Princess of Dhagabad, The (2 page)

Noisily tearing aside the jasmine branches,
the princess pops out into the glade.

“Is it true, Nimeth? Is my mother really
taking me to the bazaar?”

“Great gods! Princess! I didn’t know you were
here!” Nimeth’s eyes narrow down into slits. “Did you lose
something in those bushes?”

“I…” The princess hesitates. “This rock,”
she says hopelessly, feeling as if she is betraying a friend for
the sake of a foolish lie. Witch or not, Nimeth is not easy to
fool.

Nimeth lets out a short laugh. “A very
valuable thing, princess.”

Her scornful glance stings. Hurt at this
contempt toward her newly acquired treasure, the princess blushes
and hides the rock behind her back.

“I was hiding,” she confesses. “I thought you
and Nanny wanted me to do something boring.”

“Princess!” Airagad exclaims with
reproach.

“I value your honesty, princess,” Nimeth says
in an icy voice. “But I’ll have to tell the sultaness of your
doings, and I can’t guarantee she will still want you to go with
her to the bazaar.”

The princess sighs and clenches the rock
tighter in her hand.

With a sinking heart she follows Nimeth and
Airagad down the winding garden path. To think that she was so
close to fulfilling her wish to take a look at the mysterious world
outside the palace, and that her own foolishness may have robbed
her of that wonderful chance!

The princess looks around the garden, which
is blooming wildly after the recent season of rains. Numerous
paths, barely visible through the thick bushes, run everywhere like
small streams of gravel to merge with one of the main alleys that
run straight from the palace to the outside wall. The garden was
designed as a half-circle adjoining the back of the palace with
three main alleys radiating from the three palace entrances like
the beams of the rising sun. From the top of the tallest palace
tower this layout indeed resembles the sun. But here, among the
greenery, all these windy little paths, ponds, and hidden glades
make the garden look more like a spiderweb, wild greenery sprouting
out between its delicate silky threads. And as with a web, the
princess feels the garden and the adjoining palace are now trapping
her in their embrace, like a little fly that sees the outside world
from its silky prison but can never set itself free.

She looks at the domes and towers of the
palace rising up through the green cloud of trees. From the garden
the palace looks completely different than it does from the front,
where the central courtyard leads straight to the main gate and the
palace plaza. From the front the palace is a single being, all
harmony and flight, the big dome, which crowns the throne room and
the main ceremonial hall, flowing smoothly into cascades of side
galleries and towers that connect the central part of the palace to
its four wings. But here, from the garden, the palace looks more
like a random collection of buildings that run up to the back of
the central dome, barely visible through the forest of leaves and
flowers. The princess’s quarters, as well as her mother’s, are
located in the south wing, and it is to the south entrance that
Nimeth is now directing her firm steps, with Airagad and the
princess in her wake. The princess sadly thinks how boring it is to
go to her rooms now, leaving behind the greenery and heady aromas
of the spring flowers that make her head swim with their rich
sweetness. She clenches the little rock in her fist so hard that
its rough edges, now warm and moist with the sweat of her palm, dig
painfully into her skin.

The gaping doorway of the south wing brings a
wave of cool air carrying smells of dust and stone and the barely
perceptible aroma of bread baking in the kitchens. The princess
steps after Nimeth into the cool shade of the hallway. After the
bright sunlight of the garden she can barely see in the dim indoor
light, and she nearly runs into Nimeth, who suddenly stops right in
front of her.

“I’ll go tell the sultaness that the princess
is on her way,” Nimeth says. “Try not to take too long, princess.
We’ve lost enough time already.”

“But…” It is still unclear if the
sultaness will want to take the princess along after her
misbehavior. But if Nimeth is telling her not to take too long, it
means… The princess fearfully looks up into Nimeth’s slanting,
impenetrable eyes.

“I’ll see you soon, princess,” Nimeth says
gently, and her thin fingers lightly touch the princess’s cheek.
Blushing with joy, the princess turns and rushes along the corridor
to catch up with Nanny Airagad.

Why did you seek all this knowledge, why did
you let unsolved problems make you restless, why did you spend
years reading ancient books and marveling at learning another high
truth, if such is your reward? You shut your eyes, but your
eyesight does not fail to see the endless dunes; you see the wind
raising flamelike tongues of sand from their surface; you also see
the intolerable crimson haze marking the spot where the sun should
be. You praise your stars that this haze does not let you see the
fiery disk whose beams so mercilessly pierce your soul. And you ask
yourself again and again: would you have followed this way to the
end if you had known what this end would be? Your mind is clinging
to the tiniest straws: I did not know! If I had known, I would have
stopped sooner! No one in his right mind could wish for such an
end. And another thing: maybe this is not the end. Maybe somebody
is trying to scare you to make you leave your uneven, slippery way
of knowledge and turn to the simple and solid ways of the
mortals… And along with a new blast of hot wind carrying another
cloud of sand, along with the constant stream of sunbeams that
never tire of piercing you, you realize in the depths of your
tortured self that this is the end, the natural end, and if you had
known it all beforehand, if you could have chosen even a thousand
times, you would never have missed this eager search for the
unknown, this marvel at learning the high truth, your growing
wisdom and power, and the terrified admiration of the endless
depths of eternity.

The thing that amazes the princess is
not
the big palace gate that opens for the first time for
her, nor the palace plaza with its paving stones that run across
from the gate straight to al-Gulsulim mosque. Hitherto forbidden to
her, the solemn grandeur of the gate and plaza seem like an
extension of the palace itself, an enlarged version of the gates
that open into the main ceremonial hall within. While her litter
glides across the plaza on the shoulders of four mighty Ghullian
slaves, she feels as if the whole procession is actually moving
through the hall itself, its dome removed to reveal the clear blue
of the cloudless sky. Only later, when they finally make their way
around the smoothly hewn walls of the al-Gulsulim minarets into a
real city street, do the princess’s eyes open up with wonder.

The
first
thing that amazes her is the
blind emptiness of the walls.

From the mosque, the street runs down through
the upper city of Dhagabad, where the palace is surrounded by the
luxurious residences of rich and noble citizens, to the lower city,
where the houses of merchants and commoners form a meshwork of
narrow curved streets and plazas. Farther down, ships bring their
wares up the river Hayyat el Bakr straight from the sea, and the
busy port gradually merges with the Dhagabad bazaar.

From her lessons in local geography the
princess knows that there are many streets that run eastward from
the hills of the upper city to the lower areas of Dhagabad
surrounding the bazaar and the port. Only this main street runs
more or less straight down into the heart of the bazaar itself, and
it is used by everyone who needs to travel up to the palace or down
to the port.

She always imagined the main street to be
colorful, similar to the palace garden alleys in every way except
for the crowds of richly dressed citizens walking along in
unhurried concentration or stopping to chat with their neighbors.
She imagined every detail—down to the aroma of tobacco smoke rising
from their pipes in thin wisps or near-perfect rings. Now all she
finds is a wide cobbled road bordered by empty walls with no
windows and a few tightly shut doors. Only by the slight changes in
the shape and color of the walls can the princess see that there
are indeed many houses or perhaps magnificent residences hiding
behind the blindness. In some places she can catch a glimpse of a
domed roof, a crown of a fruit tree with pinkish-yellow fragrant
blossoms. Sometimes a tightly clothed figure or two appear and
press themselves against the wall, their heads lowered as they let
the royal procession pass. Each appearance is preceded by the
monotonous cry of Selim, the captain of the guard:

“Make way for the sultaness! Make way for the
princess of Dhagabad!”

The farther they go down into the heart of
the lower city, the more often the princess hears this cry, until
it finally becomes regular like the chant that muezzins sing from
the tops of the minarets at the time of the evening prayer.

The procession crosses a bridge, allowing the
princess a brief glance into the dark, turbid waters of Hayyat el
Bakr. She knows that the river coils through Dhagabad like a snake,
a quality that gave the river its name, which means “Serpent of the
Sea.” From the topmost balconies of the palace one can see it twist
and bend through the city like a ribbon casually thrown on the
ground. It looks quite narrow where they are now passing—the
official border between the upper and lower cities—but it widens
considerably as it reaches the colorful turmoil of the port.

From her teachers the princess knows that
Dhagabad is one of the biggest ports in existence, mainly because
it is easily accessible by land from such places as Dimeshq,
Megina, Halaby, and even the distant Avallahaim. The trade with
these countries is one of the main reasons why Dhagabad is so
powerful, but she also knows that it could be even more prosperous
if Dhagabad had direct access to the sea. As it is, all the ships
that travel up Hayyat el Bakr have to pay their passage fees to
Veridue, a country that owns the lower reaches of the river all the
way to the shores of the Southern Sea. She knows there is some kind
of trade agreement between Dhagabad and Veridue, enhanced by the
great friendship between the two sultans of these countries, but
that is part of politics, a discipline she doesn’t particularly
enjoy.

As they enter the lower city, the princess,
used to the blind emptiness along the way, is amazed yet again.
Instead of broad empty streets she finds herself surrounded by
narrow alleys filled with people and boiling with action. Sitting
up straight on her pillows, rocking with the measured tread of the
slaves carrying her litter, the princess looks around with
wide-open eyes. Beyond her mother’s litter ahead of her, the
princess sees the first stalls with goods and the open doors of
small shops. This part of town is occupied by the poorest
merchants, placed at the lower levels of the hierarchy of the
bazaar, but seeing the colorful variety of the rows of merchandise,
the princess feels as if she has been transferred into the magical
world of her favorite books. She thinks of herself as a beautiful
maiden separated from her beloved, or perhaps as a poor peasant
girl suddenly finding herself surrounded, by the will of unknown
powers, with unimaginable wealth. It seems to her that one of these
bowed men should
definitely
be an evil sorcerer, that at any
moment he will raise his head, and she will see his black beard and
a devilish grin. But no one they pass dares to raise his head for
the fear of seeing the faces of the wife and daughter of the great
sultan of Dhagabad. By law, anyone who sees them must be blinded on
the spot, even though the faces of all women, including the
princess, are covered with veils up to the eyes. Luckily, the
princess thinks, this law does not apply to the inhabitants of the
palace. It would have been so uncomfortable to have to always wear
a veil that sticks to your nostrils every time you inhale, and
makes your face feel hot whenever you exhale! Wouldn’t it be
wonderful to be able to go to the lower city without a veil!