by Zamil Akhtar
I sweetened my smile. While I’d never hunted, those summer rains felt good. I wouldn’t say I loved my cousin Shireen, but I probably loved Hamet and felt no joy in watching them find each other. Just the opposite.
Afterward, I grabbed the book I’d stumbled upon yesterday and went into the forest to pick flowers. Perhaps I could find the ones drawn so beautifully in the book. I couldn’t read their names — couldn’t read at all — but I’d never seen such beautiful pictures before.
I could, begrudgingly, make a flower bouquet for Hamet and Shireen. That was what I told Grandpa I was doing. Last night, I even dreamt I was skipping in a flower bed, and the forest had so many.
I wouldn’t go in too deep. Leopards, boars, bears, snakes — they stayed away from the tree lines near our tribe, but if you strayed into their territory…well, I didn’t feel like dying today.
The flowers grew upstream, where I once saw the fattest rat ever — but unlike most rats, it didn’t have ears, and its face was flat. Grandpa said it was something called a lemming and that he’d seen them up north, where it was colder and more forested. It seemed our summers were becoming so hot and winters so cold that strange creatures were making a home here. I didn’t mind if they were all cute like the lemming.
I hoped to see one today. I went into the thick, where the ground turned muddy, and the sun painted leafy shadows on it. A stream cooled the air. The sweet sound of its gush mixed with the chirping of birds fluttering between trees.
There! A flower I’d seen in the book! By Lat, it was purple! I bent down, muddying my dress, and caressed its edge. Near the bud, the purple was a bruised sky, but approaching the edge, it lightened like cold lips.
I fingered the bud: soft and wilting. Hard leaves decorated the stem, which reached my head while I crouched. I opened the book and flipped through to the page with this flower. Whoever the creator was, he’d drawn it perfectly! He’d also written much beneath the picture, in these block letters that definitely weren’t Vograsian — if only I could read it. I wanted to know this flower’s name, where it came from, what you could use it for — everything!
Footsteps on mud sounded behind me. I spun around, book in front like a shield. A man stood in the distance beneath a twisted tree, his hands in his pockets. He wasn’t wearing a turban, nor any hat, and his thick cloak was tulip-patterned and foreign.
“I don’t mean to startle you, girl.” He pointed to the book. “I see you found my work-in-progress.”
Now I hugged the book, not wanting to give it back. Yesterday, I’d found it in a pile of leaves nearby. I knew it wasn’t mine but loved it so much, I didn’t care to ask for its true owner.
“Can I keep it?” I asked, swallowing a mound of guilt. “Please?”
He wore his hair so strangely: combed forward, strands over his eyes, as if he wanted to hide them. I could still see his pupils, gray and bleak. But when he smiled, I sensed kindness. “I toiled to create that. Tell me, do you like it so much?”
I nodded as fast as I could. “I love it!” I could scarcely contain my excitement. “Are you the one who drew these pictures? They’re incredible!”
A strange man in the forest ought to have filled me with fear, but surely whoever made this book couldn’t be bad.
“I’m a better writer than artist,” he said, “but I’m thrilled you enjoyed the pictures.”
“I’ve never seen pictures like it. It’s as if I’m looking at the flower itself.” I sighed with sadness. If he’d worked so hard, how selfish for an unlettered girl to keep it. It probably had instructions for those with knowledge, like a healer or alchemist. “I’m sorry, here you go.” I held it out for him to take.
He shook his head. “Few things are better than being appreciated, and I can always make another. You keep it.”
“No…that would be so selfish. I don’t deserve something like this.”
He came closer until he was standing an arm span away. Only then did I notice his towering height. He smelled of leaves, too, as if he’d been living in the forest. “You sell yourself short, Nora.”
“I’m sorry, but how do you know my name? Do you know Grandpa?” I couldn’t look him in those bleak eyes, so kept my gaze on his shoulder.
From behind his back, he took out another book. As he flipped through it, I noticed bloodstains on each page. My heart thudded into my throat; had I been wrong about him? Was he dangerous?
He stopped at a page: upon it was a series of pictures, all drawn in blood. One picture looked like a tower. He mumbled in a language I’d never heard, and those pictures glowed for a second.
He held it out for me. “I want you to appreciate that book to its fullest. Touch this.”
Touch the blood? It seemed so wrong. And I swear…I heard whispers coming from the trees.
“What will happen?”
“Only good things.” His smile seemed genuine despite his lifeless eyes. I’d only seen such eyes on the blind. “I promise it won’t hurt. It will, instead, make you worthy of my gift.”
“Worthy? How?”
“Trust me. I won’t lead you astray.”
Well, I wanted to be worthy of the book, whatever that meant. But trust some stranger in the forest?
I placed the flower book on the ground. “Please take it. I must be going.”
He reached behind his back, then took out a red flower. From where had he plucked it?
“It’s a red tulip.” He sniffed it, eyes closed, breathing deep. “One of my favorites.”
“Are you…a sorcerer?” How strange for a sorcerer to be wandering the forest, writing about flowers. I could only hope he wasn’t a wicked one.
He held out the tulip in one hand and the open book, bloodstain forward, in the other. “I’m a teacher. And I want to teach you, Nora. Teach you something that will unveil a whole new world. But you have to want to learn. You can’t be like the others, willfully plugging their ears, blinding their eyes, refusing to wake from their stupors.”
I did want to learn. I wanted to learn everything. And I did think, in his own odd way, this man truly was kind and good. But those were bloodstains. I suppose, if he were an evil sorcerer, he could have killed or hurt me in some simpler way.
I took a breath, pushed my trembling finger up and onto the page, then slid it onto the blood.
Nothing happened.
The man pulled the blood book away and snapped it shut. “It’s done.” He smiled wide, showing a perfect set of smoke-gray teeth. “I’m so happy for you. You’ve taken the first step on an ever-ascending path.”
He turned and walked away, his steps crunching on the leaves.
“Wait…I don’t understand.”
He held up a hand. “Open the book.”
I flipped to the page with the purple flower. Althea, an herb native to Ruthenia, the region north of the Siyah Sea, and the Vogras Mountains. Found on moist soil on riverbanks, salt marshes, and sand. Can grow up to six feet tall, averages three feet. Though many cultures use it for healing various maladies, experiments have yielded no healing properties aside from a palliative for sore throats.
I didn’t know what every word meant, like palliative, but by Lat: I could read!
I looked up from the pages; the man was gone. I wanted to thank him, so rushed forward, darting my head in every direction, hoping to spot him. But he was nowhere.
Instead of picking flowers, instead of trying on dresses for Hamet and Shireen’s wedding, I spent the morning on my cot in our yurt, reading the words in the book. Grandpa and Disha and Diyne kept trying to pull my attention away, but I blocked them out, as if my book were a wall.
The flowers were so mesmerizing, and they grew in so many places I’d never heard of! As I read on, I became less interested in the flowers and more interested in the snippets about where these flowers grew.
Ruthenia, for example — so many wondrous flowers grew there! The book claimed Ruthenia held most of the world’s forests, animals, and flowers — and yet it was mo
stly ice. And then there was this place called Himyar, where flowers wouldn’t grow because of something called the blood plague, which had started as a puddle in the desert and spread until it poisoned the land.
But I could only ignore my family for so long. Eventually, I had to get ready for the wedding, so I pulled out whatever dress sparkled most from my clothes chest. A rather pointy hat with fluffy plumes sticking out the top came with the dress, which was thick and a shade lighter than gold. I tied the sash around my waist, tight as I could since I was thinner than when the seamstress had measured me for it last year, for the wedding of a cousin I liked much more than Shireen.
Staring at myself in the mirror, I resembled a yellow tulip. Just wonderful! According to the book, the Sargosans, who lived far to the west and sailed across the seas on ships called galleons, believed yellow tulips brought cheer. I’d never seen the ocean but now knew so much about so many things, all from reading about flowers!
The wedding would take place beneath the sky and within several palatial yurts on the plain. It started with the groom, Hamet, leading a hundred men on horseback while the women ululated and banged drums. They’d decorated the horses with colorful, tapestried saddles, which I heard they’d bought from Abistran traders. Still, watching them ride around bored me, and I wished I were in bed, reading my book. Even the sight of Hamet high on his mare did nothing for me.
Strangely, it wasn’t Hamet at the front. Another man rode at his side, a few feet ahead. I’d been to dozens of weddings and never seen someone ride ahead of the groom. That defeated the whole purpose, didn’t it? I nudged Grandpa and asked, “Who is he?”
Grandfather smiled and said, “That’s our tribe’s new protector. That’s Khagan Pashang.”
“No way. That’s Pashang?” I’d heard he was a great warrior who fought heroically against our enemy, the Sylgiz tribe. He’d even gained the favor of the Alanyans, and so held more power than any khagan on either side of the Vogras Mountains. But he was skinnier and less fearsome than I imagined. A neat brown beard covered his cheeks and chin, and his bright brown eyes seemed so mellow.
Grandpa nudged me back. “Step forward out of the crowd a bit. The man isn’t married. He might notice you.”
Other girls stepped out as he rode by, their gazes low and arms clasped at their navels. When the riders came near, they slowed, and the crowd threw flowers at them. Pashang and Hamet trotted toward us, so I stepped out.
Khagan Pashang stopped in front of me. I looked into his eyes, and he looked into mine. Perhaps I should’ve taken better care getting ready today. I smiled. He smiled back and trotted on.
“So…” I said to Grandpa after they’d gone far ahead. “Are we of their tribe, now?”
“Jotrids, you mean? In a way, I suppose. It’s the only way we’ll keep our land with those heretic Sylgiz encroaching closer each year.”
We hated none more than the Sylgiz. They’d seized so much of our grazing and hunting land that we were forced to hug the mountains and forests instead of spreading across the plain. Although, I adored the mountains and forest, and their animals, like the red-horned goats that climbed the mountainside.
Now it was time for my favorite event: the unveiling! I finally put the book out of mind while grabbing at Shireen’s veils and twirling. We pulled off twenty layers of veils. Twenty! Each was a shade of blue, starting with a dark sky and ending with a clear river. I was worried Shireen would suffocate under there, but the whole time she was giggling and laughing, and so were we.
The dance began, and my sisters did so well! The men stayed light on their toes, prancing around the women, even sword fighting with each other as they spun. The women swayed, slow and rhythmic. Someone played a flute from Kashan, which I’d never heard before, but by Lat, it was the perfect happy melody!
I regretted not dancing, regretted my bitter thoughts of Shireen marrying Hamet keeping me from something I loved. I’d never stop regretting it.
Finally, an Alanyan sheikh with a mesmerizing red beard administered the marriage. Hamet and Shireen signed some parchment — though neither could read nor write — while I swallowed the bitter lumps in my throat. While walking home, I realized the world was vast, and Hamet, despite his perfect nose, was just another boring boy from the tribe.
Sleep didn’t come that night as I lied between my two snoring sisters. Grandpa, on his cot across the yurt, was snoring too. But that wasn’t what kept me awake. I was already dreaming about where those flowers grew.
Close by, in Alanya, red tulips jutted from the desert sand, said to be nourished by the blood of a war that raged five hundred years ago. In the jungles of Kashan, another red flower called santan, which resembled a pinwheel, could be eaten whole, its sugary juices gushing down your throat as you chewed. And in a land called Talitos, said to be across the sea mists, black birds called drongos would be eaten whole by sundews, crazy flowers that resembled, of all things, a snake with hundreds of slimy tentacles on its skin!
And this was only what I’d read in one morning — the book had much more to show me! I couldn’t wait till sunrise so I could read. But the sun would never rise. Not for me, not for any of us.
It started with screams and the stench of burning. I pushed my sisters awake, then ran across the room and pushed Grandpa awake, too. He grabbed his sword, dagger, and matchlock, and we all rushed outside the yurt.
Fire, everywhere! Even the forest, with all its flowers, was just a massive flame. I’d forgotten the book, but when I tried to run in to grab it, Grandpa held my wrist.
“We have to get out of here!” he said. “Nora, Diyne, Disha, hold hands now and follow me!”
I took his hand, then Diyne took mine, and Disha took hers. The thundering of horses sounded from the burning yurts behind us. It was hard to see amid all the fire and shadow. Steel hummed against steel in the distance, creating a drumbeat for the gunshots and blasts.
Grandpa pulled us toward what had once been a river that descended from the Vogras but had since snaked a different way, leaving only a dry, crack-filled bed. It was near the ascent to the mountain, so perhaps we could hide there.
“Who is doing this!?” I asked, my voice a tremble.
“Khagan Pashang will help us. He’ll help us. We just have to stay safe until the Jotrids arrive. Stay safe in the mountain.”
We trudged through muddy grass at the edge of the dried riverbed, away from the burning tree line, toward the mountain’s ascent. The red-horned goats usually grazed here, but at this dark hour, they must’ve been asleep. The hanging crescent and the distant flames provided enough light for us to avoid the boulders dotting the landscape, though I wished we’d brought a torch.
But why was this happening? Why were we running? Why was a fire burning the forest, burning the flowers? Not even a day after we’d been so joyous. What had we done to deserve this?
We didn’t notice the three horsemen shrouded on the dark path to the mountain. They were sitting there, leaning forward on their mares, watching us. Those outfits…bear fur covered their shoulder pads and plumed hats. The hard leather across their chests was brown, too. Sylgiz warriors.
I tugged at Grandpa once I saw them, and squinting, he finally did too. I squeezed my sister’s hand, and we turned around.
“Wait,” one of the riders said in Vograsian, though he pronounced the word all wrong. “Stop, or I’ll run you four down.”
Grandpa stopped, so we all did. “Please let us go,” he said. “These are my children.”
He trembled. I’d never seen him so afraid; dread poured into my veins. I hugged my sisters to settle their tears, but I, too, wanted to bawl. Instead, I muttered the prayer for safety from the Recitals of Chisti.
O’ Lat, protect us from what is in front, behind, to the right, left, and above.
The horsemen cantered toward us. The first one held out a lantern. “Ooh, forget about spices.” I could scarcely see his face, but he sounded so excited. “How much will these three fetch, you thi
nk?” Then he muttered something in another language, probably Sylgiz.
The second horseman said, “Cihan told us to kill everyone here. Well, so—” He pulled out his matchlock, snapped the trigger. Bang. I ducked and covered my ears as Grandpa fell. He clutched the erupting burn on his belly and wailed.
“No!” Diyne screamed. I could only look on, frozen as a dead winter tree. Disha cried, “help!” with all the air she could suck in.
“I say we fuck them,” the third one said. “I’ll take the shapely one since I know you ball-lickers like them slightly underripe.”
“No-no-no. My wife has been begging for new Alanyan carpets for the walls. The little one’s at least five horse loads worth.” He pointed at Diyne, the youngest.
“Just let the poor things die,” the second horseman said. “We don’t have time. Cihan said this was to be a quick reprisal. In and out.”
“I can in and out all three at speed, too!” the third said with a chuckle.
I realized, only then, that they were speaking Sylgiz, which always sounded so choppy and strange. How, then, could I understand them? Thinking on it, I didn’t know what language that book was written in but could understand it, too. Frozen from fear, as I was, I could scarcely make sense of anything.
“Listen,” the first said, “here’s the right of it. There are three of us, three opinions on what to do, and three of them. We’ll kill one, fuck one, and sell one. Fair?”
I wanted to grab my sisters and run, but ice wouldn’t cease pouring into my veins, freezing my will. I wanted to help Grandpa but couldn’t move my hands. I wanted to kill these awful men but didn’t know the first thing about killing.
Disha was still screaming “help!” while Diyne held Grandpa’s head as blood bubbled from his mouth.
“So we sell the youngest since she’ll fetch the highest price.”
“Let’s fuck the oldest, then. Her breasts are like the Vogras. She’ll be dry like the river when I’m done with her.”