‘– and after the Marka tournament, I’ll be departing for the late winter campaign at our northern outposts,’ Yabghu continues as the guards of the bazaar wave us through the crumbling bone-stone walls.
Surrounding us, the bustle of the bazaar makes Za’skar seem like a separate realm. Though night draws a dark curtain as the moon teethes between the city’s suspended glass bridges and palaces, weaving high amongst looming mountains, Al-Haut does not rest in its mercantile trade. The Grand Bazaar is located within the eastern quarters of the capital. Attached at points to the citadel walls, sixteen welded gates of mosaicked stained glass and indigo calligraphy in geometric designs stand large, undeniably crafted from jinn masonry.
I gaze at sword dancers who perform aesthetic martial arts, to the delight of gawking onlookers. Craftsmen dye swirling blue-threaded raven designs on the arms of children. Enormous smokeless-fire filigree lanterns shine along each sand-packed alleyway, as if breathing out a false dawn. Large triple-domed temples glitter, and priests, after evening remembrance, stand amongst open prayer niches in complexes made of glazed ceramic turquoise with raven epigraphs.
‘The Heavens have abandoned humanity,’ a priest bellows to a gathering of worshippers inside an open sehan. ‘We have no prophets nor revelation. Cursed are we, like the tribes swept away by the Great Flood.’
The din of shouting shawl-makers pierces the market; they display glistening coins embroidered on tunics, printed from shuttles of wooden blocks. Carvers lift wares of worked bone: pendants, pottery and ivory seals. How so many of us fit in such narrow streets is beyond me. Dialects from Sajamistan’s different provinces chorus the air, so unusual compared to the barks and orders of Za’skar.
Notables wear raven-feathered turbans while sat cross-legged playing saktab, sipping steaming cinnamon kahvah from palm-sized coppery cups. A wave of envy at the capital’s diversity hits me. Are these bazaars common in Sajamistan? Do they always laugh and trade while on the other side of the city, children train for war?
‘Is something the matter?’ Cemil slows, letting Yabghu and Katayoun drift ahead with the other trifectas. I watch the warriors marvel at sizzling skewers of sumac and saffron lamb kebabs, and piles of pilaf garnished in slivered carrots, barberries and cashews. How can I be here, tempted, while my clan burned from these very same hands?
‘Khamilla?’
I startle. ‘What?’
He watches me for a long moment. ‘You look pale.’
‘It’s the chill.’ I glance away, anywhere but at him. ‘I think it will storm tonight.’ My hands wrap my shawl tighter.
As if on impulse, Cemil’s hand reaches up, brushing a loose strand of hair into my shawl. His finger lingers on the thin black braids rounding my temple before he retracts his hand suddenly. ‘Perhaps you are falling ill.’
‘That would be your fault. You forced me here.’ I step away before I let myself conclude that I do not despise the warmth of him.
To my left, Overseer Negar lingers with her rukhs Dara, Aizere and Aina; she catches my eye and leers. In her arms, she carries something obscured by a shawl.
‘This way, rukh,’ Yabghu calls out to me before I can look further, while Cemil splits off toward Negar.
Yabghu stands with Katayoun and other low-ranks from my halqa, Emirhan and Gulnaz. I spot a high-rank as well, Lukhman.
I hear Katayoun say, ‘You are our master, this outing should be on your stipend,’ her lips smirking.
Yabghu scowls but pays six coppers for each meal. The merchant offers up clay mugs of stew with torn semolina noodles, green lentils, reeking black garlic and dark beans. Yabghu tries to hand me one, and a kebab to Katayoun, his attar a comforting perfume of white clover. But I am rooted to the ground, watching the bazaar from afar.
He nudges it closer. ‘Are you not starved?’ Yabghu asks.
‘No, I... I’m feeling ill.’ I jump back quickly. ‘And this isrotting.’
Yabghu frowns. Training is one thing, but accepting his outstretched food is a betrayal to my own kind. My head pounds and I back away down the alleyway, past merchants and smokeless lanterns. I did not know it was possible to be surrounded by throngs of people but feel helplessly alone.
At the end of the path, No-Name is there but distracted. Her long pale fingers flicker over a tea stall. Her form shrinks until she is a girl dressed in a crane-feathered qaftan. My feet slow.
No-Name changes, somehow becoming more than a single person. Now she’s a wispy girl on the shoulders of her brother, who is dressed in monastic robes as he flaunts her across the bazaar, their laughs tumbling forward from the past.
‘Stop that.’My breath catches as the memory slides into place like two lovers snug against each other. It reflects to me: my arm pulled by my half-siblings toward a bazaar beneath showers of stars, smelling the wealth of velvet in stalls, walking my fingers across rolls of silk before we all gather under platanus trees between evening poets.
My hand grasps out to the bright memory, yearning...for who, I cannot be sure, but, like nur, the light is extinguished soon between my fingers.
I return to the present with wet cheeks, not from tears. Thunder quakes the skies; the clouds have broken. Huddling under my shawl, Iwatch the rain punish the late crowd, beating paths on the sand, forming long puddles.
I back away, right into Cemil.
‘Usur-Khan.’ His voice is tight, hand steadying my arm. It slides down, finding the old scar he inflicted on me.
‘Has Yabghu summoned me?’
He hesitates. ‘Yes, but it was a mistake to have you accompany us.’
