The Waters Of Eternity Part 1

The Waters of Eternity.

Howard Andrew Jones.

In Bygone Days.

When I was a young man, I took pride in relating my adventures in great part because I enjoyed bringing wonder and delight to my listeners. Only someone who has held an audience spellbound with naught but words can truly understand the satisfaction. As I aged, though, another purpose grew. When I told these stories, Dabir and I stood vividly before my listeners as we were in the prime of our lives. It came to me that I would not always be here to tell these tales, and I feared that with my death Dabir and the others would be well and truly gone. I knew then it was time at last to commit these stories to paper, as had long ago been foretold.

In bygone days a sword was always at my hip, and at my side was my friend and brother in all but blood, Dabir Has.h.i.+m ibn Khalil. May you be as fortunate as I to have so loyal a companion, though it be unlikely. Some of you may be familiar with our longer and more famous exploits, but we were not always racing to the world's far corners to save the caliphate. Sometimes we solved smaller problems closer to home, though they were no less challenging in their way. I have recorded a number of them here.

No one who knew Dabir could fail to notice his intellect, but to my mind it was his judgment and compa.s.sion that made him great; few understood this, for he never promoted his own accomplishments. Aye, it is true he made mistakes, but he always sought the truth, and the caliphate retains its current shape today due in no small part to his skills, risks, and sacrifices.

For all that I celebrate our adventures it is the pleasure of Dabir's company I miss the most; watching him ponder a move on the checkered shatranj board on a rainy afternoon, sharing a simple meal in some dingy caravaserai, hearing his laughter at a jest from his wife. I would give much to experience any of these simple moments once more.

But now is not the time to dwell on the end that Allah wills all men, but to remember when Dabir and I worked in service to the great caliph Harun al-Ras.h.i.+d, may peace be his, and strove to be worthy of the honors he had given us. May it be that you take pleasure from my recollections.

The Thief of Hearts.

I.

Dabir and I found the man by the graveyard wall, dried blood masking his forehead and face. Sword and knife were both girded at his waist, so we knew his attacker had moved swiftly. About his chest, stained with the mud he'd been lying in, was a bronze colored sash, identifying him as an officer of the Mosul watch.

Dabir pulled his fingers back from the man's neck, his eyes widening. "He lives." Dabir looked toward the homes across the way. "Fetch help."

It was not long in coming. A youth at the first house I visited was shortly sprinting off for a hakim learned of medicines while his older brothers and I carried the wounded soldier into their lodging. The soldier breathed, but did not wake, and I reckoned it was due to the sizable swelling on his head.

I returned to Dabir, still kneeling by the cemetery wall. The sky spat down a few errant drops, but he took no notice. The dim light filtered through gray, rumbling clouds lent a weird sharpness to ground features.

"What is it?" I asked him.

"The marks in the mud tell a story, Asim. See, here two sets of prints leave the street. The soldier's, and someone with smaller feet."

"A child," I said.

"Or a woman."

"Ah." I nodded. That would make more sense. Likely the fellow had been off duty with a day wife.

Dabir stepped carefully over a churned-up muddle of gra.s.s and dirt and crouched low. Suddenly he rose again, picking his footing with care as he approached the wall.

With a slim finger Dabir pointed to mud clinging to the rough stone. "Someone climbed the wall."

"A bandit," I said, following his line of thought.

"Who steals nothing? Except..." Dabir bent down by the wall, then looked up at me, his blue eyes sharp. "If we hurry, we might help her."

"Help who?"

"The woman, Asim-she has been abducted. Hurry! Up the wall!"

I did not question Dabir's conclusion. I knew from experience that he was nearly always correct, and pausing to explain would only irritate him. Sooner or later I would learn his reasons-now, I acted.

The wall stood half again the height of a spear, and was well mortared. But it was coa.r.s.ely made, and purchase was easy. I scrambled to reach its height, then pulled myself up entirely.

I saw no bandits, only a vast sward of rolling hills and stunted cedars with small, round-topped mausoleums looming in long rows. Farther off simple gravestones skewed from the ground like the cracked and gray fingernails of buried giants.

I am not a superst.i.tious man, but I held my fingers in a way I know to ward off the evil eye as I straddled the edge of the wall. A faint but unmistakable charnel odor reached my nostrils, and I thanked G.o.d for the rain, which must be keeping down the typical stench this day.

"Are there tracks?" Dabir asked.

"Yes."

"Help me up."

Dabir was ever nimble despite his bookishness, and in moments we were on the other side, being careful to drop away from the footprints directly below. While the scholar examined them I scanned the gloom, then spat once to either side.

"The tracks sink deep," Dabir told me. "He was small, but strong."

"Who?"

"He who bore the woman away," Dabir answered. Almost as an afterthought, he asked: "Is your sword sharp?" A smile played over his mouth, for he knew my answer. It was a game we played when we knew adventure neared.

"Always," I replied.

We had not gone ten paces before the rain came down in earnest, a few drops at first, then a steady cascade.

Dabir sped over hills, pausing now and then when the track veered around a bush or tree. The rain was cool and soon my turban and jubbah were soaked.

"The details in the tracks will wash away," Dabir said as he lengthened his stride.

I steadied my sheath to keep it from banging my leg as I ran. I cared not for the wet, nor for the onrush of night, presaged by the darkening clouds. I am brave, but not foolish. A yard of graves is no place for the living when the sun is down.

Suddenly Dabir stopped at the foot of a larger slope. Through sheets of water we could just make out the narrow, parallel lanes in the hill above, partly erased by larger swath of disturbed mud, apparently etched by someone sliding and regaining their feet. A wide tomb stood on the hill, screened by black brush.

I sensed our quarry close, and carefully slid my sword from its sheath before starting up with Dabir.

A low, animal growl drifted down from the bushes. Dabir halted, and I moved before him.

"Stand forth," I commanded.

The growl sounded, louder this time, and it was distinctly animal in nature. No human could have made a noise like that. The shrubbery shook and for a moment I fancied it might leap down upon us.

A ma.s.sive black canine launched out of the thicket and sped west along the hill's height, away from us. It disappeared around the side of a tomb.

Again I made the sign warding off the evil eye, and searched for enemies. I saw none, but the darkness loomed close. Had we missed the muezzin's call to prayer? I had little sense of time in the descending darkness.

"Come!" Dabir dashed up the hill and parted the foliage where the wolf-dog had been. I was right behind him, sword ready. I s.h.i.+fted my gaze to left and right, half expecting the beast to return.

"Asim." Dabir's voice was strangely muted. He knelt beside a grizzled thing half hidden by the foliage. While the face had been chewed upon, the dark eyes and the blood and dirt-begrimed tresses were recognizable as those of a young woman. Her torso was a ma.s.s of flesh and blood, and organs showed through a gaping hole.

To my horror, Dabir rolled up his sleeve, pushed shredded clothing aside, and felt the gory wound. Soon he plunged his whole hand within.

"Dabir!" I said.

He silenced me with a look, felt about for some moments more, then withdrew his hand grimly. "Her heart is gone," he said.

It fell to me to cart her body from that place. The unpleasant task preyed on my nerves, for beyond the smell and the violent imaginings my burden evoked I knew that I could not well protect my friend should the wolf-dog attack whilst my arms were full.

II.

The rain did not fail until evening prayers were an hour past. Gloom masked the stars, rendering even the widest streets as dark and treacherous as narrow alleys.

Dabir and I sat beside an open window in the office of the captain of the southeast gate. He was a big man, given to chewing on the beard hairs near his mouth.

This captain, Fakhir, had given us towels to dry with, then listened to our tale-the wounded guard, the woman's body-and we had all been taken to his gatehouse.

"I thank you both," he said, settling into his cus.h.i.+ons across from where we sat. "Your labored investigations have at last provided the proof needed to send Officer Marid before a quadi, and thence to his just fate."

"How so?" Dabir asked. The captain did not know him, and thus did not recognize the warning tone in my friend's voice. He always grew more succinct when challenged.

"How so..." Fakhir paused to gnaw on his beard. "Why, by following the tracks to the woman he had slain, lord, and recovering her remains."

"Then your reconstruction of the events would be...?" Dabir's voice was sharp.

"Clearly Marid overpowered the girl, carried her over the wall, slew her, and left her body behind the tomb. The dog chanced upon it, and partly devoured her."

"I did not mistake the tracks," Dabir stated coolly. "There were three sets. Officer Marid and the woman were attacked by someone outside the graveyard. He made none of those within the graveyard."

"Allow that you may be mistaken by the prints, Honored One," the captain said. "Marid probably slipped on the wall after killing her and knocked his head then."

"There were no tracks back to the wall from the tomb," Dabir objected.

Fakhir frowned slightly, then offered a polite smile. "How could you tell, Honored One, surrounded as you were by rain and darkness?"

Dabir stared at him until Fakhir cleared his throat uncomfortably. Somewhere far away a dog howled, and I wondered if it was the same unworldly animal we had seen in the graveyard.

"You are predisposed toward your officer's guilt, Captain," Dabir said. "Why?"

Many are made uncomfortable by Dabir's bluntness, but this man, being a soldier, was more accustomed to plain speech, and seemed almost glad. His formal veneer slipped away as fleetly as a maiden's promise. "Two other women died after being seen in his company these last months. And there is the matter of his bride-to-be, who died this year."

Dabir and Fakhir studied each other intently, as if their wills warred through their eyes.

"I am not mistaken about the tracks, Captain," Dabir said, carefully enunciating each word for emphasis. "A smaller foot than Marid's, with a different tread, made the tracks in the graveyard."

"I believe what you say." The captain sat back and dismissed all with a hand wave. "But I also know mistakes can be made. Perhaps, in your zeal to save the girl, you did not see Marid's tracks. Perhaps he forced her along before him."

"The tracks were burdened, as I said, as though they carried a weight." Dabir's voice was tight. He disliked repeating himself.

The captain tugged at his beard and brushed some of its hairs across his lips. His politeness now was a little too p.r.o.nounced, as though Dabir were a simpleton. "Is it not possible, Honored One, that in the rain and darkness, and in the hurry you confess, that you-"

"You do not listen, Captain," I interrupted, more loudly than intended.

In the ringing silence that followed, the captain stared blankly at me, and Dabir fingered the chain holding the caliph's amulet about his throat, though he did not draw it from beneath his clothes. Finally he spoke in more measured tones. "Tell me how these other women died."

"They were found, just like this one, dead."

"How, dead?"

"They were attacked."

Dabir's mouth curled in frustration. "Their wounds, Captain. Did they have their hearts?"

The captain frowned back. "How should I know? His betrothed was attacked but survived her wounds for a time. The others were found in alleys, with chest wounds."

"You did not examine the wounds?"

"They were dead," the captain said simply.

Again he and Dabir locked eyes.

Dabir folded his arms together with an air of finality. "Do not judge your officer until I have gathered more facts."

The captain scowled. "Would you rather justice be a turtle, or a lion?"

"I would rather it be an arrow that finds its proper mark," Dabir said. "Besides, you cannot try an unconscious man."

The captain turned up a palm. "It is true. The hakim is not even sure Marid can be made to live."

"Then give me leave to look into this. Two days."