Princess of Dhagabad, The (8 page)

Chamar Ali. Chamar the Blessed.

Blessed with everything a man could wish for,
except that, which is most important for any man. A son and
heir.

Striding along the gallery of the north wing
toward the elegant white building of the harem connected to the
palace, the sultan is listening to his grand vizier, hurriedly
following one step behind.

“Surely, your majesty knows that this
creature, the djinn, is all-powerful.”

“Yes, Shamil, I heard,” the sultan replies,
sliding his gaze over a bald spot on the top of the grand vizier’s
head, that glistens with sweat in the bright afternoon sun. Shamil,
a man in his later years, can never understand the impatience of
someone who was forced by the palace festivities to spend almost a
week away from his women. Chamar’s body aches for a gentle woman’s
touch, a longing enhanced so much by his desire to have any one of
his concubines bear him a son. He needs to beget a son who will
live. He cannot possibly waste his time talking to his vizier.

Shamil, however, is not about to give up.

“If I may be so bold, your majesty, I believe
that your majesty should feel worried about having this creature
loose in the palace. Perhaps your majesty should call the princess
to order and have her contain this…thing in the bottle where he
belongs.”

“I don’t think you should worry so much,
Shamil,” Chamar says, shielding his eyes from the sun to look
directly at Shamil. Sensing the sultan’s impatience, the older man
becomes even more nervous. His whole face is now glistening with
tiny beads of sweat, standing in the wrinkles on his forehead and
sparkling in his bushy gray beard.

Realizing how nervous his vizier is, the
sultan softens to the point of slowing down.

“The djinn cannot do anything the princess
doesn’t order him to do,” he says, summoning to his aid whatever is
left of his patience. “Because of that he is as harmless as a
child.”

“But, your majesty!” Shamil, encouraged by
what he mistakes for the sultan’s sudden attention to his words,
rushes into a new attack. “This creature, as I heard, is an ancient
wizard. I also was informed that the princess spends a great deal
of time with him. He can put ideas into her head which will
threaten your rule in unimaginable ways.”

Chamar sighs, measuring with his eyes the
last ten paces that separate him from the elegantly carved door,
eunuch guards standing still on both sides of it.

“The princess was told to use the djinn only
for her games,” Chamar says, feeling like a little boy, anxious to
run off to play, forced to recite the lesson to an overly tedious
teacher. “Besides, she is never alone with him. And she is a very
obedient child. Just think, Shamil, what harm can possibly come
from the djinn when he spends all his time with the women?” His
smile fades as he realizes his grand vizier has completely missed
the irony.

“Your majesty,” Shamil begins again. But the
sultan’s patience has finally come to an end.

“I have no time for this, Shamil,” he says.
“Later, perhaps.”

He covers the ten paces to the desired door
and waits for the eunuch on the left to open the door for him. Not
wide, in the presence of another man so close, just enough for the
sultan to go through.

“Good-bye, Shamil!” Chamar says, feeling like
a mischievous child who found a trick to escape his teacher, and he
slides through the opening of the door.

“Your move, Hasan.”

Hasan throws a careless glance at the
chessboard. The black queen floats up and sweeps in an arc into the
very center of the white defenses. A white rook, displaced by the
queen, falls to the side and stops in midair, as if held by an
invisible hand. Rocking for a second in this off-balance,
impossible position, the rook drifts into the air and lands in the
princess’s palm. The princess frowns.

“In how many moves were you supposed to win
this game, Hasan?”

“In twelve, princess.”

The princess raises her head and meets his
indifferent gaze. Since the day Hasan appeared before her for the
first time, she has never again seen even a glimpse of the look
they exchanged. As if she had merely dreamed the incredible pain
and wisdom going back into the unknown depths of countless
centuries and millennia. As if he really is similar to all other
palace slaves in everything but his magical abilities. The princess
feels an unbearable longing to see once more at least a part of
this gaze, but Hasan’s gray eyes look at her with polite
indifference, as if closed off from the whole world by tiny iron
shutters.

The princess shakes off her thoughts and
takes another look at the chessboard.

“Twelve moves?” she says thoughtfully,
frowning in calculation. Suddenly her face lights up. “You lost,
Hasan!” she exclaims. “You just made your twelfth move, didn’t you?
But to take my king you will need to make another, thirteenth,
move!”

Hasan glances at her, and in his eyes the
princess for a moment sees something human, a merry surprise
similar to that of a child caught at his favorite game. But Hasan’s
eyes quickly become impenetrable again.

Sighing, the princess looks around the room.
Nannies Zeinab and Fatima are embroidering near the window, talking
to each other in low voices and, from time to time, throwing
suspicious glances at Hasan. Everyone in the palace is afraid of
the djinn, and although nobody argues the princess’s right to spend
time with her new slave, she is strictly forbidden to be alone with
him. She is also forbidden to use his magic for anything but small
tricks. Being an obedient daughter, the princess doesn’t dare to
order Hasan anything more complicated than, for instance, moving
the chess pieces with his gaze.

The princess lets out another sigh. What is
the use of owning a djinn if she cannot order him to do anything
interesting? What is the use of the constant presence of this
wizard and mage if he closes himself off from her, and from the
rest of the world, with iron shutters? Who knows, for that matter,
what is really on his mind? Perhaps even now, sitting across from
her with the indifferent face, he is thinking up something evil.
Perhaps he really hates her and wishes something bad for her, just
as her mother and Nimeth say. But no! She couldn’t have dreamt that
look that passed between them! The look, which she saw for a brief
moment in the depths of his eyes, couldn’t go along with evil! It
is just that the pain of his soul is so great that he has no choice
but to close his mind to the outside world and look at it with
indifference.

“Princess! Princess!”

Airagad, panting, runs into the room and
stops, trying to catch her breath. Her round, childish face is
flushed; loose strands of hair are scattered over her face and
neck. She straightens out her shawl, trying to catch enough breath
to talk.

The princess jumps to her feet.

“What happened, nanny?”

“There—” Airagad takes several deep breaths.
“The sultan of Veridue sent your father a stallion—I never thought
there could be such a beautiful horse. It’s all black like a raven,
but its forehead is white like a star, bright as fire. Let’s go
look!”

“Come, Hasan!” the princess shouts, rushing
to the door. It is not every day that a beautiful Veriduan stallion
arrives at the palace! And, judging by Nanny Airagad’s excitement,
this stallion is more beautiful than any other horse of the royal
stable, which the princess often admires from a balcony as they are
exercised in their morning rides.

“Is my father already there?” the princess
asks, running.

“Your father is in the harem,” Airagad
replies, “but I know they sent for him already.”

In the harem. The princess throws a glance
from the gallery, along which they are now running, toward the
elegant white stone building adjacent to the north wing of the
palace. She doesn’t really understand what a harem is, but her
mother explained to her that by law the sultan, unlike other
citizen of Dhagabad, is allowed to have not four, but only one wife
from a noble family. To compensate the sultan for the hardships of
such abstinence he is allowed to have as many women at his disposal
as he wants. These women are called by a strange name, concubines,
and they live in a building called a harem. The princess knows that
they are not allowed to leave this building, must always cover
their faces in the presence of strangers, and dwell in their
beautiful garden like exotic birds, seeing only one another and
their master, the sultan. The princess also knows that from seeing
the sultan these women have children which are never considered to
be of royal blood. They are called
Chamari
and
Chamarat
, sons and daughters of Chamar, and as they grow up
they join the lower ranks of the palace courtiers. By Dhagabad law
only the sultaness’s children are called princes and princesses,
and the elder of them is considered to be heir to the throne. The
princess knows that the heir is supposed to be a boy, but since she
has no brothers it is her place for now to take this role upon
herself. She was told that this means a lot of responsibility for
her, but she knows that so far this role only allows her to enjoy
freedom unheard of for any other girl in the palace, princess or
not. It seems to make her mother displeased, but this is something
the princess doesn’t understand.

Trying to keep up with Airagad, the princess
looks back to make sure that Hasan is following her. The djinn’s
face is still emotionless; he is walking lightly and noiselessly
over the stone floor of the gallery, effortlessly keeping three
paces behind the princess who is running with all her might. The
princess admires the frightening ease of his grace, like that of a
panther chasing its victim. Distracted, she almost bumps into
Airagad suddenly stopping in front of her.

“If we go down these stairs, we’ll find
ourselves right in the courtyard where the horse is being walked,”
Airagad says, throwing a cautious glance at Hasan. The princess
nods, and all three of them rush down the narrow winding stairs in
one of the side towers of the palace. In the dark the princess
carefully feels her way over the narrow, slippery steps that are
covered with smooth dips and bowls, worn in the stone by the
numerous feet walking those stairs during the past centuries. In
one place the princess stumbles and, to avoid falling, grabs a hand
offered to her. She pays no attention to the hardness of the muscle
under the silk sleeve or to the cold of the metal encasing the
wrist. Only when she finally pops out from under the stone vault
into the sunlit yard, she notices that Airagad is walking ahead,
and that all this time she was holding the arm of Hasan, smoothly
walking beside her. The princess looks at him with uncertainty and
carefully releases her grasp.

“Princess!” the sultaness shouts from a low
gallery across the yard. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to see the stallion, mother!” the
princess says, shielding her eyes from the blinding sun with her
hand.

A short neigh and a snort behind startle her.
Turning, the princess finds herself face-to-face with the most
beautiful creature she has ever seen. Its shining raven-black coat
sparkles like a rainbow in the bright sunlight. Slender legs,
fluffy mane, arched neck—all these features, which to the experts
merely mean the unmistakable signs of a thoroughbred, create for
the princess a feeling of magic and wonder about this beautiful
creature. Its large brown eyes are looking straight at the
princess, as if studying her face. The stallion prances playfully,
moving his eyes and blowing out his nostrils. Two huge Veriduan
grooms are barely able to control the mighty horse.

The princess turns, looking for someone to
share her excitement with, and sees Hasan, three steps behind,
standing still with an expression that she could never imagine to
be possible for an impassive djinn. Or, rather, his face is still
impassive, but his eyes shine with admiration exactly matching the
princess’s own.

“Princess!” the sultaness shouts. “Don’t get
too close to the horse! Come here!”

The princess regretfully takes her eyes off
the stallion who, guided by the two grooms, turned around right
before her, and is now being led diagonally across the yard to its
opposite corner. Holding her shawl, the princess starts running
across the yard to share her excitement with her mother.

Everything happens too quickly. A gust of
wind tears the shawl off the princess’s head at the very moment she
passes the horse. The shawl sweeps up and, clinging for a moment to
the horse’s neck, slides off its black coat like a streak of white
flame and flies away. The frightened horse jumps aside, breaking
free of the grooms, bumping into them with its mighty body to send
them flying helplessly to the walls of the yard. The stallion rears
and starts to rush about the yard.