TALES OF ABU NUWAS 2: FAIZAH'S DESTINY
The Boys Have Their Say
I’m pleased to have Faizah’s
three male companions here today for the interview. How are you
doing?
(Parvaiz) Sure, make us out as
secondary characters. Typical. Snorts in disgust.
(Marva) A little testy aren’t you?
After all, the book is titled “Faizah’s Destiny” not “Parvaiz’s
Destiny.”
(Harib) Sorry about Parvaiz, ma’am.
He’s a little touchy since he was a slave all his life. He’ll
loosen up the longer he’s free.
(Parvaiz) Easy for you, Harib. Your
father is the richest man in the territory. He owns slaves!
(Bahaar) Hey, Parvaiz, lighten up.
Harib or his father weren’t ever mean to slaves. His dad has even
freed most of his workers, and they chose to stay on.
(Parvaiz) mumble...
(Marva) Hey, sorry to hit a sore spot
Parvaiz. Maybe if you talked it out a little. Don’t you feel a
little grateful to your father for adopting you as his son and heir?
(Harib) What’s that, Parvaiz? I don’t
hearrrr youuuu!
(Parvaiz) Yeah, yeah. I am grateful to
Ahmadj, but at my age it’s a little hard to adapt to having a
father.
(Bahaar) I wish I had even a fake
father to get used to. Me and my brother are all on our own. We don’t
carry a chip around on our shoulder.
(Parvaiz) All right! I’m grateful!
Now can we just drop it?
(Marva) Of course. Tell the readers
about your search for Master Wafai.
(Harib) Jabs his hand in the air.
Oh, me, me!
(Marva) Go ahead, Harib.
(Harib) One day, we all went to school
in the morning at Master Wafai’s house. But he was gone and the
room was a mess! We couldn’t think of anything other than he was
kidnapped.
(Bahaar) You see, his herb bag was
still there. He wouldn’t go anywhere to treat anybody without that.
It had to be a kidnapping.
(Parvaiz) But Faizah doesn’t accept
that story. Well, she didn’t say Wafai wasn’t kidnapped, but she
thought he left a sign we were supposed to find the Simurghs to find
out where he was.
(Marva) Why did she think that?
(Harib) His book of magical beasts was
open to the page about the Simurghs and a big X was chalked on the
page. She figured he’d never mark up a book except for good reason.
(Marva) So you all set out to search
for the Simurgh?
(Parvaiz) No way! I thought it was an
idiot idea. Faizah being a girl and all...
(Bahaar) interrupting Hey!
Faizah can take care of herself. She made that pretty clear when she
caught up to us.
(Harib) Yeah. She never hid behind her
skirts or us. She always jumped in and started swinging. Remember
when Raziq and his gang were beating you up?
(Bahaar) Huffs I could of taken
them. But it was nice you and Faizah showing up to help.
(Marva) So, you’re saying at first
that you all didn’t want Faizah to go along on the search, but you
changed your mind.
(Parvaiz) Well, yeah. I didn’t know
her like these guys. She pulled her weight once we got going. She
even saved the rest of us from Pazuzu’s ill wind.
(Marva) Ill wind?
(Parvaiz) Yeah, it’s a demon who
makes everybody sick. Most of the time, people die, but Faizah knew
what plants to use to cure us.
(Marva) Speaking of demons, what was
that all about?
Bahaar and Parvaiz turn noticeably
red.
(Harib) That jerk demon didn’t take
me over like these two.
(Bahaar) We apologized for that! It
wasn’t our fault.
(Parvaiz) Right. Harib didn’t even
have a very good demon try to tempt him to Dev’s side.
(Marva) Who’s this Dev?
(Parvaiz) God of war. What could we do?
Both Bahaar and I wanted to be warriors, and the demons promised we
would be great heroes.
(Harib) Yeah. All Nanghaithya did was
try to make me feel bad. Not a good way to convince somebody to join
the dark side.
(Marva) I know there’s plenty more to
tell the readers about your search for Wafai, the battle with the
demons, and so forth. But since I’d like to sell a few books, we’ll
leave it for now and let folks read about it themselves.
Thank you, boys. You’ve been a great
interview.
(Boys) Sure. Anytime. Hey, how about a
story starring me?
(Marva) Well, we'll see what the future brings. How about an excerpt from Faizah's Destiny for now?
(Marva) Well, we'll see what the future brings. How about an excerpt from Faizah's Destiny for now?
Excerpt:
She looked at Harib when he said,
“Ahmajd is a good man, but he’s hardly the type to run off after
mountain raiders. Matter of fact, I can’t think of anyone in the
whole village who’d even consider it. You heard Faluj. He didn’t
even suggest forming a search party. I don’t think anybody is going
to do anything.”
Faizah bit her lip in frustration. The
villagers lacked any adventurous spirit. Most preferred to live their
lives as quietly and safely as they could.
Leaning over the table, Parvaiz stared
thoughtfully at the open page of the book. “I haven’t had the
chance to get to know Master Wafai, or anybody else yet, but I have a
feeling Faizah is on the right track. Still, I think he just meant
for us to search for him in the mountains, not go looking for these
birds.”
Bahaar stood looking down at his feet,
lost in thought. Now he lifted his head to look at Parvaiz for a
second and then turned to Harib. “How about you, Harib? What do you
think?”
Harib sighed and scratched his head. “I
agree with Parvaiz. But we can’t go charging into the raider’s
camp and tell them to give him back. They’d just laugh at us...or
worse.”
Parvaiz nodded. “However, we can at
least try to track where he is. If we find some evidence, we can come
back to tell the village elders.”
“All right. I’ll concede Master
Wafai was just directing us to the mountains, but we still need to
figure out how to get started,” Faizah said. “Once we convince
our parents,” she continued, glancing at Bahaar, “or brother, to
let us go, we can work out the rest ourselves.”
Parvaiz stared at her and then gave a
short bark of a laugh. “What makes you think you’re going? This
is going to be hard enough without having a girl tagging along.
That’s the last thing we need!”
Faizah glared at Parvaiz, her face
flushed with anger. “I can take care of myself! Nobody has to watch
out for me. Least of all some slave boy,” she shouted at Parvaiz.
She regretted the last comment the moment she said it. Still, it
didn’t make her any less angry that these boys, she thought were
her friends, would so casually dismiss her just because she was a
girl.
“You have no call?” Parvaiz began
and then shut his mouth. He looked at Harib and Bahaar, who were both
studying their feet with intense interest.
Bahaar looked up at him and then over
at Faizah and shrugged. “Sorry Faizah, I have to agree with
Parvaiz. I...I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Faizah turned to Harib. “Well? Do you
agree?”
The boy’s face reddened, and he
wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
She glared at each of them in turn,
spun on her heel, and stormed out of the house, her fists clenched
and her head high. Stiff-backed, she marched across the tiny
courtyard and through the archway. Only when hidden by the wall, did
her shoulders slump and the tears begin to flow.
FAIZAH'S DESTINY
* * *
The gods are at war and only a
farmer’s daughter can save the world from Armageddon.
The village magician has gone missing.
His four pupils think he has left a clue to his whereabouts in the
Magicalis Bestialis--the book of magical creatures. They must seek
the help of the elusive Simurgh, the mythical birds who know all the
secrets of the universe.
However, this is not an easy camping
trip into the mountains. Spirits, gods, and demons confront the four
friends, who are not aware they’re being set up by otherworldly
forces for a much larger task.
A farmer’s daughter, Faizah is chosen
to lead the humans in the battle. She must persuade a slave, an
orphan, and a rich merchant’s son to join in the battle on the side
of good. Although divided by Dev, the evil god of war, the teens must
band together to find the Simurgh, rescue their teacher, and stave
off Armageddon.
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