The Sword Of Medina (16 page)

“I know people whisper about me and Akiiki,” she said, whispering also. Unlike me, Maryam cared what people thought of her. The rumors that she was sleeping with her skinny black eunuch—a notion I found completely laughable—niggled at her like a sore tooth that she continuously tested with her tongue.

“How could people say such things?” she fumed. “I was Muhammad’s concubine, not his wife. I could marry again if I desired. My decision to remain faithful to him should inspire praise, not gossip.”

Our being forbidden to remarry had caused tongues to wag about all of us. We’d discussed this in the
harim
many times, but since Maryam lived in her own house—we’d once treated her so badly that Muhammad had separated her from us—she didn’t know that we suffered from gossip, also. “The women who tell lies about us are jealous of our status,” I told Maryam, “and the men want us for themselves.”

She gazed across the fields. As the sun touched our hair, she lifted her face, cascading her curls down her back and revealing her throat. Then I saw the swelling in her neck, as if she’d swallowed a stone.

“By al-Lah!” I drew back from Maryam. Did she have the plague? “Stay right there.”

I had heard stories about this dreaded illness. “It begins with lumps in the neck and quickly becomes a fever that kills,” Talha had told me. And, he’d said, few of its victims survived.

Please, al-Lah, let Maryam live,
I prayed as I ran to my hut to get my medicine pouch, across the rolling meadow that separated her house from the city.

On the road, I dodged bedraggled Bedouin caravans, their riders looking for water and the handful of dates that Umar provided to all who asked—a poor ration, but it had saved many from starving. I fled through the market, praying for Maryam, past the sad-eyed vendors whose numbers had dwindled because of the drought to almost nothing. Without rain there was no milk to sell, no fruit, no wheat, no meat.

I raced into the mosque, where I stopped to tell Umar about Maryam’s
illness. As I gave him the news, his face drooped even farther than it had already sunken these past months. Gone was the fat he’d once stored like acorns in his cheeks. I’d heard that he’d given all his precious butter and honey away, saying he couldn’t indulge in those luxuries while his people starved.

“
Yaa
A’isha, you must not return to Maryam’s house,” Umar said. “She is in al-Lah’s hands now.”

“Not go back?” I frowned. “And let Maryam die in agony, alone?”

“She will not be alone.” A faint smile tugged at the corners of Umar’s mouth. “Her eunuch can care for her.”

I lowered my eyes, remembering to show submission. “But I may have remedies,
khalifa
,” I said in a soft voice.

“There are no remedies for the plague.” Umar’s tone was curt. “You will not return to her.”

“You don’t care if Maryam dies!” I cried.

“If she has the plague, she is going to die.”

“And she’ll die in agony if I obey you.” I glared at him. “But who cares about Maryam’s pain? She’s only a woman. If she’s not giving pleasure or sons to a man, she’s less valuable than your cattle.”

Umar raised his whip and cracked it down hard against the mosque floor. “She was the mother of Muhammad’s son,” he shouted. “And she is a model of womanhood, while you are the opposite.”

“Praise al-Lah for that!” My laugh mocked him. I had no respect for Umar’s order to keep away from Maryam. I turned around to address our audience: Ali, Uthman, and Talha had come into the mosque and stood behind me.

“Behold Maryam’s reward for her exemplary behavior. The ‘model of womanhood’ is now being left to die alone like a dog. In that case, I’ll happily be her opposite.”

Ali folded his arms and smirked at me. “We are aware, A’isha, of your desire to be a man. Unfortunately, al-Lah has not blessed you with the attributes you need.”

“And what’s
your
excuse, Ali?” I fired back. Talha laughed out loud at my retort, and even the tactful Uthman smiled. Umar stomped over and cracked his whip over my head.

“Enough!” he said. “A’isha, you have gone too far.”

“I haven’t gone far enough,” I said. “Not until I’ve gone back to Maryam’s house.”

I ran past him and into my hut, intending to grab my medicine bag and return to her, but in my haste I spilled the contents all over the floor. By the time I’d stuffed everything back inside and opened the door, Talha stood outside. His stricken expression was such a rare sight that I dropped my bag again.

“What are you doing here?” I said. “You know if Umar sees you—”

“I’m enforcing your confinement.” He bent down and picked up my pouch. “Umar sent me.”

“Confinement?” My body tensed. My childhood imprisonment in my parents’ home pressed like walls against my memory. Did Umar think I was contagious? I
had
hugged Maryam and kissed her cheek this morning.

I lowered my voice. “Thank al-Lah that you’re the one he sent! Is anyone watching? I’ll slip out to Maryam’s house and return in an hour. You stay here and pretend I’m still inside.” I started to move around him, but he held up his sword.

“No, A’isha.” I grunted in exasperation and he averted his face—avoiding the plague. “It is as Umar said: You cannot return. This pestilence has already killed twenty-five thousand. We can’t risk spreading it in Medina. You must remain in your hut until we know if you’ve been infected.”

“No—” Emotion filled my throat, making my voice sound choked and far away. I lowered my head and tried again to step past him, but he flung out his arm to block my way. I retreated into my hut, glowering. “What about Maryam?”

His gaze was tender. I peered over his shoulder, yearning for escape, not wanting to see love on his face that I couldn’t return.

“Maryam is in the hands of al-Lah,” he said. “As are you, A’isha. And I, for one, am praying for your good health.”

♦

Several weeks later, I’d been pronounced plague-free but Maryam was dead—not from plague, after all, but from a tumor. At her funeral, more tears watered the ground than had fallen all year. Thousands came from all over Hijaz to pay homage to the mother of the Prophet’s son, Ibrahim, who had died when he was two. Maryam’s service was simple, not befitting
her status, but since she hadn’t been a Muslim, Umar had refused to say the prayer over her grave. Her sister, Sirin, who had come with her from Egypt, led the service—while Umar, who disapproved because she was a woman, stood frowning beside her.

We sister-wives sobbed as we looked down at Maryam lying in the ground, her body shrouded. Over the years, she had become like a sister to us all, soothing our worries with her encouraging words. Even the hard-hearted Ramlah loved her, and no wonder. Maryam always honored Ramlah by calling her by her
kunya,
Umm Habiba. And when we’d heard of the death of Yazid, the Syrian governor and Ramlah’s brother, Maryam had given her a bag of dried dates—such a sacrifice during this famine—in consolation. How unjust that death should claim Maryam so soon! But al-Lah knows best, as Muhammad used to say.

Our cries could barely be heard over the ecstatic weeping and moaning of Akiiki, Maryam’s eunuch servant. As he tore his clothes and tried to hurl himself into the grave, members of the
umma
watched from the corners of their eyes, not wanting to encourage such wanton behavior yet curious about the blackamoor and his relationship with Maryam.

How eagerly Akiiki had followed Maryam about, always at hand to do her bidding, ever anticipating her needs. He was, in truth, like a smitten lover, gazing at her with limpid eyes as though she made a vision too bright to behold, yet too enchanting to look away from.

She, in turn, had seemed to rely on Akiiki for much more than a master usually asked from a servant. The eunuch dressed her, styled her hair, massaged her feet: Imagine my shock to see his hands move up her legs to caress and knead her calves, and to hear Maryam’s moans of pleasure as he did so! He danced and sang with her, and held her head in his lap and stroked her hair. He cooked her meals, murmured in her ear, and called her
habibati,
meaning “my beloved.” In short, he did everything a husband might do—and more, for who ever heard of a man cooking a meal for his wife?

I’d seen them laugh together, seen how their eyes locked in the secret knowing that lovers share. Was there more to their relationship than Maryam would admit?

This was the question on people’s lips after Muhammad had died. Gossips like Umm Ayman had found Maryam’s situation too exciting to resist. Yet they’d also paired most of us in the
harim
with a man. Some had
paired us with each other. I’d heard rumors about me and Hafsa, to my bewilderment and Hafsa’s amusement.

Often, people talked in order to forget their hunger. Drought and famine had made skeletons of us all, killing babies in their mothers’ wombs, drying up mothers’ milk, cracking and swelling lips, leaving too little energy to brush away flies. Each day was consumed with thoughts of food and water. Because of our status, we sister-wives were among the first to receive rations, but most others were less fortunate. Hundreds died miserable deaths of slow agony. Plague and its quick delirium might have been preferable.

Umar had tried to alleviate the suffering—in ways that I, sometimes, didn’t approve. Now that we’d conquered Persia’s queen and taken all her country’s wealth, he’d awarded every man in Medina a stipend from the
umma’s
treasury. He’d built houses for the inhabitants of the tent city and enlarged the mosque, replacing its date-palm pillars with ones of stone, tearing out its tree-stump platform and building a
minbar
of marble in its place. I knew the expansion was needed, for we had many more converts coming for prayer services now, but I’d hated to see Muhammad’s examples of humility cast aside. Much had changed about
islam
these past ten years. Not all of the changes, I knew, would have pleased my husband.

Yet neither silver, gold, nor renovations could compete with the distracting power of gossip.

“Behold how the blackamoor embarrasses himself,” old Umm Ayman said to Sawdah at the funeral.

“He embarrasses us all,” Hafsa murmured to me. “From the way he’s acting, people will decide the rumors about him and Maryam are true.”

I didn’t answer: In truth, I admired Akiiki’s passion. If not for Umar’s anger over my outburst when he’d forbidden me to return to Maryam’s bedside, I might have risked his displeasure and descended into her grave to kiss her forehead and sprinkle her body with rose petals. But these gestures were permitted for men only. If not for Umar’s dislike of public mourning, I might have torn my clothing, spread ashes on my face, and cried out to al-Lah the question that seemed to haunt me so frequently these days:
Why?

Why did you take Maryam, and not me?

“Al-Ma’thur,” Zaynab had gasped on her deathbed when I’d asked a
similar question. “The Legacy.” I’d been puzzling over the answer ever since. Muhammad had given me his sword named al-Ma’thur before he had died, and admonished me to use it in the “
jihad
to come.” The struggle. There had been plenty of struggles since Muhammad’s death, but nothing calling for my sword. Our only battles had been fought far afield, and I wasn’t allowed to leave Medina anymore.

Umar placed new restrictions on women every day. Now, for instance, every woman had to wear a veil. He boasted about upholding Muhammad’s vision for
islam
, but my husband had given women more rights, while Umar took them away. The battle for my freedom and the freedoms of my sisters was what I needed to fight now, and for respect for women such as Maryam, whose funeral was nearly as paltry as if she’d been a slave—and as full of scandal as if she’d been a prostitute.

Then, as if summoned by my grief, a poem burst on my lips and poured like scented oil over poor Maryam’s body:

“
Let us weep at the remembrance of our beloved, at the sight of the station where her tent was raised . . .

A profusion of tears is my sole relief; but what avails me to shed them over the remains of a deserted mansion?
”

When I had finished reciting the verses, I stepped forward and removed my gold arm band, a gift from Maryam, and dropped it into her grave. “
Yaa
Maryam, blessed mother of us all,” I said, ignoring Umar’s scowl and Ali’s stern glare.

“The generosity you have shown to me I now return to you, Maryam,” I said. “May your spirit float on the sea of our tears all the way to Paradise, and may al-Lah bless you and welcome you there.”

Having given her the eulogy she deserved, I stepped back among my sister-wives and welcomed their embraces. “Thank you,” Umm Salama whispered, “for doing what I should have done.” Yet I noticed that Ramlah, like Ali, was shooting me disapproving looks. I didn’t need to ask what either of them was thinking, for I had heard it from them both before:
Once again, A’isha has to make herself the center of attention.
Of course, if I had been a man—an Arab man, I should say, considering the baleful looks Akiiki was getting—no one would have disapproved. In truth, everyone would have murmured agreement with my sentiments.

As the crowd began to drift away, leaving the gravediggers to cover
Maryam’s body with dirt, I felt a tug at my sleeve. I turned to face Talha, who gazed at me as though I were the full moon. I had to bite back a response:
Save those adoring glances for your wife, or, if you’re looking for another wife, save them for someone available to you.

“
Yaa
A’isha, your verse was quite appropriate,” he said. “Such a beautiful homage you gave to the honorable Maryam. Muhammad would be very proud.”

And what would he think of you, blatantly displaying your desire for his widow?

Before I could say anything, though, we heard a splintering scream. We turned in the direction of the cries to see Akiiki’s long body fold and tumble into Maryam’s grave, a dagger in his stomach and his blood gushing.

“By al-Lah, the eunuch has taken his own life,” Uthman cried, holding out his arms toward Akiiki as if to catch him.