THE SCEPTER OF ARAM NAZHAR

THE SCEPTER OF ARAM NAZHAR, by Dariel R. A. Quiogue, artwork by Simon Walpole

There is nothing like a beautiful day at sea to assuage an old man’s misery. I sat on my usual perch at the prow, watching the dolphins gamboling in our bow wave and basking in the welcome heat of the sun, for we were riding the monsoon winds of Nishaan back home to Barisah and the wind was bracing, the previous night chill.

It was a fine day to be on board the Malikah al-Mawsim, the Monsoon Queen, third ship of that name to be commanded by my master Khalid, for praise Urbal, we were headed home on the same hull we’d left Barisah on and with substantial profits for a change. The crew sang in high spirits as they worked and there was a jubilant lightness in everyone’s step, for at long last Khalid’s luck had turned out good.

We were passing the rocky spurs of the Sokhuran Isles, barren and waterless wastes but a delight to the eyes of any Barisan, for they marked the last leg of the voyage home. They were another reason I’d decided to sit on the prow, for the isles’ unearthly limestone formations and giant baobabs with trunks like pregnant wine carafes never fail to delight and fascinate the eye. Once these had been the waters of the Al-Kurath pirate tribe, but in recent years the Malik’s punitive expeditions had driven them farther west.

How was I to know those forgotten of the gods were waiting for us?

Eh. You ask why I failed to divine such a thing, skilled reader of the stars that I am? Blame it on the captain, I say, and on that witch Saffiyah. All right, mayhap she was no witch, but she certainly bewitched Khalid — and me. Think about it. It was the kind of day a captain should be out on deck, his own hand on the helm to enjoy the sun after a cold night, but Khalid was busy with other things, as he’d been all through the night, and had been so for the past seven nights.

And I, because I am gifted with the most charming looks and a harmless air, was in his cabin for most of those nights instead of observing the stars to know our fates as is my wont. This lasted until my enthusiastic approbation of their antics finally got to Saffiyah.

“Oh, naughty monkey!” she had cried in that excruciatingly dulcet voice of hers as I capered among the beams above them with a painful protrusion in my pants. “Put him out, my love!”

And my master Khalid took me by the scruff of the neck, opened the cabin window, then tossed me through it. “Stay out there in the chill, Wali, until you learn manners!” he had cried, then closed the shutters with a bang.

Thus was I deprived of my rightful entertainment, which left me so put out I did not bother trying to read the stars last night.

Alas, the lovely Princess Saffiyah had reason to be disturbed. For while I remember myself as a tall, dark and handsome fellow like my master, though admittedly quite a few years older, bald as an egg and with ridiculously long tufts of white hair sprouting out of both my ears, the world sees me as a monkey. A fine specimen of the mangrove-dwelling macaque, long of tail and fang, strong of limb and handsome in a silken bolero, sirwal and turban, true, but with those same unsightly ear tufts.

Of all the things my accursed wife chose not to change, she had to choose those.

I have been this way longer than I care to remember. Despite the obvious drawbacks and frustrations, though, there are benefits. Once I had been a penurious scholar and philosopher, ever hungry because I spent most of what little I made on ancient artifacts and tomes to study. Now I can have whatever foods I fancy, if not as gifts from my master and his guests, then by my own craft and agility. And feeling the need to exercise that agility, for the strong wind was defeating the warmth of the morning sun, I took it into my head to climb the mainmast.

No one stopped me. The sailors allow me to go anywhere on the ship without interference save the galley, which I had raided once too often. Lithely I scampered up the tall teakwood mast, all the way to the crow’s nest where the boy standing watch welcomed me by scratching my ears. I luxuriated in that heavenly sensation until a trick of the winds brought to my keen monkey nose an unmistakable sour effluvium.

The scent of scores of long-unwashed men at hard labor, with a metallic overtone telling of blood drawn by the lash. Not sailors. Galley slaves.

And in these waters, the only ships that used galley slaves were pirates.

Following my nose, I turned and spotted five light, swift galleys rounding a headland, oars churning the waves white as they fanned out to entrap our ghanjah as a pride of lions surrounds a buffalo. And their trap had been perfectly laid. We had already turned north into the Gulf of Barisah, putting us on a beam reach with the monsoon coming from starboard. The pirates were coming from leeward, meaning if we turned to flee from them we’d be turning into the wind. And my eyes, keener than a man’s for spotting eagle and leopard from well away, went wide as I saw the numbers of fighting men crowding each ship. Each pirate galley was dangerously overloaded with fighters.

My normal eloquence and erudition unavailable to my current form, I screeched and chattered until the lookout turned to see what I was scolding.

“Sail ho! Five ghurabs to larboard, and closing fast!” he cried.

The sailors responded immediately. The ghurabs could only be pirate ships, and by their swallow-tailed black banners, the worst of their kind — the Al-Kurath, may their lower garments crawl with angry crabs and their wine turn into fermented fish guts. Without waiting for instruction the men armed themselves, those belowdecks passing swords, spears, bows and wicker shields to their mates.

The ornately carved door of the captain’s cabin banged open. Khalid rushed out, stopped to grab Saffiyah and give her a quick kiss, then ran up the companionway to the quarterdeck’s larboard rail.

His saif was already bared, the broad, straight ondanicum blade’s serpentine surface patterns rippling in the sunlight like a disturbed cobra or flowing quicksilver, and I could feel the crew’s spirits lift as they saw him ready to take command. He cut a fine figure, that boy. Khalid ibn Umar was tall and rangy, corded muscles rippling visibly beneath his thin silk shirt, his handsome and hawk-like features calm and confident. My master considered himself a most dashing fellow and matchless with a sword, both the one he wore outside his trousers and the other, and to my frequent woe, he is mostly right.

For Khalid’s looks, fighting skill and daring are matched only by his disdain for thinking. There are too many ports in the East now closed to us because Khalid got to know the local prince’s daughter.

Did the fool boy really believe a merchantman’s crew could fight off five ghurabs? Did he even realize the pirates had been waiting specifically for us? Pirates like to hunt together, but not in too much strength — for the more men involved, the lesser each reaver’s share of booty.

But what did they want?

Then it struck me. Of course. We had not been the first Barisan ship to set sail for home from our last stop at Manavar, so it would be known that we carried the Princess Saffiyah of Khorampur and her spectacular dowry. If the pirates had captured one of those earlier ships, its passengers or crew may have traded information on us for their lives.

I scuttled down to hang from the mainsail’s yardarm so I could closely observe the action and see how I could protect my master. My mind was racing but getting nowhere, and once again I cursed my ill-starred fate. In my time I could have raised a storm, a sea serpent, even a demon or two to make the Al-Kurathi change their minds, but now unable to speak in my shape, those powers are locked away, useless, in my head.

Fortunately, there is one person who can hear me: Khalid. But to keep my secret safe and ensure he would do as I told him, I had obtained for him a ring in the souks of Al-Khayrah, one of the fake antiques that city’s peddlers love to boast was rifled from the tombs of forgotten kings of old, and got him to believe a jinn is imprisoned in it. Thus when I speak to Khalid’s mind, he thinks it’s the jinn of the ring.

I made his ring warm to to let him know the ‘jinn’ would speak. “Khalid! You cannot outrun this threat unless you lighten the ship!” I warned him sharply, my words ringing inside his skull but unheard by any other. “Have the sailors start dumping the cargo at once!”

Khalid clenched his fist and glared at the ring. “Not our cargo!” he grated at it. “The men worked hard for that, they deserve to enjoy the profits in Barisah. I’ll give no such order!” Then he turned to the now pale-faced helmsman. “Hard a-port, Hamid. We’ll take those jackals head-on!”

“Master? You mean to fight, against those odds?” quavered Hamid, and I applauded his good sense.

“We’ve no choice. We can’t outrun them against the wind, but with the monsoon at our backs we might be able to plow through them faster than they can all grapple us,” Khalid replied. “Look, they’re fanning out to trap us — aim our prow for that ship!” He pointed at the smallest of the ghurabs.

Hamid opened his mouth to protest again, but got no words out, for an arrow had sprouted from his broad temples.

“Khalid! Down, you fool! I mean, my master!” I warned.

But Khalid did not drop to the deck as I wished, instead standing tall and twirling his sword before him like a waterwheel or dragonflies dancing over a pond. And the volley of arrows sent at him, the pirate bowmen recognizing the richly dressed young man as our captain, were all cut or sent spinning away to the crew’s cheers. There are times when I wish my old head grew long, luxurious locks instead of the short fur that covers it now, so I can tear it out by the roots whenever Khalid does something like this.

“Khalid! Listen to me! Those pirates are after Saffiyah and her dowry!” I yelled in his skull.

“All the more reason to try to break through them, then,” Khalid replied evenly. I raged and ranted at him to change his mind, but to no avail.

Another sailor took over the tiller. Ponderously the Monsoon Queen changed course until its prow pointed at the coming pirates.

More volleys of arrows raked the ship, but this time the sailors were ready, raising shields over themselves while two of them covered Khalid as he ran to the prow. I followed him forward through the rigging, chattering and scolding at the fools on deck. Their faces were set in determination now, somehow calmed by Khalid’s self-assured posturing, crowding the bows behind the captain with their weapons ready.

I screeched even louder when an arrow whizzed a few inches from my ear. Alas, stray arrows do not respect the sanctity of the noncombatant, which I was most determined to remain.

But Khalid was too busy to pay heed to what he considered his beloved but noisy pet. For the first galley was upon us. Grappling hooks caught on the gunwales at the starboard bow. Sailors chopped at the lines, but only a few of them gave; the first yards of the grapnel ropes were wrapped with soaked rawhide, making them devilishly hard to cut. Howling pirates with colorful rags wrapped around their heads, most of them naked to the waist, fell upon our sailors, to be met by Khalid’s dancing sword.

He gave quite a performance, my boy did. He had the strength to split skulls in a single blow, the agility to spin like a dervish or a dust-devil and dance aside from the steel seeking his blood. Coolly he parried stroke after futile stroke by the foes threatening to surround him, then that saif would lick out like a viper’s tongue and a pirate would stumble away, his rags turning crimson.

Khalid’s efforts kept the pirates so occupied that a couple of our sailors with axes managed to chop away all the grapnels. There was a grinding crunch as the Monsoon Queen, powered by the stiff wind, shouldered past the ghurab as a thirsty buffalo shoulders aside a goat between him and the oasis, and then we were free.

A few more pirates managed to jump the growing gap between the ships, leaving some dozen of the ratty scoundrels fighting furiously to get at our masts so they could cut down our sails and thus enable their brethren to catch up. Bitter fighting ramped back and forth on the increasingly slippery deck, neither side expecting quarter nor giving any.

One of the rascals whom I’d thought dead lurched back to his feet behind Khalid, and seeing the captain’s back turned to him, started forward while drawing a wickedly curved dagger.

I screeched and yammered, but no one paid my warning any heed. Another step, and the forgotten of the gods would reach my master. At this I forgot myself and my resolution to see my tender hide safe, and leaped from the rigging onto the pirate’s back. Just before the dagger sank between Khalid’s shoulders I buried my fangs in the pirate’s right shoulder.

He yelled loud enough to deafen my poor old ears, dropping the dagger to seize me with both hands. Khalid whirled at that, saw, and again the saif licked out, into the pirate’s belly then away to clash with yet another reaver’s falchion.

I regained the rigging as fast as only a terrified monkey can while Khalid led the sailors in mopping up the boarders.

Now I saw the rest of the pirate ghurabs streaming after us, their bloodthirsty crews yelling taunts and disappointed curses, for we had broken through their net and had the wind astern. And the Monsoon Queen is the fastest ghanjah ever to sail from Barisah. Inexorably the pirates fell behind as their rowers tired, while the strong and steady monsoon filled our two bellying sails.

Khalid and our sailors were jubilantly hurling their own taunts back at the Al-Kurathi rogues when the cabin door flew open.

Out of it emerged Saffiyah and her nurse Kahina. I got ready to warn Khalid and have him send the women back to safety, for pirate arrows were still flying at us, but before I could do so I noticed both had strange expressions. Saffiyah, unveiled, was glaring in silent, frustrated fury, the kind of fury one radiates when betrayed, while Kahina had a distant look to her eyes while her lips mouthed disturbing words.

And with a flash of belated insight I realized the nurse was holding her mistress at knife point — and she was working sorcery.

I squalled my alarm. Too late. Even as Khalid turned around, the two women wavered like a desert mirage, then a black owl was flying away toward the pirate galleys, a squirming mouse in its claws.

 

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The owl Kahina had become alighted on the largest Al-Kurathi ghurab and disappeared from our view. Immediately afterward the pirates turned and headed back for the rocky islands.

“After them!” Khalid raged, pushing the new helmsman away from the tiller so he could take control. “My honor shall be forever stained if I fail to bring Saffiyah to Barisah to marry our Malik! We must get her back, whatever it takes!”

“No, Captain! They were sailing for the stronghold of the Al-Kurathi! If we follow, we will have to fight the whole tribe!” cried the helmsman, Farouk. “We should head back for Barisah and get help!”

“But what if they kill her? Who knows what that foul sorceress Kahina may have planned for her? She might even eat Saffiyah!”

Ah, the flexibility of the young male mind when it comes to honor! Khalid had conveniently forgotten the standard clause for honorable conduct of someone else’s bride to him; the bride must reach her destination untouched. Well, having seen Saffiyah without her veil, nor much else for that matter, I cannot blame the young idiot. And while the prospect of fighting the entire Al-Kurath tribe was unthinkable with just the Monsoon Queen and her crew, I for once agreed wholeheartedly with Khalid. For my own reasons, of course.

A sorceress who knew the art of shapeshifting!

Shapechanging magic is one of the rarest, most difficult and taxing of all the arcane arts, and even harder to undo. Many a tribal witch doctor claims to know it, but most if not all of them lie. I should know. It was a disagreement over one of the few tomes thought to contain the secret, the Scrolls of Phraat-Hototh, that had driven a wedge between me and my wife Shahida.

You see, my penury had made me rather resourceful in acquiring objects of intellectual curiosity that I could not afford, and I had abstracted the Scrolls from another scholar-collector who knew not what he had so my wife and I could both study it. However, Shahida was proving a far more adept student of the dark arts than myself, daring darker bargains than I could bring myself to, and I was becoming afraid of her. Lest the Scrolls make her even more powerful, I stole them from her and burned them.

Alas, she had by then already mastered one of Phraat-Hototh’s spells, and used it to punish me.

It pains me to say it, but she truly made a monkey out of her husband. And fool that I was, instead of hiding the Scroll so I could use it I had burned the only known source of the counterspell!

Wherefore my fixation on Kahina.

“Khalid, Farouk is right and you know it,” I told him. “Set course for Barisah. The men deserve to get safely home with their profits, and there’s no chance we can sneak into the Al-Kurathi lair on the Monsoon Queen anyway. So let the ship return to Barisah as planned, but pick a few trusted men, and with them take the ship’s boat into the Sokhuras as I know you wish to do.

“Ah, and take your monkey with you. I have use for him.”

“O most crafty and puissant jinn of the ring! Thank you! Thank you! I shall do as you say, and may Urbal, Elait and Sinnu favor us,” Khalid cried, almost in tears.

Farouk and other nearby sailors stared at him then looked away. All the Monsoon Queen’s sailors knew by now of Khalid’s ring, and had survived enough scrapes by the unlikeliest of coincidences that they more than half-believed there was indeed a jinn in it. Still, it made them uneasy, and again I silently cursed the fool boy for not simply thinking his reply to me.

“And yes, though I fear he will betray us with his noise or incorrigible food-stealing, I will take the monkey as you bid. Urbal knows, I have had much better luck in life ever since you told me to buy him,” Khalid added.

I dropped from the mainsail’s yardarm to his shoulder then, and while he was not looking found on myself a flea and let it fall inside his shirt. Betray the company with noise and thievery, indeed!

Khalid began bawling out his orders, entrusting the ship to Farouk as both the first and second mates were wounded, and ordering them to make for Barisah, then calling for four of the crew’s best fighters to prepare the ship’s dinghy. As he did so he began scratching himself with increasingly vexed vigor.

The dinghy was packed with provisions for a few days then lowered onto the water, and when Khalid boarded it I was on his shoulder. We did not know where to go, of course, other than deeper into the Sokhuran archipelago in the pirates’ wake, but I meant to address that after nightfall, when I could observe the stars.

For now, our task was to get among the islands without the pirates’ observing us. Instead of following the exact route the pirates had taken, I directed Khalid to take us to another island, where we found a hidden cove to land in. Khalid wanted to climb to the island’s highest point to reconnoiter, but something made me tell him not to go. Instead we lay hidden low among the rocks, and before nightfall I spotted flashes of light from the next island as if someone was catching the sun in a mirror.

The pirates had indeed posted a lookout. Great was our relief at not having landed on the wrong island. I cast about for answering flashes, but saw none. What had the pirate lookouts signaled? Had they spotted us after all, or was that a prearranged all clear, whose absence would have alerted our quarry?

Khalid was in a wretched state that night. As soon as it was dark and it was safe to stand up and move about, he refused to sit still. He paced up and down, muttering darkly to himself, casting anxious glances westward where the pirates had gone, and would take no food.

At last he could bear it no longer in silence, and went off a little way among some large rocks by the shore and rubbed the ring. “O jinn of the ring, speak to me! Is Saffiyah alive? How much time do we have before that witch Kahina sacrifices her or worse?”

I scampered to the rocks to sit on his shoulder. “Honestly, I do not know yet, my master,” I admitted. “But consider the facts. The pirates put out an oversize force to make sure they could catch us. Only when we were close to defeating the pirates did Kahina abduct Saffiyah herself. And she did so by transforming them both. That is extremely difficult and dangerous for a sorcerer, so I believe she did it only because she could find no other way.

“From these observations, my master, we can tell several things. First, Kahina needs Saffiyah alive. Second, she is in league with the Al-Kurath, and is headed for one of their tribal strongholds. Third, the Al-Kurath would only take a sorceress among them and risk kidnapping a princess meant for the Malik’s harem if they anticipated she would give them impunity. And fourth, and most important, Kahina and the Al-Kurath expect to gain something far more valuable than Saffiyah’s dowry.”

“Having Saffiyah as hostage would give them impunity, all right,” observed Khalid in a rare flash of fear-inspired sagacity.

“True. But would they need a sorceress for that?” I countered. “No, I feel their plans come from Kahina and not the other way around. Perhaps she considers Saffiyah the key to some powerful secret.”

“You are learned in the mysteries of the ancients, O jinn of the ring. Have you any idea what that is, and where?”

“My master, I wish I could tell you. I will know more after tonight.”

That thought was the most disturbing thing to ever bother me in our adventures together so far. Khorampur’s jungle-choked mountain dales are the richest known source of emeralds and rubies known to man, and Saffiyah’s dowry included enough stones of such size and quality she could easily buy a kingdom with it. But the pirates had let us get away once they had Saffiyah. What could be so precious that they would abandon the attempt to steal her dowry for its sake?

There was a knot in my little stomach as I found a rock spire to observe the heavens from. Fortunately I had learned Saffiyah’s birthday, which allowed me to identify the stars to which her fate was tied.

Now the night sky is the writing tablet of the gods, and the stars the characters with which they write the fate of the world and everything in it before it happens. Their spelling, however, is as inconstant as Khalid’s. Not from lack of patience to learn to do it properly, but rather to keep humankind forever guessing, for their amusement.

I stayed up until dawn trying to read the stars, for some of Saffiyah’s birth stars rose very late, and I came away with more questions than answers. Her first star was in the constellation of The Lamp, signifying forgotten secrets revealed; her life-star was bisected by the line of The Bridge, which I read to mean her fate stood on a knife’s edge; but strangest and most disturbing of all, her soul-star was coming into alignment with the evil red star Nashargul, a patron of sorcerers and eldritch crafts.

And her fate and soul stars would be aligned, at their zeniths, a little to our west in three or four more nights.

At sunrise I was back in camp, rifling Khalid’s bag of dried dates while waiting for him to wake. As soon as he was up, I again made the ring warm so he would listen to me. “I believe I have discovered where Saffiyah is, or will be in three or four nights. Her stars point to an island to our west. We will know it because it lies directly beneath the stars Gishanna and Nashargul, which shall be aligned on the night you must strike.”

Khalid rolled off his blankets and swore. “By Urbal’s brass balls, O jinn of the ring, can’t you be more exact than that?”

“What does the jinn say, Captain?” asked Sabir, one of the four sailors we’d taken with us.

Khalid repeated what I had told him, and Sabir became thoughtful, stroking his villainous mustaches. “Grand Sokhura is about forty miles west of us, so it should be directly beneath those stars. I have heard that there are hills there that are not hills,” he ventured. “My own uncle went looking for treasure on that island once, though he found nothing of value. He swore til the end of his days though that he found at the foot of White Rock Mountain a buried vault that he could not open. He said it was huge, and had this sign upon its stones.”

Then Sabir did a thing that made my heart leap. He bent down and sketched a complex figure in the sand, and I recognized the sigil of the legendary Aram Nazhar, supposedly one of the greatest sorcerer-kings of Bel-eth-Shahr.

“That is what we are looking for!” I told Khalid. “We should make our way to Grand Sokhura immediately and find places to hide on the mountain so we can take them by surprise.”

“But what of the pirates? Can you do something to distract them, O jinn of the ring?” Khalid frowned. “If the entire Al-Kurath tribe is there we will need a very good distraction to have any chance of success.”

“Alas, my master, I am well and truly prisoned,” I admitted honestly. This monkey form I wear prisons me as well as any sigiled brass vessel can prison a jinn. “I can advise you and foresee things for you, but I cannot work my other powers for you. What I can do however is use your monkey to scout ahead so we can come up with a good plan.”

“Some jinn you are,” Khalid groused under his breath. “I find the first jinn ring to be heard of in centuries, and you’re nothing like the legends of old.”

Even though mistaken in the details, his insight cut so close to the truth I had not the heart to drop another flea into his clothes to punish his insolence. Also, the prospect of dealing with the sorceries left behind by the evil kings of Bel-eth-Shahr was making me weak in the knees.

 

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Though Grand Sokhura was a mere forty miles away, we took nearly three days to row there, pausing then going around one islet after another as a cat picks a circuitous route to approach a flock of pigeons. Khalid and his men took turns at the oars, while, following the supposed jinn of the ring’s advice, I would be let off from time to time to scout ahead.

We would row to the far side of an island from Grand Sokhura, just near enough for me to leap from the boat onto the rocks, from which I would cautiously creep to the island’s tallest point to take a look around. In this way I was able warn Khalid of Al-Kurathi watchers, for while they had taken positions that made them invisible from a ship on the water my sharp monkey eyes could easily spot them from on high. And if they ever saw me, they would see only a typical wild monkey common to these lands, for I had divested myself of my bright clothes and turban.

Not for the first time, though, I wished my wife had chosen to turn me into a falcon or raven instead. How easy it would have been to fly right to Grand Sokhura in bird form! And how much trouble I could have avoided had I wings!

On the other hand, a bird is rather fragile, while a macaque’s body, though small, can be surprisingly tough. As I was retreating from my last position on the third day, having scouted the last approach to our destination, I was discovered by the desert island’s surprising wildlife. My first warning was a familiar barking sound — familiar, because I make such sounds myself.

The rocks I had thought empty of all life but hidden crabs were now covered with monkeys, a gang of nearly two dozen, all of them barking, chattering and shrieking at me, jumping up and down, and four big males stalked towards me baring their fangs in exaggerated, threatening yawns. And the troop was blocking my way back to the boat.

I cast my eyes down and tried to sidle around them. Painful experience had taught me monkeys dislike eye contact from strange monkeys, and the handsomer the stranger, the stronger the antipathy. I was, of course, fated to earn this troop’s special ire. When I went right, the troop shifted right, and when I went left they too scurried to my left. And the four males were coming ever closer.

I tried retreating toward the sea, hoping that would mollify them. They followed. Soon I found myself cornered atop a high bluff, below which the green sea boomed and foamed against sharp rocks. The ring of monkeys drew tighter.

I dared not summon Khalid and his men for help. A pirate galley lay anchored off Grand Sokhura, and the promontory I’d been cornered on was visible from it.  There was nothing else I could do. When the wise ways of Wali the philosopher fail, one must resort to the methods of Khalid, and pray the gods find one amusing enough to preserve.

Finding a stone — I wish it had been larger — I hurled it full in the face of the biggest monkey. Then with a terrible cry I rushed the troop, running upright and waving my arms to look bigger. They retreated, realized they’d been tricked, and rushed me. Ah, what a battle that was! We scratched and bit and screamed — mostly we screamed, myself loudest of them all — and then, using a human trick as if I were some dirty street urchin, I slammed my little fist where the troop leader’s ancestors lived.

He leaped high into the air, perhaps ten feet straight up, and gave a terrible howl which must have frightened his troop so much they abandoned their abuse of me and scattered. I ran and did not stop running until I could leap back into the boat, the troop on my heels.

“Row around this island to the west, and make for the islet shaped like a vizier’s tall turban,” I told Khalid after giving myself a moment to catch my breath. “There is an Al-Kurathi ghurab anchored off Grand Sokhura opposite this island. From the turban islet though, we can approach unseen, as there’s a headland blocking the view. It’s rockier on that side but the surf is not too bad, you should be able to land or at least swim to shore. Also, from there the approach to White Rock is over very rough terrain, so you should be able to stay hidden easily from the pirates.”

“That is excellent news and advice, O jinn of the ring,” enthused Khalid. Our success in the game of eluding the pirate watchers had improved his spirits considerably. “We shall do as you say. But tell me — what did this foolish monkey say to the locals, to get them so upset with the fellow?”

I bit him.

The sailors only chuckled as Khalid barely repressed a squall that would’ve echoed against the cliffs, then threatened to give his monkey a thrashing to remember. I guess I am lucky that the boy is a gentle soul, and despite the frequency with which he threatens my poor monkey form with the direst punishments he has never followed through with them.

He and the sailors now bent their back to rowing in earnest, for the route I had found them led through channels with swift currents that threatened to dash us against the rocks of one islet then another. The currents seriously slowed us down, and it was near dusk by the time we made the landing on Grand Sokhura.

As we neared shore Khalid swore, and I quailed. The tide was rising, and foaming surf was now crashing with growing force upon the rocky beach I had directed him to. Without waiting for an order, Sabir and Maruf who were manning the oars, backed water. They had to pull hard to keep the tide from rushing our boat onto the island’s fangs.

“The boat will not survive landing there, will it?” Khalid murmured.

“No, Captain,” said Sabir. “We must look for another beach, or try again tomorrow.”

I made Khalid’s ring warm. “You must land tonight, for we cannot risk any more delay. I know not what time Saffiyah will be brought here tomorrow nor what she is required for, so we should be in hiding atop White Rock tonight. But you cannot risk the boat, for you need a means to get away.

“Choose the two best swordsmen from these four and swim ashore with them,” I told him. “Then let the two who remain row back to deep water, and look for a safe place to land and hide the boat. They can rejoin us at the mountain if they find a landing, or if not, await us at the turban island, in which case you must steal one of the pirates’ boats to get away.

“I don’t like it,” Khalid muttered, pulling at his short beard and his brow furrowed with concern. “Three swords is very much less than five. But so be it. Your advice has been good so far, O jinn of the ring, so we’ll continue to do as you say.”

He gave the sailors his instructions. It turned out however Sabir and Maruf were not our best fighters, but they were the best swimmers of the four, while our best fighter, Farid, who was a devil with both sword and bow, swam like a stone. Farid was thus left in charge of the boat with Amr, while Khalid, Sabir and Maruf strapped their weapons to their backs and slipped into the water.

As for myself, I knew very well that sharks prowled these waters, specially with dusk falling, and had no wish to learn their opinion of monkey flesh. I made the crossing sitting on Khalid’s back. I am afraid my eyes were very big and round as I watched a triangular fin break the surface, head for Khalid, then, thank the gods, abruptly swing away. Perhaps it’s a good thing after all that a merchant dhow has no space for a proper bath. Or perhaps it liked not the hint of Saffiya’s perfume that still clung to him.

As soon as we were within range I jumped from Khalid’s head for a jutting rock. The surf was growing higher and stronger, and as the last wave ebbed it threatened to drag Khalid and Sabir back out to sea. Then I yelped as something cold and clammy seized my tail and nearly yanked me off my perch. In panic I screeched and tried my hardest to bound for shore, but the grasp would not let go.

Then I heard Khalid, foaming and burbling as he gasped, “For the love of all the gods, monkey, hold tight!” I turned and found it was Khalid who had hold of my tail with one hand, and a groggy-looking Sabir in the other. The wave must have dashed Sabir hard against another rock, and I believe only his turban had kept his skull from cracking like an egg, for there was blood on his face. I clung to my perch with all fours, until Khalid was able to get Sabir to also hold onto the rock while more waves pounded them.

As soon as there was a lull in that beating, the men dragged themselves to their feet and half-crawled, half-ran for the shore, and you can be sure that as soon as they let go of my tail I was bounding ahead of them. For I had seen the shark’s fin again, and Maruf, who lagged behind, swore he got out of the water only just in time to avoid the jaws closing on his leg. “I could feel that devil closing in on me from behind,” he growled, shaking his fist at the shark as soon as he was safely on the beach. “Let us rest here a moment and wait for my manhood to grow back, for by Ashirah’s bountiful bosoms I feel the thing has retreated all the way into my belly.”

Khalid and Sabir gave low chuckles at that, then helped Maruf gather up his gear. Maruf was a big bull of a man who always brought two swords and half a dozen daggers to a fight, for he would often strike hard enough to break whatever blade he was using. He had also taken along a heavy bronze-studded shield. It was these, especially the latter, that had impeded his swimming.

I went ahead of them to scout a path among the tumbled rock formations to the white mountain looming above us. Grand Sokhura was an island carved entirely from the bones of the earth, all spires and columns and crags of limestone with not a hint of soft soil to cushion the feet, and without me to find a path the men would likely have broken a leg or ankle, for the sun had sunk as they started the climb. Fortunately the moon was round and pregnant in a near-cloudless sky, so for most of the way we could clearly see where we were going.

A staccato chatter interrupted my ascent as I rounded a bend, and my blood froze. A troop of monkeys barred the way, thrice as many as the gang of tailed ruffians that had hounded me earlier.

I was about to retreat, but then Khalid appeared, and the monkeys stopped their advance, chattered fearfully, then wheeled about and took off. Khalid patted my head, which was still turbanless so I could blend among the wildlife, and whispered, “Say nothing to your cousins, Little Wali, lest you rile them up like your kindred back there.”

I bared my fangs at him then continued the climb. Before midnight we were well up the mountain and ensconced in a hidden hollow. The monkeys though, proved to be a blessing. By watching their movements I discovered the spring where they drank, to which I led Khalid and Maruf to refill their empty water skins.  As my companions secured water, I continued following the monkeys as they called each other to feed, and by them discovered the pirates’ camp, where they sought morosely for scraps. I crept closer to the campfires to reconnoiter.

My spirits rose as I saw there were only four tents. There were only about ten or twelve pirates moving between the campfires or sitting and drinking a sour wine whose reek easily reached me over many yards, and sometimes idly pitching rocks at the monkeys. Four kid goats were tied up at one side of the camp, all of them pure white and perfectly formed, which meant they were likely brought for sacrifice. This gave me hope Saffiyah may not have been taken for the same purpose, though of course it was no guarantee.

The tents were pitched on a clear level space between the foot of White Rock Mountain and a low hill that I surmised to hide Aram Nazhar’s tomb. Between the tents and the hill were piled stacks of cut wood, mostly baobab boughs, and I noted the monkeys often going there and pawing the hard, dry ground, only to leave in disappointed pique. As I prowled the outskirts of the camp I also found myself treading on many bits of crushed eggshells, which on sniffing proved fresh.

Now I realized the monkeys were hanging around the camp, despite their fear of man, because they were starving. The pirates had cut the fruit and leaf-bearing boughs of the baobabs and raided the seagull nests for eggs, and these were the monkeys’ main food.

As the moon approached its zenith the largest tent’s flap was thrown open, and out came Saffiyah propelled by Kahina.

Again I caught my breath at the beauty of both women. Both their heads were uncovered, revealing their fine faces in full. Saffiyah’s perfect, dusky patrician features were proud in spite of her obvious fear, and she was clad only in a voluminous cloak which slipped open from time to time to reveal a sweetly rounded breast or flash of smooth thigh. Behind her, Kahina’s face was like palest alabaster in the moonlight, and her robes bulged even more grandly in the right places than Saffiyah’s cloak. Little wonder Khalid had seduced them both, the nurse first so he could get at her charge.

Kahina’s expression was not unfriendly, though there was a steely determination in her eyes as she pushed Saffiyah ahead of her.

“Where are you taking me, witch, and what infernal deed are you planning?” I heard Saffiyah hiss.

Kahina only laughed. “Why do you think so ill of me, Princess? We are only going for a bath. You must be purified while the moon is at its zenith, to prepare you to meet your most puissant ancestor.”

“So you mean to kill me tomorrow? You serpent! How could you! My family took you in, a homeless refugee, treated you kindly, gave you gold and every comfort with an open hand, and this is how you show your gratitude?”

“I was misspoken,” Kahina chuckled. “When I said meet your ancestor, I meant it literally. For on this island lies the last resting place and treasure vault of your distant ancestor Aram Nazhar, the last sorcerer-king of Bel-eth-Shahr. Only a descendant of Aram Nazhar may open his tomb, and then only on a night when Gishana and Nashargul align over this island, which happens only once every hundred and forty years!

“Be at ease and stop trying to escape, little Saffiyah. What we will do should bring you no harm, unless you offend the spirit of Aram Nazhar. And afterward, why, we’ll even let you go on to Barisah and your marriage with that old toad the Malik! I might even convince my father, Shaikh Barshid, not to charge a ransom for you. The gods know, after tomorrow night we’ll be so powerful that all the Malik’s gold will be as the old fruit left unsold in the souk to us.

“And besides, it would be unfair to charge ransom for a bride who’s no longer a maiden,” Kahina added with amused malice.

Saffiyah glared at the witch. Suddenly she broke away, running for the sea — not toward the gently shelving beach where the pirates had left their boats, but toward the cliffs where the surf continued to roar and boom. My heart was in my mouth as she paused at the edge, steeling herself to jump. But Kahina raised a hand and incanted something. Saffiyah froze in place, then with her face set in fear and rage, began walking with unwillingly mechanical steps back to Kahina.

The two women’s loveliness, light and dark, nearly hypnotized me. Belatedly though I realized that they were heading toward the very spring I had found. I faded away into the shadows, planning to race ahead to warn Khalid. This was a golden opportunity to snatch Saffiyah away and arrest Kahina, from whom I meant to extract the secret of shapechanging by whatever means necessary.

But Kahina apparently did not trust her sorcerous grip on the princess to last, for she now called for some of the pirates to accompany them. And the Al-Kurathi dogs, knowing she would be giving Saffiyah a bath, all came trotting eagerly after them with hot and hungry eyes.

The sorceress glared a warning at them. “I had not meant to take you rogues along, but you must keep the girl from getting away from me again,” she hissed.  “So come and watch — but watch only! If any of you try to touch her I swear I shall shrivel the wretch’s flesh from his bones, and he will watch his own limbs fall apart leaving only the skeleton before he dies! Do you understand, you dogs?”

“We understand, O Kahina of the Ages,” the pirates murmured as they bowed.

“Then, Tarik, Omar, and Hafiz, you three go back and watch the camp. The rest, come with me, and at the spring spread out so our little bird here cannot escape again.”

I realized then that we had never known the witch’s true name, for Kahina had been a title all along; it meant Seeress. The pieces of the puzzle were falling into place, and the picture they formed was terrifying. I had heard dim rumors the Al-Kurathi claimed descent from the survivors of Bel-eth-Shahr, in fact from the royal guard of Aram Nazhar himself. No wonder then that their Shaikh knew the secret of the king’s tomb, and had had his daughter raised as a sorceress so they could unearth the fabled treasure, knowing the fateful date would fall in her generation. The pirates had awaited this event for a long time. They would fight like lions when we tried to take Saffiyah and Kahina.

I ran for the spring, my hopes of an easy ambush spoiled.

 

 

###

 

I found them in the rocks not far above the spring. Khalid was all for attacking anyway, anxious to get Saffiyah back as quickly as possible, but in a furiously whispered argument Sabir, Maruf and I were barely able to dissuade him.

The spring was in the bottom of a gully, from which there was only one walkable exit. We would have to come to it by climbing down its sides, and while easy escape would have been possible if we had just Kahina to deal with, but if we tried it now, we would be climbing back up the steep slopes with our backs to ten angry pirates.

“We should wait until just before dawn, then raid their camp while they’re all asleep,” suggested Maruf. “The jinn should know which tent she’s in.”

Sabir checked the position of the moon then grimaced. “The tide will be going out at that time. Since Farid and Amr have not joined us, they must have failed to find another landing. That means stealing one of the pirates’ boats — and at low tide those longboats are too heavy for us to push all the way to the water in time to avoid pursuit. And if we’re to swim, we’ll be jumping into rocky shallows.”

“By Urbal’s balls, are we to admit ourselves defeated by what-ifs?” growled Khalid. “I’ll go and take my chances now rather than just watch as Saffiyah is sacrificed or worse!” He surged to his feet, loosening his sword from the scabbard.

“Stop!” I cried into Khalid’s skull, so loud I’m sure his brain pan rang like a struck bell. “Wait, my master, wait! I know now the best time to strike. It shall be at the climax of or immediately after the ritual Kahina plans to perform tomorrow. I shall give you the signal to strike. Be sure you are hidden as low down the slope as you can by then. Go down the other side of the mountain now and work your way around while the moon is still high. You may sleep through the morning — we know Kahina can only open the tomb at night, so you’ll have time to rest. Go now.”

In truth, it would have been safer to assume position at dawn, despite the risk of being seen, for a fall was more likely under night’s cloak. But I had to give Khalid something to do, else he might charge in immediately as he threatened. I wish the boy had been born without this irksome excess of bravery — but what could I do?

I did, however, have the germ of a mad idea brewing. It would be a gamble, but no bigger than what we were already doing.

The pirate camp was a flurry of labor starting from dawn. As I watched from hiding on the mountainside three more boatloads of pirates arrived, bringing yet more sacrificial animals, great amphorae of either wine or oil, likely both from the sheer number, and yet more firewood. Kahina or the shaikh must have called for these the day before or earlier. The supplies were carried to camp, and Kahina emerged from her tent to direct the arrangement of the wood into two great pyres.

After this she had two goats slain and their blood collected in great calabash bowls, then used that blood to paint a wide circle of arcane sigils, a task that took her until noon. The work paused only for a quick midday meal, then Kahina retreated back to her tent from which now arose a drumming and chanting that went without pause while the shadows lengthened and the cerulean skies turned the color of brass, then fire. My heart began to sink as there was no sign of the new arrivals leaving. Khalid and his two men would be facing not a dozen pirates, but nearly forty.

Would my trick work?

As the sun sank beneath the horizon, Kahina came out again with Saffiyah in tow. Saffiyah moved with an odd and unsteady languor, as if drunk or drugged. The sorceress made a sign. Oil was poured over the pyres, amphora after amphora of it, then Saffiyah was made to take a torch to them. Then the burliest pirates seized half a dozen goats, dragged them before the hill, and as Kahina chanted over them, slit their throats. The first set of sacrifices was immediately followed by another, then another until all the goats were gone. As each set of goats was butchered, men with bloody knives presented choice parts to Kahina, who threw them into the fires.

The rest of the goats’ flesh was placed on spits before smaller cooking fires, and sweaty pirate cooks bathed the turning meat with what smelled like butter. Soon the air was heavy with smoke, while the reek of burning flesh warred with the tantalizing aroma of roasting kid.

I heard loose rocks shift behind me, along with an expectant chattering. The starving monkeys, who had fled earlier at the screams of the dying goats and the reek of hot blood and entrails were returning, irresistibly drawn to the food.

When they tried to approach the camp, however, the pirates threw stones at them, and one unfortunate drew the attention of a pirate who’d brought a bow. With an evil smile the archer nocked, drew, and loosed, and the monkeys scattered away again as their shot comrade rolled and howled and died in the dust.

Saffiyah was made to sit on an improvised high seat, like a queen observing festivities in her honor. A strangely wrought crown, heavily patinaed with age, was set on her head, and her arms crossed before her breasts in a ritual attitude, allowing me to glimpse what may have been a massive blood-red ruby on a finger of her left hand. And I let out a hiss of awe, for these were unmistakably the Crown and the Ring of Aram Nazhar, each a great artifact of sorcery in itself.

Legend, however, claimed that Aram Nazhar had crafted three items that would form the pillars of his eldritch power. A ring, a crown, and greatest of them all, a scepter. All three had been lost with his death, but there were rumors that the crown and ring, taken by his usurper sons, had resurfaced some centuries ago. The scepter however had remained hidden, and it was said only one who wore both ring and crown could safely handle the scepter.

At last I knew what Saffiyah had been brought here for.

Kahina began dancing between the two blazing pyres to the music of flutes and drums. Hers though, was not the mellifluent, teasing dance of the harem or courtesan, but a much more primal expression, strident and stamping, and as she danced she beat a small hand drum in a martial rhythm. Led by their white-bearded shaikh, whom I surmised was the legendary pirate chief Barshid ibn Akhtar, the gathered Al-Kurathi began to chant in time to her drumming and dancing. Outside the circle of firelight, however, the monkeys were beginning to return, helplessly drawn by the aroma of the roasting meat.

This went on for hours.

By then the moon had risen. And now, as if in response to her call, or perhaps the presence of Saffiyah, the landscape began to change. The rocky hillside they were facing seemed to melt away, being replaced, little by little, by a pair of massive stone doors. When the moon reached its zenith the doors were perfectly delineated, almost sharper than real life.

At that point Kahina led the chanting to a crescendo, then she stamped one last time and the chant also stopped. Now she was bowing to Saffiyah, then taking her hand, led her to the doors. “Get ready,” I told Khalid.

Saffiyah moved like a sleepwalker, and did not resist as Kahina marched her to the great doors, then placed the princess’ little dark hands over the valves, one on each slab. The doors rumbled open. Then Kahina called for a torch, and together she and Saffiyah entered the tomb.

A pregnant hush fell over the pirates. I could see the whites of their eyes, wide and afraid, and the fingers of many twitched to their breasts where hung various charms and amulets. Lips moved in whispered prayers to various gods. Even three hundred centuries after his death, the name of Aram Nazhar still struck fear, and the prospect of disturbing his ghost was even worse.

The glow of a torch reappeared within the yawning black portal, grew and brightened, and then Kahina and Saffiyah emerged. The princess was now carrying a heavy, mace-like scepter carved with winding serpents, whose joined and gaping fanged heads formed its head. A cry of awe was torn from the Al-Kurathi pirates, and many of them fell to their knees, bowing and praying a mighty blessing upon Kahina and their shaikh.

The pair went to old Shaikh Barshid, who rose from his seat of honor as Kahina divested Saffiyah of scepter, crown, then ring, placing each on a cushion held for her by a kneeling Al-Kurathi tribesman. The cushion-bearer then presented the regalia to Barshid, who ceremoniously refused them and signed for Kahina to put them on. She did so triumphantly, in the reverse order she’d removed them. Then she turned to the pirates, raising the scepter high. As she did so, more wine, oil and meat were thrown into the flames, which again blazed high and spat showers of sparks.

And fearing that her next action would be to test those powers, I put my own plan into effect. “Now!” I called to Khalid. Then I ran for the camp on all fours, through the ring of surprised monkeys, straight for the nearest spitted goat that been taken off the fire. I snatched off one of the goat’s legs and waved it over my head with an exultant cry.

The monkeys lost their heads. Hunger and jealousy at last overcoming their fear, they charged after me and the food I was taunting them with. And before the pirates could guess what I was doing, I ran for the tomb doors, the entire monkey troop hard on my heels. If I faltered just one step, I was sure the enraged creatures would tear me apart for that goat leg. But when I got to the doors I threw the goat’s leg in.

The monkeys barreled past me and into Aram Nazhar’s final sanctum.

There was a pandemonium of clanging, crashing metalware, breaking pottery, and shrill screams as the fifty or sixty monkeys fought over the meat. I got out of there, hoping for and fearing what would come next. And then the monkeys were barreling back out, hooting in absolute terror. Heavy footsteps were coming after the fleeing simians, preceded by a blast of otherworldly chill that froze my guts. The pirates wailed in terror and began to back away.

“Now, Khalid!” I called. “Get Saffiyah while they’re confused!”

A tall creature emerged from the tomb. It was shaped like a man but wrapped in moldering bandages, gold bands adorning its arms and legs, a gold mask of terrifying visage and sweeping beard of chains covering its face. In its hands was a pair of large bronze swords, their forward third curved like sickles but reversed. There could be no doubt who this was: Aram Nazhar himself.

 

 

The pirates ran, all except for a few doughty warriors, Kahina, and the old shaikh.

The creature spotted Kahina, or perhaps his attention was magically drawn to his old regalia, and he pointed the sword in his right hand at her. “You! You wear my crown and my ring and hold my scepter, but you are no descendant of mine!” thundered the mummy of Aram Nazhar.  “You have not the right! Now shall you be punished!”

“What right do I need, when I have the power!” Kahina cried back. She raised the scepter. “O Akhurammalikh, servant of the scepter, I call you! Come forth and do battle in my name!”

A blasphemous dark shape materialized before the sorceress, as if the night itself had coalesced into solid or semi-solid form. Something that was dimly manlike, and may have had many limbs growing out of its misshapen shoulders, but the form kept shifting like clouds, so I might describe it as having eight arms, while another said a thousand, and at different times we might both be right. The only details constant in the demon were its blazing orange eyes and great, multi-tusked maw from which lolled a tongue tipped with a toothy mouth like a lamprey’s.

It advanced upon the mummy of Aram Nazhar, then stopped. The ancient king saluted it and boomed, “Hail, Akhurammalikh, my old servant. By our ancient bargain, sealed in my own blood, I command you to strip my regalia from that impostor! You may do as you please with her after!”

But the being called Akhurammalikh did not move. For pregnant moments it did not take another elephantine step forward, though its form kept shifting. Then it began to laugh. “My oath was to serve as the servant of your scepter, O my old master. And it is my mistress Kahina who holds it, not you. Farewell!”

The demon smote. Aram Nazhar interposed his left-hand kopesh, but it rang like a hundred bells struck in rapid succession, and the ancient bronze was shattered. The revenant king reeled back, and Akhurammalikh struck again. This time Aram Nazhar was driven to his knees, and a foulness filled the air as his dead flesh was torn apart by a hundred invisible blows.

Akhurammalikh closed in for the kill. But before it could do it paused, its head swaying from side to side in uncertainty. It raised its nose, like a horse that has scented the waters of home.

Then I heard the clangor of steel and Khalid’s voice shouting his war-cry.

I whirled and saw that Khalid had rushed unseen upon Shaikh Barshid and Kahina, and somehow he’d torn the crown from her head, leaving the demon masterless. Now he was measuring steel against the old chieftain, Sabir and Maruf right behind him keeping the last brave pirates away.

Khalid was afire, fighting as I had never seen him fight before, but Barshid, though his beard and brows were like pure snow, demonstrated why he’d been known as the Lion of the Gulf. For Barshid despite his age was huge and powerfully muscled, and where age had taken his speed, it had added to his cunning. Again and again his long saif came close to ending Khalid’s life.

But drowning out the noise of their swords was a shrill scream that went on and on and on — and I saw it was Kahina, now in Akhurammalikh’s grip as he dissolved back into the darkness, Kahina’s pale form dissolving with him.

And Aram Nazhar was laughing in unholy triumph as he shouted, “Aye, Akhurammalikh, take her and scourge her with your unholy flames until the world’s end!”

“As we agreed, my old master, any who try to wield the scepter without the crown and ring are mine,” the demon laughed, and then he and Kahina were gone.

“And I shall punish these defilers of my tomb,” said the undead king.

Aram Nazhar moved again, his remaining sword arcing down, the bronze glinting redly in the firelight. Khalid stared in shock as Shaikh Barshid was cloven in two right before his eyes. Then my master was again fighting for his life as Aram Nazhar turned upon him. Maruf and Sabir darted in from behind the mummy, their blades bloody from pirates they had dispatched, but the unliving king could not be taken by surprise. One of the mummy’s blows broke Maruf’s shield and the arm beneath, while Sabir, barely parrying a sweeping cut, was hurled backward by its force almost into one of the still-blazing pyres.

It was plain no mortal sword could defeat the ancient king’s wrath. But perhaps there was still a way to stay his anger.

“Khalid! Get the ring and crown on Saffiyah, then put the scepter in her hands!” I cried.

“Do it yourself, you useless jinn!” Khalid gasped as he desperately threw himself to the ground and rolled away from yet another of Aram Nazhar’s powerful blows. “I’m busy!”

I stared at them, my limbs frozen. I was forced to admit to myself that I was a coward. And cowards do not deserve friendship. But how could I stand back and do nothing? I was determined not to die in this accursed monkey’s form that I wear — but by the gods, could I expect to live forever? No.

I ran into the fray, snatching up the fallen ring and crown, dodging between the legs of the three men and the unholy creature they fought. Saffiyah, still drugged, had not even the will to move away from the danger, but did not resist either when I took her hand and led her a little ways back, then put on her the crown and ring. Then back into the fray again, almost getting my spine broken as I barely dodged the giant mummy’s stamping, bronze and gold-shod feet, snatched up the scepter, and put it in Saffiyah’s hands.

The desperate battle continued. Merely placing the regalia on Aram Nazhar’s descendant had not been enough. I realized then that Saffiyah could not just wear the treasures, she had to claim her heritage herself.

But she was still in a drugged daze.

I regretfully apologized to Khalid, to Malik Ambar ibn Rafik of Barisah who would be her husband, and to Saffiyah for what I must do. Then I stood up, saw I did not reach high enough, jumped up her thigh — and sank my teeth into her haunches, round as full moons and smoother than any silk woven in Wulong.

She shrieked, her magnificent eyes coming alive at last, and swatted me away with the scepter.

“Khalid! Tell Saffiyah she must claim her heritage!” I cried into his skull. He evaded yet another of Aram Nazhar’s swipes then did as I asked.

Saffiyah nodded. Then she cried out to the undead king, as if now the scepter guided her words. “O King! Father of my fathers! Behold, I Saffiyah, a princess of Khorampur, am your descendant, and I claim my inheritance from you! Cease attacking my companions, I pray you, and return to your rest. Your ancient regalia of power is safe with me.”

The mummy stopped. His sword arm dropped to his side as he looked Saffiyah up and down. “Well met, daughter of my blood,” he said in a voice like the haunting desert wind. “It is good to know my line continues. Use those treasures well, and make yourself a queen among queens. To my long sleep I now return.” And the dead king turned and marched back into his tomb, and the great stone doors slammed shut after him.

The earth rumbled and shook beneath our feet, and then the top of the hill came tumbling down, burying the entrance to the tomb.

Saffiyah ran into Khalid’s arms.

 

###

 

The pirates in their headlong flight had taken to their boats and thence to their galleys. Even as we trudged wearily to the beach we saw the ghurabs setting full sail, their prows pointed homeward. Two longboats however had been left behind, and Khalid commandeered one of these.

The longboat had its own mast and sail, unlike our little dinghy, so at sunrise the men raised the sail. By noon we had found Amr and Farid waiting on the island like a vizier’s turban, and taking the dinghy in tow, set course for Barisa.

As the sunlight turned golden and the mast’s shadow reached farther and farther away, Khalid sat in the bows holding Saffiyah’s hands. They had come to somewhat tearful understanding over their future, Saffiyah having managed to convince the youth that his family should not risk the Malik’s disfavor by asking for the royal marriage to be canceled. After a while I could see my master begin smiling again, and when Saffiyah made some teasing comment, he laughed.

Then the girl looked over the boat’s side. “Khalid, tell me, how deep are these waters?” she suddenly asked.

He looked about him. We were now in a broad gap between two islands, and the sea here was a dark sapphire, not the jade or malachite of the shallows. “Quite deep, I should think,” he said.

“Could a pearl diver, say, reach the bottom?”

“I should think not.”

“Good. Because I cannot stand these blasphemous things, precious to my heritage though they be,” Saffiyah said fiercely. Then one by one, she threw the scepter, the crown, and the ring into the sea, thus throwing away the equivalent of ten shiploads of gold or more, and my chance of trading them for the knowledge I sought.

And even now, many many years later, and I still in my monkey form, I wish I had bitten her rump again for that.

 

________________________________________

Dariel R. A. Quiogue is a writer-photographer from the Philippines. In 1977, he was simultaneously exposed to Star Wars, Herodotus, Homer, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Robert E. Howard, and his brain has never been the same since. He now writes F&SF in his spare time, flavored by his fascination for history, science, the sea, and the richness and diversity of Asian cultures. His creative motto is “Simple stories, powerfully told.” Quiogue’s works have appeared in The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly I, New Edge of Sword and Sorcery Magazine, Old Moon Quarterly, Rakehell Magazine, and his self-published story collection, Swords of the Four Winds.

 

Simon Walpole has been drawing for as long as he can remember and is fortunate to spend his freetime working as an illustrator. He primarily use pencils, pens and markers and use a bit of digital for tweaking. As well as doing interior illustrations for various publishing formats he has also drawn a lot of maps for novels. his work can be found at his website HandDrawnHeroes.