The Dancer of Hafiz

 

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1. A Diamond in the Dung Heap

 

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(Late Winter, 1179)

 

The Tehraqis had a crude term for copulation. They called it riding the camel – predictably garish for a city-state of stargazers, merchants, and cutthroats. The Kushwaris on the other hand, at least those of a certain breeding and social stock, they knew it by a much more elegant name – the Dance of Flesh.

How many years had Abana of Hafiz danced? How many partners had he danced with? It galled him to admit that he lost count many, many dances ago. He barely even remembered their names – but he remembered their faces. The mole-eyed boy and the jowly spearman; the fat merchant and the pale-skinned guildsman; the nervous bookkeeper and the gold-toothed baker; the lord's minstrel and the exiled chieftain. The drunk charioteer. The one-armed executioner. The governor's sons. All had had their turn in countless times and contexts. He hated them. And he would never forget any of them. Maybe their names... but never their faces.

Cruel men made Abana dance before he even knew what dancing was. Cruel men tempered him like steel to cater to their ilk, to crave their touch, to covet spilt seed like some precious reward – and the cruellest man of all nearly succeeded.

Abana learned to hate the dance.

The pain of it, the shame of it, the sweat and the smells, the moans and the growls; the unwanted ecstasy you clung to like flotsam to moor you through it. Abana thought he might always hate the dance... if not for the man he danced with now.

Maliq.

It was as though the gods sculpted a man from finest marble and brought him to life by the breath of their essence – solely for Abana's sake. The boy adored every inch of the man; his hair like thick ebon whorls, his deep jade eyes and smooth bronze skin, those broad shoulders and muscular frame... and his unflinchingly kind heart.

Yes, Abana had no idea how wonderful the Dance of Flesh could truly be until he chose Maliq as his partner. And he was so lost in the dance that lusty night (in one of the many cushioned tents of Dhabr's caravan) that he almost missed the little spy peeling back the curtain door and poking an inquisitive eye inside. Abana watched the spy as the spy watched him bounce up and down off Maliq's thick hips and all eight inches of his girth. And then Abana smiled at him.

The boy blushed and ran away.

So far as anyone knew Maliq was only his guard, and until they reached Tehraq, that was the way it had to remain.

`I'm going to have to kill you, little one,' thought Abana. `But not until I finish my dance...'

 

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(Early Summer, 1176)

 

There were so few things in Abana ibn Tawab's life that he could genuinely take pride in. His family's possessions were few and his own even fewer. They had next to nothing of value... except the sword.

Jahanshah, they called it, and it was the pride of their family. With a thin and curving blade wrought from crucible steel and a hilt of glittering gold its beauty was completed by the blood red ruby set in its pommel. Both the blade and the scabbard were tightly spell-woven – only members of their bloodline or their loved ones could draw it.

Polishing Jahanshah was the only chore Abana liked. With tender care he took his cloth and wiped the scabbard from locket to crest, then latched his fingers around the grip and with one pull unsheathed its curved single edge. The boy stopped a moment to admire it (as he always did). Abana polished it until his impish reflection stared back at him with awe.

Jahanshah once belonged to his grandfather Fouzan ibn Mushegh; an anointed paladin who served under King Gurkhan II as governor of the Nyssinian borderlands. At the height of his power Fouzan commanded nearly 40,000 troops and resoundingly repelled the Great Trident: a three-pronged invasion by the northern paleskins. From tent to tavern, whether dusk or dawn, they sung his grandfather's name across the High East. He was a hero.

And then, on the final night of his victory march to the royal court at Tehraq, Fouzan disgraced himself by bedding one of the king's paramours.

Execution normally followed such treason but King Gurkhan was wise – killing the popular Governor of Nyssinia so soon after his colossal victory over the paleskins would incite the entire High East – so instead he chose the `merciful path' and exiled him to the blustery pastures of Kushwar. Stripped of his titles and wealth (but most of all his honour) the old soldier did not take kindly to the quaint rigours of rural life. He died fewer than two years into his banishment – of a broken heart according to family legend.

`Temptations of the flesh', said his mother once. `That is what killed Fouzan'.

And then his mother screamed.

Panicked, Abana quickly returned Jahanshah to its rack and sprinted into the next room, whipping the moth-eaten azure curtains out of his way to find his mother, Paja, fallen over by the cooking pit. The pot of broth she'd brought to boil had overturned along with her and sat half-spilt over the sandstone floor.

"Mama," Abana helped her back onto the wooden stool she'd been seated on. When made to sit upright she stiffened ever so slightly, as if her back hurt. "Are you alright? What happened?"

With a long wince Paja straightened out the veil around her hair and shoulders as though nothing had happened. `Composure is the essence of a noblewoman', or so went her mantra... but she had lived by it long since her father's fall from grace. "Thank you, my child. The winds merely took my breath a moment. I am fine."

That was when he noticed the bruising.

Patches of grape-coloured flesh around her left eye and jaw. Red welts around her wrists and elbows. No doubt his father Tawab gave her another beating the night before – her third in the last ten days – but Abana could only swallow his displeasure with frowning silence. It was not a son's place to question his father's judgement.

But she didn't have to cook alone. Maybe half the broth was gone but a meal could still be salvaged.

"Stay off your feet, Mama," said Abana. He quickly set things to rights. First by hauling the heavy iron pot back onto the stone nooks overhanging the spit, then by sweeping up the remnants of the spillage. After that he took Paja's gourd spoon to the adjacent pantry where they kept their small supply of spices and vegetables in cold clay jars arrayed around its curved wall. Though many were empty Abana found just enough turmeric, cumin and garlic to make a soup. All he left his mother to do was grind up some herbs with her mortar and pestle.

Paja smiled to herself as her son attentively stirred the pot. "You are a good boy, Abana. Sometimes, I-"

"ABANA!"

The boy, the mother and the gourd spoon all froze. Both were far too familiar with that roar. It was Tawab – and he was furious about something. If he kept his father waiting, then he'd put his fists back into action before the sun fell.

The boy sighed.

"Wait here, Mama," he said. "I will be back."

Abana left her to grind the herbs alone as he made off through the rear door and walked out onto the pebbled grass surrounding their homestead. Tawab ibn Shabab stood a few yards away at the gate of their goat paddock, as still as a temple idol. Cold morning winds bit at Abana's skin as he walked to his father's side. Something had rattled him hard.

"Baba?" Abana shivered, "Is everything alright?"

Tawab didn't blink. "Open your eyes, boy."

He did as his father asked and saw it for himself... that the goats were dead. All fifty of them, the whole herd, strung out across the paddock in lifeless heaps of three of four, their teeth skinned back and speckled with foam and gouts of cud. They hadn't been killed. It was as if some disease suddenly struck over the course of the night and cut them down where they stood.

But how was that possible?

Tawab's fists clenched so tight his knuckles turned white.

"This... this is the end of us," he said. "We're finished..."

 

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(Late Winter, 1179)

 

Between his lilac-dyed veil and the dim patch of shade provided by the tasselled velvet parasol attached to his camel's saddle; nothing overwhelmed the constant and oppressive heat that so defined the land Abana of Hafiz knew as the High East, even in this, the equivalent of its winter season.

Tehraq was close.

The dancer slipped a hand beneath his veil and mopped up his brow with one of the silk cloths he'd taken with him from Jawwaz. The embroidery was gold and it bore the emblem of Lady Yahya's house (the griffin and the rose) a symbol of his right to travel under her blessing. Such a boon gave him leeway, particularly with a man like Dhabr. (`Enough. I will take the women, the boy and those six Jafari men over there. The rest I have no use for.')

Abana peeked a subtle look at him from the corner of his grey eyes. Unlike Hakkan, he had not changed much these past two years, save for his attire.

(`Kushwaris. And weak ones at that.')

He was swathed (rather garishly for a mere caravan trader) from shoulder to slipper in an ebon-black cloak and a lavish crimson doublet trimmed with gold. He was also a stout man and his girth served him no favours in this heat. Abana could say much about Dhabr (`Set them free? Chop them up for pig's feed? The choice is yours, my friend!') but one thing he could not say was that he was unsuited to the labours of mercantilism.

From his camel's saddle Dhabr oft bellowed strict orders for his men to keep up with him (and so they did) driving the caravan's thirty camels along at a brisk but measured speed. These days Dhabr trafficked in nothing that could spoil (silk, jade, myrrh, incense, figs, wheat, etc) but he kept a tight pace amongst his ranks of pay-beaters and sell-backs. He suffered no stragglers and spared no flesh the rigours of his whip (should its misfortunate bearers chose to displease him).

Men like Dhabr were blunt instruments – cretinous and loathsome but frighteningly suited to certain tasks. Lady Yahya could not have chosen anyone better to smuggle he and Maliq into Tehraq.

Somewhere behind them Abana and Dhabr overheard a monstrous scream from one of the animal cages. The caravaner scrubbed the sweat from his brow with a single meaty fist as he ordered one of his henchmen to see what was happening without breaking formation. As it would later turn out (for Abana was too tired from sun fatigue to turn back and enquire) one of the capuchins had gotten loose and startled the falcons. The sell-back returned the monkey to his cage and secured its damaged lock with a rope.

"Men are tamer than animals," said Dhabr. He pulled a bloated waterskin from his belt, popped the cork, drank, then handed it over to his guest.

"Indeed," Abana took a few welcome gulps. It was his first drink of water since daybreak. "Are they gifts of some sort?"

Dhabr nodded, his shoulders rising and falling with his camel's every step. "Specifically requested by one of my governor patrons for the coming festivities in Tehraq. When King Qattullah returns home the whole city shall turn to the streets to celebrate his annexation of Kushwar, and those beasts will be presented to him at his banquet."

`Annexation...' thought Abana. Such a diplomatic word for such a boorish man (and such a polite way of describing so thorough a conquest). Kushwar was a land of vast expanse but devoid of mineral wealth. Its only bounty lay in its fertile soil and it was (historically) of little consequence to the Tehraqi Kings, but after a series of raids by the mountain tribes had disrupted the flow of wheat into the city a year prior, King Qattullah sought to consolidate his hold on the region. The scriveners would record for posterity's sake that King Qattullah I (son of Gurkhan II and grandson of Gurkhan the Great, titles and so on) arrived with a host of 20,000 men at the `behest' of the Ban of Kushwar to `liberate their Kushwari brothers from the subjugation of the vile mongrel tribesmen' but even the lowliest tongue-wagger in the tavern knew that was a lie. It was a bloodless conquest of another name – annexation – so told by the Ban's prompt abdication after the defeat of those mountain tribesmen.

King Qattullah was not a man to take lightly.

`Bastards attract bastards...' thought Abana.

"The annexation is a great victory," said Dhabr.

`Against a windy flatland of paupers and goatherds...?' thought Abana, finding himself even more disgusted with Dhabr than he already was. The caravaner's thick Tehraqi accent was rough on the ears and betrayed his lower caste origins – and yet he spoke so confidently about matters of politics – matters far beyond his station. Abana smirked at him. Spending so much time around his highborn clientele had caused him to forget his place... but Abana knew better. The highborn had a habit of reminding you... one way or another.

"How true, Lord Dhabr," said Abana. "You are most wise in these matters. Would that I knew more of politics."

Dhabr cast a broad grin.

The two mounted guardsmen at the head of the caravan stopped their camels by the slope of a sandy ridge and exchanged cheerful grins amongst themselves. Abana broke ranks with Dhabr and coaxed his camel forward until he saw what the guards saw with his own grey eyes.

Tehraq.

The sight of that sprawling sandstone metropolis stopped Abana's breath dead in his throat. As loathe as he was to admit it, the city remained an astounding sight; from its towers and observatories to its tenements and aqueducts, its markets and its plazas, the profuse winding laneways interlocking its many shrines, libraries, temples, academies, waystations, forums and barracks. Even from that distant cliff edge he spotted numerous trading vessels floating into its wharfs along the Kazara; a gigantic river cutting through Tehraq's heart and bisecting it into two separate wards; North District for the highborn and South District for the low. Its ancient wonders stood proud as ever – the 25-cubit high walls of the Old City, the Hanging Gardens of Sur, the Necropolis, the Coliseum of Kings, the immense redoubt of Hyadara Fortress; and most impressive of all the Sun Court, King Qattullah's residence and the seat of his power.

Tehraq was once one of the three great cities of the Abyyabid Empire and it was the sole surviving city of its catastrophic collapse. Its last census (commissioned in the year 1170) estimated that nearly a million people called it home. It was the centre of civilization... and it was the evillest place in all the known world.

Abana's blood boiled.

Not so long ago the dancer recalled himself fleeing from those towering sandstone walls... and yet here he was again. The dancer's eyes rolled from those walls to an unassuming domed palace on the northern bank of the Kazara just a mile or so east of the legendary Azarashapur Market. It was a palace Abana knew all too well.

The Elephant Palace.

`I am coming for you,' he thought, seething. `I care not cost... I am COMING for you...'

Hoofbeats turned him away from the city to the sands behind him. Unlike the other caravaners Maliq was on horseback and he rode up to Abana's side from beyond the rear end of the caravan. The last oasis was more than two hours behind them, but his steed was a swift one and covered the ground in half the time.

The horse whickered as its rider frowned at the ancient city. "...That day we escaped Tehraq I prayed to your gods and mine that I would never lay eyes upon this city again. And now..."

"Is it done?"

Maliq's frown deepened. "...Yes."

Abana breathed a sigh of relief he had not realized he'd been holding. Two hours behind their backs, weighed down by stones and rope, the corpse of Dhabr's apprentice bled out from its slit throat into the azure waters of the oasis. They would be within Tehraq's walls for days before anyone found the body, but there was disgust in Maliq's eyes. It was unmistakable.

`...Apologies, my love, but we cannot suffer any spies, potential or otherwise,' Abana's eyes returned to the city, `Not with a task of this scale...'

 

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(Early Summer, 1176)

 

His father could not say what killed the goats. He spent much of the morning inspecting their bodies but found no bites or wounds (which precluded jackals) and none were stolen (which precluded thieves). Their gritted teeth, enflamed gums and wilting fur suggested some sort of illness they had never seen before – and it burned through the herd like a flame through the night.

Tawab was a man prone to rages. Abana ibn Tawab and Paja had both suffered his knuckles in anger. Years ago, he split a headman's lip for underbidding him at Hafiz market, shouting that the mere `insult' warranted correction. None had challenged him then. As the third son of the previous Ban of Kushwar he'd had stature – stature enough for an exiled Paladin to accept his proposal of marriage to his beloved daughter; stature enough for a handsome dowry of 400 silverlings, 80 acres, 100 goats, and 30 cattle – for time, at least. Fouzan died just a few days before Abana's birth and his entire household fled the instant his ashes left the pyre. The guards, the servants, the handmaids and the steward all made off with whatever wealth they could carry to fund their route back to luxurious Nyssinia and away from the cold hills of Kushwar.

`It was a terrible time', Paja had once said of this. `The ignobility of it all... to be robbed and abandoned by your servants... we were laid low, your father and I, we children of highborn men.'

They survived the betrayal by selling off half their land to the Ban's estate and hiring tenants to work what was left with the proceeds, but Tawab was a cruel master at the best of times. When he put the beating stick to his head boy's son and broke his teeth, the tenants stole some goats and absconded that very evening – but not before setting the main residence on fire.

Abana still had the burn scars on his left shoulder.

As Tawab had no money for repairs or new tenants, he, Paja and Abana had no choice but to take up residence in the servant quarters and work the land themselves – to grow their own crops, herd their own goats, stitch their own linens – like any commoner would.

In the year 1159 (although exiles and third sons) they were people of their station, living as their birth rights dictated – but by 1164 they were destitute paupers. The one thing keeping them from starvation was their herd... and now the entire herd was dead.

Abana spent his morning trembling, not from cold, but from fear of his father's rage. Though his mind was awash with questions – "what will we do?", "how will we survive?", "how did this happen?" he dared not ask them. Instead he followed his father's every instruction dutifully as he and Tawab dragged the first goat corpse out of the paddock and strung it up upon the branches of their butchering tree.

"Abana. It is time for you to become a man and take more responsibility," as he said this, Tawab pulled a short-bladed cleaving knife from his belt. The son had seen the father slaughter his fattened goats many a time for many a year and was familiar with the process – stun the beast with a heavy stone to the head, then hang it and slit its throat and bleed it into a gourd. Cut the skin from the hindlegs down to the belly and forelegs, then remove the hide. Cross cut the belly to remove the guts, intestines, liver, and kidneys, then bisect the ribcage to remove the heart and the windpipe. Spare the best of the organs, take the carcass to cool and salt the hide for tanning. Abana saw it done many a time.

But he had never been asked to do it himself.

"Come," Tawab put the knife in his hand. "Cut from the hoofs down like I showed you."

Abana froze.

"What are you waiting for? Do it."

Abana could not move.

"CUT THE GOAT, BOY!" Roared Tawab.

`This was Jahan', he thought. `You told me not to give them names but if only in my mind...' The slap that followed hit so suddenly it knocked the knife out of Abana's hands and sent the boy screaming into the dirt. Through misty tears Abana watched Tawab tower over him, the sun at his back blackening him into some cruel dark idol he dared not recognize as a father.

"Curse the gods for cursing me with such a WEAK son," he spat. "Fetch your mother and take her place by the hearth. Go! Now!"

Abana scrambled to his feet before his tears began to spill and incense his father any further. He ran from the butchering tree in the yard through the curtained doors of the pantry and into the living chamber where Paja sat stitching up some of her old working linens upon her reed mat. She worked the needle gingerly so as not to strain her bruises.

"Abana?"

"Mama," the boy scrubbed his eyes. "Baba w-wants you to help him b-butcher the goats. I wanted to help, I genuinely wanted to, but..."

Paja sighed. "...Try not to think unkindly of your father, Abana. He is not angry with us... merely with the situation. Without the herd we will not survive this coming winter."

"W-what will we do?"

There was a grey gloom in Paja's eyes, palpable and foreboding like the rime scent preceding a heavy downfall. She put aside her needle, stood upon her bare feet and turned towards her father's mantled sword. Jahanshah sat as it always did – bold, beautiful, and ornate – the one thing the traitors could not take, the last symbol and testament to their family's former greatness.

A diamond in the dung heap.

"We shall do what we must, Abana," said Paja solemnly. "We shall do what we must."

 

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* Hi, thanks for reading! Comments and constructive criticisms always welcome, please e-mail me at stephenwormwood@mail.com. If you enjoyed this, please read my other stories on Nifty = Wulf's Blut, The Harrowing of Chelsea Rice and The Dying Cinders (gay, fantasy/sci-fi) and The Cornishman (gay, historical).