Equal of the Sun (54 page)

I drew my dagger and rushed at his chest. The fear that entered his eyes only encouraged me to attack. From close up, his skin looked white with panic. When I was near enough to smell the fenugreek on his breath, I raised my dagger in the air, feeling the muscles of my neck stiffening. I am certain I snarled, anticipating the pleasure of feeling the dagger plunge into his undefended skin. When I saw him raise a long sword to defend himself, I blocked the maneuver and broke his nose with the heel of my hand. Water sprang into his eyes, and his sword arm grew limp. But then the side of my head seemed to slam into something hard, and the dagger slipped from my hand.

Everything around me went black and quiet. I must have remained that way for several minutes. When I awoke, the captain of the Circassians and a few of his men were standing around me, dabbing my face with a cloth and holding a vial of rose water under my nose. The strong scent revived me.

“Good work,” the captain said, chuckling. “Not one of us will ever forget the fear in Khalil Khan’s eyes. It isn’t often that a nobleman gets humiliated like that. He wanted to kill you, but when he saw that we were ready to fight, he gave up.”

I put my hand on the place under my turban that ached. It came back covered with blood. White spots danced in my vision.

“What happened?”

“One of his soldiers flattened you with the side of his sword. I imagine your head is burning like an oven.”

The square was quiet now except for a few onlookers. I had been down for longer than I realized.

“Where are they?”

“Khalil Khan gave them orders to go to his house. They marched the palanquin down the Promenade of the Royal Stallions.”

He handed me my dagger, which I slipped back into its sheath. “May your hands never ache, Captain.”

I got up and ran toward the Ali Qapu gate in the direction of Khalil Khan’s house.

“Agha, wait! Are you sure you are well?” I heard behind me as I left, but I did not stop. My head was pounding as if I were banging it against a wall with each step. Warm blood trickled into my ear.

When I arrived at Khalil Khan’s, some of Pari’s supporters were still milling around his door demanding that the light of the Safavis be released. Khalil emerged from behind the gate holding a bloodied cloth over his nose and yelled at them to disperse, threatening that he would take a sword to them otherwise. Then he slammed the heavy wooden door in our faces.

In despair, I called out to a boy in the street and told him to go to the palace and tell Daka Cherkes Khanoom about her daughter’s whereabouts. Placing a small coin in his hand, I promised to double his money when he delivered a reply.

I walked around the perimeter walls of the grand home and tried to find another way in; there must be an entrance for the servants. Before long, I saw a young maid laden with cloth bags full of fruit stop in front of a small door that probably led to the kitchen.

“Excuse me, kind Khanoom, do you work for Khalil Khan?”

“I do.”

“A great lady has been taken inside the house, and I would give much to see her. A small fortune, in fact.”

She looked carefully at my expensive riding attire to gauge what I might be worth.

“How much?”

I showed her a heavy silver coin. It was probably the most money
she had ever seen, and she dropped her bags and reached for the coin with both hands. I eluded her grasp.

“If you want me to sneak you into the house, forget it. They would have my head.”

“Then how about if you tell her I am here and bring me a message from her. My name is Javaher.”

She reached out for the money again.

“It is yours as soon as you bring me news from the lady.”

After she went in, I crossed the street and stood in an alley where I could see the kitchen door but not be easily observed. The day grew colder, and my head pounded. I found one of Pari’s handkerchiefs in my robe and stuffed it into my turban to absorb the blood.

I waited a long time before the door opened and the maid came out and looked around for me, her face covered now with a picheh. I stepped out of the alley and called softly, “Over here.”

She approached and lifted her picheh. Her dark eyes were as troubled as a river whose muddy bottom had been stirred up by a stick.

“It wasn’t worth the silver you promised. Never would I wish to see such a sight again.”

I felt my heart clutch in my chest so tightly I could not breathe.

“What sight?”

“That great lady in her bed.” She turned away as if to banish the thought. I grabbed her arm, too tightly perhaps, and said, “Tell me.”

She shook off my hand.

“The other servants told me that a group of soldiers had brought a lady into the courtyard in a palanquin. When Khalil Khan ordered her to come out, she cursed him and refused. He reached inside, took hold of her legs most disgracefully, and pulled her out. Her curses filled the air. Two of his men grabbed her body and forced her inside the house. She was yelling all the while, but soon after they closed the door behind them, the house grew deadly silent. No one wished to know what was happening. After only a few minutes, the soldiers departed. Khalil Khan gave orders that no one should enter that room, and no one dared. By the time I returned from shopping,
the house was as quiet as the grave. After the master retired for his afternoon rest, I slipped inside.”

Here she paused and put her hand against the mud wall to steady herself.

“Is she alive?” I asked, feeling the breath freeze in my throat.

“No,” she replied. “Her eyes were open and staring at the ceiling. Her neck was bruised and bloodied, and the cord they had used to strangle her was still wrapped around it as if she were nothing more than chattel. Her forehead was creased with agony and her teeth were bared, as if she wished to maul those who had murdered her.”

“Say no more,” I said. “No more.”

“I wish you had never asked me to look. What I saw will haunt me until the end of my days. No amount of money could be worth such a sight.”

Nonetheless she stretched out her hand. I steadied myself against the wall and fished out the coin.

“You have received the better deal,” she said, turning to go. “May God be with you.”

My heart felt as if it had turned to shards of ice. I grabbed at the wall behind me for support, but it crumbled in my hands. I drew the dirt on my fingers over my face and head as if it were the dirt of my grave. Pari dead? It could not be. It could not be!

Racked with sorrow, I stumbled through the streets, drawing stares.

“Agha!” an older man called as I passed. “What pains you? Are you all right?”

I don’t know how long I walked, or where. All I know is that I ended up at a tavern in a low part of town, which stank of men’s feet. I sat on a cushion covered with a tattered, stained cotton cloth. A few men welcomed me as their new drinking companion. I called for spirits, and after a few glasses of a foul cinnamon-flavored concoction, I switched to bang. It was very strong. Whatever was put before me, I drank, and then I consumed some more.

Before long, I lay on the floor of the tavern and began speaking to the angel who was ministering to me. She appeared in a blaze of light, her long hair like a comet whose tail turned into sparks. As I
spoke, she hovered over me, her eyes filled with compassion. I told her the story of my life, starting with how my father had been killed and how I had been chopped at the middle. Then I described Pari and our times together.

“I don’t have royal blood,” I told her, “but we two could have been twins. It was as if we swam in the same fluids in our mother’s womb, so that some of my maleness became hers and some of her femaleness mine. That made us strange in the eyes of the world, which does not care for in-between beings. We have both taken blows because of it. She was protean, as am I. She was fierce and affectionate and smart and unpredictable. That is why I loved her . . . that is why!”

I told the angel what had happened in the streets. When I reached the part about Khalil Khan, I could barely speak. “She pushed me out of the palanquin. She wouldn’t let me try to save her!”

The angel hovered over me, and I felt wrapped in a heavenly embrace. “My child,” she said, “don’t you see? She pushed you out so that you wouldn’t come to harm. She loved you, too.”

God be praised! Pari loved me, too. Tears flowed from my eyes. I pulled out a handkerchief to wipe them away. Its perfume bore the pungent scent of pine—her scent, which I would smell no more. I wept so loudly that the tavern grew silent for a moment and my fellow drinkers clustered around to ask about my sorrows. I told them I had lost a treasured woman, and then they all wept with me, for who hadn’t? Mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters—we had all lost someone dear.

Early in the morning I awoke on the tattered cushions, my head burning. My hair was matted with blood. All the other men were gone, and my money purse was gone, too. I lay there for a moment, wondering if I could arise without pitching over, and then I remembered the furtive maid and her account of what had happened to Pari. Oh my esteemed lieutenant! Oh my battered heart!

I arose unsteadily, found my feet, and walked back to the palace in the cold. My turban had been stolen along with my warm outer robe, but the men had not wished me to freeze to death, as they had left me my shoes. The snow was thick and white on the ground. I hurried through the frozen streets. When I arrived at my room, I
opened the door and was surprised to see that although Balamani was gone, a tiny figure was huddled on my bed. It was Massoud Ali. He woke up, rushed toward me, threw his arms around me, and howled, his tiny face collapsing with grief. I deeply regretted not having been there to comfort him.

“My child, my child!” I said. “Don’t swallow so much sorrow.”

“What will become of us?” he asked between sobs. “Where will we go?”

I did not have an answer.

“Who will take us into their service now?”

“Her mother,” I replied promptly, trying to comfort him.

His sobs became huge.

“She has been killed as well.”

I felt as if I had been stabbed with a sword. No wonder the boy messenger had never returned.

“May God protect us. An old woman!”

Massoud Ali sobbed harder all of a sudden. “And a little child has been killed, too!”

“Who?”

“Shoja.”

By God above, they had not even spared an infant. Poor Mahasti! Pari had offered to send her child away from the palace to protect him, but Mahasti had refused.

“Don’t worry,” I said. I wanted to sound calm and to reassure the poor child, who was quaking with fear. “We will find a new protector, I promise you.”

“The princess was kind to me,” he said, still weeping. “Who will be kind to me now?”

“I will,” I replied. “I promise to be kind to you always. Now come sleep, and we will sort all of this out later.”

I led him to my bedroll, tucked him in, and held his small hand until he fell asleep. As I sat listening to Massoud Ali breathe, his mouth slightly open, his cheeks salted white from his tears, I knew that he had reason to be scared. We had been the closest servants of a princess who had fallen into the deepest disgrace. Would the new shah look upon us as traitors? We could not know. Our survival
depended on being thought humble and powerless, but what if Mohammad and his wife judged us otherwise?

My father’s death came to my mind as freshly as if it had just happened. I had become, once again, the closest servant of someone whose star had plummeted into the sea. My heart was torn anew, and I wept as if I were a young man again facing the rest of my life all alone.

CHAPTER 9

BREAD AND SALT

Fereydoon trussed Zahhak, threw him onto a donkey, and rode with him to the foothills of Mount Damavand. He intended to kill him there, but an angel instructed him to stay his hand. Instead, Fereydoon climbed the mountain until he came upon a cave populated by boulders. Slinging Zahhak over his back, he scaled the tallest boulder, threw Zahhak onto the rock, and pounded nails into his arms and legs until he dangled over the middle of the cave.

I suspect that Zahhak did not die. He and his snakes are eternally suspended, awaiting the moment when the forces of evil unleash their powers again.