but a little boy, somehow entrusted with far too much responsibility than he was supposed to shoulder.

  Inhaling deeply, he turned, stumbled over a pot of flowers someone had set aside for their beloved. He smiled sadly.

  “Shoki!” came a harsh voice behind him.

  Surprised, Shoki turned his head around. The priest stood a few paces to the right, his features still covered in shadows. Despite the heat, a cold shiver ran down Shoki’s spine.

  “Y-you…” Shoki stammered, raising a finger toward the hooded figure.

  The priest threw back his hood, took a step forward. “You didn’t think I would forget you, did you?”

  Shoki gasped as Mara bared his teeth. “Why are you here?”

  “You owe me,” said the djinn magus, interlacing his fingers “Remember?”

  Shoki swallowed. All his life, he had been warned about idle promises one made to the djinn at their own peril. “I… I am v-very busy nowadays, but I’m sure—” he stopped as Mara withdrew his left hand, opened his fist. A small white stone glittered under the bright sunlight, one very similar to the ones Shoki had seen before. “Is that an Asghar stone?”

  “Aye.”

  “Why have you brought it here?”

  The djinn took another step forward. Despite himself, Shoki retreated. “It’s time you fulfilled your part of the bargain. I have helped you save your world from the pari folk. Now it’s your time to save mine.”

  Shoki gaped at the djinn, mind racing furiously to produce a rebuttal. “B-but—”

  The djinn took yet another step forward, close enough for Shoki to see the unnatural whites of his eyes. “It’s time.”