The Jewel Of Medina

by Jones, Sherry

  Jeers pelted her, but Muhammad lifted his hand again, quelling the noise.

  “Your husband has prayed for al-Lah’s mercy, and God has decided to grant it, whether or not you convert,” Muhammad said. “Go home with your husband, and do not cause any more trouble. Al-Lah’s patience is infinite, but mine is not.”

  Hind’s eyes grew as round as her astonished mouth, and her body began to quake. Her legs collapsed and she fell to her knees, then pressed her face shamelessly into Muhammad’s lap. His cheeks reddened as if someone had lit a fire in his mouth, and my own face flamed, also.

  But when she lifted her head and I saw her tears, my anger quelled. Pride poured into me like water filling an empty vessel. Muhammad had known what he was doing. By granting Hind her life, he’d won her allegiance.

  “After all I have done against you, you would let me live?” she said. “What kind of man are you, son of Hashim? By God, I have never known such kindness.” She stood and lifted her arms toward the sky, as if to embrace the entire umma. “I hereby proclaim your God as my God, Muhammad ibn Abdallah ibn al-Muttalib, and you are most certainly His Prophet.”

  And then, his enemies vanquished by force and forgiveness, Muhammad at long last, after decades of anguish and rejection, heard his kinspeople and his enemies shout his praises. One by one, every shaykh, every grandmother, every warrior and wife, every girl and boy in the city dropped to the stone steps at his feet and declared Muhammad the Prophet of the One God, then walked away with a red spot on the forehead from pressing it into the stone. Some grinned like jackals; others nursed sullen frowns. Many looked exhausted—but not Muhammad, who stood all night under the full moon to accept the homage of his people, his face brighter than the light from ten thousand fires.

  And I? I led the wives, with Talha before us, back to our camp and slept the long, peaceful sleep of the first wife of the most powerful man in Hijaz.

  THE KEYS TO PARADISE

  MEDINA, FEBRUARY-JUNE 632

  NINETEEN YEARS OLD

  Muhammad was so proud of his son, anyone might think he’d fashioned him with his own hands. “Isn’t he a handsome boy?” he’d say as the rosy-cheeked Ibrahim yanked at his beard. And then, with a wink, “Note how he resembles me, A’isha.”

  I’d tilt my head, eyeing the baby’s golden curls and indigo eyes, and frown. “I see no likeness,” I’d tease. “Are you sure he’s yours?”

  In truth, Ibrahim was like his father in just about every way. He never seemed to be still, even when he slept, and he never let anything stand in the way of a goal. Sawdah loved to tell how he took his first step as she and Maryam watched: Frustrated with trying to chase Abu Hurayra’s cat on his hands and knees, he’d pulled himself upright and hurled his body across the floor to catch it. And, like his father, Ibrahim loved women. He made the rounds through the harim more often than Muhammad.

  As for me, I loved him as much as anyone in the harim, despite my failure to conceive another child with Muhammad. I’d been jealous, yes, when he was born, and my arms ached with longing for a baby when I watched Maryam cuddle him. But as much as Muhammad doted on his child, his love and respect for me seemed only to grow as the years passed, easing my fears that he’d discard me for his concubine and freeing me to adore Ibrahim the way I did my nephew Abdallah. Besides, I’d learned from Muhammad how powerful love and forgiveness could be—far more so than jealousy and hate.

  Then one day, Ibrahim fell ill. Fever burned his skin as though he’d swallowed not just one sun, but one thousand and one, and his eyes grew as dazed and shiny as if they’d turned to glass. Muhammad spent every moment at his side, growing thinner and more haggard every day. When the time came for Friday service my father offered to take Muhammad’s place, but Muhammad declined. “Perhaps my prayers will help him,” he said.

  Moments after the service had ended, Sawdah and I had begun preparing the daily meal when Akiiki ran into the oven tent, gesturing crazily and gibbering in his broken mixture of Arabic and Egyptian. I and Sawdah grabbed our medicines and ran—or rather, I and Akiiki ran under the clouds racing like dark horses overhead while Sawdah hefted along far behind us, shouting through the winds for us to go on, not to wait, she’d be there in a minute or two.

  But there was no need for Sawdah to hurry. I knew it as soon as we entered the house and saw Maryam holding the stiff little bundle in her arms and pressing it to her chest.

  “He is cold, that is all,” she said. “I need to warm him up.”

  I reached for him but Maryam drew away.

  “I’ve run all the way from the mosque,” I said. “See? I’m so warm I’m perspiring. Give him to me, and I’ll try.” His fist grasped the ankh pendant Maryam wore under the sapphire necklace Muhammad had given her. A faint blue sheen edged his lips. His body was a chunk of wood or stone in my arms. I placed my hand over his nostrils, feeling for breath, knowing there’d be none. I cried out just as Muhammad threw open the door and rushed into the room.

  “I heard there was trouble,” he said. He glanced at Maryam’s stricken face, then turned panicked eyes to me. I couldn’t speak for my tears so I held the child out to him with trembling arms.

  He took the baby and fell to his knees. He covered Ibrahim’s cheeks with kisses and shook him until I feared he’d harm the child—until I remembered that it was too late, and my sobs wracked me so that I also sank to the floor.

  “Al-Lah!” Muhammad cried. “Al-Lah! Why have you taken my son from me? Did I love him too much? Al-Lah! Give him back, and I will love him less. Take me, instead.”

  Outside, a crash. A smell like the sea blew in through the open door. Wet splats hit the roof as Muhammad’s tears fell on Ibrahim’s still face. In Medina the men would dance, lifting their faces to drink in our first rainfall in years. Sawdah appeared in the doorway, clothes clinging to her drenched body, her broad smile as ephemeral as a child’s life.

  At the funeral Muhammad prayed over Ibrahim’s body with vacant eyes. His voice droned as if his soul, too, had flown from this world. Maryam huddled against the weeping Akiiki, her blue eyes swimming in their own stormy sea. We sister-wives stood around her in the still-pouring rain, shielding her with our robes from the storm.

  Her grief made me almost glad I had never given birth to my child. Hadn’t Khadija birthed two of Muhammad’s sons, both of whom had died as infants? I’d heard the whispers circling through the umma: It is not al-Lah’s will for the Prophet to leave an heir. If that were so, and I’d borne a son, how much greater would my pain have been to lose him now! As it was, my heart still ached for my little man. But no one’s grief was more wrenching than Muhammad’s.

  For days, weeks, months, no one could console him. Darkness veiled his eyes, and he eluded us all like a shadow under the new moon. We begged him to eat, but he prayed instead, kneeling on his attic floor and awaiting God’s comfort. We offered to hold him in our beds at night, but he slept in the cemetery, next to Ibrahim’s grave.

  One night in June, four months after Ibrahim’s death, he arrived in my room at dawn. I moved in a fog through the morning prayer, having waited up for him. When I’d finished my prostrations, I slumped onto my bed, moaning. Muhammad sat beside me and held my hand, touching me for the first time in weeks.

  “Oh, my head,” I complained. He stroked my forehead with his fingertips, and the pain disappeared.

  “No, A’isha,” he said. “It is, ‘Oh, my head.” He tried to smile, but it looked more like a grimace.

  “You’ve been grieving too long for a child you’ll see again in Paradise,” I said. I sat up and patted my lap. “Come and rest.”

  “You speak the truth, habibati.” He stood to set his turban on the windowsill, then nestled down against me. His eyes flickered like waning fires. “I will see Ibrahim again, and soon.”

  “You, my love? A strong and healthy warrior? Al-Lah willing, I’ll die before you.”

  “A’isha.” His voice lowered. I leaned forward to hear him. “If you died bef
ore me, would you allow me to put the shroud on you and pray over you?”

  “And leave you to feast with your other wives? I’ve changed my mind.” I forced a smile, teasing. “I will not die first.”

  “You speak the truth.”

  I smoothed the hair away from his forehead. “Muhammad, your skin is burning! Did you build a fire at the cemetery to warm yourself?”

  “My energy has been diminished since Ibrahim’s death. My head aches so acutely, I can barely see.” He closed his eyes and pressed his fingers against his temples. “A’isha. Al-Lah gave me a choice last night: Either the keys to my kingdom and the treasures of this world, or meeting Him in Paradise soon.”

  “By al-Lah, I hope you chose your new kingdom and its treasures!” My voice quivered like the string of a plucked tanbur.

  He opened his eyes, but his gaze was far away. “This world’s wealth stands as a barrier to al-Lah,” Muhammad murmured. “I would rather go now, before too many possessions block my path to Him.”

  “There is little danger of that, my ascetic one.” Tears clotted like blood on my tongue. My hand moved mechanically over his forehead, detached from my whirling thoughts. What could I say to bring him back to me? Help me, al-Lah, before he is truly lost.

  “Don’t be so impatient for Paradise, my husband. Eternity lasts forever, but I’m only nineteen years old. I have many days and nights remaining in this life. Would you be so cruel and leave me alone now? Tarry with me a while longer, habibi.”

  “It cannot be, A’isha.” He closed his eyes. His breathing slowed. His right arm twitched. His lips blurred. The vein between his eyes pulsed gently, giving off a faint blue glow. “I have made my choice.” Soon his snores filled the room like music, accompanied by my sobs and prayers. Please don’t take him from me, not yet.

  My legs grew numb, but I never moved. Two calls to prayer passed. Hafsa called at my door, but I didn’t answer. I sat with my eyes affixed to Muhammad’s face as if he were a star in the night sky, leading me home. If his days were numbered, I wanted to fill my memory with him now, before death snatched him away.

  When he awoke that evening, his fever had broken. His smile fluttered; his eyes danced.

  “I thought your frown had conquered your face,” I teased. Thank you, al-Lah, for hearing my prayers. “And your sickness, habib? Has it gone away?”

  “I am feeling well enough to visit my wives.” He made his way to the wash basin, where he brushed his teeth and cleansed his face. I rewound his turban for him, then placed it on his head.

  “I have neglected you for too long, A’isha,” he said. “Forgive me.” He pulled me into his arms and kissed me so deeply his turban tumbled to the floor. I clung to him, drinking him in the way we’d lifted our thirsty mouths to the rain the day Ibrahim died. Then, when Muhammad had left, I rolled out my prayer mat and gave thanks to al-Lah until my knees ached.

  At last the rumblings of my stomach sent me to the cooking tent. Crossing the courtyard, I heard a cry. The door to the hut of Maymunah, Muhammad’s new wife from Mecca, flew open, and she appeared, shouting for help. I ran to her aid and found Muhammad slumped on her floor, moaning and white-faced. The aroma of meat hit me, and I noted, in the corner of the room, a dish half-filled with tharid. Had she put something in that dish to sicken him? I ran to Muhammad and touched his face. His skin burned with fever. His eyes winced with pain.

  “Oh, my head,” he moaned.

  The other sister-wives rushed in, flapping and cooing, crowding Maymunah’s elegant apartment. Her father al-Abbas had provided well for her: carpets, frankincense, silk curtains, velvet cushions, jewels dripping from her ears to rival the onyx necklace Muhammad had given her.

  Ali and al-Abbas pushed their way in and helped us stretch Muhammad out on Maymunah’s soft feather bed.

  “This is a good place for you to rest,” I said, but Muhammad shook his head.

  “This is not Maymunah’s night,” he said. “Whose night is this? Is it yours, A’isha?”

  “That was last night, remember?” I squeezed his feeble hand.

  “When will it be your night again?” he said.

  “Don’t you be worrying about that, Prophet,” Sawdah said. “Get your rest. We will stay here with you all night, if that is what it takes.”

  He moaned and clutched his head. Umm Salama placed her hand on my arm. “Yaa A’isha, do you have anything for headaches in your pouch?” she asked.

  “Yes, by al-Lah, relieve his pain!” Zaynab cried. She sank to the floor and pressed her wet cheeks against his ankles, cascading hair over his bare feet.

  I raced to my hut for the pouch, then back again. There I fumbled through my medicine bag, spilling half the contents onto the floor. Rose oil. I snatched up the vial and unstoppered it, then trickled it over Muhammad’s forehead.

  “This will help,” I said as I massaged the oil into his skin. “You’ll be better soon, my love.”

  “No,” he said with a faint smile at me. “That is not true, A’isha. I made my choice. Soon I will be with Ibrahim.” Over my head, the whir of wings. I glanced up; al-Abbas was staring with lifted eyebrows into Ali’s startled face.

  In a while Muhammad’s headache subsided. He stood shakily and, with his arm around Ali’s shoulder, made his way slowly to Hafsa’s hut.

  “This is not necessary,” Hafsa said as she followed close behind. “I wish you would simply rest, husband.”

  He continued this way for a week. Struggling through his pain to lead the Friday prayer service. Defying his fever to stumble from one wife’s apartment to the next. Ignoring our pleas for him to forget about us, to take care of himself. As he’d said, I knew his fate was sealed. But when my sister-wives consoled one another with news of this joke he’d made or that meal he’d eaten, I kept my knowledge to myself.

  Then one morning Saffiya entered the oven tent with a face full of woe.

  “Muhammad asked for you all night, A’isha,” she said.

  Hafsa looked down at her clasped hands. “He did the same on his night with me. But I was too selfish to tell you.”

  “‘Who am I with tomorrow?’ he kept asking on his night with me,” Zaynab said.

  “‘When will I be at A’isha’s hut again?’”

  “He wants you, A’isha,” Hafsa said. She sounded small and far away.

  “Of course he wants her!” Sawdah said in a thick voice. “Have you heard how he talks? The end is near for him. He wants to be with the one he loves most.”

  A sob burst like a bubble from Saffiya’s lips. “Dying?” She covered her face with her hands. “Our Muhammad, slipping away! What will happen to us?”

  “Who will take care of us?” Juwairriyah said. “We cannot remarry. Where will we go? What about our children?”

  “It’s useless to worry about that now,” Raihana said.

  “If only there were something we could do for him,” Hafsa said.

  “There is.” Umm Habiba leveled her gaze at me. “Yaa A’isha, take my night with Muhammad tonight.”

  “I will do the same,” Maymunah said quietly.

  Soon all the sister-wives had given up their turns with him so that Muhammad could spend his last days and nights in my bed. If any of them did so begrudgingly, I’m sure they were gratified by his enormous smile at the news.

  “Al-Lah will bless you all for this, after I am gone,” he said. “I will see to it personally, when I sit by His side in Paradise.”

  I wept bitter tears as he spoke. How freely I would have given up all my nights with him to keep him among us! He couldn’t even walk to my room. Al-Abbas and Ali had to carry him, and when he fell from their grasp, I felt myself falling, also, as though I tumbled from a cliff toward a jumble of sharp rocks.

  The threat of Muhammad’s death drew us in the harim more closely together than before. Umm Salama’s powers of organization kept us from falling apart; she instructed Hafsa and Raihana on the amount and types of foods to prepare for the visitors who streamed in
to my apartment. She suggested Sawdah call the best caregiver in Medina to prescribe treatment for Muhammad. I listened to the nurse’s advice, but my trembling hands could not administer the palliatives. Umm Habiba, for all her foreboding airs, turned out to be a capable assistant, clear-headed enough to do the job for me. To ease Muhammad’s convalescence, Umm Salama arranged entertainment: I recited poetry; Hafsa danced; Sawdah strummed her tanbur while Maryam sang to him, relaxing his tightened brow.

  Meanwhile, the umma began to tear apart as if invisible hands pulled it in different directions at once. His eyes red-rimmed, my father sat with me one night while Muhammad slept and told me of the struggles that had begun. Men of the Aws and Khazraj tribes, rivals for the leadership of Medina before we arrived, were fighting in the public market over who would rule when the Prophet died. Immigrants to the umma whispered rumors of impending Bedouin attacks and another Qurayshi invasion against a weakened Medina.

  “The people need to know who will lead them if Muhammad dies,” my father said. “But he has told me that he wants al-Lah to decide.”

  To me, the choice of a leader was obvious: My father had stood by Muhammad’s side from the very beginning. He’d been the first man, with Ali, to convert to islam—and he was far more diplomatic than the brash, impetuous Ali. He’d sent food and supplies to Muhammad after the Meccans banished the Believers to the desert. He’d stood up for Muhammad at meetings of Mecca’s leaders, and helped him escape assassination. He’d given him his favorite daughter—me—to seal their friendship. He’d helped him plan every caravan raid and battle, and had fought by his side despite Muhammad’s protests that the risk was too great, that my father was too valuable to the umma and to Muhammad to lose.

  I begged my father to let me speak to Muhammad on his behalf, but he refused. Others weren’t so principled. One evening as I returned to my hut after the daily meal, I heard al-Abbas and Ali within, arguing so loudly I could hear them through the closed door.