The Wild Ones

by Nafiza Azad

  Paheli is curled up beside Etsuko, fairly humming with nerves. Valentina sits beside Daraja, who is next to Etsuko. Taraana sits on the other side of Paheli, with Ghufran next to him and Widad next to her. Kamboja and Areum are too restless to sit and are playing chess set up in a corner. Sevda and Ligaya are standing over their game, giving them spectacularly unhelpful advice.

  Talei shrugged when we asked her how the meeting last night went; we translated that particular shift of her shoulders to mean that no blood was spilled but the situation was tense. Talei’s shrugs are masterfully eloquent.

  The designated hour arrives with the chiming of the clock on a wall in the room. We order some seriously sweet milkshakes and a lot of desserts and continue waiting.

  Forty minutes pass. The dessert sits a bit too heavily in our stomachs. Will she come, this girl we know nothing about? Will she side with us, or will she bring her grandfather with her? We don’t know. The tension rises and Sevda moves to lean against a wall, her palm pressed to it, ready to call a door into the Between.

  “She’s not coming.” Valentina is the first to give up. “Let’s leave.”

  “She will be here,” Taraana replies. “I know she will.”

  “How can you be so sure?” Ligaya asks. She has dressed up entirely in black today, so we have been careful of her. When one of us wears black, it is a signal to the rest of us that our nightmares are running rampant. That our words will be sharp, maybe draw blood, but that we do not intend to hurt. Not really.

  “Wouldn’t you want to know what happened to someone you saved?” Taraana answers, and Ligaya turns away without replying.

  “Not if it means meeting him would place him in danger,” Paheli replies instead, and gets to her feet. “Let’s go.”

  “Giving up on me so soon?” a voice says from the doorway. We all turn. What had been empty space just one second ago is now filled by a tall girl dressed in black jeans and a black vest. We wonder if she, too, is having a bad day. Her hair is pulled back in a French braid, and her lips are as red as ours. Her expression, however, is far more relaxed.

  She comes into the room and the door bangs closed behind her. The click of the lock is audible. She looks around at all of us, her gaze lingering on each of our faces. When she gets to Taraana, her eyes widen and her composure slips for a brief second before she forces her features back into the pleasant mask she is wearing.

  “I am Tabassum Naaz, here at your request. What do you have to say to me?” She moves over to a chair in front of the narghile and drops down on it. She picks up the narghile pipe and breathes in deeply before exhaling the smoke.

  Her every move is designed to broadcast her fearlessness, but what she doesn’t realize is that all of us present are fluent in the language of fear. We recognize the pulse of it in her throat, in the tic under her ear, and in the little tremble in her fingers that she doesn’t think we see.

  “What terrible deed have you done to deserve exile from your family?” Valentina asks.

  As an opening gambit, it might be a bit harsh, but the girl doesn’t flinch. “Why do you think I owe you any answers?”

  We look at Paheli, waiting for her to enlighten all of us. “Well,” Paheli says, “we can’t run from your grandfather forever, so we have decided to fight against him.” Paheli picks up a drink as pink as her hair used to be and sips it before wrinkling her nose at the sweet taste. “One of the ways in which we can do that is to change the patriarch of your family. So, um, considering your current persona-non-grata status in your family, we’ve called you here to ask whether you’d like to help us.”

  All artifice falls away from Tabassum Naaz. Her eyes sharpen. “What exactly do you mean?”

  Paheli awkwardly scratches her cheek. “Was I not clear? We are going to keep Taraana safe. To achieve that goal, we need Baarish without power. From what we’ve observed, the majority of his power comes from his title as the Dar. So, if he’s no longer the Dar, he won’t have as much access to power.”

  Tabassum Naaz is shaking her head long before Paheli finishes talking. “You do know that my grandfather is but one person who seeks to exploit the keeper, right? So even if you manage to disable the Dar, there will be someone else to replace him.”

  We don’t trust Tabassum Naaz yet, so we won’t tell her that we plan to find a way for Taraana to bond to the Between before we have to worry about the other middle worlders who desire him.

  “I believe in tackling only one problem at a time. Right now, that problem is your grandfather,” Paheli says, with her eyes dark. She’s thinking about the children in cages. “By the way, did you know that your family is involved in child trafficking?”

  Tabassum Naaz blanches. We wait for her to verbalize the denial her lips open to deliver, but, in the end, she says nothing. Her shoulders sag; a terrible defeat tugs down the corners of her lips.

  “They were also attempting to harvest magic off the children. We don’t know the details, but perhaps you can find out.” Paheli doesn’t give Tabassum Naaz a chance to recover from the first blow and neatly deals her a second one. When the other girl just stares at her in a daze, she continues. “The actions of your family don’t implicate you. We don’t think you’re in any way responsible for the evil they’re doing. However, now that you do know of their misdeeds, if you still don’t act against them, you will be an accomplice. Perhaps an unwilling one, but an accomplice nonetheless. Have you ever seen a child trapped in a cage? Treated as if she is less than a human being? Some of us here were one of those children.” Paheli stares straight at Tabassum Naaz, who seems unable to hold her gaze for more than a moment.

  She leans forward, placing her elbows on her knees. Her eyes are stormy. Perhaps there’s a hurricane within her. “I know it’s a weak justification, but I really didn’t know.” She drags a hand across her face. “I’ve been pushed away by family for as long as I can remember. I don’t have any conflict with you wanting to fight against my grandfather, but… do you know who he is? If it was so simple to kill him, he would have been dead years ago. It isn’t as though he is lacking in enemies!”

  “We are not murderers. We don’t plan to kill him. We just want him to stop being the Dar,” Valentina says.

  Tabassum Naaz grins suddenly, showing off her sharp white teeth. We wonder if she’s related to a shark. “You don’t have to pretend. You can kill him. I don’t care. He has hated me ever since I was born. In fact, until I was five, my parents kept me hidden because they were afraid of how he’d react when he found out about my existence.”

  Widad passes her a plate of baklava, and we lean in closer to listen.

  “When my father finally took me home, my grandfather tried to kill me. Only”—she takes a bite of the dessert and grins—“he couldn’t. I was protected by some kind of magic he didn’t understand. That pissed him off immensely, and my existence became even more like sand in his eyes.” She eats some fries with relish. “I turned sixteen, and the waters of the rivers and the lakes started talking to me. I discovered I am a magic user. He almost lost his shit then.”

  “You’re his heir?” Paheli asks, her eyes shining with glee.

  “Yep.” Tabassum Naaz grins back, and for a second, they’re almost friends. “Everyone believes that he has the power to choose his heir. In fact, most of my cousins are counting on it and suck up to him, trying to get into his good graces and be chosen as the Dar. Only when the rivers and the lakes started talking to me did I understand that the position of the Dar is chosen by the magic.”

  “I suppose he didn’t take you being chosen as heir too well?” Valentina asks.

  Tabassum Naaz’s smile is very warm as she looks at Valentina. “You could say that. He tried to kill me again, and when he didn’t succeed, he threw me out of the house, saying my behavior was wanton. He tried to have me killed by others, but magic is strange. It reads intent, and every time he tried to hurt me, it rebounded on him.”

  “But he can still hurt your parents,” T
alei says, and the smile disappears from Tabassum Naaz’s face.

  “Yeah. Which is why I’m here, living in a place I’m not familiar with, trying not to draw attention to myself.” She rubs her face and grimaces. “It sucks.”

  “Since you’re his heir, can’t you replace him?” Paheli asks, her eyes wide with the same hope glinting in Taraana’s.

  A strangely bitter smile lifts Tabassum Naaz’s lips. “It doesn’t work that way.” She sighs. “The only way to instate a new Dar is to remove the old one. And the only way to remove the old Dar is to kill him or have him drop dead. And I don’t think my grandfather is kind enough to do that.”

  A shocked silence fills the room. Murder is not one of the choices on our list.

  Tabassum Naaz smirks at us. “So, when you say you want to remove him from power, I really don’t mind. In fact, I would thank you. But you are overestimating your skills. It’s like you’re dogs, growling at a mountain. You might annoy the mountain, but in the end, you will be buried by it.”

  “Is there really no other way than for him to die?” Paheli asks softly. “He was in prison for a long while. Can’t we send him back there?”

  “The people currently in power, whether in the middle world or on the Magic Council, are all his allies. He has enemies, but none of them are going to act soon. The chances of removing him from power now are slim to none.” Tabassum Naaz shakes her head.

  “So, what are we supposed to do? Live life running from one city to another?” Kamboja bursts out. “How long are we going to run?”

  “I… I can leave,” Taraana immediately offers.

  “Nonono, I didn’t mean that, Taraana,” Kamboja says, her voice wobbling.

  “What did you mean, then?” Daraja’s voice is cold. “We’ve only just experienced a portion of what Taraana’s life has been. Have you forgotten that it’s because of him you’re even here now?” All of a sudden, everyone is speaking at once. Our emotions are sensitive and our tempers easily ignited.

  “You will all shut up for me,” Paheli says, her voice loud enough that everyone, including Tabassum Naaz, falls silent. Valentina glances at her, but she is lost in her own thoughts.

  “At this moment, I don’t have a concrete plan or any way to act against your grandfather. This may not be the case in the future. Will you help us when we need you to?” Paheli asks.

  “I won’t risk my parents,” Tabassum Naaz says. “But… if I can help without putting them in danger, I will.”

  “Are you sure?” Valentina again.

  “At this moment, yes.”

  “Aren’t you worried that your cousins will try to kill you to gain favor from Baarish?” Etsuko asks.

  Tabassum Naaz smiles the sort of smile we associate with dark corners and sharp knives. “I am my grandfather’s granddaughter. I have more than my fair share of his ruthlessness, not that I would ever do what he did… what he’s trying to do,” Tabassum Naaz says, more earnestly than she has said anything before. She meets Taraana’s eyes for the first time and bows her head to him.

  “Thank you.” He smiles at her. “I wasn’t able to say these words to you back then.”

  “You don’t have to thank me,” Tabassum Naaz says angrily. “I am the last person who deserves your gratitude. My family owes you a debt.” She leans back in her chair as if exhausted and waves a hand. “Are you sure you can keep the keeper safe? As I said, my grandfather has many allies, even here.” Tabassum Naaz looks at Paheli and shakes her head. “I didn’t risk my life twice to set him free for him to be caught again, you know?”

  “How did you manage to do that?” Valentina asks curiously.

  “Well, I overheard my uncle and my grandfather talking about the keeper. So one day I followed them to where he was keeping Taraana. I don’t know how I managed to do it, honestly. I was a lot of braver as a kid than I am today.” She makes a face at Taraana. “I freed him, but the next day I heard that he was caught again. I was so mad, but I was determined not to give up on him.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t,” Paheli says. She squeezes Taraana’s hand.

  Tabassum Naaz shrugs. “I didn’t inherit my grandfather’s evil gene, thankfully.” She gets to her feet. “I will take my leave now and wait until it is my turn to move. Ah, just so you know, if you get caught, this conversation never happened. I don’t know you and we have never met.” Tabassum Naaz moves toward the door, then stops and whirls toward Valentina. She whispers something in Valentina’s ear, throws us a smile, and is gone.

  “What did she say to you?” Paheli asks as soon as the door closes behind her.

  Valentina’s cheeks are scarlet. “She said that if I have an itch, she’ll be happy to scratch it for me.”

  “And do you?”

  “You should worry more about your itches than mine,” Valentina says primly, and effectively shuts Paheli up.

  “What are we going to do about Baarish?” Sevda asks. Her voice is soft but her question is loud.

  “Let’s not worry about that right now,” Paheli answers, her fingers briefly on her eyelids, which flutter down as if to underline her exhaustion. “We can figure out the logistics when we have a weapon with which to fight him. Currently, we have nothing.” She thinks we don’t see the coldness in her eyes, but with Paheli, we have learned to step softly, cautiously, so we don’t say anything.

  Paheli continues. “I know you are all upset and unsettled. I have no quick fixes with which to appease you. But hey, this is not the first time we’ve faced mountains, right? We will bring him down, one way or another. Anyway, let’s change the topic. All this talk about Baarish is giving me an upset stomach.”

  “Are you comparing Baarish to expired food?” Taraana asks.

  “No. Not expired food. Just something that doesn’t taste good,” Paheli replies.

  “Like peanut butter?” he says with a grin.

  Paheli narrows her eyes. “This conversation is over.”

  Listen.

  Sometimes we wish for things and people we never had but other people take for granted. Like:

  A mother who worries when you don’t come home at night. A father who is neither a gaping absence nor only present in the marks on our bodies. The luxury of nights not fragmented by nightmares. Bodies that are ours alone.

  Sometimes we wish for impossible things like that.

  The Fault in the Stars

  Midnight. Somewhere in Beyoğlu, Istanbul.

  The darkness has depth and the scent of magic is heavy in the air. We walk the cobbled streets on light feet, veiling ourselves with shadows. Paheli is on a mission, and we know better than to stop her.

  Each of her missions yields a Wild One. We were all once such missions.

  We do not consider ourselves heroines of yore. We are not strong like the superheroes people love. We do not intend to save humanity. Far from it, in fact.

  We simply help girls. We help them escape, we listen to them when they need someone to listen, and we hug them when they need comfort that comes without conditions. We set up safe houses around the world and keep them funded.

  We help them because once, Paheli helped us. She brought us out of danger, listened to us, comforted us, and gave us the space and the resources we needed to heal. All of us have spoken to professionals versed in the science of broken hearts, hurting minds, and invaded bodies. We are works in progress.

  We don’t know what drives Paheli to go one step further than us to help other girls in need. Thanks to Eulalie, she has a spell that sends her a summoning whenever she is in the vicinity of a girl who might become a Wild One. A girl who is hanging on to life and sanity by the last strand she can muster. A girl who has been betrayed by those she considers most dear. Paheli tastes the pain and she yields to its summoning.

  We left Taraana in the apartment. He wasn’t happy, but he didn’t protest. Perhaps he read the haste in our hearts. He is there, and for the moment he is safe.

  Walking swiftly, we leave the revelry in the main
streets for the quiet blanketing the residential areas of the city. Paheli leads the way.

  It is a clear night. Stars, what we can see of them, glitter in the sky. Paheli stops in front of an apartment building. We stop with her. She looks up, and for a moment we see nothing. Then we do and we wish we hadn’t.

  We make our way to the roof—the door to it is ajar, banging in the wind. It is cold; our breaths steam. The girl is framed against the night. She stands at the very edge of the roof, poised as if to fly. She is about seventeen and slender, with thin brown hair.

  Our footsteps are silent, but she must sense us, because she turns. We stand in front of her, a collection of broken girls. She looks at us, but she doesn’t seem to see us. The sounds of the city are muted. A cat yowls somewhere.

  Paheli steps forward. The look in the girl’s eyes sharpens and she focuses, for the first time. She doesn’t say a word, though. Her silence is a question.

  We have all stood on precipices much like this one. When you get this close to self-destruction, words no longer have strength. How did Paheli reach us? How did she persuade us to retreat from the edges we cleaved to?

  We cannot remember.

  “I am Paheli,” she says, and sits on the wall right next to the girl. “Why are you here?”

  The girl stares down at Paheli, her expression frozen in a grimace of grief. “Why do you want to know? Do you collect tragic stories or something?”

  “You could say that. Do you have one to share?”

  The girl turns back to face the night, the city, and the sky. “I was raped by my brother-in-law.” She takes a deep breath. “When I told my mother, she told me it was my fault. It must have been something I said or did or wore that gave him the wrong idea. That led him on.”