Rughum & Najda by Samar Habib

Author:Samar Habib [Habib, Samar]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Fiction & Literature
Publisher: Oracle Releasing
Published: 2014-07-25T04:00:00+00:00

LADY MARIAM

After Najda was allocated her portion of figs for her labor, she took these to share them with Bathal and Qureisha but she found Bathal in an absolutely agitated state.

“What is the matter, Bathal?” Najda asked, looking at her companion’s tear stricken face and blushed cheeks. Bathal said nothing at first, but eventually, as she was brushing her hair with her fingers she spoke, but not directly to Najda, she spoke as if leveling her eyes at a spirit in the room, hovering an arm’s length above her own head. Her eyes stayed fixed in this position throughout her speech.

“I, Qureisha.... I was going to meet her in the afternoon. She did not come. I assumed she was delayed with work and went to take her a handful of grapes but her mistress said that she never showed. I asked all the girls with whom she worked, none had seen her. None had seen her after she left my quarters this morning. She often leaves while I am performing ablution. I don’t know where she is, it seems as though I was the last to see her. And now the sun has set, it is dark and she has not yet come. I am afraid for her, that she might have come by a bad way, slain perhaps, stolen by a gang of common thieves to be sold elsewhere, or what if this is an attack on her because of her connection to me, would this make me next in line for a brutal slaying? Some of the people are in arms about the grand judge’s unwillingness to condemn us tharifat and the men who are like us.... How can I live without her? How can I sleep without knowing where she lays her head? I am in such a state!” Here Bathal burst into tears and she was clearly sick with worry.

“Why has Allah forsaken me? I am his subservient creation! I have taken on my new faith with due diligence, I fast the month of fasting and pray the daily prayers and I pay alms,” continued she.

Najda put her arm around her friend and tried to comfort her and it was her first instinct to think that Qureisha was going to appear through the door at any moment, that there would be a rational explanation for her disappearance which would soon be uncovered. But as nighttime settled, with Bathal sobbing in fear and grief, Najda too began to fear for Qureisha’s well-being.

“Let us wait until the morning, if she does return by then, then we can inform the grand judge.”

“What will they care for one missing slave girl?” Bathal burst out, feeling utterly helpless.

“The grand judge might care if Mohamad Ibn Iqbal approached him!” Najda exclaimed, desperate to render assistance to her distraught friend and Bathal considered this idea worthy of pursuit for she looked up and said, “let us go to him now, I beg you, let us not wait until the morning.”

And in a moment or two, Najda donned the attire of Mohamad Ibn Iqbal.

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