George Alec Effinger - Marid Audran 3 The Exile Kiss

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Books by George Alec Effinger

What Entropy Means to Me

Relatives

Mixed Feelings

Irrational Numbers

Those Gentle Voices

Felicia

Death in Florence

Dirty Tricks

Heroics

The Wolves of Memory

Idle Pleasures

The Nick of Time

The Bird of Time

Shadow Money

The Zork Chronicles

When Gravity Fails A Fire in the Sun The Exile Kiss

George Alec Effinger

The Exile Kiss

BANTAM BOOKS

NEW YORK • TORONTO • LONDON • SYDNEY •

AUCKLAND

All of the characters in this book are fictitious, and any

resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely

coincidental.

This edition contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition.

NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITTED. THE EXILE KISS

A Bantam Spectra Book I published by arrangement with Doubleday

PRINTING HISTORY

Doubleday edition published May 1991 Bantam edition / March 1992

spectra and the portrayal of a boxed "s" are trademarks of Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 90-22944.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,

electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information store

and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

For information address: Doubleday, 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10103.

To the science fiction community of the South Central region, which has given me so much support. and

encouragement over the years. My thanks to Armadillo Con in Austin, Swamp Con in Baton Rouge the New Orleans

Science Fiction and Fantasy Festival, 'and Coast Con m Biloxi.

And special thanks to Fred Duarte and Karen Meschke for hospitality above and beyond the call of duty, while my

car was m a near-fatal coma during the writing of this

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware

that this book is stolen property. It was reported as "unsold and

destroyed" to die publisher and neither the author nor the publisher

has received any payment for this "stripped book."

ISBN 0-553-29664-7

Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Bantam

Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the

words "Bantam Books" and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S.

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Bantam Books, 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10103.

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Though it rain gold and silver in a foreign land and daggers and spears at home, yet it is better to

be at home. —Malay Proverb

O! a kiss Long as my exile, sweet as my revenge!

—William Shakespeare Coriolanus Act 5, scene 3

The Exile Kiss

1It never occurred to me that I might be kidnapped. There was no reason why it should. The day had certainly

begun innocently enough. I'd snapped wide awake just before dawn, thanks to an experimental add-on I wear on my

anterior brain implant. That plug is the one that gives me powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. As far

as I know, I'm the only person around with two implants.

One of these special daddies blasts me into full con-sciousness at any hour I choose. I've learned to use it along

with another daddy that supercharges my body to remove alcohol and drugs from my system at better than the normal

rate. That way I don't wake up still drunk or damaged. Others have suffered in the past because of my hangovers, and

I've sworn never to let that happen again.

I took a shower, trimmed my red beard, and dressed in an expensive, sand-colored gallebeya, with the white knit

skullcap of my Algerian homeland on my head. I was hungry, and my slave, Kmuzu, normally prepared my meals, but I

had a breakfast appointment with Fried-lander Bey. That would be after the morning call to prayer, so I had about

thirty minutes free. I crossed from the west wing of Friedlander Bey's great house to the east, and rapped on the door

to my wife's apartment.

Indihar answered it wearing a white satin dressing gown I'd given her, her chestnut hair coiled tightly on the back

of her head. Indihar's large, dark eyes narrowed. "I wish you good morning, husband," she said. She was not

terrifically pleased to see me.

Indihar's youngest child, four-year-old Hakim, clung to her and cried. I could hear Jirji and Zahra screaming at each

other from another room. Senalda, the Valencian maid I'd hired, was nowhere in evidence. I'd accepted the

responsibility of supporting the family because I felt partly to blame for the death of Indihar's husband. Papa

—Friedlander Bey—had decided that in order to accom-plish such a worthy goal without causing gossip, I also had to

marry Indihar and formally adopt the three children. I couldn't remember another instance when Papa had cared at all

about gossip.

Nevertheless, despite Indihar's outrage and my flat re-fusal, the two of us now found ourselves man and wife. Papa

always got his way. Some time ago, Friedlander Bey had grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and shaken the dust off

me and turned me from a small-time hustler into a heavy hitter in the city's underworld.

So Hakim was now legally ... my son, as queasy as that concept made me. I'd never been around kids before and

I didn't know how to act with them. Believe me, they could tell. I hoisted the boy up and smiled in his jelly-smeared

face. "Well, why are you crying, O Clever One?"

I said. Hakim stopped just long enough to suck in a huge breath, then started wailing even louder.

Indihar gave an impatient grunt. "Please, husband," she said, "don't try being a big brother. Jirji is his big

brother." She lifted Hakim out of my arms and dropped him back to the floor.

"I'm not trying to be a big brother."

"Then don't try being a pal, either. He doesn't need a pal. He needs a father."

"Right," I said. "You just tell me what a father does, and I'll do it." I'd been trying my best for weeks, but Indihar

had only given me a hard time. I was getting very tired of it.

She laughed humorlessly and shooed Hakim toward the rear of the apartment. "Is there some actual point to this

visit, husband?" she asked.

"Indihar, if you could just stop resenting me a litde, maybe we could make the best of this situation. I mean, how

awful could it be for you here?"

"Why don't you ask Kmuzu how he feels?" she said. She still hadn't invited me into the suite.

I'd had enough of standing in the hall, and I pushed by her into the parlor. I sat down on a couch. Indihar glared at

me for a few seconds, tiien sighed and sat on a chair facing me. "I've explained it all before," I said. "Papa has been

giving me things. Gifts I didn't want, like my implants and Chiriga's bar and Kmuzu." "And me," she said.

"Yes, and you. He's trying to strip me of all my friends. He doesn't want me to keep any of my old attach-ments."

"You could simply refuse, husband. Did you ever think of that?"

How I wished it were that easy! "When I had my skull amped," I said, "Friedlander Bey paid the doctors to wire the

punishment center of my brain."

"The punishment center? Not the pleasure center?"

I grinned ruefully. "If he'd had the pleasure center wired, I'd probably already be dead. That's what happens to

those wireheads. It wouldn't have taken me long, ei-ther."

Indihar frowned. "Well, then, I don't understand. Why the punishment center? Why would you want—"

I raised a hand and cut her off. "Hey, / didn't want it! Papa had it done without my knowledge. He's got lots of little

electronic gimmicks that can remotely stimulate my pain centers. That's how he keeps me in line." Learning recently

that he was truly my mother's grandfather had not disposed me more favorably toward him. Not as long as he refused

to discuss the matter of my liberty.

I saw her shudder. "I didn't know that, husband."

"I haven't told many people about it. But Papa's al-ways there looking over my shoulder, ready to jam his thumb

on the agony button if I do something he doesn't like."

"So you're a prisoner, too," said Indihar. "You're his slave, as much as the rest of us."

I didn't see any need to reply. The situation was a trifle different in my case, because I shared Friedlander Bey's

blood, and I felt obliged to try to love him. I hadn't actually succeeded in that yet. I had a difficult time deal-ing with

that emotion in the first place, and Papa wasn't making it easy for me.

Indihar reached out her hand to me, and I took it. It was the first time since we'd been married that she'd re-lented

any at all. I saw that her palm and fingers were still stained a faint yellow-orange, from the henna her friends had

applied the morning of our wedding. It had been a very unusual ceremony, because Papa had declared that it wouldn't

be appropriate for me to marry anyone but a maiden. Indihar was, of course, a widow with three chil-dren, so he had

her declared an honorary virgin. Nobody laughed.

The wedding itself was a mixture 6f customs observed in the city as well as those from Indihar's native Egyptian

village. It pretended to be the joining of a young virgin and a Maghrebi youth of promising fortune. Friedlander Bey

announced that it wasn't necessary to fetch Indihar's family to the celebration, that her friends from the Budayeen

could stand in for them.

"We'll pass over the ritual certification, of course," Indihar had said.

"What's that?" I asked. I was afraid that at the last minute, I was going to be required to take some kind of written

test that I should've been studying for ever since puberty.

"In some backward Muslim lands," explained Fried-lander Bey, "on the wedding night, the bride is taken into a

bedroom, away from all the other guests. The women of both families hold her down on the bed. The husband wraps a

white cloth around his forefinger, and inserts it to prove the girl's virginity. If the cloth comes out stained with blood,

the husband passes it out to the bride's father, who then marches around waving it on a stick for all to

see."But this is the seventeenth century of the Hegira!" I said, astonished.

Indihar shrugged. "It's a moment of great pride for the bride's parents. It proves they've raised a chaste and

worthy daughter. When I was first married, I wept at the indignity until I heard the cheers and joy of the guests. Then

I knew that my marriage had been blessed, and that I'd become a woman in the eyes of the village."

"As you say, my daughter," said Friedlander Bey, "in this instance such a certification will not be required." Papa

could be reasonable if he didn't stand to lose any-thing by it.

I'd bought Indihar a fine gold wedding band, as well as the traditional second piece of jewelry. Chiri, my

not-so-silent partner, helped me select the gift in one of the expensive boutiques east of the Boulevard il-Jameel,

where the Europeans shopped. It was a brooch, an emer-ald-encrusted lizard made of gold, with two rubies for eyes. It

had cost me twelve thousand kiam, and it was the most expensive single item I'd ever purchased. I gave it to Indihar

the morning of the wedding. She opened the satin-lined box, looked at the emerald lizard for a few seconds, and then

said, "Thank you, Marid." She never mentioned it again, and I never saw her wear it.

Indihar had not been well-off, even before her hus-band was killed. She brought to our marriage only a mod-est

assortment of household furnishings and her meager personal belongings. Her contribution wasn't materially

important, because I'd become wealthy through my asso-ciation with Papa. In fact, the amount specified as her

bride-price in our marriage contract was more than In-dihar had ever seen in her lifetime. I gave two thirds of it to her in

cash. The final third would go to her in the event of our divorce.

I merely dressed in my best white gallebeya and robe, but Indihar had to endure much more. Chiri, her best friend,

helped her prepare for the ceremony. Early in the day, they removed the hair from Indihar's arms and legs by covering

her skin with a mixture of sugar and lemon juice. When the paste hardened, Chiri peeled it off. I'll never forget how

wonderfully fresh and sweet-smelling Indihar was that evening. Sometimes I still find myself getting aroused by the

fragrance of lemons.

When Indihar finished dressing and applying a modest amount of makeup, she and I sat for our official wedding

holos. Neither of us looked especially happy. We both knew that it was a marriage in name only, and would last

only as long as Friedlander Bey lived. The holographer kept making lewd jokes about wedding nights and

honey-moons, but Indihar and I just watched the clock, counting the hours until this entire ordeal would be

finished.

The ceremony itself took place in Papa's grand hall. There were hundreds of guests; some were friends of ours,

and some were sinister, silent men who stood watch-fully at the edges of the crowd. My best man was Saied the

Half-Hajj, who in honor of the occasion was wearing no moddy at all, something remarkable in its own right. Most of

the other club owners in the Budayeen were there, as well as the girls, sexchanges, and debs we knew, and such

Budayeen characters as Laila, Fuad, and Bill the cab driver. It could have been a truly joyous occasion, if Indihar and I

had loved each other and wanted to get married in the first place.

We sat face to face before a blue-turbaned shaykh who performed the Muslim marriage ceremony. Indihar was

lovely in a beautiful white satin dress and white veil, with a bouquet of fragrant blossoms. First the shaykh in-voked

the blessings of Allah, and read from the first surah of the noble Qur'an. Then he asked Indihar if she con-sented to

the marriage. There was a brief pause, when I thought I saw her eyes fill with regret. "Yes," she said in a quiet voice.

We joined our right hands, and the shaykh covered them with a white handkerchief. Indihar repeated the words of

the shaykh, stating that she married me of her own free will, for a bride-price of seventy-five thousand kiam.

"Repeat, after me, Marid Audran," said the shaykh. "I accept from thee your betrothal to myself, and take thee

under my care, and bind myself to afford thee my protec-tion. Ye who are present bear witness of this." I had to say it

three times to make it work.

The shaykh finished it off by reading some more from the holy Qur'an. He blessed us and our marriage. There was

an instant of peace in the hall, and then from the throats of all the women came the shrill, trilling sound of the

zagareet.

There was a party afterward, of course, and I drank and pretended to be happy. There was plenty to eat, and the

guests gave us gifts and money. Indihar left early with the excuse that she had to put her children to bed, al-though

Senalda was there to do just that. I left the cele-bration not long afterward. I went back to my apartment, swallowed

seven or eight tabs of Sonneine, and lay on my bed with my eyes closed.

I was married. I was a husband. As the opiates began to take effect, I thought about how beautiful Indihar had

looked. I wished that I had at least kissed her.

Those were my memories of our wedding. Now, as I sat in her parlor, I wondered what my real responsibilities

were. "You've treated me and my children well," Indihar said. "You've been very generous, and I should be grate-ful.

Forgive me for my behavior, husband."

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Indihar," I said. I stood up. The mention of the children reminded me that they

could run squawking and drooling into the parlor at any moment. I wanted to get out of there while I still could. "If

there's anything you need, just ask Kmuzu or Tariq."

"We're well provided for." She looked up into my eyes, then turned away. I couldn't tell what she was feel-ing.

I began to feel awkward myself. "Then I'll leave you. I wish you a good morning."

"May your day be pleasant, husband."

I went to the door and turned to look at her again before I left. She seemed so sad and alone. "Allah bring you

peace," I murmured. Then I closed the door behind me.

I had enough time to get back to the smaller dining room near Friedlander Bey's office, where we had break-fast

whenever he wanted to discuss business matters with me. He was already seated in his place when I arrived. The two

taciturn giants, Habib and Labib, stood behind him, one on either side. They still eyed me suspiciously, as if even after

all this time, I might still draw a naked blade and leap for Papa's throat.

"Good morning, my nephew," said Friedlander Bey solemnly. "How is your health?"

"I thank God every hour," I replied. I seated myself across the table from him and began helping myself from the

breakfast platters.

Papa was wearing a pale blue long-sleeved shirt and brown woolen trousers, with a red felt tarboosh on his head.

He hadn't shaved in two or three days, and his face was covered with gray stubble. He'd been hospitalized recently,

and he'd lost a lot of weight. His cheeks were sunken and his hands trembled. Still, the sharpness of his mind hadn't

been affected.

"Do you have someone in mind to help you with our datalink project, my darling?" he asked me, cutting short the

pleasantries and getting right to business.

"I believe so, O Shaykh. My friend, Jacques Devaux."

"The Moroccan boy? The Christian?"

"Yes," I said, "although I'm not sure that I completely trust him."

Papa nodded. "It's good that you think so. It's not wise to trust any man until he's been tested. We will talk about

this more after I hear the estimates from the datalink companies."

"Yes, O Shaykh."

I watched him carefully pare an apple with a silver knife. "You were told of the gathering this evening, my

nephew?" he said.

We'd been invited to a reception at the palace of Shaykh Mahali, the amir of the city. "I'm startled to learn that I've

come to the prince's attention," I said.

Papa gave me a brief smile. "There is more to it than joy over your recent marriage. The amir has said that he

cannot permit a feud to exist between myself and Shaykh Reda Abu Adil."

"Ah, I see. And tonight's celebration will be the amir's attempt to reconcile you?"

"His futile attempt to reconcile us." Friedlander Bey frowned at the apple, then stabbed it fiercely with the knife

and put it aside. "There will be no peace between Shaykh Reda and myself. That is quite simply impossible. But I can

see that the amir is in a difficult position: when kings do battle, it is the peasants who die."

I smiled. "Are you saying that you and Shaykh Reda are the kings in this case, and the prince of the city is the

peasant?"

"He certainly cannot match our power, can he? His influence extends over the city, while we control entire

nations."

I sat back in my chair and gazed at him. "Do you expect another attack tonight, my grandfather?"

Friedlander Bey rubbed his upper lip thoughtfully. "No," he said slowly, "not tonight, while we're under the

protection of the prince. Shaykh Reda is certainly not that foolish. But soon, my nephew. Very soon."

"I'll be on my guard," I said, standing and taking my leave of the old man. The last thing in the world I wanted to

hear was that we were being drawn into another in-trigue.

During the afternoon I received a delegation from Cappadocia, which wanted Friedlander Bey's help in de-claring

independence from Anatolia and setting up a peo-ple's republic. Most people thought that Papa and Abu Adil made

their fortunes by peddling vice, but that was not entirely true. It was a fact that they were responsible for almost all the

illicit activities in the city, but that ex-isted primarily as employment for their countless rela-tives, friends, and

associates.

The true source of Papa's wealth was in keeping track of the ever-shifting national lineup in our part of the world.

In a time when the average lifespan of a new coun-try was shorter than a single generation of its citizens, someone had

to preserve order amid the political chaos. That was the expensive service that Friedlander Bey and Shaykh Reda

provided. From one regime to the next, they remembered where the boundaries were, who the taxpay-ers were, and

where the bodies were buried, literally and figuratively. Whenever one government gave way to its successor, Papa or

Shaykh Reda stepped in to smooth the transition—and to cut themselves a larger chunk of the action with each

change.

I found all of this fascinating, and I was glad that Papa had put me to work in this area, rather than overseeing the

lucrative but basically boring criminal enterprises. My great-grandfather tutored me with endless patience, and he'd

directed Tariq and Youssef to give me whatever help I needed. When I'd first come to Friedlander Bey's house, I'd

thought they were only Papa's valet and butler; but now I realized they knew more about the high-level goings-on

throughout the Islamic world than anyone else, except Friedlander Bey himself.

When at last the Cappadocians excused themselves, I saw that I had little more than an hour before Papa and I

were expected at the amir's palace. Kmuzu helped me select an appropriate outfit. It had been some time since I'd

last put on my old jeans and boots and work shirt, and I was getting used to wearing a more traditional Arab

costume. Some of the men in the city still wore Euram-style business suits, but I'd never felt comfortable in one.

_I'd taken to wearing the gallebeya around Papa's house, because I knew he preferred it. Besides, it was easier to

hide my static pistol under a loose robe, and a keffiya, the Arab headdress, hid my implants, which offended some

conservative Muslims.

So when I'd finished dressing, I was wearing a spotless white gallebeya suitable for a bridegroom, beneath a royal

blue robe trimmed in gold. I had comfortable sandals on my feet, a ceremonial dagger belted around my waist, and a

plain white keffiya held by a black rope akal.

"You look very handsome, yaa Sidi," said Kmuzu.

"I hope so," I said. "I've never gone to meet a prince before."

"You've proven your worth, and your reputation must already be known to the amir. You have no reason to be

intimidated by him."

That was easy for Kmuzu to say. I took a final glance at my reflection and wasn't particularly impressed by what I

saw. "Marid Audran, Defender of the Downtrodden," I said dubiously. "Yeah, you right." Then we went down-stairs

to meet Friedlander Bey.

Tariq drove Papa's limousine, and we arrived at the amir's palace on time. We were shown into the ballroom, and I

was invited to recline on some cushions at the place of honor, at Shaykh Mahali's right hand. Friedlander Bey and the

other guests made themselves comfortable, and I was introduced to many of the city's wealthy and influen-tial men.

"Please, refresh yourself," said the amir. A servant of-fered a tray laden with small cups of thick coffee spiced with

cardamom and cinnamon, and tall glasses of chilled fruit juices. There were no alcoholic beverages because Shaykh

Mahali was a deeply religious man.

"May your table last forever," I said. "Your hospitality is famous in the city, O Shaykh."

"Rejoicings and celebrations!" he replied, pleased by my flattery. We conversed for about half an hour before the

servants began bringing in platters of vegetables and roasted meats. The amir had ordered enough food to stuff a

company five times our size. He used an elegant, jew-eled knife to offer me the choicest morsels. I've had a lifelong

distrust of the rich and powerful, but despite that, I rather liked the prince.

He poured a cup of coffee for himself and offered me another. "We live in a mongrel city," he told me, "and there

are so many factions and parties that my judgment is always being tested. I study the methods of the great Muslim

rulers of the past. Just today I read a wonderful story about Ibn Saud, who governed a united Arabia that for a time

bore his family's name. He, too, had to devise swift and clever solutions, to difficult problems.

"One day when Ibn Saud was visiting the camp of a tribe of nomads, a shrieking woman ran to him and clasped his

feet. She demanded that the murderer of her husband be put to death.

" 'How was your husband killed?' asked the king.

"The woman said, 'The murderer climbed high up on a date palm to pick the fruit. My husband was minding his

own business, sitting beneath the tree in the shade. The murderer lost his grip in the tree and fell on him, break-ing my

husband's neck. Now he is dead and I am a poor widow with no way to support my orphaned children!'

"Ibn Saud rubbed his chin thoughtfully. 'Do you think the man fell on your husband intentionally?' he asked.

" What difference does it make? My husband is dead all the same!'

" Well, will you take an honest compensation, or do you truly demand the death of this man?'

" 'According to the Straight Path, the murderer's life belongs to me.'

"Ibn Saud shrugged. There was very little he could do with such an obstinate woman, but he said this to her: Then

he will die, and the manner of his death must be the same as the way he took your husband's life. I com--mand that this

man be tied firmly to the trunk of the date palm. You must climb forty feet to the top of the tree, and from there you

shall fall down upon the neck of the man and kill him.' The king paused to look at the woman's family and neighbors

gathered around. 'Or will you accept the honest compensation, after all?'

"The woman hesitated a moment, accepted the money, and went away."

I laughed out loud, and the other guests applauded Shaykh Mahali's anecdote. In a short time I'd completely

forgotten that he was the amir of the city and I was, well, only who I am.

The pleasant edge was taken off the evening by the grand entrance of Reda Abu Adil. He came in noisily, and he

greeted the other guests as if he and not the amir were the host of the party. He was dressed very much as I was,

including a keffiya, which I knew was hiding his own corymbic implant. Behind Abu Adil trailed a young man,

probably his new administrative assistant and lover. The young man had short blond hair, wire-rimmed spectacles,

and thin, bloodless lips. He was wearing an ankle-length white cotton shift with an expensively tailored silk sport coat

over it, and blue felt slippers on his feet. He glanced around the room and turned a look of distaste on every-one in

turn.Abu Adil's expression turned to joy when he saw Friedlander Bey and me. "My old friends!" he cried, crossing the

ballroom and pulling Papa to his feet. They embraced, although Papa said nothing at all. Then Shaykh Reda turned to

me. "And here is the lucky bridegroom!"

I didn't stand up, which was a blatant insult, but Abu Adil pretended not to notice. "I've brought you a fine gift!"

he said, looking around to be certain that everyone was paying attention. "Kenneth, give the young man his gift."

The blond kid stared at me for a brief moment, sizing me up. Then he reached into his jacket's inner pocket and

took out an envelope. He held it out toward me between two fingers, but he wasn't going to come close enough for me

to take it. Apparently he thought this was some kind of contest.

Personally, I didn't give a damn. I went to him and grabbed the envelope. He gave me a little quirk of the lips and

raised his eyebrows, as if to say "We'll sort out where we stand later." I wanted to throw the envelope in the fool's

face.

I remembered where I was and who was watching, so I tore open the envelope and took out a folded sheet of

paper. I read Abu Adil's gift, but I couldn't make any sense of it. I read it again, and it wasn't any clearer the second

time. "I don't know what to say," I said.

Shaykh Reda laughed. "I knew you'd be pleased!" Then he turned slowly, so that his words would be heard easily

by the others. "I have used my influence with the Jaish to obtain a commission for Marid Audran. He's now an officer

in the Citizen's Army!"

The Jaish was this unofficial right-wing outfit that I'd run into before. They liked to dress up in gray uniforms and

parade through the streets. Originally their mission was to rid the city of foreigners. As time passed, and as more of

the paramilitary group's funding came from peo-ple such as Reda Abu Adil—who himself had come to the city at a

young age—the aim of the Jaish changed. Now it seemed that its mission was to harass Abu AdiFs enemies,

foreigner and native alike.

"I don't know what to say," I said again. It was a pretty bizarre thing for Shaykh Reda to have done, and for the

life of me, I couldn't figure what his motive had been. Knowing him, however, it would all become painfully clear soon

enough.

"All our past disagreements have been settled," said Abu Adil cheerfully. "We'll be friends and allies from now

on. We must work together to better the lives of the poor fellahtn who depend on us."

The assembled guests liked that sentiment and ap-plauded. I glanced at Friedlander Bey, who only gave me a

slight shrug. It was obvious to us both that Abu Adil had some new scheme unfolding before our eyes.

"Then I toast the bridegroom," said Shaykh Mahali, rising. "And I toast the ending of conflict between

Fried-lander Bey and Reda Abu Adil. I am known among my people as an honest man, and I have tried to rule this city

with wisdom and justice. This peace between your houses will make my own task simpler." He lifted his cup of coffee,

and everyone else stood and followed suit. To all but Papa and me, it must have seemed a hopeful time of

reconciliation. I felt nothing but a growing knot of dread deep in my belly.

The remainder of the evening was pleasant enough, I guess. After a while I was quite full of food and coffee, and

I'd had enough conversation with wealthy strangers to last me many days. Abu Adil did not go out of his way to

cross our paths again that night, but I couldn't help noticing that his blond pal, Kenneth, kept glancing at me and

shaking his head.

I suffered through the party for a little while longer, but then I was driven outside by boredom. I enjoyed Shaykh

Mahali's elaborate gardens, taking deep breaths of the flower-scented air and sipping an iced glass of Sharab. The

party was still going strong inside the amir's official residence, but I'd had enough of the other guests, who came in

two varieties: men I'd never met before and with whom I had little in common, and men I did know and whom I just

wanted to avoid.

There were no female guests at this affair, so even though it was nominally a celebration of my marriage, my wife

Indihar was not present. I'd come with Kmuzu, Friedlander Bey, his driver, Tariq, and his two giant body-guards,

Habib and Labib. Tariq, Kmuzu, and the Stones That Speak were enjoying their refreshments with the other servants

in a separate building that also served as the amir's garage and stables.

"If you wish to return home, my nephew," ^aid Fried-lander Bey, "wp may take leave of our host." Papa had

always called me "nephew," although he must have known of our true relationship since before our first meet-ing.

"I've had my fill of this amusement, O Shaykh," I said. Actually, for the last quarter hour I'd been watching a

meteor shower in the cloudless sky.

"It is just as well. I've grown very tired. Here, let me lean on your arm."

"Certainly, O Shaykh." He'd always been a bull of a man, but he was old, nearing his two-hundredth birthday. And

not many months before, someone had tried to mur-der him, and he'd required a lot of sophisticated neuro-surgery to

repair the damage. He'd not yet completely recovered from that experience, and he was still weak and rather unsteady.

Together we made our way up from the beautiful for-mal gardens and back along the cloistered walk to the softly

lighted ballroom. When he saw us approaching, the amir rose and came forward, extending his arms to em-brace

Friedlander Bey. "You have done my house great honor, O Excellent One!" he said.

I stood aside and let Papa take care of the formalities. I had the sense that the reception had been some kind of

meeting between those two powerful men, that the cele-bration of my marriage had been entirely irrelevant to whatever

subtle discussions they had conducted. "May your table last forever, O Prince!" said Papa.

"I thank you, O Wise One," said Shaykh Mahali. "Are you leaving us now?"

"It is after midnight, and I'm an old man. After I de-part, you young men may get on with the serious revelry."

The amir laughed. "You take our love with you, O Shaykh." He leaned forward and kissed Friedlander Bey on both

cheeks. "Go in safety."

"May Allah lengthen your life," said Papa.

Shaykh Mahali turned to me. "Kifoo basat!" he said. That means "Good spirits and cheer!" and it kind of sums up

the city's attitude toward life.

"We thank you for your hospitality," I said, "and for the honor you've done us."

The amir seemed pleased with me. "May the blessings of Allah be on you, young man," he said.

"Peace be with you, O Prince." And we backed away a few steps, then turned and walked out into the night:

I had been given a veritable hillock of gifts by the amir and by many of the other guests. These were still on

dis-play in the ballroom, and would be gathered up and deliv-ered to Friedlander Bey's house the next day. As Papa

and I emerged into the warm night air, I felt well fed and content. We passed through the gardens again, and I ad-mired

the carefully tended flowering trees and their shim-mering images in the reflecting pool. Faintly over the water came

the sound of laughter, and I heard the liquid trickle of fountains, but otherwise the night was still.

Papa's limousine was sheltered in Shaykh Mahali's ga-rage. We'd begun to cross the grassy courtyard toward it,

when its headlights flashed on. The ancient car—one of the few internal combustion vehicles still operating in the

city—rolled slowly toward us. The driver's window slid silently down, and I was surprised to see not Tariq but Hajjar,

the crooked police lieutenant who supervised the affairs of the Budayeen.

"Get in the car," he said. "Both of you."

I looked at Friedlander Bey, who only shrugged. We got in the car. Hajjar probably thought he was in control, but

Papa didn't seem the least bit worried, even though there was a big guy with a needle gun in his hand facing us on the

jump seat.

"The hell's this all about, Hajjar?" I said.

"I'm placing both of you under arrest," said the cop. He pressed a control, and the glass panel slid up between

him and the passenger compartment. Papa and I were alone with Hajjar's goon, and the goon didn't seem inter-ested in

making conversation.

"Just stay calm," said Papa.

"This is Abu Adil's doing, isn't it?" I said.

"Possibly." He shrugged. "It will all be made clear according to the will of Allah."

I couldn't help fretting. I hate being helpless. I watched Friedlander Bey, a prisoner in his own limou-sine, in the

hands of a cop who'd taken the pay of both Papa and his chief rival, Reda Abu Adil. For a few min-utes, my stomach

churned and I rehearsed several clever and heroic things I'd do when Haj jar let us out of the car again. Then, as we

drove through the twisting, narrow back streets of the city, my mind began searching for some clue as to what was

happening to us now.

Soon the pain in my belly really began to gripe me, and I wished I'd brought my pillcase with me. Papa had warned

me that it would be a serious breach of etiquette to carry my cache of pharmaceuticals into the amir's house. This was

what I got for turning into such a respect-ful guy. I got kidnapped, and I had to suffer through every little physical

discomfort that came my way.

I had a small selection of daddies on a rack in the pocket of my gallebeya. One of them did a great job of blocking

pain, but I didn't want to find out what the goon would do if I tried to reach inside my robe. It wouldn't have cheered

me up to hear that things would soon get a lot worse before they got better.

After what seemed like an hour of driving, the limou-sine came to a stop. I didn't know where we were. I looked at

Hajjar's goon and said, "What's going on?"

"Shut up," the goon informed me.

Hajjar got out of the car and held the door open for Papa. I climbed out after him. We were standing beside some

buildings made of corrugated metal, looking at a private suborbital shuttle across a broad concrete apron, its running

lights flashing but its three giant thrusters cool and quiet. If this was the main airfield, then we were about thirty miles

north of the city. I'd never been there before.

I was getting worried, but Papa still had a calm look on his face. Hajjar pulled me aside. "Got your phone on you,

Audran?" he said quietly.

"Yeah," I said. I always wear it on my belt.

"Let me use it a minute, okay?"

I unclipped my phone and handed it to Hajjar. He grinned at me, dropped the phone to the pavement, and stomped

it into tiny broken pieces. "Thanks," he said.

"The fuck is going on?" I shouted, grabbing him by the arm.

Hajjar just looked at me, amused. Then his goon grabbed me and pinned both of my arms behind my back. "We're

going to get on that shuttle," he said. "There's a qadi who has something to tell the both of you."

We were taken aboard the suborbital and made to take seats in an otherwise empty front cabin. Hajjar sat beside

me, and his goon sat beside Friedlander Bey. "We have a right to know where you're taking us," I said. „ Hajjar

examined his fingernails, pretending indiffer-ence. "Tell you the truth," he said, gazing out the window, "I don't

actually know where you're going. The qadi may tell you that when he reads you the verdict."

"Verdict?" I cried. "What verdict?"

"Oh," said Hajjar with an evil grin, "haven't you fig-ured it out? You and Papa are on trial. The qadi will decide

you're guilty while you're being deported. Doing it this way saves the legal system a lot of time and money. I

should've let you lass the ground good-bye, Audran, be-cause you're never going to see the city again!"

Honey Pilar is the most desirable woman in the world. Ask anybody. Ask the ancient, wrin-kled imam of the

Shimaal Mosque, and he'll tell you "Honey Filar, no question about it." She has long, pale haii, liquid green eyes, and

the most awe-inspiring body known to anthropological science. Fortunately, she's at-tainable. What she does for a

living is record personality modules of herself during sex play. There are Brigitte Stahlhelm and other stars in the

sex-moddy industry, but none of them come close to delivering the super-light-speed eroticism of Honey Pilar.

A few times, just for variety, I told Yasmin that I wanted to wear one of Honey's moddies. Yasmin would grin and

take over the active role, and I'd lie back and experience what it felt like to be a hungry, furiously re-sponsive woman. If

nothing else, the moddy trade has helped a lot of people get some insight into what makes the eight opposite sexes

tick.After we'd finished jamming, I'd keep Honey's moddy chipped in for a while. Honey's afterglow was just as

phe-nomenal as her orgasms. Without the moddy, I might have rolled over and drifted off to sleep. With it, I curled up

close to Yasmin, closed my eyes, and just bathed in physical and emotional well-being. The only other thing I can

compare it to is a nice shot of morphine. The way the morphine makes you feel after you're done throwing up, I

mean.

That's just how I felt when I opened my eyes. I didn't have any memory of supersonic sex, so I assumed that

somewhere along the line I'd run into a friendly pharma-ceutical or two. My eyelids seemed stuck together, and when I

tried to rub the gunk out of them, my arm wouldn't work. It felt like a phony arm made out of Styro-foam or something,

and it didn't want to do anything but flop around on the sand next to me.

Okay, I thought, I'm going to have to sort all this out in a minute or two. I forgot about my eyes and sunk back into

delicious lethargy. Someday I wanted to meet the guy who invented lethargy, because I now believed he hadn't gotten

enough credit from the world at large. This was exactly how I wanted to spend the rest of my life, and until somebody

came up with a reason why I couldn't, I was just going to lie there in the dark and play with my floppy arm.

I was lying with my back on the earth, and my mind was floating in Heaven somewhere, and the dividing line

seemed to run right through my body. Right through the part that hurt so much. I could feel the ragged pain

thrumming down there, beneath the opiate haze. As soon as I realized what land of agony I'd feel when the drug wore

off, I began to get very afraid. Fortunately, I couldn't keep my mind on it for more than a few seconds, and

then I was grinning and murmuring to myself again.

I suppose I fell asleep, although in that state it was very hard to tell the difference between consciousness and

dreams. I remember trying again to open my eyes, and this time I could move my hand to my chin and kind of walk the

fingers across my lips and nose to my eyelids. I wiped my eyes clean, but I was so tired from that exertion that I

couldn't move my hand back down. I had to rest for a minute or so with my fingers blocking my vision. Finally I tried

to focus on my surroundings.

I couldn't see much. It was still too much trouble to raise my head, so all I could make out was what was di-rectly

in front of me. There was a bright triangle with a narrow base on the ground, rising up to a sharp point a few feet high.

All the rest was blackness. I asked myself if I'd ever been put in mortal danger by a bright triangle. ^The answer was

slow in coming: no. Good, I thought, then I can forget about it. I went back to sleep.

The next time I woke up, things were different. Not pleasantly different. I had a tremendous, throbbing mis-ery in

my head, and my throat felt as if a tiny little man in goggles had crawled down there and sandblasted it. My chest

ached as if I'd inhaled a couple of pounds of mud and then had to cough it all up again. Every joint in my body

shrieked with soreness whenever I made the slight-est movement. My arms and legs were in particular agony, so I

decided never to move them again.

Cataloguing all the discomfort occupied me for a few minutes, but when I got to the end of the list—when I

realized that most of my skin surface was sizzling with pain, proof that I'd been flayed alive by some madman before

he got around to cracking my bones—there were only a few choices: I could lie there and appreciate the totality of my

suffering, I could try cataloguing again to see if I'd missed anything, or I could attempt to make myself feel better.

I opted for number three. I decided to get out my pillcase, even though that act would probably cost me a lot in

terms of further distress. I remembered what my doctors told me in times like this: "Now," they always said, "this might

sting a little." Uh huh.

I gently moved my right hand down across my belly, until it was resting flat beside me. Then I sort of worm-walked

my fingers down my gallebeya toward the pocket where I kept my drugs. I made three rapid observations. The first

was that I wasn't wearing my gallebeya. The second was that I was wearing a long, filthy shirt with no pockets. The

third was that there was no pillcase.

I've been confronted by maniacs whose immediate concern was ending my life on the spot. Even in those most

desperate hours, I never experienced the sheer, cold emptiness I felt now. I wonder what it says about me, that I'd

prefer to risk death than endure pain. I suppose, deep down, I'm not a brave man. I'm probably motivated by a fear that

other people might learn the truth about me.

I almost began to weep when I couldn't find my pill-case. I'd counted on it being there, and on the tabs of Sonneine

inside to take away all this horrible pain, at least for a while. I tried to call out. My lips were as crusted over as my

eyelids had been. It took a little effort even to open my mouth, and then my throat was too hoarse and dry for me to

speak. At last, after much effort, I managed to croak "Help." Uttering the single syllable made the back of my throat

feel as if someone had hacked my neck open with a dull knife. I doubted that anyone could have heard

me. I don't know how much time passed. I grew aware that in addition to my other discomforts, I was also suffer-ing

from great hunger and thirst. The longer I lay there, the more I began to worry that I'd finally gotten myself into

trouble I wouldn't survive. I hadn't yet begun to speculate on where I was or how I'd got there.

I noticed after a while that the bright triangle was getting dimmer. Sometimes I thought the triangle seemed

obscured, as if someone or something was passing in front of it. At last, the triangle almost completely disappeared. I

realized that I missed it very much. It had been the only actual thing in my world besides myself, even though I didn't

really know what it was.

A spot of yellow light appeared in the gloom where the bright triangle had been. I blinked my eyes hard a few

times, trying to make them focus more clearly. I saw that the yellow light was coming from a small oil lamp, in the hand

of a small person swathed almost completely in black. The black-clothed person came toward me through the triangle,

which I now guessed must be the opening of a tent. A truly evil-smelling tent, I realized.

My visitor held the lamp up to let the light fall upon my face. "Yaa Allah!" she murmured when she saw that I

was conscious. Her other hand quickly grasped the edge of her head cloth and pulled it across her face. I had seen

her only briefly, but I knew that she was a solemn, pretty, but very dirty girl, probably in her late teens.

I took as deep a breath as I could with the pain in my chest and lungs, and I croaked out another "Help." She

stood there, blinking down at me for a few moments. Then she knelt, placed the lamp on the level sand beyond my

reach, stood up again, and ran from the tent. I have -that effect on women sometimes.

Now I began to worry. Where exactly was I, and how did I get here? Was I in the hands of friends or enemies? I

knew I must be among desert nomads, but which des-ert? There are quite a number of sand seas throughout the

geographic expanse of the Islamic world. I could be anywhere from the western edge of the Sahara in Mo-rocco to the

fringes of the Gobi in Mongolia. I might have been only a few miles south of the city, for that matter.

While I was turning these thoughts over in my trou-bled mind, the dark-shrouded girl returned. She stood beside

me and asked me questions. I could tell they were questions by the inflections. The trouble was that I could make out

only about one word in ten. She was speaking some rough dialect of Arabic, but she might as well have been

jabbering in Japanese for all I could tell.

I shook my head, once slightly to the left, once to the right. "I hurt," I said in my dead voice.

She just stared at me. It didn't seem that she'd under-stood me. She was still holding her head cloth modestly

across her face, just below her nose, but I thought her expression—that part of it that was visible—was very kind and

concerned. At least, I chose to believe that for the moment.

She tried speaking to me again, but I still couldn't understand what she was saying. I managed to get out "Who are

you?" and she nodded and said "Noora." In Arabic, that means "light," but I guessed it was also her name. From the

moment she'd come into the tent with her lamp, she'd been the only light in my darkness.

The front flap was thrown roughly aside and someone else entered, carrying a leather bag and another lamp. This

was not a large tent, maybe twelve feet in diameter and six feet high, so it was getting kind of crowded. Noora moved

back against the black wall, and the man squatted beside me and studied me for a moment. He had a stern, lean face

dominated by a huge hooked nose. His skin was lined and weathered, and it was difficult for me to guess his age. He

wore a long shirt and he had a keffiya on his head, but it wasn't bound with a black rope akal, merely twisted around

with its ends stuffed in somehow. In the dancing shadows he looked like a murderous savage. Matters weren't made

any better when he asked me a few questions in the same dialect Noora had used. I think one of them had to do with

where I'd come from. All I could do was tell him about the city. He may have then asked me where the city was, but I

couldn't be sure that's what he said.

"I hurt," I croaked.

He nodded and opened his leather bag. I was sur-prised when he pulled out an old-fashioned disposable syringe

and a vial of some fluid. He loaded the needle and jammed it into my hip. I gasped in pain, and he patted my wrist. He

clucked something, and even ignorant of his dialect I could tell it was "There, there."

He stood up and regarded me thoughtfully for a while longer. Then he signaled to Noora and they left me alone. In

a few minutes, the injection had taken effect. My ex-pertise in these matters told me that I'd been given a healthy dose

of Sonneine; the injectable variety was much more effective than the tabs I bought in the Budayeen. I. was tearfully

grateful. If that rough-skinned man had come back into the tent just then, I would have given him anything he asked.

I surrendered myself to the powerful drug and floated, knowing all the while that the relief from pain would soon

end. In the illusory moments of well-being, I tried to do some serious thinking. I knew that something was terribly

wrong, and that as soon as I was better I'd need to set things right again. The Sonneine let me believe that noth-ing

was beyond my power.

My drug-deluded mind told me that I was in a state of grace. Everything was fine. I'd achieved a separate peace

with the world and with every individual in it. I felt as if I had immense stores of physical and intellectual energy to

draw upon. There were problems, yes, but they were emi-nently solvable. The future looked like one golden vista of

victory after another: Heaven on Earth.

It was while I was congratulating myself on my good fortune that the hawk-faced man returned, this time with-out

Noora. I was sort of sad about that. Anyway, the man squatted down beside me, resting his haunches on his heels. I

could never get the hang of sitting like that for very long; I've always been a city boy.

This time when he spoke to me, I could understand him perfectly. "Who are you, O Shaykh?" he asked.

"Ma—" I began. My throat tightened up. I pointed to my lips. The man understood me and passed me a goat-skin

bag filled with brackish water. The bag stunk and the water was the most foul-tasting I'd ever encountered.

"Bismillah," I murmured: in the name of God. Then I drank that horrible water greedily until he put a hand on my arm

and stopped me.

"Marid," I said, answering his question.

He took back the water bag. "I am Hassanein. Your beard is red. I've never seen a red beard before."

"Common," I said, able to speak a little better now that I'd had some water. "In Mauretania."

"Mauretania?" He shook his head.

"Used to be Algeria. In the Maghreb." Again he shook his head. I wondered how far I'd wandered, that I'd met an

Arab who had never heard of the Maghreb, the name given to the western Muslim lands of North Africa.

"What race are you?" Hassanein asked.

I looked at him in surprise. "An Arab," I said.

"No," he said, "I am an Arab. You are something else." He was firm in his statement, although I could tell that it

was made without malice. He was truly curious about me.

Calling myself an Arab was inaccurate, because I am half Berber, half French, or so my mother always told me. In

my adopted city, anyone born in the Muslim world and who spoke the Arabic language was an Arab. Here in

Has-sanein's tent that relaxed definition would not do. "I am Berber," I told him.

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