Desert Stars (4 page)

“
Ah,” Jalil nodded. He
crouched down and tousled Majd’s hair, ignoring the chatter of the
infuriated women.

“
It’s good that you want
to share the best we have with our guests,” he told her. “Those
strawberries are very special, and I know why you wanted to share
them.”

Majd stopped crying and turned to him.
“But why don’t we?”

“
You’ll understand
someday. They’re very important.” He smiled and glanced over at
Mira.

“
That’s right,” said Mira.
“The strawberries aren’t just for eating, Majd—they show that Lena
is a pure and honorable woman. Someday, when a handsome young man
comes to the camp to marry you and take you off to his tribe,
Mother will grow strawberries for your wedding.”

Jalil left them and walked towards the
tent doors leading to the main chamber. The guests were certainly
seated by now, and as Sathi’s only son, he would soon be expected
to make an appearance. Besides, someone needed to explain Tiera’s
scream—even with the storm buffeting the camp, the guests surely
must have heard it. A scorpion in the women’s quarters, perhaps?
Yes, that would work.

This is one thing I’m not
going to miss when I’m gone,
he reflected
as he absently fingered the pendant underneath his
shirt.

* * * * *

The sandstorm was fierce, but like so
many summer storms, it blew over in little more than a day. The
main brunt passed far to the south, sparing the camp from any
damage. Still, it left the landscape noticeably changed, burying
some small craters and outcroppings while uncovering others. The
wall, however, protected the camp from the worst of the drifts, and
only the windmill took any damage—damage which Jalil repaired
before the morning was finished.

Lena
Al-
Sauliha Bint
Shira Al-
Najmi Saharat
Al-
Gharab
Al-
Gaiani
Al-
Jadida was wedded to
Mazhar
Al-
Kariym
Ibn
Amr
Al-
Jabaliyn Saharat Mutli’ih
Aliet
Al-
Gaiani
Al-
Jadida
just after sundown. The festivities continued late into the night,
long after the bride and groom had retired to their wedding suite.
Jabaliyn and Najmi tribesmen danced around the roaring bonfire to
the music of the drums and pipes, celebrating all night beneath the
stars and satellites.

Jalil was the first to rise the next
morning. Even so, he walked some distance from the camp to say his
morning prayers, seeking the solitude that only the desert could
give.

“
In the name of Allah, the
Merciful, the Compassionate,” he began, kneeling on the stiff
prayer rug in the midst of the rust-red sand. The compass laid
before him pointed east by southeast, and as he pressed his
forehead to ground, he visualized a pearly white spire surrounded
by a sea of glass, reaching upward toward the starry sky. The image
hung on the wall in the magnificently decorated front room of the
camp, and depicted the Temple of a Thousand Suns, the Noble Shrine
of Earth and the holiest place in all the settled
worlds.

“
Almighty Lord of Earth,”
Jalil whispered, his face low to the ground, “Thou who led our
fathers safely through the starry void and blessed them with the
richness of Thy bounty, if it be not against Thy will, lead me to
Thy holy temple, that I might discover the truth of who I
am.”

The wind whispered across the rocky
plain, stirring the dust and tickling his cheek with sand. Jalil
closed his eyes and savored the silence, finding in it a peace that
refreshed and edified his soul.

When he returned to the camp, the
guests had already begun to gather in the lavish front room to
drink the morning tea. Several of the Jabaliyn tribesmen eyed him
as he entered, staring at his unusually blond hair and fair skin.
He pretended to ignore them and joined the Najmi girls near the
front, reclining on the cushioned floor between Tiera and
Mira.

“
Where were you?” Tiera
whispered.

“
Praying.”

“
Ah.” She glanced at him
out of the corner of her eye. “Why did you leave the camp to
pray?”

“
I’ll tell you later,” he
whispered back, pouring himself a cup of tea. More than a dozen
gold kettles littered the center of the room, ample evidence of the
Najmi tribe’s hospitality.

Mazhar and Lena were the last to
arrive. Lena entered wearing a black dress and veil lined with red
embroidery, and Mazhar entered wearing his finest flowing robes,
dyed in the green and blue colors of the Jabaliyn tribe. As they
stepped into the chamber, everyone present rose to their feet to
clap and cheer. Mazhar raised his rifle in the air and let out a
great whoop, and the women let loose with their loud ululating
cries.

After several moments, the chamber
quieted down once again. The spirit of anticipation, however, did
not leave them—breakfast had not yet been served. Jalil stretched
out on his side, enjoying the moment.

“
When are you going to
marry?” Jalil asked Mira light-heartedly. “You’re the prime age for
a bride!”

Mira blushed deeply, struggling to
come up with an answer. Jalil smiled and winked, and she turned
away quickly, hiding her face behind her headscarf.

She’s changed a lot since
we’ve grown up,
Jalil thought to himself.
It was true; her eyes alone were gorgeous enough to disarm any man,
and even in her loose black robes, her figure was very noticeably
feminine. He wouldn’t be surprised if she were married off before
the end of the year—with luck, she’d already caught the attention
of one of the Jabaliyn boys.

Sheikh Sathi rose to his
feet, and
Shira
led her three youngest
daughters into the room: Rina, Majd, and Alia. The young girls
carried a giant platter between them, piled high with hundreds of
plump, juicy strawberries. A loud cheer erupted as the men raised
their rifles in the air and the women filled the room again with
their ululating cries.

After some time, the noise gradually
died down, and Sathi motioned for everyone to have a seat. As they
did, he cleared his throat with a magnanimous wave of his
hand.

“
Fellow tribesmen, both in
law and in blood,” he began. “Here sits my flower, my daughter,
Lena Bint
Shira
, whom we have given in
marriage to your son Mazhar
Ibn
Amr Al-Jabaliyn. For
many years, we have labored hard to cultivate and nurture her into
an honorable woman, that she may become a noble wife. Indeed,” he
said, taking a single strawberry from the platter and raising it in
the air, “we have cultivated her as we cultivated this noble red
fruit that you see before you now. Even as the strawberry requires
shelter from the hot sun and nourishment with water and nutrients
that the desert alone cannot provide, so too have we struggled
these many years to raise our daughter pure and unsullied in this
world of sin and corruption. But behold, our labors have not been
in vain, for here before us stands a woman worthy to be called a
daughter of the most holy Earth.”

Mazhar’s mother stepped
forward and accepted a plate of the strawberries from Rina, the
youngest daughter. She presented the plate to
Shira
,
who smiled warmly as she offered it to Lena.

“
And now,” Sathi bellowed,
“may this union of our people be blessed with much
fruit!”

The cheering and singing
began anew as Lena hand-fed a juicy strawberry to her new husband.
As the guests clapped and made music, Sathi took his seat next to
Sheikh Amr, and Rina served them both with generous servings
that
Shira
had spooned up. As the girls
served the guests, lavishly dressed dancers from the Jabaliyn tribe
moved to the center of the room to provide the
entertainment.

“
I wish I could dance like
that,” said Mira. “Those women are beautiful.”

“
You’re as beautiful as
any of those girls,” said Jalil. “Besides, you’re a Najmi, and that
makes you better than any two of them.”

“
Truly?”

“
Of course. It won’t be
long before Sathi’s making some long-winded speech on your wedding
morning, of that I’m sure.”

Mira smiled and blushed,
quickly looking away.
Strange,
Jalil thought to himself—but then again, she
always was the shy one.

Chapter 2

“
So which of the Jabaliyn
boys caught your eye?” asked Amina, eyes sparkling as she looked up
from scrubbing one of the giant cooking pots. “My eyes are for
Ozal—that man’s a beast.”

Ozal?
Mira wondered quietly as she rinsed the last of the
plates.
Which one is he?

“
Good Lord!” cried
Surayya. “You’re much too young for him. Ozal is almost as old as
Uncle Samir!”

“
Eh, you’ll probably marry
a blind old man,” Amina retorted, passing the pot on to Mira for
rinsing. “Besides, I’m not too young to take a husband if I want
to.”

“
Oh yes, you are,” said
Surayya, carefully drying one of the plates with a vacuum sponge.
“Besides, Father isn’t going to marry you off until he finds a
husband for Mira and me.”

Mira kept to herself as her sisters
argued around her. She always felt awkward talking about boys,
especially with sisters as gossipy as Amina and Surayya. It wasn’t
that she never thought about the subject—far from it—but the way
her sisters gossiped, to tell one of them was to broadcast it
throughout the camp.

“
Come on, Mira,” said
Surayya, hands on her hips in impatience. “Can’t you do your job?
You’re holding us all up.”

Mira jolted upright and nearly dropped
the pot she was rinsing. “Oh,” she said, slowly regaining her
composure. “Sorry.”

“
Looks like Mira has
someone on her mind,” said Amina, smiling mischievously.

“
I do not,” said Mira, a
little too quickly. She passed the cooking pot on to Surayya and
fumbled about in the rinse water for the next plate.

“
Sure,” said Amina, “and
I’m secretly a man. Come on, Mira. What’s his name?”

Mira tried to think of something to
say, but nothing came to her mind. Her knees began to feel weak,
and she took a deep breath.

“
Oh my,” said Surayya, her
face lighting up. “You’re right, Amina; she’s got that dreamy-eyed
look about her.”

Hot blood rushed to Mira’s cheeks, and
she glanced quickly down in an attempt to hide her face.

“
I knew it,” said Amina.
“You’ve been up to something, haven’t you, girl?”

“
Good Lord!” said Surayya,
eyes widening as she covered her mouth with her hand. “You didn’t
actually go into their tents last night, did you?”

“
What?” said Mira. “No!
Why would I—”

“
I think we all know the
answer to that,” said Amina, winking.

Mira’s hands became clammy, and she
started shaking. She bit her lip, but her cheeks still burned with
embarrassment.

“
Don’t be shy, now,” said
Surayya. “You
have
to tell us.”

“
Is it Ozal?” Amina’s eyes
were practically glowing with curiosity.

“
No,” Mira
whispered.

“
Ezrom?”

“
No.”

“
Zeyd, then. It’s gotta be
Zeyd.”

“
No! It isn’t
anybody.”

“
Su-ure,” said Surayya,
drawing out the word for emphasis. “Come on, Mira. You
have
to tell
us.”

“
Don’t worry,” said Amina.
“We won’t tell anyone.”

Mira shuffled uneasily on her feet.
“Well, he’s not one of the Jabaliyn boys.”

“
One of our cousins,
then?”

She shrugged.

“
Ah!” said Amina, giving
her a meaningful look. “So it’s our own Jalil you’ve got eyes for,
eh?”

Mira froze where she stood. A wave of
dizziness passed over her, and her heart started racing. For a
terrible moment, all she wanted was to sink through the ground and
disappear.

Surayya shrieked with delight. “Jalil?
Lord of Earth!”

“
Don’t tell,” Mira cried,
grabbing her arm. “P-please, don’t tell anyone!”

“
Don’t worry about it,”
said Amina, stepping between them. “You could do a lot worse than
Jalil. Besides, Father wants to marry him off to one of us—why
shouldn’t it be you?”

Mira said nothing, but inwardly, her
heart skipped a beat.

“
But I thought Jalil was
supposed to marry Tiera,” said Surayya. “She’s Mother Zayne’s
oldest daughter—shouldn’t the inheritance fall to her?”

Mira’s stomach fell. She bit her
lip.

“
Not necessarily,” said
Amina. “Tiera may be the oldest, but Jalil is Sathi’s only son,
even if he is adopted. The inheritance falls to him, so long as he
marries in the family.”