The Complete Parsina Saga

Volume I: SHRINE OF THE DESERT MAGE-17

Feeling proud to have accomplished her task so quickly, she whisked out of the palace and soared at top speed over the darkened city. She passed the dreaded walls without fear this time and flew to her master’s pavilion, half a parasang away from the city in open countryside, away from the well-traveled road.

The magical pavilion Akar had brought with him was like a palace in miniature. The silk top rose to onion-dome spires without the need for poles to hold them up. The fabric draped gracefully, billowing softly in the gentle evening breeze. The most unusual feature of the tent, though, was its color—pure black, like the darkness of the night sky at new moon, without benefit of starlight. The wizard Akar had no need of brilliant colors or flashy designs. His was the elegance of pure power, and black was his natural element.

Akar was dressed in black robes as Cari entered the pavilion, and the black turban on his head held an enormous black pearl in the center. He was seated in the middle of his magical carpet, ten cubits by fifteen, smoking on his hookah and waiting for Cari to report.

“O master, your humble slave has returned,” Cari said. She did not bother to materialize or make the deep salaam that would normally be required, since she knew Akar could not see them. She was careful, though, to keep the proper tone of deference in her voice, for he would surely notice that.

“What are thy findings?” Akar asked without prelude.

Cari informed him that all of Ravan was searching for a gold and jeweled reliquary urn that had been stolen from behind the Bahram fire in the Temple of the Faith. Akar stroked his beard with his right hand as she spoke, while his left hand was clenching into a powerful fist.

“The urn of Aeshma,” he whispered, so softly Cari could barely hear him. “It could be no other.”

Cari had heard the name of Aeshma before, and it filled her with as much dread as the city walls had done earlier. Had she been in corporeal form, she would have shivered.

Akar, though, paid no attention to his slave’s discomfort. If Aeshma were set free from his imprisonment Parsina would shake to its very foundations. It would be a time of fire and fury the likes of which mankind had never seen—not even in the Age of Heroes, when there were at least stalwart men who could combat the evil loosed by Rimahn upon the world.

But strangely, Akar did not fear the liberation of Aeshma. Every great tragedy brought with it an equally great opportunity. He was suddenly struck with the realization that this was what he’d been training himself for all his life. Without knowing it, he had put himself along a course that would bring him to this position with exactly the right mastery of his craft to handle the situation. He alone of humankind could duplicate Ali Maimun’s legendary feat and tame the power of evil incarnate. He, Akar, would harness the king of daevas to bring the world under his rule of perfect justice, perfect peace.

“Do they know who committed the theft?” he asked Cari abruptly.

“The police caught a man who may or may not be guilty, but he didn’t tell them where the urn was,” the Jann said, and she related the strange interrogation of Jafar al-Sharif. Akar listened to the tale, deep in thought.

“The man who would steal the urn of Aeshma must be either a total fool or a mighty wizard,” he mused aloud when Cari had finished speaking. “I’ve never heard of this Jafar al-Sharif before, and it’s unlikely any powerful wizard could have kept himself so pure he could have passed through Ravan’s gates. On the other hand from the wit of his replies he cannot be such a fool as I would imagine. An interesting dilemma.”

Akar was silent for long minutes as he contemplated the puzzle. At last he said, “Cari, I have another task for thee.”

“Always at your will, O master.”

“Return to Ravan and find out whether this Jafar al-Sharif really is the thief who took Aeshma’s urn. If he is, bring him and the urn, unopened, to me. If he isn’t, find the true thief and do likewise.”

“Hearkening and obedience,” Cari said and, without a moment’s hesitation, flew back to the Holy City of Ravan. Her heart was heavy with foreboding, though, for she knew that this time she might well be forced to commit an evil act—rescuing the thief of Aeshma’s urn. Such a deed could have only one result: her instant vaporization. An order was an order, though, and Cari—slave to the ring her master wore—could not help but obey.

Chapter 10: The Dungeon

The night passed slowly and painfully for Jafar al-Sharif. He was taken directly from his audience with the wali down to the palace dungeon, a labyrinth of dark corridors with cold stone walls that dripped moisture and were covered with scum. The air was rotten with the smell of human wastes and stale blood. Flickering torches provided the only light, as well as an oily black smoke that pervaded everything.

Aswad the dungeonmaster, also known as Aswad the stonehearted, received his new charge with a wide grin that revealed more blackened teeth than white ones. He gave a silly, highpitched giggle as he received the wali’s instructions, then told his guards to strip Jafar and bring him down to the interrogation chamber.

Aswad began with a simple torture. Taking a slim piece of wooden doweling he pressed it hard into his victim’s lower abdomen, then slowly began twisting it. The skin of Jafar’s belly began twisting with it, and the more he turned, the harder Aswad pressed until the pain in Jafar’s intestines and bladder became excruciating. Jafar confessed to the crime many times over, but that did not satisfy Aswad; he wanted to know where the urn was.

To gain a respite, Jafar told them the urn was at a given site, specifying the doorway where he’d found the altar cloth; perhaps the real thief had left the urn near there as well. A policeman was immediately dispatched to investigate, but returned shortly with word that the urn was not there. Aswad grinned, for this meant more interrogation. Aswad enjoyed interrogation.

Using his sharpest knife, Aswad made deep cuts in the webbing of skin between the fingers of Jafar’s left hand and then poured boiling oil on the open wounds. Jafar screamed and pleaded for mercy, pleas that only increased Aswad’s enjoyment. In desperation Jafar described a second place, if only to gain himself another respite—but Aswad would not allow that to happen. While the police were out checking this latest spot, Aswad applied torches to the soles of Jafar’s feet, charring the flesh and bringing more screams from the victim. Aswad explained calmly that if this answer wasn’t correct, the next step would be to dip Jafar’s testicles in honey and let the ants eat at them.

Jafar had passed out from the pain, though, by the time the police returned emptyhanded. Aswad, clucking sadly at how soft this new generation of criminals was, told his guards to carry the prisoner to a cell and let him recover for a few hours until he was sufficiently revived to undergo more interrogation.

Accordingly, the guards picked up the storyteller’s unconscious body and dumped him in one of the small holding cells. The room, barely three cubits by five, had solid stone walls and a heavy iron door. A tiny grill in the door at eye level let in the room’s only light. A foul-smelling bucket in the corner served as toilet; a pallet of moldy straw was the only other furnishing. On this pallet the guards unceremoniously dropped Jafar’s abused body, naked save for his loincloth, and left him there to contemplate the folly of resistance.

Jafar al-Sharif remained unconscious for two hours, a period of blessed relief from his agonies. Then his body betrayed him and the pain insinuated itself into his mind once more. His breathing grew ragged as he sobbed uncontrollably, curling up into a ball and cursing the fate that had brought him to this sorry position. He knew that more of this pain lay ahead. More than anything he wished to die to avoid suffering it, but knew not how to accomplish that end.

As his mind came more and more awake he grew slowly aware of another presence within his darkened cell. At first he didn’t care; all that mattered in his mind was the burning pain in his left hand and both his feet. But the presence was patient and persistent, and eventually Jafar al-Sharif stopped his sobbing and turned his head to look at it.

The person standing in the cell with him was short and slender, but barely more than a silhouette in the dim light. Through the stench of the small room wafted the delicate scent of ylang-ylang. “I’ll tell Aswad no more, no matter how much I suffer,” Jafar rasped in a voice that hurt his throat, still sore from screaming.

“I do not come from Aswad,” said a female voice.

Even to a mind confused by pain, this seemed odd. Women were not allowed in dungeons unless they were prisoners—and even then there was a separate dungeon for them. “Go away, then, and let me suffer alone,” Jafar said. His mind was not ready for riddles now.

But the figure did not go; it stood there, peering down at him. “I cannot go yet,” she said. “Not until I have accomplished my mission.”

The pain came in waves over his body, and Jafar had to gasp for several moments before it eased enough to let him think again. The woman was still there, waiting.

“Who are you?” he asked hoarsely. “What do you want?”

“I am a Jann, sent by my master Akar, the world’s mightiest wizard. I must find out if you stole the urn and where it is.”

A Jann? A wizard? Jafar al-Sharif had told many stories about Janns and wizards, but never expected to meet any. And now here was one, all because of that thrice -damned urn. “No,” he said aloud, “it’s a trick. But it won’t work. I won’t tell you any more than I told Aswad.”

“It’s no trick,” the woman said, “and I must know.”

“A Jann couldn’t enter the Holy City,” Jafar coughed. “Even I know that.”

“I am of the righteous Jann, and Oromasd has judged me blameless and worthy of entering Ravan.”

A righteous Jann? Jafar knew there were some such, but…No, it couldn’t be. Djinni simply did not come visiting ordinary mortals like him. He might tell stories about them, but those were only tales to entertain and instruct. They weren’t meant to be taken literally.

“Prove to me you’re a Jann,” he said.

The figure did not reply immediately. Instead, she merely faded from view until she was totally gone, then gradually materialized in front of him once more. “Is that sufficient?” she asked.

Jafar al-Sharif began coughing both from his amazement and his pain. When at last he could control his breath again he said, “All right, I believe you’re some kind of magical being. But why have you come to me?”

“My master commanded that if you are the true thief of the urn I must bring you to him.”

That put matters in an entirely new light. If this Jann was willing to take him from this place of torture, Jafar would cooperate as much as possible.

“Of course I’m the true thief,” Jafar said. “Do you think I’d be here if I weren’t? Now take me to your master at once.”

“Where is the urn?” the Jann asked.

Jafar coughed again. “It’s hard to think, my mind is in so much pain. They tortured me, you know.” He didn’t have to act to convey the agony he was suffering.

“Yes, I was there in the room, invisible, when they did it.”

“Why didn’t you stop them?” Jafar wailed.

“It wasn’t my duty,” the Jann replied, “and interfering at that point might have compromised my mission.”

“Well, I’ll forgive you if you get me out of here now.”

“First tell me where the urn is.”

“I’ve told you, I can’t think when I’m in this much pain. Get me out, give me a chance to heal, and I’ll do much better.”

The figure was silent for a moment, then knelt beside Jafar. She passed her left hand over his feet, his face, and his own throbbing left hand, muttering some words under her breath. Suddenly the pain was gone and the skin was whole again, as though there’d been no torture or beatings at all.