Chapter 17 #2
‘It has hardly been one day. What do you think?’ His eyes linger on my slitted sleeves. The hint of skin displays logos – like his own, except his are ravens – a hallmark of the Camel Road lands, divided by empires. I yank my sleeve down.
Then he smiles sharply and I recoil. ‘I do enjoy your grovelling. I will help you on one condition.’
‘Was the way you knifed me not enough?’
He ignores it. ‘On the last Saturday of this moon cycle, the captain is taking his favoured soldiers from Squadron One to visit the Sixteen-Gated Grand Bazaar. It’s the Festival of Lights, to celebrate the first harvest. You might join us. We go before he drafts his squadron for the Marka.’
‘During the evenings, I study.’
His nose wrinkles at the thin excuse. ‘It’s my condition.’
Around us, torchlights of smokeless fire along the grand staircase cast shadows against the bedrock, playing against Cemil’s face like an omen. A cool wind clatters through the waning evening. He waits, but my instincts prickle in warning.
‘I do not know your intentions. I cannot agree.’
Unsurprised, he stands. ‘For anyone, it would be an easy choice, but not for you. You may live in Sajamistan but the Azadnian in you is clear as day. No wonder the scholars despise you. Your paranoia, your isolation . . . you are forever the lone wolf prone to the devil in the empty valley.’ He bends to my ear.
‘I’d watch my back if I were you,’ he says, before shouldering past me.
I stagger at the force, left to watch him walk up the stairway.
‘Wait.’
He continues walking. I rush forward and block his path. He steps around me but I catch the front of his tunic. He pushes my hand away, lightly, avoiding my injured arm. But I yank him until we are nose to nose.
‘I changed my mind. I will go.’ I swallow my nausea.
He stares at my hand until I release him.
‘You need the oldest Jazatāh annals,’ he finally says. ‘The Keeper of the Great Library guards these ancient scrolls. For him, we need something first.’
Cemil disappears across the road, into the monastic apothecary, reappearing with a foul-smelling pouch in his left hand.
I follow him inside. The Great Library lives in tales scrawled across the continent; its ancient archives are the confluence of jinn-folk and human knowledge, a portal between the material and immaterial realm through sages and script.
Golden light hovers in a halo around the emerald domes above the imposing library, a grand stairway climbing to shimmering gold balconies and entryways disappearing into the dark mountain, as if it is a slumbering beast and we are ants crawling into its bowels, scared to awaken it.
Tamed phoenixes crouch atop the filigree-laced wood flanking a bone-stone entrance. Ababil birds streak circles across the dark sky as if compelled by some unknown force to guard the round roofs. The wings of par? form feathered shields across the ivory walls carved in vibrant epics.
Seeing us, the par? bow and smile. Their cheeks have a rosy pink tint, pointy ears twitching, skin shimmering as if the Divine ensconced their forms in starlight.
‘It’s easy for initiates to wander lost and never appear again.
’ Cemil yanks on my hemp waist cord, guiding us through a maze of corridors; hexagonal walls painted in miniatures about the Stone Empires dating to Adam’s first descendants.
Long palm shelves hold scrolls secreted from the Unseen world into the greed of human hands.
The tiled walls carved from merciless bedrock depict various stelae of warriors slaying azhdahak by feeding the winged serpents poisoned cow.
Not even hate can rival fascination. I admire the architecture, the old creatures, the mounds of mineral-inked parchment, even the friezes of bone-stone, strange as they are. Above us, on patterned tiles, it reads:
SPECIAL THIRD BUREAU OF MARID, JINN AND UNSEEN SCROLLS.
The complex widens into shelves that descend into eight layers below, filled with thousands of scrolls, ringing in spirals, eventually tunnelling into underground crypts.
I still against the archway. ‘What is this?’
On the first level are hundreds of low-ranks sprawled across kilim rugs. From training, I recognise Aina and Gulnaz, Yima, Dara, Sharra, Adam and Aizere, the last looking especially disgruntled.
‘Khamilla?’ Katayoun spots us at the entrance, her russet braid aglow beneath the lanterns. She taps her chin. ‘Cemil, are you feeling generous?’
I wait for a protest at my presence. None comes.
‘Not generous,’ Cemil corrects Katayoun as he enters, releasing my cord. ‘We’re here to find the Keeper.’ He glances at me warily. ‘This is where trifectas gather to study. We can return here after finding the annals.’
Small wonder the other students are succeeding.
A little wide-eyed, I watch the rukhs parse out assigned manuscripts; trifectas debating, as united units, against others.
I’m unwilling to admit how easy it would be to fall into their communal routine, as if deceiving myself into believing I can be one of them – that I can enjoy this curious studying as an Eajīz, where we fuel each other’s answers.
‘The Keeper?’ Katayoun scowls. ‘That old ass.’
‘Who is the Keeper?’ I remember to ask.
‘He is the Sepāhbad-vizier for the jinn. The jinn-folk have their own tribes, wars and rivalries. The Keeper is a par? who handles their affairs in Za’skar City, for peace.’
But the Keeper does not live up to his grand status.
Deeper inside, at the centre of the alcoves, upon golden cushions, reclines an unimpressive par?.
He chews areca nuts, his other claw smoking – I discreetly sniff – charas.
The par? are mischievous creatures granted permission to leave the Unseen and guard ancient texts in the mortal realm.
By doing so, they atone for their past sins so they can return to Paradise.
‘I thought smoking was banned in the army,’ I cough through curling smoke.
‘Well, so is hashish. But the Keeper is not a mortal, so he’s absolved from the rules,’ Cemil answers, pointing at the par?.
‘Surely that cannot be the Sepāhbad of the jinn-folk.’
‘Am I a soldier?’ The Keeper does not glance up as he starts tying knots with a black thread.
‘Scholar Mufasa sent us,’ Cemil says to him.
A scowl.
‘The scholar will have my head if I do not memorise the annals,’ I add.
The Keeper pouts. ‘Can one piss without causing a smell?’
Cemil chokes on his breath. ‘I-is this a jinn’s riddle?’
I answer anyway. ‘No, urine tends to have an awful odour.’ The Keeper finally looks up and stares. After squirming, I add, ‘Unless you drink plenty of water. Then the urine is clear.’
He sighs. ‘I see. The fool always thinks he’s not reeking up the place, sending pupils to bother me. Tell that to Scholar Mufasa.’ He holds out his hand. ‘As for my payment.’ Cemil bows and digs into his pouch, pulling out a leaf of . . .
‘Hashish?’ My eyes bulge.
The Keeper accepts it and leads us through the archives, hopping over the kilim’s embroidery, ensuring his heel does not graze any lines. I struggle to hide my annoyance.
He stops at a spiral of shelves. ‘Jazatāh scrolls,’ he says.
I reach to graze the bleached-bone papyrus with unworthy hands: knowledge shared by benevolent jinn, channelled and scribed through Qabl sages.
The Qabl Order: spiritual intellects of Za’skar who commune with the jinn-folk – by crossing their souls temporarily through the Veil that separates jinn and mankind – to gain knowledge.
‘I would not touch those just yet,’ the Keeper warns.
‘Use this.’ Cemil places a cold, wet bone into my hand, forcing my wrist toward the shelf. Before I can flinch away, the smokeless firelight flickers around us, dimming the library. Something sharp gnashes against my palm and the bone disappears. A manuscript tumbles out.
I jump back.
‘Old guardians from the Unseen world. They help students find a text if you bribe them with food, meaning bones.’ Cemil watches me in amusement.
‘A warning would have been nice.’ I extract my hand from his.
‘Please continue,’ the Keeper interjects. ‘I’d love to see the a?i serpents and zār demons sink their fangs into a novice brat like you.’
I shrink against the marble columns. ‘Zār? But these are archives.’
‘Archives now, but millennia ago, long before even Adam and Nuh, this was a jinn-kingdom’s abode,’ he corrects.
‘Beasts have festered for millions of years, guarding ancient relics tucked into tombs, finding homes in obscure niches.’ As if to prove his point, a hiss emits from below.
‘Knowledge in our language holds thousands of meanings, not made for human comprehension, and forever lost in script. Nothing is translated without losing its original meaning. We are the Veiled; our knowledge remains Veiled. You read our texts with unfasted eyes, and we guard them. Bones are a simple price to pay.’
With that kind warning, the par? wanders off to hunt for the other manuscripts, Cemil trailing him. Beside me, No-Name leans the slit of her nose to the pages, giddily. She’s changed her appearance into a younger version of Uma, as if preferring it.
‘I’ve never seen so much parchment,’ she says.
A scroll catches our eyes, embossed with a triangular seal.
I feed the shelf a bone and pull out the faded paper, the material woven through with silk threads.
The parchments illustrate cuneiforms of the monoglot Jazatāh tribes, magicians who worshipped jinn and magick.
After flipping through the leathery pages, at the halfway mark, I find pictograms demonstrating monks in meditative states. It’s a text for the monastery – Qabl sageism is how they meditate through the Veil to the world of jinn.
The Keeper returns to me, admonishing, ‘Tongue-fasting begins soon, hurry and go.’ He pauses when he spies the text I’m holding, and for the first time, his eyes flicker with unease. ‘Those sageism scrolls are too advanced.’
‘What are they?’
‘A Za’skar monk travelled to the Mist Mountains and convened with ancient jinn.
Those jinn had eavesdropped on Heavenly matters, copying forbidden knowledge.
Later, when angels were sent down to teach magick as a test to mankind, the Jazatāh learnt and added more to these texts. You’ve no need for it.’
‘I think I found the fifth annal,’ Cemil interrupts and the Keeper turns away. I tuck the scroll into my satchel.