Harem Of Aman Akbar Part 14

Avoiding her, I tugged the end of Amollia's sash and pulled her toward the Peri.

She looked straight at us, her faceted eyes glittering. "That's a singularly sloppy job you did of vanishing your friend," she said to me. "Why have you returned? Do you wish to undo me when I have already attested to your demise? I warn you, I will see to it personally that I was telling the truth before, if you endanger me."

"No, Queen," I said respectfully. "We seek only to remove your rival long enough that our husband may be released from her curse."

"And I suppose you have no interest at all in the bottle borne hither by that slug of an Emir?"

Amollia's grin, even half-transparent, shone in the dark. "We would not refuse the item should it come our way, O Queen," she replied. "But there is one more matter upon which we desire your help, and that is the healing of a young man who aided us earlier and who now lies wounded-"

"And I'm to do this with the great art you are certain I possess?" the Peri asked ruefully. "You confuse shape-shifting with healing. The two are as different as pomegranates are from grapes."

"That may be so, Lady," Amollia said in her most persuasively reasonable sibilant voice. "But from Rasa's tale, you are more than a simple shape-shifter. You have officiated lo these many years as Queen and Lady of these powerful people and all have looked to you for guidance and nurturing. Surely healing entered into your duties."

"Not necessarily," the Peri said, her eyes flickering with indecision. "While the Divs are not immortal in the manner of my people, they are long-lived and heal quickly."

"Ah, but they can be injured!" Amollia said. "For I myself saw three of them all but destroyed by an elephant."

The Peri shrugged and looked away. "I know nothing of this."

"And yet you know of the Emir's presence and the bottle," I said.

Her faceted eyes flashed back to me, sternly. "My husband was suspicious of the story I made in your protection. He chained his little favorite even before the wedding and has threatened to bob my hair if the slightest irregularity occurs again."

"And you would let him?" I asked.

"What can I do?" she replied. "My powers, save a few external ones such as the cream, are dwindling daily."

"We can still release you," I said.

"Only by cutting my hair and that would destroy me."

Amollia shook her head. "Not at all. If Rasa will give me a leg up and you can stand it, I'll have you free soon enough."

The Peri hesitated for only a moment before agreeing. Amollia sprang from my hands to the Peri's shoulders, but almost immediately grasped her hair high up its length, climbing hand over hand, her legs scissoring the locks, whose colors glowed through all of her limbs, until she gained the iron ring. Rainbow strands slid over and through her fingers, the length of hair slackened and fell. Amollia dangled fully visible for a moment from the heavy ring before swinging twice and leaping. She landed rolling at my feet.

Instantly, the Peri was transformed. Her hair curled and twined constantly, charged with power. Her eyes gave off sparks. She stretched and smiled, but the smile was not especially kind. Her knuckles popped as she stretched her fingers and for the first time I noticed how long and clawlike were her nails. Pointing to Hyaganoosh she said, "You have a quarter of an hour to remove her and yourselves from the caverns before I give you to Sani. With my powers renewed and her gone, I will be queen again and I must not be remiss in my duties. Go!"

I did not argue. Suddenly I saw the sense in that coupling. King Sani and his Peri wife, humble and helpful while captive and frightened, arrogant and curt when she was once more in charge, seemed made for each other.

Amollia dusted herself off and bounded across to Hyaganoosh, who cowered with her fingers pressed against her teeth while the translucent fingers unknotted her hair. I spoke to her quietly. "We need your help for but a moment. I will now rub something upon your face that will cause you to vanish. If you will come quietly and aid us in undoing the harm you have done, you'll be free to return. If you give us away, I'll kill you. Is that clear?"

She nodded and gulped. I applied the last portion of cream to her eyelids and cheeks. Before she disappeared, Amollia had freed her from the ring but had twined the length of her hair around her own wrist and arm. "Come now, little sister, come with us and you will soon be back in time for your wedding. Do not be afraid." Hyaganoosh looked only minimally rea.s.sured before she vanished and, with her between us, we made for the door.

Before we reached it, it swung open of its own accord. A distinguished and regal-looking person stood framed in the opening.

"Sani!" Hyaganoosh breathed. I pressed my knife into the side of her. The man looked all around him, his eyes changing gray to brown to black to gold to green to blue to gray again.

"Greetings, my Lord of a Thousand Shapes," the Peri said smoothly, her hair crackling out behind her as if charged by lightning, her eyes casting splinters of color around the room.

The Div King tried unsuccessfully to look unsurprised, but stumbled slightly over his feet, which resembled those of a toad. No doubt he had found them handy for sloshing through the water-filled tunnels when investigating the gongs and warbles and had forgotten to change them back to suit his new visage.

His forward momentum gave us a chance to slip past him and the guards who stood on each side of the door outside the harem staring as far forward as beings with eyes on either side of their mouths can stare. Standing in the middle of the tunnel, his form straining toward the harem door, was the Emir Onan. Breaking loose from Hyaganoosh, I shoved both her and Amollia forward. I could say nothing, and only hoped Hyaganoosh would not cry out until I rejoined them and that Amollia would have the good judgment to keep turning right until the two of them were free of the palace.

The Emir crept closer as the voices rose inside the harem.

"And what have you done with her, my dove?"

"I? I have done nothing," she replied. She added cryptically, "Why don't you ask your house guest, the Emir, where she could have gone?" I thought at first she only meant that the Emir was the one who could explain why we would kidnap Hyaganoosh, and by fobbing the question off on him would give herself time to build her power and think how to retain it, but I failed to give her enough credit. The wily Queen instead used one suggestion to divert her husband's suspicion to the Emir, discrediting both her rival and the man who had introduced the chit who displaced her.

When the King stepped back outside the harem and the door swung shut on the smug face of the Peri, I took advantage of the seeds of dissension she had already sown.

The King changed his aspect to the boar-lion cross I had previously seen as he addressed his guest, "I see, tail of a dog, that you have eavesdropped upon my conversation with my Queen, who has discovered your duplicity. What have you to say for yourself? You who offer tribute and withdraw it before it can be sampled?"

"My Lord, I a.s.sure you, I-" he began, and at that moment, while the Div King faced him, I slipped my arm between them and parted the folds of the sash spanning the Emir's belly. Grasping the neck of the bottle, I jerked it toward me and retreated quietly to the side of the tunnel, holding my breath. The Emir's face did a color change worthy of a Div as he patted and pounded at his middle, sputtering, "See here, my Lord. Allies we may be but I have not seen that girl since I sent her to you and you have no cause to steal from my person my own private property"

"Steal? I, steal? Watch your tongue, thief!"

"May I remind Your Majesty that we are allies!" the Emir exclaimed. "And that my army is no less mighty, though somewhat less fickle of form, than your own. If you will just be so kind as to return my bottle, I will be happy to help you hunt for the missing woman."

"Allies, hah! What sort of ally is one who cannot be trusted?"

"I don't know. I would ask the father of your Queen, great Sani, but I understand he-"

At that point I crept down the hall, leaving them to break or maintain their alliance as their treacherous dispositions dictated.

I had pa.s.sed the first three right-hand turns before the gongs and warblings began again. Soldiers stomped past me on their elephant feet, but they always took the left-hand turns and I the right. At one point I heard an eight-pawed splash and heard a ferocious snarl. Looking back, I saw that the snarl was largely composed of frustration, for the beast hated water, and no sooner took a pounce into the stuff than it sat down, trying to keep one rump dry while propping it on the other rump and licked at each of its eight paws before rising. Furthermore, its sense of smell would be impeded by the water. Thus I pa.s.sed once more unmolested into the rainy afternoon, where a now visible Hyaganoosh and Amollia waited with the others.

I wiped the ointment from my own face with my sleeve, so they could see my triumphant expression and the bottle I held in my hand.

The bottle and the seal were soon reunited. I took the precaution of retaining a grip on both as Hyaganoosh meekly placed her hands on the bottle and we removed the plug we had just inserted.

Aman Akbar shoved his nose between Um Aman and Aster, who crowded forward as the djinn smoked forth.

The demon laid his finger to his chin and bowed, saying facetiously, "Now, I just wonder wonder, dear ladies, how I may be of service to you?"

"Tell him," I said to Hyaganoosh.

"Tell him what what?" she cried pettishly. "I don't know what to say to him. You've disgraced me, making me look at a strange man without my veil or anything-"

"Fear not, Treasure of Princes," the djinn said gallantly, "for I am no man but-"

"Tell him to turn Aman Akbar back into a man."

"Aman Ak-but-but-" she stammered and looked appealingly at Um Aman, who glowered at her.

"Do as you're told, Goosha."

"Oh, very well, but I don't see-"

Um Aman gripped her by the elbow so tightly the skin of the old woman's knuckles blanched.

"Turn Aman back into a man," she said very quickly.

The girl babbled her words so quickly I thought for a moment she'd botched them. But the djinn nodded and dispensed from his forefinger a cloud of smoke which enshrouded the donkey. When the smoke drifted away, in place of the a.s.s Aman stood, supported by two human legs rather than four donkey ones. He was clad as he had been when he disappeared into the Emir's palace. His ears had been returned to sh.e.l.l-like smallness. His eyes were reduced from donkey largeness and brownness to human largeness and brownness. Aster flung herself at him, of course, but Um Aman was there clutching him before her. Amollia smiled at him with joy and fondness. Aman himself looked rather dazed for a moment. He patted himself with the beautifully shaped hands he had just regained and gazed across at me with an expression so full of fathomless intensity that it was painful to meet his eyes. I grinned at him foolishly and he grinned in turn, and beamed down at the other three. Then behind him, Marid Khan groaned. Aman blinked and shook off wonder with a still somewhat donkeylike toss of his head and turned toward his injured former rider.

"For your second wish," I quickly informed Hyaganoosh, "you can tell the djinn to heal Marid Khan."

This time she did not hesitate, but repeated my demand at once. Afterward she said petulantly, "If it's true I only get three wishes, that one shouldn't count. It was really yours."

I smirked at her.

"If you women are quite done," Aman Akbar said, "there is a serious matter to be taken care of. If the Emir and the Div King are plotting against the Sultan, I must warn him immediately. Therefore, the djinn must dispatch me at once, in suitable apparel and style, naturally, to the palace, where you will join me and we will enjoy the King's gracious thanks together."

"May I remind you, former master, that all of your wishes are used up."

Um Aman wrenched the bottle from Hyaganoosh's limp grasp and my own. "Do as my son says, ifrit. Did you not hear him say the matter is grave?"

The djinn rolled his eyes heavenward and in one wink Aman Akbar was clothed in lime green satin embellished with gold and in another wink he was gone.

"Now then, djinn, you must honor the second part of our husband's wish and take us to safety-" Aster began before the reflection of Aman's image was yet gone from her eyes.

"In a moment, little sister," Amollia said. "Wait first, while I pluck the lemon we promised to take the King for Fatima-" And she tripped down the hill, Kalimba trotting along at her side.

At that moment the ground beneath us rumbled and Marid Khan cried out an alarm. I ran down the hill to pull Amollia back and Aster ran after me, babbling unintelligibly. A dripping bitiger padded into the grove followed by soldiers in the livery of the Emir, who seemed to be chasing the two-bodied cat. Kalimba bristled and stood with all four paws planted.

The Emir appeared and Hyaganoosh gave a little shriek. Um Aman shouted, "Ifrit, obey my son's wish as if it were mine," and tackled Hyaganoosh.

Selima's carpet snapped open and scooped up first Aster and myself and then Amollia, who had already snapped off a fruit and started back up the hill.

Kalimba leaped onto the carpet after her. Hyaganoosh and Um Aman rolled over and over down the hill as the carpet rose steadily toward the peaks. I saw something roll, shining, from their embrace and the djinn's smoke streaked down toward it, wrapped around it, and twirled it upward, arching high above our ever-climbing carpet, into the neighboring mountains. Thus did the ifrit seek to guarantee that he would be bothered no more to grant wishes to any of us.

Chapter 13.

Amollia kept looking back toward the grove even as we sailed over the jungle and fields toward the rain-wet city in the distance. Her face was sad and quiet.

Aster grumbled. "The djinn might have at least provided a parasol," she said, wringing out her hair and sleeves.

Both of us ignored her. "Poor old lady," Amollia said. "She was so determined to save that worthless girl from dishonor-and to think, she used her last wish for us."

"If that even more worthless demon had done as he was told, the wish would have saved her and the girl also," I said sourly. "I don't know what we're supposed to tell Aman about this. How can I explain that I left his mother in the hands of his enemies?"

"Oh, really, Rasa," Aster said, "you act as if someone put you in charge of everything. I wouldn't concern myself with that tough old hen. If the Emir gets his hands on her, he'll quickly wish himself rid of her. Besides, maybe Marid Khan saved them. You weren't the only warrior there, you know. Now, come on, both of you, cheer up. See you, the domes of the city are upon us! Soon we will be sitting in our own perfumed garden full of exotic flowers. We will sip sweet drinks and have lute music played for us while we try on silks and brocades and wait for Aman to return ahead of a whole train of slaves bearing baskets and baskets of beautiful gifts from the King."

She was right about the garden, at least, but had figured without the djinns mistrust of lone females and his prudery. The rug settled softly in the middle of an extremely lovely garden, surrounded by high fretted walls and arched and scalloped doors and windows. The flowers were laid in fanciful patterns and the trees trimmed into the shapes of frogs, mushrooms, little horses, all sorts of ridiculous shapes trees were never meant to a.s.sume. Also, however, many of them were left tall and broad and sheltering, bearing cool-looking moss up their sides and long streaming branches like a woman's hair dressed with silvery coins, fanning in the breeze. Tiles of blue, green, red and gold lined sparkling pools full of golden animals spraying water and paved the pathways between ornate beds of roses. Hedged borders also flamed with bold tropical blooms of which a single blossom was larger than a whole bouquet of our little plains violets or wild daisies. In the middle of all of this glory, surrounded by drooping trees, stood a latticed and carved pavilion.

Aster threw us each a look that said plainly that she had told us what to expect and stepped off the rug.

Kalimba growled warning, so that we heard the laughter and voices before they were upon us and were able to dive behind a flowering hedge. Aster looked indignant. "Probably just our slaves come to see if we need anything," she muttered. But that was just wistful thinking. We were all sufficiently accustomed to trouble to be wary, and she watched as anxiously as did Amollia and I as six guards of a girth sufficient to make the djinn look meager strode down the dainty pathway followed by half a dozen women, dressed in white robes and bearing bronze ewers on their heads. Not a drop sloshed over the side. These women swayed their way down the path to the pavilion. Behind the last of these came the rows of laughing, chattering females all clothed in rich and colorful garments. Most of these ladies looked strangely short.

Their laughter and high chirping voices carried out into the garden. Though the pavilion had no windows, the airy dome was supported by a wooden lattice separating dome from walls, and all sounds floated out through the diamond-shaped holes.

Aster was swearing in her native tongue again, her face screwed up like a monkey's with the vehemence of her curses. We both stared at her.

"Can't you see? That misbegotten son of a she-goat djinn has not sent us to our own palace, but someone else's! No doubt the King's, where he reasons we will be unable to entertain h.o.a.rds of men while awaiting Aman Akbar. The fool fool! Landing us here like this, in these tatters and rags, he endangers our very lives! Why, the guards will take us for thieves."

Amollia smiled for the first time since we had left Um Aman rolling down the hill in Hyaganoosh's embrace. "Why then, we must see if we cannot find a way to introduce ourselves to the ladies without arousing the interest of the guards. Surely one of them will be disposed to help us. Let me see if I can discover how best to accomplish it." She motioned us to follow, but patted her hand low to the ground, and we kept below the level of the hedges, our eyes always on the guards, until we were able to gain the cover of the dripping trees surrounding the pavilion.

Amollia was up the first of these in less time than it takes to tell, but when she tried climbing out upon the branch nearest the carving, it bobbed dangerously. She crept back, summoning Aster, who swarmed up and past her. The limb readily supported Aster's smaller form, and by steadying herself with her fingers in the lattices, she could lean forward and peer through the holes. For once she was silent, but soon she leaned back and grinned at us.

Thereupon she pulled gently at the lattices and the delicate strips broke off in her hands until she had made a hole no larger than my head. The limb protested, groaning and dipping, but held. When she had discarded the strips which were warped and rotting from the damp weather, she slipped out of her gown and undergown and, naked, wiggled her way through the window.

Amollia grabbed at her ankle but too late for she slid away, slippery as a serpent, and Amollia was too big to pursue her. Kalimba growled and leapt halfway up the tree to join them but Amollia waved the cat away, and with a clicked exclamation that sounded like disgust to me, she backed down the tree again to stand beside me, studying the hole, waiting for Aster to return.

In a few moments Aster did just that, poking her head around the corner of the door, and then her hand, waving her fingers in a downward cupping fashion to summon us. Warily, we joined her, finding ourselves in a sort of anteroom where several ewers, towels, and a.s.sorted stacks of clothing waited. "It's a bath house," Aster giggled. "Quickly, disguise yourselves," and helped us as we too removed our clothing and followed her inside.

I cannot say I felt enthusiasm for entering the enemy's camp, as it were, naked. This was, no doubt, the private bath house of the King's harem, but the women here were as unlike the bored and voluptuous beauties of the Emir's apartments as they were unlike one another. None of us appeared out of place, for there were several women darker than Amollia and of like stature, and likewise, several far paler than myself, and with lighter hair. Aster, as usual, blended in, the only significant distinction being that most of the females around us appeared to be either somewhat older or very much younger than ourselves. I thought at first that the King must have begat a great many daughters, for most of the women in the pool were little girls, of no more than twelve years, shrieking and splashing and ducking each other. Like the older women, these girls were of diverse races, which puzzled me until I recalled that the King was not a man but a boy. These children must be his wives or his espoused wives. Or perhaps concubines-to-be? And the older ones his aunts and sisters or former members of his father's harem? Since possession of women was deemed among these people to signify wealth and power, I supposed a child-king might need the girls as symbols, even if he was too young as yet to need them for any other reasons.

Children are curious. Before long one of these miniature houris had befriended us. Aster told her we were the wives of an influential man who was having an audience with the King. She cunningly explained that our baggage camels had been lost in a sandstorm and our husband delayed while looking for them. Because of his exalted position, we had been invited-she didn't say by whom-to lodge with the King's ladies. She wondered with decorous wifely concern if the girl could tell us from whom we could make inquiries regarding our husband's safety.

The girl, Zarifa, interrupted this story many times with tales about the antics of her ponies and goldfish. Amollia drew her out maddeningly by asking playful questions. In the end, however, the effort was worth it. Our new acquaintance turned out to be none other than the King's favorite sister and niece to the acting Sultana. She was a nice enough little thing, despite her lofty t.i.tle and runaway tongue. When we emerged from the baths, she had us dressed in fine clothing. As soon as she saw Kalimba, she insisted that we be lodged in her personal quarters. Amollia persuaded Kalimba to allow herself to be stroked and the girl returned the favor by persuading her aunt to grant us an audience.

The Sultana's court was large enough to pasture forty goats and a horse for a week. None of the adult ladies looked as if they would allow anything so odoriferous as a goat anywhere near them, however. I was very glad we had availed ourselves of the baths, fortunately late enough in the day that the rains had begun again, cooling the air, preserving the beneficial effects of the soap and water. Despite the grandeur of the court, dishes were set here and there to catch water leaking through the ceiling. Once a salamander scuttled across the tile: no one bothered it. Either it was beneath the notice of these folk or its businesslike progress convinced them that it should be able to proceed unmolested.

Princess Zarifa explained the disrepair of the baths and the apartments by saying that the palace was a makeshift affair built on the ruins of the palace of the native prince who had ruled here before being conquered by the Sultan's father. The baths, which were very old and fed by natural hotsprings, had been left standing more or less as we now saw them, since bathing is important to True Believers. The King's main audience chamber and apartments had been remodeled and other parts of the palace were still under construction, but the women's quarters were saved for last, since either special eunuch craftsmen had to be obtained or else the women had to be removed. I wondered why everybody didn't just put their veils on, but apparently that expedient wouldn't have been sufficient.

The acting Sultana was the central gem of this setting, but she didn't seem to fit. She was herself a royal princess, a paternal aunt of the King who was actually only half-brother to Zarifa. She didn't seem to care much about ruling, for she yawned all during the audiences prior to ours, and she didn't really have the hang of it either. She kept interrupting her pet.i.tioners with irrelevant questions about where they had gotten the material for their dresses or if they knew a good bootmaker locally. I felt she mostly asked these questions to keep herself awake. Zarifa whispered that she was chosen Sultana because she was barren and therefore presumed to have no partisan interest in who obtained what favors and privileges. Her face was round, with a little more chin than a Yahtzeni woman ever has the good fortune to acquire. Her brows were scanty and arched high over wide eyes a bit popped and staring, as if she didn't see well. She unfortunately emphasized them by lining them with kohl, which was favored by the women of the desert and was said to be beneficial to the eyes, but which in her case made the problem more prominent. She dressed well, of course. Her gown was the same shimmering blue as that found in the tails of peac.o.c.ks, with a scarlet undergown, and her hair, not gray enough that I could discern it from our waiting place by the fountain, was braided under a jeweled cap.

At last it was our turn to speak with her. Zarifa, eager to act as tutor to three adults, had instructed us to approach the dais upon our knees, not to speak until spoken to, and to back away when dismissed.

The Sultana's eyes popped a little wider as she inspected us. "My niece tells me you ladies seek my help, and through me, the help of the King? Is that right? I believe there was some-er-travail you have recently encountered."

We had all been so impressed by the Princess on the perils of speaking without being asked that as one woman we dipped our heads to indicate that the Sultana had the straight of it.

"Oh, dear," she said, and leaned forward, whispering, "Are you going to bow and sc.r.a.pe all afternoon or are you going to tell me about it? I haven't the faintest idea what to ask you. You'll have to tell me what you want to say." Aloud she said, "Falidah, please fetch some cushions for these ladies. And-and some cakes and sherbet, please."

Cheered on by the promise of food, Aster told a much-embellished and highly colored version of our adventures thus far, carefully pruning the facts to coincide with the story she had told Zarifa of lost baggage camels and influential husband.

The ladies relished the part where, according to Aster, we (all except her of course) came much closer to being ravished by Marid Khan's men than was actually the case. Marid Khan himself she cast in the role of deliverer, which was more or less true, and so spared his reputation for later. The women's eyes all but bugged out of their heads as she described our flight to the shrine on the magic carpet, especially when, as a grand dramatic gesture (previously agreed upon among us), she presented it to the Sultana and commended it to the King in the name of Fatima.