The Complete Parsina Saga

Volume I: SHRINE OF THE DESERT MAGE-4

The outer ziyada made escape impossible that way—but on the side of the temple where the sanctuary was, the building was separated from its neighbors by only a narrow alleyway. Running with the quick stride of the accomplished thief, Hakem Rafi raced to the edge and leaped onto the roof of the building across from the temple. Some of the priests followed him, but most were less daring and less desperate; they returned instead to spread the word of the temple’s violation to the Royal Guards.

For the next hour and a half, Hakem Rafi the black-souled, the accursed, led his pursuers a merry chase across the rooftops and down the back streets of Ravan. Where before he’d been spurred by fear and desperation, the acquisition of his precious urn had filled him with a glow of confidence. Though sometimes his pursuers came almost within reach, he never lost his faith in his ability to elude them. After dodging down one winding, narrow street he heard the growing horde of his pursuers—numbering many of the Royal Guards by this time—race off in a different direction, finally chasing a shadow that was not of his making.

Hakem Rafi leaned against the wall and wiped the sweat from his brow with the tattered sleeve of his cloak. Then suddenly he threw his head back and laughed. It was a high-pitched laugh, a harsh laugh, a laugh devoid of mirth or good humor, a laugh deriving from the cheating of the innocent and the misleading of the honest. Hakem Rafi was a man who laughed at cripples when their crutches cracked.

When he’d had his fill of laughter, Hakem Rafi took his prize from his pocket and looked at it by starlight in the early morning darkness. Even though dawn had not yet begun, the waning moon had risen and shed some light on the empty street. Unwrapping the urn, he let it glitter mysteriously under the moonlight, its jewels hypnotizing him once more with their unearthly beauty.

He looked for a moment at the altar cloth in his other hand. It was a fine piece of fabric and intrinsically valuable, but it would be far too recognizable for him to trade safely. There was bound to be a fuss about the thief who’d broken into the temple. The jewels in the urn could be pried loose from their settings and sold individually, and the golden urn itself could be melted down into a safer form. The altar cloth was too distinctive to sell.

Tossing away the cloth, Hakem Rafi tucked the urn once more in his pocket and walked jauntily back to the miserable room he rented in the caravanserai behind the Winding Bazaar.

A reliquary urn and a discarded altar cloth. With such slender threads, then, does kismet weave its intricate tapestry and change the fate both of worlds and of men.

Chapter 2: The Storyteller

Morning came to Ravan with little outward sign to mark the passing of one era and the dawn of a new. Few citizens were aware of any change at all; even those who’d participated in the chase through the darkness thought of it as nothing more than a thief in the night—an annoyance, to be sure, but scarcely an interruption in the peaceful flow of events that made the calendar of Ravan such a remarkably boring document.

The thoughts of Jafar al-Sharif were not upon such weighty matters as the change of worldly Cycles and the fate of all Parsina. The thoughts of Jafar al-Sharif were centered more on the rumblings in his belly and the lightness of his purse, which he’d emptied yesterday of its last few copper fals so his daughter Selima could buy some food for the day. And the thoughts of Jafar al-Sharif were centered on how he could fill up both belly and purse while yet making an honest living.

Like Hakem Rafi the blackhearted, Jafar al-Sharif was but lately come to the Holy City of Ravan. Like Hakem Rafi, he was finding his new home less than rewarding to a man of his peculiar talents. But there the similarities ended. Where Hakem Rafi stole men’s money, Jafar al-Sharif stole only their attention; where Hakem Rafi killed people, Jafar al-Sharif killed naught but time. Jafar al-Sharif was, by both profession and inclination, a storyteller—and while some have argued that storytellers fulfill no useful purpose in life’s plan, the harm he did was likewise minimal.

In his native Durkhash, Jafar al-Sharif had been justly renowned as one of the premier artisans of his craft. His patrons included the noblest families of the city, and more than a few times he’d been called upon to entertain King Ashtor himself. The death of his beloved wife Amineh had so driven Jafar to distraction, though, that he had no choice but to seek his fortune elsewhere. He’d come to Ravan in hopes of improving his lot—yet the only work he’d found here was telling bawdy stories in taverns for meals and drinks, a particularly demeaning occupation. Still, in the daytime, he searched for higher employment with hope ever strong that his true talents would be recognized and rewarded.

Jafar al-Sharif stopped his morning walk before the carved wooden gate of a wealthy home in the northwest quarter of the city, and paused to gather his nerve. Knowing that outward appearance was a vital asset to a storyteller he’d taken great pains to look the part. He was a tall man with a suitably handsome face, old enough to have streaks of gray prominent now in his well-kept beard. He was wearing the best of the three outfits he currently owned: the white sirwaal pants with the gold sash, the white kaftan with the gold sequined sleeves, his good niaal, and the mantle so heavily embroidered with gold thread it was hard to see the color of the original fabric. Only a person looking very closely would see how badly frayed the embroidery around the hem and the cuffs really was.

Straightening his lemon yellow turban, Jafar al-Sharif took a deep breath, stepped forward, and knocked authoritatively on the gate. After a few moments the door was opened by a crusty old man who, by his outfit, appeared to be one of the household domestics.

Jafar al-Sharif bowed and said in his deepest voice, “Salaam to thee, O worthy servant of a noble house. Please inform thy master that Jafar al-Sharif awaits his pleasure.”

The old man gave a slight nod of acknowledgment and closed the door again. Minutes passed interminably. The gate had been opened just enough to allow the aroma of breakfast to escape and tantalize the storyteller’s nostrils, and his nose reminded him how empty his belly was. Jafar al-Sharif stood and suffered until the door opened and the old man reappeared.

“My master says he knows no one named Jafar al-Sharif,” he said in a thick Chudish accent, and started to close the gate again.

The storyteller moved forward just far enough that his foot rested against the gate near its hinges, not allowing it to close. He waved his arms in broad gestures as he spoke. “Allow me then, O valued servant, to correct the oversight which I’m sure is due solely to my having come but so recently to Ravan. In my native Durkhash I am widely renowned as Jafar the golden-tongued, Jafar the spellbinder, Jafar the spinner of a thousand thousand tales, Jafar the fablemaster….”

“A storyteller,” the old man said with insight, and again would have closed the door had Jafar’s foot not prevented it.

“More than some mere street-chanter, I assure you,” said Jafar, striving still to keep the desperation out of his voice. “My repertoire is the most complete in all Parsina, suitable for any occasion. I have sagas of history and stories with morals to educate the young men of the household….”

“They already have teachers,” the old man interrupted.

“Stories of love to touch the heart, stories of adventure to chill the blood, stories of magic to astound the mind,” Jafar continued undaunted, his hands waving with serpentine grace to emphasize his words. “I have stories of manners to charm the ladies and stories of erotic delights to please the most jaded of men. My stories speak to the soul as well as to the ear, lifting it to soar through the air like a hawk on the desert currents….”

“We don’t need a storyteller.”

“Ah, you only believe that because you’ve never heard my talents for yourself. Your voice marks you as a native of illustrious Chudistan. Surely you were raised on tales of King Bhered and the Varanhi Knights. What Chudish boy doesn’t grow up dreaming of Khanseranno, the Jeweled City, and its beautiful warrior queen, Moranna? Announce me to your master, let me regale his table, and I’ll make those tales live again for you.”

“My master isn’t Chudish and those stories wouldn’t interest him,” the gatekeeper said stubbornly.

“Then I have others that will. What man does not need to forget the cares of his worldly day, to fly on wings of song and fable to another land beyond his own? What noble table is complete without the entertainment only a fablemaster can provide, to regale household and guests alike with tales of other times and other climes? I ask you, sir….”

“We’ve already got a poet,” the old servant said.

“A poet? A poet?” Jafar al-Sharif straightened his back and drew himself up even taller, towering over the shorter figure of the old man. “Surely a man of your intelligence, of your Chudish discernment, knows better than that. Consider, O illustrious doorkeeper, what is a poet? Merely a rhymer, a juggler of words in clever order. I do not mean to speak ill of poets, far from it; poets have been some of my dearest companions. I myself, from time to time, have been heard to say an occasional rhyme. A man whose table boasts both a storyteller and a poet is justly renowned as a learned man indeed, for all knowledge and all beauty are available at his command.

“But to retain a poet in place of a storyteller is rankest folly. That is the valuing of style above content, the frame more than the picture. Poetry supports and enhances a story; it does not substitute for it. A man who keeps just a poet would go through the world with one ear and one eye when he could easily have two at his disposal. A poet alone….”

The old servant had heard more than enough. He slammed the gate so hard that Jafar al-Sharif had to pull back his foot lest his ankle be shattered.

“May thy nose grow warts on the inside, O guzzler of camel’s piss.” Jafar spat the Chudish curse at the now-vanished gatekeeper—but not loudly enough, he hoped, to really be heard. He was in no position to alienate anyone in Ravan, no matter how rude or abrupt they were.

Instead he turned his feet northward along the Street of Jewelers and walked along, muttering to himself. “Thus is Jafar, confidant of kings, brought low. Forced to argue with menials about the worthiness of art, forced to justify my own existence to an ignorant Chudistani who knows nothing about talent and cares even less.”

He kicked at a clot of dirt in the road at his feet and, in a voice to mock the servant’s, repeated, “We’ve already got a poet. Now all thou needst is a brain, son of a monkey’s sputum.”

He tried again at other gates and other houses throughout the morning, but his reception was largely the same. Storytellers were not in vogue in Ravan these days. Poets, it seemed, were all the rage. Every rich merchant and noble household sponsored at least one, if not an entire stable of the creatures—yet no one was willing to spend a dirham for a storyteller of substance and art.

Jafar’s spirits sank lower with each rejection. To be unwanted is a bad thing, but to know one has a proven talent and to be outcast because it is unpopular is devastating. Jafar’s eyes were cast hopelessly downward as he at last gave up his attempts for the day and began making his way through the now-busy streets of Ravan to the caravanserai where he and Selima currently dwelled. Perhaps tonight he could find some other tavern where his stories were fresh and his welcome hadn’t been worn out.

With his gaze so low, he could not miss the glint of gold as it shone from the corner of a doorway. Thinking at first it might be a coin, he moved closer and saw that it was merely gold thread along the bottom of a long rectangular piece of good white linen. The gold was stitched in a design he recognized as lettering, but the words meant nothing to him. Reading was not among the talents of Jafar al-Sharif. He could hear any story once and know it forever in all its detail, but the mystery of the written word was still beyond his grasp. It was a trait he shared with most men of his time.