Saladin Ahmed - Throne of the Crescent Moon

“Listen to me. Look at me, Adoulla! God is the Most Merciful, do you hear me? It will take money to repair, and time, but six months from now you’ll be back where you started, minus a few old books and scrolls.”

Adoulla swallowed and shook his head. “Six months from now, I’ll probably be a crimson-eyed corpse whose soul has been severed from God.”

With their main patient resting, Litaz and Dawoud tended to Adoulla’s bruises and tender ribs. Their friend sat with vacant eyes as they worked, flinching in pain, but saying nothing. Afterwards he fell into a deep, snoring sleep on a pile of cushions in the greeting-room corner. Then, with Adoulla’s hard-eyed young assistant insistently keeping watch, she and Dawoud slept as well.

Upon waking a few hours later, Litaz made more tea and Adoulla thanked her for it as if she had saved his mother’s life. He was a bit less inconsolable after his rest, grim planning clearly giving him purpose.

“That jackal-thing that calls itself Mouw Awa, and its mysterious ‘blessed friend’—they must be stopped. Somewhere out there is a ghul-maker more powerful than any I’ve ever faced. I fear for our city,” Adoulla said. He took a long, messy slurp of tea and wiped the excess from his beard.

Your city, my friend, not ours, some resentful part of her protested. She’d lived in and loved Dhamsawaat for decades now, but the older she grew the more she pined to return to the Soo Republic. This city had given her meaningful work and more exciting experiences than she could count. But it was in this dirty city that her child had died. It was in this too-crowded city that her husband had grown older than his years. She did not want to die saving this place—not without having seen home again.

She spoke none of this, of course. And she sat complacently as Dawoud said, “Whatever help you need from us is yours, brother-of-mine. Whatever this is you are facing, you will not face it alone.”

For a long while, the three of them sat sipping tea. Then Dawoud spoke again, a hard smile on his face as he poked a long finger at Adoulla. “You know, despite the dangers facing you, you should thank Beneficent God. Thank Him that we live two doors down. That we came home late at night rather than in the morning. That we were walking home when we saw the smoke from your house.”

At the word ‘house,’ Adoulla sighed, his eyes wet and shining. He thanked Litaz again for the tea, stood, and walked forlornly out the front door.

Dawoud stood with a grunt and followed Adoulla. She heard the men walk slowly away from the shop, talking however men talked when they were alone with one another.

Litaz set sad thoughts aside and went to check on Zamia. The girl’s teeth had unclenched, and she slept untroubled now. It was time to apply the second poultice. Litaz placed a small pot of mixed herbs over the hearth.

A few minutes later they began to boil, leaving behind a sticky residue. She removed the girl’s bandage and cleaned the wound again. Then, with a small wooden paddle, she applied the still-hot muck from the pot. She watched her poultice burn magically away from the wound, absorbing the girl’s pain. Wisps of smoke curled into the air, leaving half-healed flesh in their wake. Using her other hand, she pushed pressure points on the girl’s palms.

As if struck by lightning, Zamia sat up and screamed until she was out of breath. Then she sucked in a great gulp of air and screamed again. Litaz felt badly for the neighbors, but they were used to the cries of the afflicted that sought relief in her skills.

Raseed jumped up from the pile of cushions where he’d been sleeping. “Auntie! Wh-what?” he said, blinking sleep from his tilted eyes and going for his sword.

“Go back to sleep, Raseed. All is well here—the screaming is a good sign. Evidence that the girl’s soul is still strong.” Even as Litaz spoke, Zamia lay back again, falling into a deep sleep.

Dawoud and Adoulla entered the room, drawn by the screams. Just as well. It was now Dawoud’s turn to treat the more metaphysical pain that consumed the girl.

He looked a question at Litaz, and she nodded. He crouched before Zamia’s sleeping form, his hands moving in slow, serpentine circles as they hovered an inch from the girl’s boyish body. He closed his eyes and winced as if he were in pain. A slight glow of green surrounded his hands. He kept his eyes closed tight and his hands danced until the glow faded and her husband collapsed onto a stool, clutching at his chest.

It’s been a long time since he’s strained his powers so. It’s aging him almost before my eyes! Litaz thought again of their homeland and prayed that her husband would live to see it once more before the body-costs of his calling claimed him. She ran to him and placed an arm around his bony shoulders.

He spoke through clenched teeth, clearly exhausted. “It is time to wake her.”

“Wake her?” The dervish frowned at them. “Forgive me, Auntie, Uncle—but she has been grievously wounded. We must let her rest, yes?”

The boy nosed in where he didn’t belong, and there was something behind it. Does he think he loves her? Litaz wondered. “The girl was too close to death, Raseed. She must be awakened—if she can be awakened—in order to remember that she is still alive. There will be time to let her rest later.”

She turned to her juniper wood case and removed a vial full of big pinkish salt grains. Bringing the vial over to the Badawi girl and placing it under her nose, Litaz pulled out the stopper and turned her own nose away from it.

Zamia jerked upright. She began to cough and moan in pain. As she coughed, blood stained her mouth and nostrils.

Thank Almighty God . Though Raseed looked terrified, Litaz knew the blood was a sign of further recovery. She just might make it through this all right .

Raseed was now close at the girl’s side, clearly wanting to do something but not knowing what that something was. “What is happening to her?” he shouted.

Litaz rubbed her temples and forced patience. She pushed the boy back and dabbed away the girl’s blood. “It is hard to explain, Raseed. We have, for a few moments, fooled her soul into thinking it is in an unwounded body. Her soul will be forced into remembering this attachment. She will wake, in shock but aware and able to speak. Then she will need rest before we complete our treatment. If God wills it, the bonds that He has tied between body and soul will reattach.”

Litaz stood back, and a moment later the girl opened her bright green eyes.

“Did… did I kill it?” were her first words. There was no need to ask what she meant.

To Litaz’s surprise—and, she would swear, his own as well—Raseed stepped forward to answer her. “You gave me an opening, but I failed, Zamia Banu Laith Badawi.” He bowed deeply, shame etched on his face. “I beg you, accept my apologies. But know that it was your valor that drove the creature off.” The boy fell silent and took a step back, looking ashamed to have spoken.

Ah, Litaz thought, thinking on the beautiful, foolish ways of young people. He doesn’t think he loves her. He worries he loves her!

The girl spoke strongly in response to the dervish’s words, as if she’d been awake half the day and had not been sitting between death’s teeth mere moments ago—another good sign. “What did you expect?” she said, “I was trained by my father.” Then she closed her eyes and fell asleep again.

When afternoon came, Litaz sat with Dawoud and Adoulla in the kitchen over small bowls of goat’s milk and cherryfruit, discussing their next moves. Raseed, as usual, stood.

“So what now?” her husband asked.